I think Tim is absolutely right about this:
"We need a serious and big picture statement from Greg Clark or even David Cameron himself on how they plan to reconcile their extraordinarily ambitious targets to cut the UK's carbon emissions with the number one priority of the British voter; a return to job-creating, income-enhancing economic growth."
As well as a speech, I think the Conservatives need to show that they are willing to scrap some of the more ineffective and economically destructive of Labour's environmental policies.
At the moment, a cocktail of policies are in place that pose a huge burden on employers. 21 per cent of the average industrial electricity bill is the result of climate change policies (PDF, 10.5.3). Manufacturing industries, and they still employed 3 million people in the UK at the start of 2008, are competing with one hand tied behind their back.
These policies aren't delivering a major reduction in emissions. Emissions are up 1.6 per cent between 1997 and 2006 as I've discussed in a previous post. Despite massive subsidies under the Renewables Obligation major energy companies are abandoning UK schemes and focussing on the American market. Even Greenpeace have condemned the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation for, among other things, contributing to the destruction of rainforests and have called for the scheme to be scrapped. The EU Emissions Trading Scheme has been such a farce that environmentalists are now calling for prices in that market to be fixed.
If the Conservatives start pledging to scrap some of these dreadful policies then notional commitments to environmental policy that doesn't imperil the prosperity of ordinary Britons will start to become more credible.
