Lurid warnings and distant targets won’t avert climate change. Transport is a key battleground and we desperately need a plan

 
Boris Johnson last week told the assembly of world leaders at the United Nations in New York that COP26 had to be a “turning point for humanity”

 
I don’t know about you, but I’m getting rather tired of high profile individuals issuing dire warnings about the state of the planet, when those same individuals are unwilling or unable to take meaningful actions themselves to address the issue.

Step forward John Kerry, the US special presidential envoy for climate, who has dramatically presented the run-up to the COP26 meeting in Glasgow as a countdown to save the world.

Last week he told the world that “scientists fear we’re reaching irreversible tipping points on ice melt, coral reef destruction and other areas. That should scare the hell out of folks.”

Indeed it should. Yet when Mr Kerry was interviewed on Radio 4’s Today programme earlier this year, he fell at the first fence when asked about the targets, or lack of them, to phase out polluting vehicles on US roads.

Step forward Prince Charles who set off round Europe to give a series of lurid lectures about the dangers of climate change. Rather than use scheduled flights, or even the train, he resorted, as he generally does, to a private jet. His carbon footprint for the trip to hard-to-reach capitals like Berlin and Rome was 52.95 tonnes, five times what the average UK citizen emits in total in a year. But then Prince Charles famously complained about the lack of comfort in the first class cabin on British Airways planes. He should try economy!

And back home, he addressed an audience in Cambridge, pleading with them to save “this poor old planet”. His message was somewhat undermined by the fact that he travelled to the city, which has an excellent train service, by helicopter. He says he uses public transport “where appropriate”, which appears to be almost never.

Step forward prime minister Boris Johnson who last week told the assembly of world leaders at the United Nations in New York that COP26 had to be a “turning point for humanity … It is time for us to listen to the warnings of the scientists and to understand who we are and what we are doing.” When challenged about climate sceptic comments he had made in the past, not least in his columns in The Daily Telegraph, he replied by saying that when the facts change, so does his view. Which is fair enough, except the facts haven’t changed.

As far back as 1989, Ed Davey and I co-wrote a long call for action on climate change and other environmental challenges entitled What Price Our Planet? which contained all the facts Johnson would have needed. Many, even in his own party, like John Gummer, have repeatedly warned of the dangers of climate change and called for action.

As recently as 2015, Johnson told The Telegraph readers that global leaders were “driven by a primitive fear that the present ambient warm weather is somehow caused by humanity; and that fear – as far as I understand the science – is equally without foundation.”

An admission from the prime minister that he was totally wrong, not to mention irresponsible, would not come amiss, though I fear we may wait a very long time for that.

Still, perhaps the fact that world leaders are now at least getting the rhetoric right may optimistically be seen as a precursor to real action. Because it is action we now need, not words.

At this juncture, it is particularly important for the UK to be seen to be delivering on the ground, given our role as host of COP26 which, yes, is indeed a key moment for the world. We need to demonstrate we are putting our own house in order if we want to occupy the moral high ground with any credibility.

The government has set stretching targets – for the end of sales of petrol and diesel vehicles, for reaching net zero – which are among the most ambitious in the world. But again there is a yawning chasm between the rhetoric and the reality.

Johnson’s government is approaching the “turning point for humanity”, just a matter of weeks away, with a £27bn road building programme, a possible new coal mine in the north west, new oil and gas drilling near Shetland and a nod to airport expansion

Johnson’s government is approaching the “turning point for humanity”, just a matter of weeks away, with a £27bn road building programme, a possible new coal mine in the north west, new oil and gas drilling near Shetland and a nod to airport expansion.

Furthermore, an analysis of the budget measures from March this year reveals that far more was spent on measures that will increase greenhouse gas emissions than on measures to tackle climate change.

This analysis by WWF found £40bn of spending that will worsen climate change, offset by just £14.5bn pointing in the opposite direction.

There are some simple steps that the Treasury could take, but has so far failed to do so. This includes ensuring tax breaks to encourage business investment have to meet a net zero test. At the moment, some of those breaks are being used to invest in fossil fuel schemes.

Johnson needs to deal with the huge issue of emissions from buildings and the need to promote a big increase in home insulation. It is not right for protestors to block the M25, but in terms of their asks, they have a point. I hope the government will listen and act, rather than simply passing yet more draconian laws to try to shut them up.

And of course, the Treasury, largely out of cowardice, has for over 10 years now failed to increase fuel duty, while allowing, even requiring, train and bus fares to rise. The entirely predictable consequence has been to encourage modal shift from public transport to private cars, the very opposite of what is needed if climate change is to be seriously tackled now.

For while carbon emissions from the energy sector have fallen impressively since 1990, those from transport have barely been dented. Transport emissions now constitute the largest source of carbon emissions in this country.

My back channel intelligence sources suggest that the concentration from qualified pilot Grant Shapps at COP26 will be on electric cars and jet zero, that is to say electric planes. Public transport and active travel will barely get a look-in.

My back channel intelligence sources suggest that the concentration from qualified pilot Grant Shapps at COP26 will be on electric cars and jet zero, that is to say electric planes. Public transport and active travel will barely get a look-in.

While it would indeed be very helpful to banish petrol, diesel and kerosene entirely as sources of fuel for cars and planes, this is not going to happen any time soon. It will take decades to transform the country’s vehicle fleet. And if people have worries about running out of charge on their car while driving up the motorway – and they do – imagine the worries about running out of battery power halfway across the Atlantic.

The budget and comprehensive spending review due at the end of October gives the chancellor the perfect opportunity to set the tone, to give a moral lead for others to follow.

So what should he do to send the right message on transport?

The central point from where to start from is to announce that he wants to see the price of transport linked to its environmental impact. Radical but entirely logical.

It cannot be right that it is cheaper to fly from London to Glasgow than to take the train, when the train journey emits a mere fraction of the carbon from the equivalent plane trip.

He absolutely must resist the pressure from the likes of Ryanair to cut the already paltry Air Passenger Duty, which is in fact the only tax on air travel. There is no duty at all on kerosene.

He needs to freeze rail fares to encourage people back on to the trains, which is not just the right environmental move, but the right economic and social one too.

The Treasury still seems to have the mindset that it can raise rail fares and people will continue to use the train with no drop off in the passenger numbers. An elementary understanding of the impact of price on consumer behaviour shows this assumption to be obviously shaky. Indeed, all the indications are that the last RPI+1 increase forced on the railway brought in very little extra money, so failing in income generation terms while sending out entirely the wrong signal.

In the past, the Treasury may have banked on a captive commuter market that had no choice but to stump up. But those days are gone, especially with the advent of home working, which another bit of government is actually encouraging and making easier.

Increasingly, rail travel growth will come from leisure trips which are by their very nature optional, and where the car or the plane is available as an alternative.

He must of course raise fuel duty and announce that in principle the government will introduce interurban road pricing as a nudge tool to get people out of cars and onto trains.

Of course he needs to cancel the vast bulk of the obscenity that is the £27bn road building programme

And of course he needs to cancel the vast bulk of the obscenity that is the £27bn road building programme.

So will we see this moral lead, this radical series of actions, this timetable for change? We need to, but don’t hold your breath.

2050 targets are all very well, but what the government urgently needs to do now, and ahead of COP26, is to set out a clear plan with identified steps and a timetable for the actions it will take to get us to net zero.

If it does so, it will enter the Glasgow event with some real credibility and ability to apply real pressure to other countries. If instead we merely have lurid warnings in the abstract and far distant targets, then that is what will come back to us from other countries, like a pointless echo chamber.

 
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Norman Baker served as transport minister from May 2010 until October 2013. He was Lib Dem MP for Lewes between 1997 and 2015.

 
This story appears inside the latest issue of Passenger Transport.

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