Labour vows to be ‘laser-focused’ on net zero despite £28bn U-turn

Ed Miliband has insisted a Labour government will be “laser-focused” on decarbonising the UK’s electricity system by 2030, in his first major speech since the party dropped its £28bn a year green investment pledge.

Labour’s energy security and net zero secretary, speaking on Tuesday at the International Energy Week conference in London, said his party would also remove a de facto “ban” on new onshore wind farms in England that has been in place since 2015. 

The comments come after Sir Keir Starmer, Labour leader, dropped his pledge to spend £28bn annually on green infrastructure, raised almost entirely from borrowing, if the party wins the general election expected this year.

As energy secretary Miliband said he would seek to accelerate planning decisions for energy schemes and “ensure net zero is at the heart of all relevant regulators’ duties” to help reach the ambitious 2030 target.

Starmer announced the U-turn this month after a drawn out period of internal arguments over whether the pledge, made in 2021 when borrowing rates were close to zero, was still affordable at a time of higher interest rates. 

The £28bn figure — part of Labour’s “green prosperity plan” — has been slashed to under £5bn a year of spending on green projects. Half is expected to come from borrowing and half from an extended North Sea oil and gas windfall tax. 

Labour has been widely ridiculed for lengthy prevarication on its single biggest spending pledge. 

But shadow ministers hope to convince voters concerned about climate change that Labour has green policies that distinguish it from the ruling Conservatives.

Jonathan Reynolds, shadow business secretary, told the Make UK industrial conference in London on Tuesday that Labour would “boost manufacturing in Britain’s industrial heartlands” through the revised green plan.

The plan includes a £7.3bn “national wealth fund” to support various industries, such as steel and automotives, as they transition to greener sources. 

Labour also intends to spend £8.3bn to set up GB Energy, a state-owned energy company that will work with private partners on energy projects. Proposed investment in a home insulation programme has been cut from £6bn a year to £1bn annually.

“Our plan for manufacturing will bolster our industrial heartlands, be that clean steel in Wales, a renewable ready port in the Humber, a gigafactory in the West Midlands or carbon capture and storage in north-east Scotland,” Reynolds said.