LONDON (AP) – Environmentalists warned Britain’s main political parties on Sunday not to scale back their pledges on climate change after a special election result widely seen as a voter rejection of a tax on polluting cars.
The ruling Conservatives suffered two big defeats in a trio of by-elections for House of Commons seats on Thursday. But they managed to win the third contest, for a suburban London borough, by focusing on a divisive green tax imposed by London’s Labor mayor.
The Ultra Low Emissions Zone, or ULEZ, charges drivers of older gas and diesel vehicles £12.50 ($16) a day to get around the city. The charge was announced by then-Mayor Boris Johnson, a Conservative, in 2015 and came into effect in central London in 2019. Mayor Sadiq Khan plans to extend it next month to the city’s less densely populated suburbs, where more people rely on cars to get around.
Labor leader Keir Starmer said the mayor should “reflect” on the policy following the loss of the Uxbridge and South Ruislip constituency.
“I don’t think there’s any doubt that ULEZ was the reason we lost the election in Uxbridge,” he said.
But naturalist Chris Packham said Labor should not abandon green policies to make electoral gains.
“Do you want to protect humanity and the rest of life on Earth, or is it just about getting into office? They have to stick to their guns here,” he told Times Radio.
The mayor argues that the policy has already reduced air pollution in central London and will only affect one in 10 cars in areas such as Uxbridge.
UK greenhouse gas emissions have fallen by 46% from 1990 levels, mainly due to the almost complete phase-out of coal from electricity generation. The government had pledged to cut emissions by 68% from 1990 levels by 2030, ban the sale of new petrol and diesel cars by the same year and achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
But with just seven years to go before the first pole, the government’s climate advisers said last month that the pace of action is “worryingly slow”.
Some in the ruling Conservative Party want to slow down even more. A group of conservative right-wing lawmakers, the Net Zero Scrutiny Group, said the date to ban new gasoline vehicles should be moved to 2035 or later.
Conservative lawmaker Jacob Rees-Mogg said “getting rid of unpopular and expensive green policies” would be a vote-winner for the party, which is trailing Labor in opinion polls. National elections are scheduled for late 2024.
Housing Secretary Michael Gove told the Sunday Telegraph that a move forcing landlords to improve the energy efficiency of rental accommodation was “asking too much, too fast” and should be delayed for several years.
Other senior Conservatives urged the government to stick to its guns. Lawmaker Chris Skidmore, the government’s net zero watchdog, said it would be an “abdication of responsible government” if ministers “played politics” with environmental policies.
Alok Sharma, a former Conservative government minister who served as chair of the UN’s COP26 climate summit in 2021, tweeted: “Given the economic, environmental and electoral case for climate action, any political party would attempt to break political consensus on this vital agenda.”
