Rishi Sunak confirms he’s delaying ban on new petrol and diesel cars and boosts boiler upgrade scheme
Rishi Sunak has confirmed he will be easing a series of green policies under a “new approach” designed to protect “hard-pressed British families” from “unacceptable costs”.
Delivering a speech from Downing Street, he said he is still committed to reaching net zero by 2050, but the transition can be done in a “fairer and better way”.
Announcing a raft of U-turns, the prime minister confirmed he will delay a ban on the sale of new diesel and petrol cars by five years and a weakening of targets to phase out gas boilers.
He also said a “worrying set of proposals” that had emerged during debates on net zero would be scrapped, including:
- For government to interfere in how many passengers you can have in your car
- To force you to have seven different bins in your home
- To make you change your diet and harm British farmers by taxing meat
- To create new taxes to discourage flying or going on holiday
“Our destiny can be of our own choosing,” Mr Sunak said – while calling for politicians to be “honest” about the costs of green policies on families.
Politics live: Rishi Sunak gives speech from Downing Street
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‘No rights to impose costs on people’
The measures have faced criticism from across the political spectrum as well as from businesses, environmental groups and even former US vice president Al Gore.
Labour accused the prime minister of “dancing to the tune” of net zero-sceptic Tories and said the plans would actually add more costs to households while damaging investor confidence.
Explaining the government’s decision to delay the ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars – currently due in 2030 – by five years, Mr Sunak said this would give businesses “more time to prepare”.
He also said people would still be allowed to buy secondhand diesel and petrol cars after that date and this would align the UK’s approach with countries across Europe, Canada and many US states.
In weakening the plan to phase out gas boilers from 2035, Mr Sunak said households would “never” be forced to “rip-out their existing boiler and replace it with a heat pump”.
This will only be required when people are due to change their boiler anyway and there will be an exception for households for whom that will be the hardest.
Mr Sunak also announced an increase to the boiler upgrade scheme, saying rather than banning boilers “before people can afford the alternative” the government is going to “support them to make the switch” to heat pumps.
He said: “The boiler upgrade scheme which gives people cash grants to upgrade their boiler will be increased by 50% to seven and a half thousand pounds.
“There are no strings attached. The money will never need to be repaid.”
Landlord efficiency targets scrapped
Mr Sunak has also scrapped plans to force landlords to upgrade the energy efficiency of their properties, saying some property owners would have been forced to “make expensive upgrades” within two years and that would inevitably impact renters.
“You could be looking at a bill of £8,000, and even if you’re only renting, you’re more than likely to see some of that passed on in higher rents,” he said.
“That’s just wrong, so those plans will be scrapped.”
Despite the “new approach”, the prime minister insisted the UK would meet its international obligations on climate change – such as those made under the Paris Climate Accords.
He went on to defend the UK’s record, arguing the country is “so far ahead” of other countries in the world when it comes to cutting greenhouse gas emissions.
PM wants to portray himself as a leader prepared to take unpopular decisions his predecessors weren’t
For all the rhetoric about democracy and real political change – today’s speech was fundamentally about the Prime Minister giving into the concerns of many in his party about the costs of the green policies set out by Boris Johnson’s government.
Labour see these announcements as projecting fundamental political weakness: 20 points behind in the polls and struggling to meet the majority of his five pledges, Rishi Sunak urgently needs to find a way to connect with voters struggling during the cost of living crisis. He’s keen to win over the right wing Tory backbenchers concerned about the electoral danger of expensive environmental policies like the ULEZ expansion which was widely seen to have cost Labour the Uxbridge by election.
It’s an impression underlined by the hurried way the announcement was made – less than 24 hours after these controversial change in tack was leaked to the media, prompting a huge backlash from business and many in his own party. Making such a key speech in the Downing Street media briefing room – rather than to Parliament, also looks chaotic.
It’s sent the Speaker into a fury, earning a humiliating rebuke. “Ministers are answerable to MPs – we do not have a presidential system here,” Sir Lindsey Hoyle thundered. For a man like Mr Sunak, who prides himself on being a sensible pragmatist – the complete opposite to the cavalier Boris Johnson – it’s surely a criticism that will sting, though it’s hardly unexpected.
The irony is that Rishi Sunak opened his speech by pledging to put the long term interests of the country before the short term political needs of the moment. Climate campaigners, for whom nothing could be more urgent, will surely scoff at this.
But in the framing of his speech – as the first of a series of long term policy decisions in a ‘new kind of politics’ – the Prime Minister and his team are keen to burnish his reputation as a pragmatic reformer, prepared to take the kind of unpopular decisions his predecessors weren’t. Certainly many in his party have been calling for a change in approach, a new bolder strategy to set out a greater distance with Labour – and it seems he has been listening.
The PM’s key arguments – that government shouldn’t impose unnecessary or heavy handed costs on hard working people, and relying on the market to drive change – are a return to classic Conservatism.
But his core argument that the need for action is less urgent than we have previously been led to believe, because of the UK’s success in meeting existing climate targets – is not one which will sit easily with green minded MPs.
And while he spent a key part of the speech concentrating on the importance of green technological innovation, and celebrating the power of the market in delivering progress – that will surely stick in the throat of companies who’ve spent billions getting ready to meet targets which have now been delayed. Many in his own party are concerned about the reputational damage to the UK as a centre of business investment.
He’s well aware that today’s message will be deeply unpopular with some – but promised to ‘meet any resistance’. Many Tory MPs will welcome that more bullish approach; but his promise to deliver ‘pragmatism and not ideology’ is pure Sunak.
The question now is in the hands of voters – do they buy into this argument that the country can reach Net Zero by 2050 without many of the policies designed to get there? Or in the midst of the cost of living crisis – will they be delighted to avoid the cost of paying for them?
‘Act of weakness’
Among the critics, Ed Miliband, Labour’s Shadow Energy Security and Net Zero Secretary, said: “Today is an act of weakness from a desperate, directionless prime minister, dancing to the tune of a small minority of his party. Liz Truss crashed the economy and Rishi Sunak is trashing our economic future.
“Having delivered the worst cost of living crisis in generations, the prime minister today loads more costs onto the British people.”
Lib Dem leader Ed Davey said: “This is a prime minister who simply doesn’t understand and cannot grasp for Britain the opportunities for jobs and our economy of driving forward with action on clean energy.”
There was also criticism from the car industry and energy industry.
Chis Norbury, the chief executive of the E.ON energy firm, said it was a “false argument” that green policies can only come at a cost, arguing they deliver affordable energy while boosting jobs.
He said companies wanting to invest in the UK need “long-term certainty” while communities now risk being condemned to “many more years of living in cold and draughty homes that are expensive to heat”.
Ford cars UK chairwoman Lisa Brankin said: “Our business needs three things from the UK Government: ambition, commitment and consistency. A relaxation of 2030 would undermine all three.”
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Rishi Sunak is asked if his net zero policy climbdowns are a result of him panicking about the next election.
Tory MPs split
The announcement comes after last night’s leak of the plans sparked a major Tory backlash and even a threat of a no confidence letter.
Mr Sunak was due to give the speech later this week but brought it forward following a hastily arranged cabinet meeting this morning.
Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle reacted furiously to the announcement not being made to MPs, who are on recess for conferences, expressing his views “in the strongest terms” in a letter to Mr Sunak.
Tory MPs are split, with some seeing the row back on costly green policies as a vote winner and others fearing the impact it will have on business and the climate.
Senior figures who have backed the prime minister include his predecessor Liz Truss, who said: “I welcome the delay on banning the sale of new petrol and diesel cars as well as the delay on the ban on oil and gas boilers. This is particularly important for rural areas.”
Read more:
Braverman: ‘Bankrupting Britons won’t save planet’
Sunak’s messaging suggests net zero is negotiable
What could be scrapped from net zero pledges?
However Boris Johnson, who Ms Truss briefly took over from, said the row back would cause uncertainty for businesses, adding: “We cannot afford to falter now or in any way lose our ambition for this country.”
Mr Johnson’s ally and prominent Tory environmentalist Lord Zac Goldsmith went as far as to demand a general election over the “economically and ecologically illiterate decision”.
The UK’s commitment to reach net zero by 2050 was written into law in 2019.
Climate scientists say urgent cuts are needed to the world’s greenhouse gas emissions if we are to stop temperatures rising to a potentially catastrophic extent.
In the summer, scientists warned extreme heat events were rapidly on the rise due to climate change.
Warning: this article contains references to suicide.
The case for: I want a good death under the oak tree in my garden
Clare Turner, 59, Devon
I want a good death underneath the oak tree in my garden, with my daughters playing guitar and people chatting in the background. I want to look up at the tree, see birds and insects and feel part of nature.
I live on a farm in Devon where right now the sunflowers are blackened by winter, drooping over in a field where birds feast on their oily seeds. Next year’s vegetables sleep in the soil below – everything that lives ends up dying.
Clare would like to die under the oak tree in her garden
Finding out I have stage four cancer was a shock but I have found acceptance. I hope my energy, my “Clare-ness”, will be released into the natural world to mingle with all those who have gone ahead of me, and all the living things which came before.
When I first told my daughters about my illness, Chloe, my eldest, was terrified about the type of death I would have. She works in a hospital and really wants people to have assisted dying as an option. My other daughter Izzy is fully supportive of that too.
I’ve done a straw poll of friends. One is absolutely against it because of his religious beliefs but others are overwhelmingly in favour of assisted dying.
Clare with her daughters Izzy and Chloe
My grandfather, Arthur Turner, was a campaigner who at the end of his life battled for safe, affordable housing. I don’t have the energy to fight due to my cancer, but I wanted to speak out now because it means a lot to me.
It is extraordinary to me that under our current laws, if we allowed one of the animals on this farm to suffer, a farmer would be prosecuted.
But assisted dying isn’t just about avoiding suffering. I used to be a counsellor working with adolescents around bereavement. There is a difference between the normal, natural process of death and situations where people become traumatised by the manner of it. That affects the brain in a different way.
Clare Turner has stage four cancer
My oncologist told me that without chemotherapy I have months to live. I’m just hanging on for my daughter to get through university but I’ve got no intention of eking out every single second. If the law doesn’t change, I plan to take my own life.
I wouldn’t want to get anyone in trouble, so I would choose to have a lonely death. I don’t think I deserve that. I’d be at home, but the idea of being surrounded by my loved ones and nature and then contrasting that to aloneness… I find that sad.
Philip’s religion informs his stance against assisted dying
The case against: ‘Death isn’t like a video game where you pop back up’
Philip, Midlands.
I want to live until God wants me to die. He will sort that out, not me. I have no idea how it’s going to happen and I don’t want to know.
This world is temporary, and I have a better one coming. I have pancreatic cancer which not only affects my pancreas, but also my lungs. When we were told I had less than six months to live, my wife Pauline couldn’t stop crying. Sitting in the hospital we sung praises to God. It’s now five months, and I’m grateful for this time.
I don’t think people realise death is a one-way journey. It’s not like games that kids have on their consoles where you get killed then pop back up again.
These days, it seems like people are talking more openly about suicide, which because of my beliefs I see as a sin. Thirty-five years ago, one of my neighbours had lymphoma cancer and was given six months to live. He’s now 67 – imagine if he had taken his own life back then.
Philip’s mother died of cancer when he was young
When I was 15, my mother suffered a slow and painful death from breast cancer. I would sit by her bed and pretend to wipe rats off her chest because she thought they were gnawing at her breasts. Two days before she died she prayed, “God, I want you to either heal me or take me”. She died naturally, with dignity.
Medical science has moved on since then. There is no reason why somebody with cancer should die in excruciating pain. Doctors can manage the pain, but the bigger problem is the lack of services in end of life or palliative care. I’ve paid taxes all my life so I see no reason why that care shouldn’t be available for me.
We all feel for those who want assisted dying but if you allow the law to be changed for just a few people, in a short time it becomes wider to include others.
Philip doesn’t want to know when he will die
We can see this in Canada and the Netherlands, where it started off with just people who were terminally ill and now there’s talk of allowing it for people with mental illness, children and even the homeless.
So you start to have a society where life’s value is lessened, where the state gets to decide who has had enough. That is horrendous. It’s not the sort of society I want to live in, or leave behind.
Anyone feeling emotionally distressed or suicidal can call Samaritans for help on 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org in the UK. In the US, call the Samaritans branch in your area or 1 (800) 273-TALK
UK
David Cameron comes out in support of assisted dying bill after previously voting against in 2015
David Cameron has become the first former prime minister to come out in support of the assisted dying bill.
The former Tory leader has written a piece in The Times explaining his decision, and saying that in the past he opposed moves to introduce measures allowing terminally ill people to end their own life.
Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton wrote: “My main concern and reason for not supporting proposals before now has always been the worry that vulnerable people could be pressured into hastening their own deaths.”
However, he says he has now been reassured by those arguing in favour of the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill.
Labour MP Kim Leadbeater will put the bill forward for a vote in the House of Commons on Friday.
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MP has ‘no doubts’ about assisted dying bill
“As campaigners have convincingly argued, this proposal is not about ending life, it is about shortening death,” Lord Cameron wrote in The Times.
His intervention comes after Gordon Brown, Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Liz Truss all came out in opposition to the bill.
None of Sir John Major, Sir Tony Blair or Rishi Sunak have made their positions public.
Gordon Brown. File pic: PA
In his article, Lord Cameron says he asked four questions before reaching his conclusion – whether there are sufficient safeguards to protect vulnerable people, whether this is a “slippery slope”, whether it would put unnecessary pressure on the NHS and will the proposed law lead to a meaningful reduction in human suffering?
On the first point, Lord Cameron says protections like two doctors needing to give approval as well as a judge, alongside the requirement of self-administration of the fatal drugs, are enough.
He also highlights the criminalisation of coercing someone to end their own life.
On whether the bill is a “slippery slope” – as Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood claimed – he says such an argument can be made for any social change.
The former prime minister writes that the bill is in “a sensible and practical resting place for public policy in this area”, and is explicitly only for the terminally ill, rather than those with mental illnesses and disabilities.
Read more:
What is in the assisted dying legislation?
Lawyer says Canada’s assisted dying has gone too far
The most senior Conservative to back the bill
Former prime ministers David Cameron and Gordon Brown both lost a child in tragic circumstances. But they’ve now come to a different conclusion about assisted dying.
Lord Cameron lost son Ivan, aged six, who was severely disabled and suffered from epilepsy and cerebral palsy, in February 2009. Mr Brown, the then prime minister, cancelled PMQs out of respect.
When assisted dying was last debated in the Commons in 2015 – when he was prime minister – Mr Cameron voted against it. But now, in a major and potentially influential intervention, he’s changed his mind.
“When we know that there’s no cure, when we know death is imminent, when patients enter a final and acute period of agony, then surely, if they can prevent it and – crucially – want to prevent it, we should let them make that choice,” Lord Cameron writes in The Times.
But the former premier is in a minority of Conservatives who back the bill and most senior Tory MPs, including Kemi Badenoch, Priti Patel and former leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith, are opposed.
Lord Cameron is also the first of all the UK’s living former prime ministers to back Kim Leadbeater’s controversial bill, which is being debated in the Commons on Friday.
This week three former Conservative PMs – Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Liz Truss – let it be known that they oppose the bill. Baroness May, like Lord Cameron, will have a vote if the bill reaches the Lords.
Mr Brown’s daughter Jennifer, born seven weeks prematurely weighing 2lb 4oz, died after just 11 days in January 2002 following a brain haemorrhage on day four of her short life.
A son of the manse who was strongly influenced by his father, a Church of Scotland minister, Mr Brown says the tragedy convinced him of the value and imperative of good end-of-life care, not the case for assisted dying.
On whether it put undue pressure on the NHS, Lord Cameron dismisses the argument.
“It’s not just that the bill would be applicable in only a very small number of cases, it is that the NHS exists to serve patients and the public, not the other way around,” he writes.
On the fourth point – whether it will reduce human suffering – the former prime minister says: “I find it very hard to argue that the answer to this question is anything other than ‘yes’.”
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Lord Cameron adds that, as a member of the House of Lords, he gets letters from terminally ill patients and that poses questions.
He wrote: “When we know that there’s no cure, when we know death is imminent, when patients enter a final and acute period of agony, then surely, if they can prevent it and – crucially – want to prevent it, we should let them make that choice.
“It’s right that MPs are having a free vote on this issue – and our tradition of free votes on such moral issues should be maintained.
“The fact it is a free vote gives legislators the chance to think afresh and, if the evidence convinces them, to change their mind. That’s what I have done. And, if this bill makes it to the House of Lords, I will be voting for it.”
UK
Mohamed al Fayed: Police investigating ‘more than five’ people who may have ‘enabled’ alleged abuse of women and girls
Detectives have launched a new investigation into more than five people suspected of helping Mohamed al Fayed commit widespread sexual abuse over almost 40 years.
The fresh allegations against the former Harrods and Fulham FC boss, including rape and sexual assault, span the years between 1977 and 2014, with the youngest victim aged just 13 at the time she was allegedly targeted.
The Metropolitan Police were previously contacted by 21 women, who made similar allegations about incidents between 2005 and 2023, but the billionaire businessman was never charged before his death aged 94 last August.
Some 150 people have since contacted the force, 90 of whom have been identified as potential victims, and officers are now looking at Fayed’s associates who are suspected of facilitating or enabling abuse.
More than five people are under investigation so far, the force said, although no arrests have yet been made.
Pic: Dave Cheskin/PA
Commander Stephen Clayman said: “I recognise the bravery of every victim-survivor who has come forward to share their experiences, often after years of silence.
“This investigation is about giving survivors a voice, despite the fact that Mohamed al Fayed is no longer alive to face prosecution.
“However, we are now pursuing any individuals suspected to have been complicit in his offending, and we are committed to seeking justice.”
In response to the new probes into associates of Fayed, Harrods said in a statement: “We are aware of and wholeheartedly support the Met police’s investigation. We have an open, direct and ongoing line of communication with the Met police for the benefit of the survivors.
“We continue to encourage all survivors to engage with the Met police and we welcome the investigation in supporting survivors in their wider pursuit of justice.”
The famous Harrods department store in Knightsbridge, London. File pic: PA
Detectives are also reviewing the Met’s previous investigations, including 50,000 pages of evidence, to identify any missed chances or misconduct.
The force said previous investigations were “extensive and conducted by specialist teams” but accepts “contact with and support for some victims at the time could have been improved”.
Two files – the first in 2008 and the second in 2015 – were passed to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) for a charging decision, but the CPS has said no charges were brought because there wasn’t a realistic prospect of conviction.
The Met already referred two cases to the police watchdog the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) after receiving complaints from two women about investigations in 2008 and 2013.
Commander Clayman said: “We are aware that past events may have impacted the public’s trust and confidence in our approach, and we are determined to rebuild that trust by addressing these allegations with integrity and thoroughness.
“We encourage anyone who has information or was affected by Fayed’s actions to reach out to us. Your voice matters, and we are here to listen and to help.”
Hundreds of women – many of whom worked for Fayed – have contacted lawyers alleging abuse following a BBC documentary about his behaviour.
Harrods has previously said it is “utterly appalled” by the claims and said it is a “very different organisation to the one owned and controlled by Fayed between 1985 and 2010”.
Fulham previously said they were trying to establish whether anyone at the club had been affected, and were encouraging people to come forward to the club’s safeguarding department or the police.
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