Starmer Faces Early Test of Climate Leadership With Big Decisions on Carbon Budget

Keir Starmer will face a key test of his claims to leadership on the climate early next year, when the UK's statutory advisers issue their latest advice on future cuts to greenhouse gas emissions.

- Fiona Harvey

The independent Climate Change Committee (CCC) will set out recommendations on the UK's seventh carbon budget on 26 February. At the core of the budget will be an overall cap on emissions for the years 2038 to 2042, needed to meet the legal obligation of reaching net zero emissions in 2050.

While the scope of this budget will fall long outside the current parliament, policies to achieve the recommended cuts will be needed much sooner. By 2035, the UK should already have slashed emissions, relative to 1990 levels, by about 81%, according to the international pledge unveiled by Starmer at the Cop29 UN climate summit in November.

The seventh carbon budget will need to go beyond that: by 2040, emissions should be about a quarter of what they are today.

Ed Matthew, campaigns director at the E3G thinktank, said: "The seventh carbon budget should not be met with fear. It is the opportunity to put the finishing touches to a project to rewire the UK economy, to make it globally competitive and help nature to flourish. The only question is whether our leaders have the courage to stand up to the vested interests standing in our way."

That will require not just the decarbonisation of the power sector, which Labour has made one of its flagship "missions", but also drastic changes in many other sectors of the economy. Fossil-fuelled cars must be switched for electric vehicles, and a revival of public transport will be needed; homes must be insulated, and gas boilers exchanged for heat pumps; big changes will be needed to farming practices; new techniques for industry, and tree-planting and nature programmes will be needed to restore the UK's carbon sinks.