Rishi Sunak gives Net Zero speech: PM waters down key policy goals

Net zero is a globalist ploy I reckon. Conceived by the illuminati and the elites!

There's a point to be made that the big target of no new fossil-fuel cars by 2030 was never going to be deliverable due to a failure to set smaller targets to get the infrastructure in place (charging points, the Grid, precious metals etc).

Personally i don't consider the change to be signficant.

Moreover, it does have polling support. While net zero has 71% support, individual measures like banning gas boilers and combustion engines are basically 40-40 but with 2019 Tory voters being opposed to the tune of 56-68%. The electoral math for the Tories is clear, if they can get back the 2019 vote, they win. Thus despite the whaffle, the logic is there and it won't harm them among the people that matter.

My own personal view is that i would support keeping the target at 2030 but it's not a priority issue.

Focusing on short term supposed populist vote winners/headline grabbers while neglecting the more serious long term problems is what the Conservatives have been doing for a while now.

The polls aren’t budging. Why is this going to win over voters?

It probably won't to be honest but it's at least a plan. There's no one thing they can do to rescue the situation and you can't ask Sunak to simply roll over for the incoming Labour government.

As I highlight above, Sunak needs 2019 Tory voters (a lot are DK and some have switched to Lab) to vote Tory again and whether you agree with the actual policy or not, this is something that polling says they can force a divide with Labour on (though Lab on Peston indicated that they disagree but have no firm policy of their own).

Why isn't anyone asking the big questions here

Who set these Net Zero targets because for the life of me I can find no mention of them within any legitimate published scientific literature to date

Lets say (at enormous cost to the poorest) we reach them and it doesnt work. What then ?

Why isn't anyone asking the big questions here

Who set these Net Zero targets because for the life of me I can find no mention of them within any legitimate published scientific literature to date

Lets say (at enormous cost to the poorest) we reach them and it doesnt work. What then ?

The targets were enshrined into law by Theresa May's government using a statutory instrument. You can find the The Climate Change Act 2008 (2050 Target Amendment) Order 2019 here and more information here.

The fundamental truth is that if we don't manage to prevent further climate change we will be continuing to head down a dark path that could result in the extinction of our species.

I feel the need to point out that we'd need an incredible amount of warmth to kill the species, even the worst case scenarios only really suggest that those in the upper tropics will struggle.

I did mean to write 'many of our species' as I think the figure is something like 15% of all mammals are at risk of extinction if the planet warms by 1.5 degrees Celsius. However, scientists this week have published supercomputer predictions that extreme global warming will wipe out all mammals within the next 250 million years (or possibly much sooner if humans don't stop burning fossils fuels, as the model was based on that being the case).

In any event, there does seem to be a fair amount of sources suggesting that millions of lives could be at risk from the impacts of climate change, e.g. extreme weather events, rising sea levels due to the melting ice caps, wildfires, pollution, food and water scarcity, heat-related illness, increased spread of diseases, etc. Whilst humans are unlikely to go extinct in the near future, it's clear we can't continue in the way we are for long and so climate change is certainly a huge threat to our current way of life (and perhaps rightly so!).

It's good to see others here calling them out, they managed to get rid of the leader who was going to remove their power, bring back Truss

I feel the need to point out that we'd need an incredible amount of warmth to kill the species, even the worst case scenarios only really suggest that those in the upper tropics will struggle.