On the day when the long heralded UK general election was finally called, I posted up a thread so that people could begin to discuss what I expected to be a series of climate related issues that would emerge as campaigning got under way. That is not to say that I expected AGW to be a major debating point between the parties, but I did expect that it would figure somewhere down the list of concerns that were likely to be of interest to voters. After all it is so often referred to as the greatest challenge of our times, not least by a failing government which has built a vast edifice of policies around that belief.
The reality of the election campaign has been very different. During the four and a half hours of TV debate that have provided the main platform for the party leaders, just one question was aimed at this subject. Although I didn’t time how long the discussion lasted, my impression was that this was less than for any other question during the whole series of debates. It seemed as though the speakers wanted to mouth the necessary platitudes and get-the-hell-out-of-it as quickly as possible. Not even Nick Clegg, whose Lib Dem Party has criticised the present administration for not doing enough to limit carbon emissions, seemed reticent. David Cameron, who will perhaps be our next prime minister, seemed only to have a home insulation scheme to offer, with due lip service to the ideal of more alternative energy, but no specifics. Gordon Brown effortlessly morphed the subject into the realms of economic recovery by claiming that 400,000 new jobs can be created in green technology.
And then everyone heaved a sigh of relief and moved on. In the final debate, which focused on our nations economic woes, the subject was touched on again, but only in the context of more vacuous hopes of deliverance from fiscal meltdown. No one, of course, was prepared to ask whether vastly increasing the cost of energy would be a smart contribution to rebuilding our shattered economy.
I have said more than once on this blog that I did not think that, in the aftermath of Climategate, Copenhagen and the IPCC scandals, political consensus and a headlong commitment to the crusade against climate change could survive a general election campaign in this country. In the light of this subject’s relegation to the outer fringes of the hustings it would seem that I was wrong about that; or was I?
Not only has climate change been a non-event so far as the campaign is concerned, but recently, for the first time in years, it seems to have virtually disappeared from the media too.
I am certainly not going to try to anticipate the outcome of this general election, but there is one thing that is quite certain. By the end of this week, the radical change in the political landscape that so many commentators have identified ever since Nick Clegg’s spectacular – if possibly transient – emergence as a major force on the current British political scene as a result of the first TV debate, is likely to be a reality. The electorate will have spoken, and their message is likely to rock the two major parties to their foundations.
There now seems to be a consensus that the astonishing increase in support for the Lib Dems has little to do with their policies, which the vast majority of the voters know little about, or actively dislike. Their appeal lies in a far more nebulous message of dissatisfaction addressed to Labour and The Conservatives, together with Clegg’s cheerful, relaxed and confident performance on TV. It might not have made much difference if he had recited a laundry list rather than spoken about politics. For those who are fed up with the tedium of two centrist parties he at least seemed to offer a credible alternative.
In spite of the usual bombastic rhetoric of campaigning, there is a large measure of apparent consensus between the two main parties; on the war in Afghanistan, the need to restore the tarnished reputation of politics, protection and enhancement of the welfare state, membership of the EU, and much else, including, of course, climate change . Neither party seems willing to risk stirring far from the now hallowed centre ground of politics. This, inevitably, requires universal compromise between what the politicians actually think and what they are prepared to say to the electors, a situation that can only lead to near universal disenchantment and distrust among the electorate at a time of economic crisis.
Voters are looking for convictions and for certainties, and Nick Clegg’s spectacular TV performances would seem to offer this, even if many of those who have hitched themselves to his bandwagon are not very sure what he is convinced about.
By Friday morning, we will know how the vote has gone, but that is likely to be only the start of the process of deciding who will have the opportunity to govern for the next five years. The possibilities at the moment seem to be: a very fragile Conservative majority, an attempt by David Cameron to form a government without an outright majority, or a coalition where the Lib Dems will have the opportunity of calling at least some of the shots. Whichever it may be, the spectre of another election, and probably soon, will stalk the corridors of Westminster. It is likely that even now there are some back-room policy wonks, who are not directly involved in the maelstrom of this campaign, turning their attention to that eventuality.
The fact that AGW has been a non-issue in the present campaign will necessarily be a factor in formulating new policies and new priorities that may win the ultimate prize; the keys to Number 10 Downing Street on a secure long-term basis. Perhaps the absence of climate change from the list of must-do subjects on the election trail will have an even greater effect on politician’s thinking about this most vexatious subject than if it had played a signifiant part in the campaign.
If politicians have learned anything form the Blair years – another politician who owed his meteoric rise to sounding convincing on television – then it is probably that holding on to power depends on starting to plan for he next electoral victory the day after an election is won. From Friday onwards the politicians and their teams who have been totally dedicated to the minutiae of the race to victory during the previous month, will begin to assess what interested and motivated the voters and what did not. The priorities of the new administration, whatever form it takes, will flow from this process.
Instead of the supposed dangers posed by climate change being dragged out into the open during the election campaign, and debated out of existence, it seems to have been relegated to a non-issue, so far as the public are concerned at least. For politicians it is likely to be an area of policy so toxic that, in whatever administration we get, the tendency may now be to shy away from it. In the UK at least, it would seem that there likely to be very few votes, and a lot of risks, in climate change politics.
Perhaps I was not so wrong about AGW hysteria being unable to survive this general election after all.
Tony a very perceptive post; and you are correct, the public are not interested in Global Warming/Climate Change at all. For Labour it’s a way of raising taxes, for Cameron it’s been a way of demonstrating he has modernised the Tories, and for Clegg it’s a way of showing the other parties are not doing enough.
The frightening thing is these leaders have demonstrated such an intellectual void on the subject that one has to wonder how much though they put into any other subject. They still don’t get what the expenses row was all about. Their inability to represent their constituents is breathtaking, and I wish it was Thursday because it’s going to be entertaining in a perverse sort of way.
As I have indicated on other posts the state of our finances is going to dominate proceedings for the next 2 or 3 years if not more. Any hope of lowering unemployment will rest on creating new jobs and this will need lower costs to business. Manufacturers in particular are going to need lower energy costs, and any hope that we will increase our manufacturing base will rest on this.
The climate change levy will have to be brought into sharp focus and the climate change bill should be repealed. Even if we do a good job of sorting our finances, the fairy tail that was the Euro is about to take an unscripted turn and I don’t think our biggest market is going to have a smooth ride.
I think more and more as our world fails to warm we will turn our attention to the actual areas of waste that have occurred due to our obsession with AGW. At some point there will have to be a mechanism where we can directly challenge our politicians to justify for example wind turbines, when they produce no power. In no other field of commerce could an organisation receive bucket loads of public money and not have to guarantee a return to the public.
The scientific argument for AGW is well and truly lost. The models are appallingly inaccurate, the temperature record is a nonsense, and our understanding of the atmosphere has shown to be absent in all but a few minor areas.
None of the so called technologies that are going to save the planet have worked commercially.
Wind Turbines inefficient and hugely costly
Carbon Capture not yet shown to work at all on an industrial scale and question makes are being raised over some of the side effects of the capture process.
Solar Cells Very costly and don’t work well on an industrial scale. Also the cells “wear out” before payback in a consumer environment.
Fuel Cells. This technology works well except we can not produce the fuel at an energy balance that gives a return or makes any sense. And perversely none of the above save CO2 emissions. Some such as bio fuel make them worse although this is only just being admitted.
I could go on, but the bottom line is we don’t have the technology for our carbon free utopia. This is the new battleground.
Tony I won’t go into all the reasons here, too far OT, but I think we should expect a second election if the parliament is hung. The Lib Dems I don’t think are prepared for the level of compromise they will need to share power. And all of their big policies will cost money at a time when the prudent thing to do will be to save it. Time will tell as they say.
No, Tony, I cannot agree that “the fact that AGW has been a non-issue in the present campaign will necessarily be a factor in formulating new policies and new priorities”. You might as well say that the fact that the related matter of the energy gap (amazingly another non-issue) will not be a factor in formulating new policies – surely an absurd proposition. Or, far more telling, the fact that the wholly dire nature of the woeful economic disaster we are facing – with debts of hundreds of billions – has (even more amazingly) been another non-issue. OK, it’s been mentioned but mainly so that politicians can tell us what they’re not going to cut. Had this been an adult election (as demanded by the estimable Mrs Duffy), it would have dominated everything. Yet it most certainly will be a factor, probably the factor, in formulating new policies and priorities.
Maybe AGW is no longer an issue. I suspect that’s true. But it’s absence as an issue in the election campaign is not evidence of that.
Robin and TonyN
While I am certainly no expert on the UK election, I can guess that those issues that promise a large increase in (direct or indirect) tax revenues will always be of great interest to politicians, who directly benefit (in discretionary spending of tax-payer funds and power) from these revenues.
So, although AGW is the direct opposite of a “sexy” issue for attracting voters today, it will certainly bob up again once the election is over.
And Robin is right when he writes:
My humble assessment:
Brown acts and looks like a loser. His arrogance has cost him votes. Barring a miracle, he is history.
Clegg never really had a chance, despite his debating skills (plus he blew it with his latest gaffe).
Cameron is not “sexy” but the least of three evils, and will probably win (unless he does something astoundingly stupid the next day or two).
Once he is in office he will have a chance to show where he stands on carbon cuts and taxes, etc., which may very well determine his longer-term chances for survival.
I do not believe polls show that UK citizens are prepared to support the misguided AGW policies of the outgoing government.
Just my opinion (from across the Channel).
Max
Peter G:
I’m sure that you are right and that future energy policy — and prices — will lead to a re-assessment of climate/energy policy, including the Climate Change Act. Keynes identified competitiveness and productivity as the key to emerging from recession. Greatly increasing the price of energy is not going to do a lot for our competitiveness, and so far alternatives are concerned, what is productive about industries that rely on government subsidies for their very existence?
Given the choice between building a sound economy and keeping the lights on, and saving the planet from a threat that is looking ever more implausible to the general public, what is any government, other than the present one, likely to do?
Robin:
The point that I was making, or trying to make, is that CAGW mitigation seems not to be a vote winner or, at the moment, a vote looser.
The same cannot be said, I think, of a rational energy policy from now on, given the very real and immediate impact getting that wrong will have on the electorate. And as I suggested in the comment above, the two are not only inextricably linked, but in many ways they are incompatible.