Prime Minister Andy Burnham told the COP31 climate summit in Turkey that the consensus on both science and climate change has "gone," but that the United Kingdom was ready to begin a "new era of British leadership" on the issue, the BBC reported. Environmental campaigners at the summit said he had to back those words with stronger actions. In recent months his government has announced policies that critics say have weakened its green credentials, including reduced support for heat pumps, approval of the Jackdaw gas field, and continued backing for Heathrow Airport's expansion.
Burnham opened his Thursday speech by talking about the heat the UK experienced this past summer, which he said "was not normal." It was the hottest on record and was made 130 times more likely by climate change, according to the Met Office. Hundreds of schools were closed, cereal harvests were down 11%, and ambulance services were inundated beyond levels seen during the Covid-19 pandemic. In response, he said he was creating the UK's, and the world's, first climate security envoy, Dame Madeleine Alessandri, the former head of the Joint Intelligence Committee. "Climate change and nature loss are increasingly shaping the security environment in which the UK operates," she said, "placing additional pressure on resources, economies and communities around the world." That focus will be watched as the UK prepares to take up the G20 presidency next year. The current president is the United States, which has been absent from the COP process for two years since President Trump withdrew from the Paris Agreement.
Professor Lord Nicholas Stern, who two decades ago warned that unchecked climate change could cost the global economy up to 20% of GDP, praised the speech. "The Prime Minister was right to identify climate change as a threat to security around the world, and the importance of investments in clean electricity generation as the best way of protecting households and businesses from the high prices and volatile markets for fossil fuels," he said. Burnham said his government remained committed to net zero by 2050 and to getting bills down, by cutting dependence on fossil fuels and increasing electrification. Turkey, a co-host of COP31, wants countries to commit to meeting 35% of their energy supply from electricity by 2035, up from around a fifth today.
Critics accused him of double standards. "The Prime Minister simply cannot call for clean power across the world while saying yes to more fossil fuels in the UK," said Beth John, a climate adviser at Oxfam. Last month the government approved the Jackdaw gas field in the North Sea on energy-security grounds, and Chancellor John Healey announced a funding cut to the Warm Homes Plan, which supports heat-pump installation. There has also been speculation that electric-car sales targets could be watered down, though the government says no decision has been made. King Charles III, who did not attend, sent a message saying future generations "will not judge us by the promises we made, but by what we chose to do." Burnham was the only G7 leader to speak at this year's conference, a sign of faltering support for the COP process that he himself acknowledged. The verified news is the speech, the new envoy, and the contrast with recent domestic energy decisions.