97: Election Special with Sir John Curtice and Daisy Powell-Chandler

The long-awaited 2024 General Election is just around the corner - but how important will climate change be in the context of voting intention? Joining Matt and Fraser to discuss this, and analyse the key differences between the manifestos, are Daisy Powell-Chandler from Public First, and Sir John Curtice, political scientist and Professor of politics at the University of Strathclyde, who you'll all recognise from election nights gone by.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION

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Matt: Local Zero is brought to you by the University of Strathclyde, home of the Strathclyde Institute for Sustainable Communities.

Matt: Hello and welcome to Local Zero with Matt and Fraser.

Fraser: Now some of you might have heard that there's an election just around the corner.

Matt: Not another one!

Matt: It might be lost, that particular meme might be lost on people. We are of course joking and we're quite sure that Local Zero listeners will be well aware of the election on July the 4th, otherwise known as Independence Day, but Just how important and influential will climate change be when it comes to voting intention?

Matt: It

Fraser: is a vital question and one that we will dive into later. Joining us today are Daisy Powell Chandler from Public First, a policy research, opinion, and strategy consultancy.

Matt: And I'm delighted to say that we're also joined by Also joined by one of the University of Strathclyde's most well known voices, Sir John Curtis, the renowned political scientist and sephalic.

Matt: Nobody comes close to John Curtis, obviously his reputation precedes him, he will be there on election night as he has been previous years, so we couldn't be in safer hands with John.

Fraser: And as always a reminder To all listeners that LinkedIn is now the place to follow local zero. Ask any questions, suggest any episodes, just type local zero podcast into the LinkedIn search bar.

Fraser: Thanks so much to all of you who have joined already. It would be great to continue the conversation as we gear up for election time.

Matt: And for further reading and the entire local zero back catalog, which is creeping up to the hundred episode mark celebration incoming our website, www.localzeropod.com is the place to go.

Fraser: And make sure you've hit the subscribe button wherever you listen. So the new episodes of local zero are there as soon as they become available.

Matt: Now, Fraser, as you've indicated, there is an election in the offing. It feels like this one took an age and since the starting pistol about four or five weeks ago, as we record, it has gone by in a flash. Has any of it, any of it actually landed, uh, with you, changed your mind on anything? Have you felt informed, even just the once?

Fraser: Well, um, I'm not sure. I think it's been a strange one.

Fraser: It's been a really, really strange one. Um, sweetened by that, that a hundred quid that I put on at the bookies was made things all better. But generally speaking, it's, it's so and in this election, it has been wall to wall coverage. I think it has been lively. I think there's been a lot covered within it.

Fraser: However, notable for me has been the broad absence of climate net zero, sustainability, et cetera, which is, which I think is, is notable because in the run up to the election, we were hearing so many signals, particularly from the Conservatives that they were likely to make net zero a bit of a culture war, a bit of a wedge issue.

Fraser: And it just hasn't. Landed, or it hasn't taken off in that way. Do you, do you feel the same?

Matt: Yeah, this was, it's promised to be the cultural climate election. And it hasn't been, it feels a bit of a bit of a letdown on that front. Not that I wanted it to be a cultural wedge issue, but I kind of was mentally all geared up for it to be that now it isn't.

Matt: And other things, you know, I think have stolen the oxygen out of that debate, not least immigration, but no, it, the party has been very quiet on this. The manifestos do speak to this. Interestingly, some are using the terms climate change more than net zero, others interchangeably, but there are some meaty policies there.

Matt: And there are also some meaty absences and voids in other manifestos, and some outright anti-net zero policymaking too.

Fraser: Yeah, absolutely. I think that's right. I think there's been a little bit of derailment in terms of that, that sort of anti net zero sentiment we were hearing in the gear up.

Fraser: And of course, worth providing some context to that as well is we're just through pandemic cost of living, energy price crisis, which ostensibly the last of those is a, is a net zero issue, or at least net zero is a fundamental solution to that. But I think it seems more like not necessarily those issues in themselves, but those issues among others have dominated the conversation.

Matt: Okay, so we've had, have to go back to the late 2000s for the UK to pass the Climate Change Act, at which point, you know, we had an 80 percent climate reduction target by 2050. That was upgraded under Theresa May to net zero and most of the progress that we've made in sort of roughly sort of halving our emissions, carbon emissions versus 1990, a lot of that has kind of been, um, what I call, from the perspective of the average voter behind the scenes. This has been stuff that's been done around corporate boardroom tables and Whitehall. You know, this hasn't really touched the sides for your average household. Okay not until recently. We roll back the clock about blimey 12, 18 months ago, we had the what's now known as the Ulez kind of by election, the Uxbridge, Rice Slip.

Matt: So the Ulez, the ultra low emission zone, which was really about taking some of the most. Polluting cars and vans off the roads, um, really created or catalyzed, uh, kind of kickback from, um, from some of the public, not all from some of the public, and this was really kind of ramped up by the media and you saw shortly after that, this acknowledgement from the ruling party, Conservatives government since 2010, they ought to step back on the net zero front.

Matt: And we started to see some key changes to policy, for example, delaying the phase out of internal combustion engines from 2030 to 25, I was a whole host of other kind of, um, some more pernicious policies from the context of climate change. You then Fraser saw labor get the heebie jeebies.

Matt: Dial back on their own net zero and climate agenda. And I think it was earlier this year, February, March time, I believe that they sort of stepped back from their 28 billion pound, uh, commitment to tackle net zero. Big part of that would be retrofitting people's homes. And we arrive at the present day, the manifestos that we have are still quite differentiated.

Matt: I might add, but you have a labor manifesto, which is much diluted versus what it's Might have been, but others, uh, might actually look at it and say, well, thank goodness is still, you know, from a climate perspective, still a lot of pretty robust policymaking in there. And before I hand back over to you, Fraser, I just wanted to kind of flag a bit of a summary here of where the.

Matt: Uh, manifestos land. So it was a fantastic piece by the carbon brief, which digested all the policies, um, and the manifestos. And they cited an analysis from environmental charities, Greenpeace UK and friends of the earth. And they, and we don't get into the methodology, but they had their own scoring system basically, and they ranked the manifestos as following.

Matt: So the manifestos were judged against 40 recommendations from the charities and the Green Party scored 39/40. Second place, do you want to have a guess who that might have been?

Fraser: I'm gonna go rogue and say Lib Dems.

Matt: Lib Dems, 32/40. Uh, the next two big beasts are third and fourth on here.

Matt: I don't think that, I haven't got a note of the other parties here, like SNP SNP, but

Fraser: it's got to be Labour, right? It can't be.

Matt: Labour, 21 out of 40 and Conservatives in last place. What score do you think they got out of, what, what have, how many of the recommendations had they kind of satisfied, do you think?

Fraser: I'm going to be generous because Conservatives have, there's, there's at least a little bit of. an historic environmental strain to them, and I'll say 10.

Matt: Five. Wow. So, uh, just the five.

Fraser: It doesn't surprise me massively. I think the Greens, and just very sort of, um, subjectively, in my own opinion, have performed really well in this election.

Fraser: I think they're, um, They've made the points they needed to make around fairness, around marrying up sort of climate, economy, society. I think they've done that really well and you would expect them to come at the top anyway. I think the Lib Dems have been a little bit more ambitious in general on this recently.

Fraser: They've also got a really strong track record on things like community energy. Ed Davey was one of the sort of early pioneers of community energy in UK government. So you would, I think you would expect to see that. I think what I find frustrating is 21 out of 40 for Labour in an election where they've been long understood to, or long known that they would be winning out a very hefty majority, in a time where public attitudes are broadly, and we'll hear more about this in the discussion, but where public attitudes are broadly in support of climate action, asterisk, big caveats attached to that, 21 out of 40 is a little bit Underwhelming when it feels like they've got such an open goal to, to progress a lot of this.

Matt: Yeah, it did. And I think one of the big kind of open goals they had was particularly around retrofitting homes. We know how, how poor government performance has been on that in the last 10 years. Um, um, we know how, how many homes still need retrofitting, but labor, they're putting forward the notion of great British energy, a kind of publicly owned energy company to set up a whole host of their own, um, energy projects.

Matt: Part of that will be its local power plant. Which is a 3.3 billion pound, uh, commitment over the five years. You love this local power turbo charge, Turbo Charge, community owned and local authority owned projects. So that's, for me, that feels pretty radical. No, I mean, that is something, so, I mean, you did your whole PhD on feeding tariffs, looking at the, you know, focus on communities on the local side.

Fraser: Yeah.

Matt: I mean, we haven't had a policy like this. Does that feel radical in your mind as a, as a, let's, let's call you a voter Fraser, an informed voter.

Fraser: I, I think it will put two hats on for it, but with my sort of energy day to day job hat on, it doesn't necessarily feel radical. This shift towards sort of more localization.

Fraser: An energy is a trend that's been happening for a long, long time in terms of how we plan the energy system in terms of local authorities and communities, establishing their own projects in terms of the research and the resource that's gone into demonstrating the value of more localized energy approaches, whether that's the value to the energy system itself, whether that's the ability to more directly reach citizens and communities and retain benefits within communities.

Fraser: We've known about the value and this trend. Has been coming for some time. So not necessarily radical from a day to day point of view, although admittedly it's more than we've ever seen sort of dedicated to this. So on that side of things, absolutely. As an average voter, I think it probably is quite radical.

Fraser: I think our experience, generally speaking of renewables so far of the energy system so far is it's this huge monolith that's dealt with centrally. Big wind farms, big offshore wind farms, gas power plants, nuclear, whatever it is, kind of happens away from us. It's not necessarily, you know, our thing on our doorstep, as much as you might have to look at it. Whereas this brings a new local dimension to it and the opportunity for more input from the average citizen community across the country.

Fraser: Ownership. Exactly, exactly, to shape what it looks like. So I think that is, I'm not sure, you know, how much it registers moves the dial, but for those who are tuned into it, I think it is quite a, quite a radical thing.

Matt: Is an interesting point to what extent it would actually be a vote winner, you know, uh, at any scale, but I, I see.

Fraser: I think it could be I think it could, I don't, I don't think it's, I don't think we can skim over it.

Fraser: I think it depends on how you frame it, but for a lot of people, particularly if you think about the Highlands of Scotland, let's take that as an illustrative example. There are a lot of people in Scotland who look at the window, they'll see a massive array of wind turbines and wonder why their bills are higher on average than a lot of other places in the country.

Fraser: They wonder why they were never involved or very lightly involved in terms of maybe a little consultation about when they're getting set up. They might get a little benefit fund or whatever it is. What this, what this does now, what the local power plan does is provide a lot more resource for local actors, community actors, local authorities to develop these projects in collaboration and partnership.

Matt: I need to caveat my point though. I don't think it's going to be a vote winner, particularly at any scale, for this coming election. Why? Because I just don't think many people are aware of it, and even if they were aware of it, don't necessarily know what it can do. You imagine this policy playing out though, over the next five years, and those communities that can directly own and benefit, and you come to the next general election, that's when I actually think it could be very powerful.

Matt: So there's something here, you go through these policies, what could, and Fred, all the, uh, political parties. I'm kind of looking in two minds, this election and future elections, and including local elections as well, Fraser, because I think that's where some of these national policies could really play out and support going forward as well.

Matt: But onshore wind remains a dividing line in these manifestos. Labour Committing to double onshore wind capacity. Conservative party's still, you know, ambivalent towards this, sort of framing it at the right time at the right place with the right communities. Both are very much in support of offshore wind, but not onshore.

Matt: North Sea licenses. Now this is something, you're not too far from that neck of the woods. They take a very different stance on this, the two parties. So you've got Labour saying we won't rip up any new licenses, but we're not going to provide any new licenses and Conservatives. Taking a very different track on that.

Matt: Uh, yeah, I think the other kind of probably key dividing line as well here is around retrofit. So labor sort of committing roughly twice the cash to get homes retrofitted. So look, that's a flavor. I'm kind of wanted to, to note that because I, and I am very close to the energy and climate space, so at least you'd hope somebody hosting this bodies.

Matt: I wasn't clear on some of the fine policy. You know, we go to the polls, um, 4th of July, not far away. I was kind of surprised by how little I was aware. And I think that speaks to our original point. This has not really been covered much. So this election, next election, what should we be doing on a kind of comms point here?

Matt: Because this stuff matters, right? If you believe in climate change. which I do, this stuff matters. So how do we communicate to the masses? Because people I think will be voting without having, some people just won't be aware of necessarily what they're voting for.

Fraser: I think that's right. And I, I would throw into that as well, not just the average voter, but industry, the sector.

Fraser: The market air quotes broadly defined when you don't have clarity on exactly what's happening. It's very, very difficult to gear up for investment in whatever the pathway is, because there's no clarity on what that pathway is. This is part of the big frustration with the ruling out replacing gas boilers after 2035 is because while there's probably a need for a little bit of a flexible, you know, pragmatic approach in terms of exemptions under special conditions for, you know, uh, people in, in whatever circumstances, having that fixed date gives the industry, the supply chain, um, You know, workers, workforce generally, a chance to gear up for it and aim at something.

Fraser: Whereas when you move that, you create a lot more uncertainty. So I find that very, very frustrating. Um, from an average voters point of view, I think again, we know that climate net zero is high on the agenda. There's broad brush support for it, but I do wonder just how strong that support is once you start to filter through the actual details.

Matt: This is my real concern now, and you may remember we did an interview, one of two interviews with Chris Stark, the former CEO of the climate change committee, first one he did. And it was, I want to say January 2022 could have even been 21. And he said, you know, what's your biggest fear? He's like climate change becoming a absorbed by the culture wars.

Matt: And if we were to go back a year, or even six months, I think we probably both agree that it was very much headed in that direction. And I think at that point, we started to have a bit of a national debate in the UK about climate, about energy, about net zero, and all of a sudden we went quiet again about six months ago.

Matt: Not everybody, right? And I thought this election was the time at which everything was laid out on the table. And my big fear about this now, so whichever party gets in, and according to the polls, it's going to be labor at present. They will have to contend with this national debate on their watch with a manifesto, which and as I've just outlined, bakes in a lot of ambitious targets and a lot of ambitious rollout to meet those targets and how that shakes out. Uh, anyone knows because it's, um, could get very messy and this, this mandate could fall apart quite quickly. Yeah.

Fraser: I think so. And I think I'd want to caution as well, while it's not necessarily a bad thing that it hasn't been higher on the agenda, um, at this point, it hasn't been mired in that culture war discussion.

Fraser: And in a way that we expected it to, but that doesn't mean that you can afford to shy away from it as the major issue that it is. And I think if anything, it's more dangerous to shy away and create this vacuum where people who disagree fundamentally politically with net zero can march on to that ground and and, you know, make it, make a fight of it.

Fraser: I think the best thing to do is to get out in front, um, to provide clarity and exactly the things that we want to do, provide that leadership and that vision and crucially fill the void of, well, it could mean anything because that means it could also mean it can also be terrible as, as much as we, we feel it could be a positive and it is ultimately essential.

Matt: Absolutely. And then I think, you know, maybe the final point I want to make here before we, we bring the guests in is this blog by, by Jim Watson. At the end, it starts to talk not about policies per se, although I guess they are policies, but more about the governance, the policy process or procedures around net zero.

Matt: And it talks about things like climate assemblies. Uh, it talks about the role of select committees. Um, and there's a whole kind of bigger questions about what the climate change committee do, you know, of, uh, frame that they need to have more oversight about affordability and security.

Matt: There are, there are things that can happen in the next, um, during the period of the next government, next parliament, which can start to bake in that architecture for a more well rounded and informed debate around these policies. Because the fear is that Labour If they get in, could go about their business, do this, but without the political support, maybe they only get one term.

Matt: And maybe the next party that comes in is, is there on a tidal wave of, um, resentment about policies being imposed against their will or consultation. So my big call, my big request for any incoming government is to consider how we lay the groundwork for more meaningful public dialogue and also, uh, local level community engagement, really.

Fraser: Hear, hear. I think on that note, it might be time to bring in people who know a lot more than us about it. Bring in the pollsters.

Daisy: Hello, I'm Daisy Pearl Chandler. I'm a partner at Public First, and I head up our work on energy and environment.

John: And I'm John Curtis, Professor of Politics at the University of Strathclyde.

Matt: First and foremost, to what extent do you think this has been framed as a real key kind of dividing line amongst the amongst the parties? And how is this being received by voters?

John: The short answer to you is that it's not. I mean, clearly, In the wake of the result of the Uxbridge by election last summer, where the row of course was not strictly speaking about climate change, it was about Ulez but let's leave that distinction to one side for the moment.

John: We did see the prime minister in the early autumn announce some measures that effectively were designed to address some of the more obvious concerns of public opinion about climate change, that is the potential requirement for them to being able to acquire petrol and diesel cars or indeed, you know, not having not being possible to Install gas boilers beyond a certain date.

John: He kind of extended both of those deadlines. Although at the same time and probably the only thing that actually Matted in what he said in terms of anything happening anytime soon was actually to increase the potential subsidy for the installation of heat pumps up to a level that was already, um, in place in Scotland.

John: Anyway, evidently the government was anticipating that perhaps this might help to restore their electoral fortunes. But I'm afraid, like many another initiative in which the Conservatives have engaged in the last six months, it frankly did not have any obvious impact. And to that extent, at least, it is not clear that in the end, the Conservatives have decided particularly to pursue this issue, um, in the election.

John: Labour, of course, on the other side, dropped much of the money that they were going to spend on the Green Investment Fund. But, Primarily because they're concerned about their ability to do that while meeting the fiscal rules. Or they are any about all of that. We might come onto this a bit further later on is that what they essentially cut, at least amongst that expenditure, which they actually had some idea what they were going to do, what they cut was actually the subsidization of heat pumps, which is actually probably the one of the more popular things you can do if you're trying to address net zero.

John: But there we go.

Matt: Absolutely. Thank you, John. And Daisy, is this from your perspective, has this become the culture war issue that many feared? It might, or, uh, or gone a different way.

Daisy: What's fascinating is, uh, I completely agree that all of the ingredients were there for this to become a wedge issue. And I think those of us working on it were very worried that it, it might be pushed into that situation.

Daisy: Where we are at the moment though, is that the polls are so far towards labor, and this has become so much a, a referendum on the, The competence and likability of a deeply, uh, unlikable Tory government, that it's actually masked a whole load of different issues that might otherwise have been really important.

Daisy: Um, and, and that includes the environment, which regularly rates as kind of fourth or fifth most important issue on, on most of the issues trackers that are out there. And is for example, a big dividing line between the reform party and other parties. And they essentially do not accept that we should be trying to reach net zero.

Daisy: However, It hasn't become that wedge issue simply because there are so many other things to be talking about and people are simply not making their decision based on this topic because there's this one big thing that people are choosing on the basis of. That doesn't mean it doesn't matter to people and what's really interesting in the polling is that Um, we've seen net zero move from being something that was perhaps seen as a bit fringe to actually being quite a big values indicator.

Daisy: So one of the things that really backfired about the prime minister's reaction to Uxbridge last summer is that there was this view that they could be seen as on the side. of the little guy against, you know, big green and putting money onto bills and making stuff more expensive. Now, first of all, we know from the focus groups that a lot of the public instinctively understand that if you can increase energy efficiency or move to wind power, then actually that drives down some of their bills.

Daisy: But also, um, There's a, there's a bigger problem in here that net zero has become seen as implicitly a good thing, uh, even amongst people who think that there might be some economic benefit to be had by going back on our net zero pledges. In general, it's seen as something that indicates that you are on the side of right.

Daisy: You're scientifically based, you're sort of centrist, rational, looking to the future, care about. Our young people, it's got a really important signaling power. And so what we see is that you're in those polls that politicians really care about in the run up to elections on the values that each party is perceived as holding.

Daisy: Looking like you're, uh, in less than good position in backing that zero actually negatively impacts all of those values. So it may not be the wedge issue of the election, but it is definitely having an impact on the values that each party is perceived as holding.

Fraser: John, Daisy picks up on a point there about a sort of a broader understanding, not, maybe not full throated support, but a broader understanding that net zero needs to happen.

Fraser: It signals a number of things. In terms of the public attitudes, how does this shake out among the general population with different party voters, different demographics?

John: Well, I mean, I think the first thing to say, I mean, he's absolutely right. There is widespread concern about net zero. Most of the polling done by Ipsos, um, or done for the Department of Business Energy in net zero, uh, suggest the figures runs around 75 to 80%.

John: But it's spiked in particular, uh, in the wake of the, heatwave of not last summer, but the summer before that. And it is perhaps worth noting that the UK has been almost unique, not only last summer, but now also seemingly this summer as well, in being pretty much the only part of the advanced industrial world, which has not been suffering from what would appear to be some of the heat consequences of climate change.

John: Southern Europe is already now having trouble. Southern Europe had trouble last year, as did Northern Europe, as did North America and Hawaii and Canada, et cetera. We had a uniquely Dreek summer, as is so often the case. And, uh, it may well be that we're heading for another one.

John: Although at the moment I'm sitting in London and we're promised 30 degrees tomorrow. But the truth is, you know, broadly speaking, there is concern. However, the fact that there might be concern about an issue, and to that extent at least, it's almost an issue of consensus, doesn't necessarily mean that voters necessarily agree about how we should address it.

John: And this is where the potential for differences between the parties comes in. Arise, and I guess I would make two broad points. The first is if I were to characterize public opinion, it would be Oh government, could thou please regulate the industry so that we can carry on with our daily lives undisturbed While you have ensured that business is only selling us things and doing things that are compatible with net zero. In other words, they're looking to see Whether or not the structure of the market can be changed in such a way that they don't necessarily have to change their individual behavior, what they engage in, but rather they continue to carry engaging in it without necessarily compromising net zero.

John: That's point one. So they're looking for the structure of the choice that they're faced to be changed. The second thing I can say is that, you know, surprise, surprise, the public for the most part, although there are some differences, are fairly happy about being subsidized. So, if you want to subsidize their heat pumps, you want to subsidize their electric car, they don't mind that.

John: As already said, regulating business is fine. If you're going to stop them from banning doing things, well, we get a bit sniffy and a bit suspicious. And if you're going to tax us on things we like, like dairy products, you're going to tax our milk for our breakfast, or tax that our burger, maybe Tax the, taxing the flights of those folk who go on airplanes a lot is okay, but just make sure I can get to Menorca every year without it costing too much.

John: So, you know, I mean, that's human nature for you. Now, within that, this is where you then begin to get the party divide, because basically, On the things on which there is consensus like subsidization, et cetera, there's not that much difference between conservative and Labour voters. For the most part, they're both willing to back it all, but maybe often a little bit less amongst conservative voters.

John: But when we get to the more controversial things, like limiting meat eating or dairy or certainly taxing our cars. Then you see the divide opening up between conservative and labor voters and conservative voters are less keen than otherwise. And in a sense, it fits a broader, a broader remit here. At the end of the day, conservative voters in general tend to be looking to the market to solve things.

John: And I think many conservative voters think that ultimately, Climate change is going to resolve not necessarily through government action and government intervening what they regard as a heavy handed fashion, but rather through the market responding to the incentives, not least that if you try and build a business now that is going to continue to emit carbon in 20 years time, what increasingly banks are going, well hang on, that's not going to be sustainable, that's not a sensible long term investment from our point of view.

John: So therefore they think the market will provide an answer, Whereas labor folk are more likely to want to intervene through taxation, et cetera. In other words, the argument debate about climate change and how we deal with it maps on to that wider longstanding division between conservative and labor voters and between the parties about the role of the state.

Fraser: And so Daisy, I think the, the point here is an interesting one about how it maps to different voters, but there's also, there's also something within that about where impacts are felt and how you're sort of designing your solutions to climate. Is this something you see shake out? What comes to mind for me is if you're asking someone, for instance, to switch from a gas boiler to a heat pump versus host offshore wind infrastructure a couple of miles off the coast, do you see differences in terms of acceptability and support on, on those types of lines?

Daisy: Yes, I just, I want to take a step back here a moment because I agree with a lot of what just John just said, but I, I think actually there's a, there's a more basic divide here, which is, um, I'm actually not totally sure that this all maps onto conservative versus labor, classic politics viewpoints, because I think actually you would then see conservative voters calling for more interventions in the market to price the externality, you know, more More carbon border adjustments, more ETSs, more carbon taxes of one kind or another.

Daisy: And that's not really something we're seeing. We're not seeing it really put forward as kind of, well, we could, we could change the market. We could reshape the market versus we should intervene in people's homes and lives. And I think that's actually because what we've seen is a phased introduction of these things.

Daisy: So actually what the Conservatives have achieved actually pretty successfully over the past decade or so is driving carbon out of the electricity market. Um, We are, we have effectively decarbonized the grid a fairly radical amount over the past decade. We reached halfway to net zero earlier this year and blink and you might have missed the singular tweet from the secretary of state responsible for it.

Daisy: It's almost like the government wasn't that interested, but actually that's a really big achievement and we should probably have shouted about it a bit more because what we find time and again in the polling is that the public haven't noticed the public think, if anything, that our carbon footprint is still going up.

Daisy: And it's really hard to sell a program of change off the back of, uh, we've been talking about this for a decade and we haven't achieved anything. And that is different to some other countries where they have gone in with the more public facing bits first, the behavior change has come first, and then that market change is planned to come second.

Daisy: It's a very different sell at that point. It's arguably a. Our way is a lot easier to make fast progress, but you have to talk about it a lot. Otherwise, when you get to asking people to make change, to, to tweak their diets, to change their heating systems, to think about changing their car, it feels like you're asking people to do a lot off the back of, well, what if, what have you ever done for me?

Daisy: Now, To the point of what that means in terms of who is most affectionate, who is least affected. If we can set this up, right, it will feel like it's a journey that we're all going on together towards an inevitably better world where we have nicer cars, more comfortable houses, costs go down, fuel volatility, uh, fuel price volatility is much less, or we can make it seem piecemeal and like it's being done to you and that you're being victimized.

Daisy: Now, arguably a lot of the way in which the energy infrastructure debate has played out so far has felt much more like the latter than the former. There hasn't been articulated a clear plan and it is a real, uh, problem of the way in which the government has moved on this agenda. Um, towards sort of being half critical of it, they want to give you more bins, people want to force you to, there will be taxes on meat, but we won't do that.

Daisy: We won't rip the boiler out of your house. Well, wait a minute. Who was threatening to rip the boiler out of my house? I think both manifestos. Main party manifestos say that they will not rip the boiler out of your house, which has no one was planning to do. That is a really weird thing to promise. But in general, what humans want is they want things to be easy and they want things to be cheap.

Daisy: Um, they, they don't want something to make their life more difficult and they don't want it to cost them more. And if we can make the transition, do that, what we will see is people are happier with it. If actually the only bit of the transition they see is you want to build something in their garden and then charge more for it.

Daisy: They will be unamused. And that's what we have seen play out. When we look at the planning struggles in East Anglia over pylons, for example, when you turn up and say we're bringing pylons, you have no choice. That is a very different debate to our country needs to grow. And in order to grow, it needs more power.

Daisy: We're building that power. We're a world leader in doing that. But we need to get it to people.

Matt: It seems like the, the, one of the key dividing lines here, and I think John, Daisy, you've set this up here is, is around, uh, not necessarily around the delivery of net zero, although maybe there has been some key questions about when you phase in or out certain parts of our economy, like internal combustion engines shifting from 2030 to 2025. So it's not necessarily what, it's how. And I wonder from a polling perspective, whether there's any insight you may be able to offer about the kind of key dividing lines about what. So does a voter's demographic or geographic background shape what they deem to be desirable or undesirable in terms of how we get there?

Matt: I mean, that's, that's really the, I guess from a net zero perspective, a minister's perspective, that's the billion dollar question. What will people swallow? And that really sets up this general election and, and the, and the ones that succeed it.

John: Well, the two things that people won't swallow, and it follows on from what Daisy's has been saying, it's basically asking people to incur a substantial capital cost without any support from the state.

John: So, this is why the issue of, uh, heating domestic, uh, properties and cars are the issues. Because these are the two issues where you are potentially asking individuals to subsidize, to incur a substantial capital cost. And while there might be a return in the long run, uh, the long run might be so long that some people may not be around to, in order to, to actually see the financial benefit.

John: In contrast, as Daisy, uh, quite rightly said, for the most part, making our infrastructure more net zero, uh, compatible is, is, is fine, particularly so far as wind farms are concerned. There is one issue though, there is one issue where all public attitudes get turned on their head and the conservative labor divide gets turned on its head.

John: And that is nuclear power, right? Conservative voters do regard nuclear power, are more likely than neighbor voters. to regard nuclear power as something they're willing to back as part of the net zero journey. And of course, so therefore an older environmental debate about the safety of nuclear power and the waste and all the rest of it clearly influences, um, attitudes there.

John: And it's the one thing that cuts across what is otherwise a tendency For labor voters to be more willing to accept some of the, uh, net zero actions. And so that, in a sense, for those who are, you know, trying to advance the cause of net zero, I think an important question. is to what extent in the end are the costs of adaptation going to be individualized or to what extent they're going to be socialized.

John: And I've seen contradictory evidence in this. I've actually seen a public first poll, which actually rather, rather paradoxically found that conservative voters were more willing to see the costs of, uh, introducing heat pumps being socialized that were labor voters. So I can find other evidence in the opposite direction.

John: But you can see the rationale. I mean, if you've got a, um, uh, a big house with a big boiler and you don't want to have to change all your rain, you're going to have to change all your radiators. Hey guys, if the state's going to cough up, you might really find that quite important if you're a relatively well off voter.

John: So Daisy's right. We've done a great deal. But we've done, we've answered a great deal by things. Again, we changed the structure of the market without requiring individuals to change their lifestyle. We can still turn on our lights. We now no longer feel guilty about turning our lights because they are lit in a way that is net zero compatible for the most part.

John: Um, the question is, I mean, it's particularly what do we do about our heating, particularly, of course, in a country where the issue is not just introducing heat pumps, it's how to make the housing stock much more heating efficient. And it's one of the things we have long, long been weak about. But again, that also is difficult because of the capital costs involved.

John: Historically, what I can go back to the 1970s, 1980s of, you know, various government initiatives to insulate and I'd subsidize the cost of putting insulation in people's loss and all the rest of it. It doesn't seem, however, I mean it's not my specialist area, but it doesn't seem, however, to anybody clear a concerted policy agenda for doing this in a long term manner in order to make it possible.

Matt: And Daisy, geography? Demography, does it matter? Does it shape, do you see it shaping voters intentions and their preference about how we get to net zero?

Daisy: It does, so demography definitely, uh, shape how people view on this issue. And, and a lot of those will be, um, obvious, almost too obvious to mention, but, but important.

Daisy: You know, younger people tend to be more in favour of action towards net zero, uh, higher socio economic grades. So, more professional versus, you know. Less in, in manual grades, um, support of net zero sustainable energy sources um, depending on how you categorize that, as John has already called attention to.

Daisy: Everyone loves renewable energy to an extent that is actually hard to test which, and which messages are better at promoting or opposing renewable energy because everyone loves it so much then yes. People are much, much more contradictory on things that involve their homes, basically. And cars, people feel as very much an extension of their home.

Daisy: So you start to get a lot of, uh, I'm pro in principle, but in practice, um, it's okay as long as it doesn't impact me. So for example, um, The frequent fly attacks, which gets cited a lot actually, uh, comes up in a lot of situations as looking very positive, but actually when you put that into a focus group, um, people hate it, um, it to an extraordinary extent considering how positive the polling is sometimes.

Daisy: Um, because Oh, but what about someone whose family is split between two places? What about if your wife's ill and you have to fly to see her? What if you used your allowance of flights on work flights and now you're being charged extra on your holiday? There's always a whataboutery to this. And I think this really gets to the heart of a lot of this conversation about net zero is that any policy, when you get into the nitty gritty is always more complicated than the one liner that you stick in a poll or the headline of the, um, of the article or the, the one liner in the politician's speech.

Daisy: And that is true of, you know, absolutely every policy area is true of the NHS. It's true of, um, defense policy and net zero gets set up to fail because what the opponents spend a lot of time doing is finding the one version of that policy that people hate. And then saying, this is what they want to do to you.

Daisy: Actually, the truth about net zero policy is all of us could probably agree on is that there's going to be a lot less choosing and a lot more doing all the things. So for the people that a heat pump works for, there will be heat pumps in their homes for, um, particularly areas with high levels of fuel poverty, there'll probably be more government intervention to put more insulation in.

Daisy: For some areas, there'll be district heating. That is also true of our power system. There'll be more renewable power sources. There'll be more nuclear, there'll be more pylons. Some of them will be underground. We will do all of these things. It will probably be fine, but we do need to do all of them and we need to get on with it.

Daisy: And the way to keep people on board is to set a really clear trajectory that tells a story about how and why we're going to get there. This is actually a success story. We are at the forefront of this energy transition. It could be going a lot worse than it is. And there is a story to be told there.

Daisy: And my hope is that with a new government that everyone feels a bit more hopey changey about, they will have some space to tell a story about that trajectory, because I think one of the reasons people feel worried at the moment is that they suddenly hear. One announcement that's about something that's going to change in 2030 is another thing's happening in 2035.

Daisy: Oh, I thought hydrogen was going to be the thing instead, but now they're saying it's heat pumps. We do focus groups fairly regularly on these issues and people are incredibly confused, including the trades people who were relying upon to make these changes. And without a consistent story about why and what and when it's going to be really difficult to take people along on that journey, whether they're old or young or upper class or lower class or which part of the country they're in.

John: But isn't part of the trouble, Daisy, that indeed there are still disagreements about, and indeed there is frankly market competition going on between those with different interests and possibilities.

John: I mean, not least there is still a battle going on about hydrogen versus, uh, heat pumps.

Daisy: Not really. Well, I'm afraid you've fallen for the propaganda there, John.

John: Well, no, no, but,

Daisy: Hydrogen and home heating is. dead. That's not a thing. Um,

John: But, but, but, but, but the point is there are still those because they have an investment in the infrastructure that was still want to pursue that agenda.

John: I mean, I'm not arguing about what's right and wrong here. The point is that these debates are still going on because there are those with different interests and different means of delivering these things that, um, uh, therefore disagree with each other.

Daisy: These debates are still going on, but we actually know categorically that by 2035, if you're putting a gas boiler in your building, you've done something horribly wrong.

Matt: If, if I might just follow up on the earlier point. So Labour famously have stepped back from their 28 billion pound commitment to net zero. This was on the back of some of the context you offered before around Uxbridge and Ulez and many of these by elections where this is a, this is a dividing issue.

Matt: So if I maybe just, turn the question on its head. The polls obviously plumping foot for labor very much so an outright and stonking majority as it stands.

John: Yeah, but hang on, but the majority doesn't tell you where public opinions are. You're talking about a party that at the moment is running at only 40 percent in the opinion polls.

John: Do not read public opinion from the state of the house of commons.

Matt: And I'll defer to you and your expertise on this, John, entirely. The question to turn on its head is, do you think Labour needed to take that shift early on this year, I think it was February, March time, in order to retain that polling lead?

Matt: It's a different way of asking the same question, right? But, but, um, and obviously polling is,

Daisy: No they didn't. They didn't. They absolutely didn't. The public didn't know about it. They, they just got bored of Jeremy Hunt yelling it across Parliament, basically. if, and they didn't want to give them any more things that they could yell from the dispatch box, this was foolish because the Tories were just going to find something else to yell about anyway.

Daisy: And now it's one more thing that convinced people that Keir Stamer is a flipp flopper which they were actually much more worried about than the idea that he was going to spend on the environment because most of the public assumed that they are fibbing about not raising taxes.

John: Yeah, sure. I mean, it's because the Labour Party were concerned about the tax, um, that the Conservatives were making about this and, and.

John: Well, that's part of it. The other part of the story is the Labour Party had only ever worked out how to spend about half the money in the first place. Um, and to that extent, at least they were, they were, as it were, letting themselves be attacked for something they didn't quite know what they were going to do with in the first place for themselves.

John: Um, so it wasn't exactly the world's most thought through. policy, it was a headline number, um, the details of which had never been, uh, fully fleshed out. But I, you know, and you know, Rachel Reeves is convinced, rightly or wrongly, that the Labour Party has to demonstrate, uh, fiscal, uh, fiscal rectitude in order to be accepted as a potential alternative government.

John: Now, some of us think that probably they are being, uh, too careful about this, but in any event, that's the path down which they've decided to go with. But frankly, it's nothing to do with, nothing to do with net zero and everything to do with Labour's positioning on the question of taxation and spending.

Fraser: So we've talked a lot about the higher level, the election level. Daisy, something you touched on earlier was around transmission, around how this is playing out for communities themselves. And I think the question that we had lined up was to the effect of do attitudes change when it becomes local, which I think is still a relevant question, but then does it also become sort of less about the what's happening and more about the how things are happening with within that transition?

Daisy: Oh, I think it's both. Uh, sorry, it's a terrible answer. No, so I think first of all, um, there's a really important question about the why. Because when you, we, my team spent quite a lot of time doing immersive research in communities that host energy infrastructure or might host energy infrastructure. And if you go to a community and they say, Oh yeah, there's pylons coming in.

Daisy: It's because the college is having its connection upgraded. They're getting a new workshop. They don't have a problem with the pylons. If it's, yeah, Mike's business has expanded. They're bringing in 10 more people and they needed an extra warehouse and they needed three phase. So we've got more pylons.

Daisy: That's not a problem. But, oh, yeah, they're putting pylons through such and such's field. It's where I walk my dog. And there's no connection to the why. That's a big problem. And part of this is an interesting difference between long term hosted energy generation and short term hosted energy generation.

Daisy: And pylons transition, transmission of various kinds. And I think it's a really interesting set of lessons to be drawn out of this, that I think give us hope on solar actually. So bear with me, optimism incoming. Um, which is that if you are a generator, if you're a, uh, an energy developer that wants to create new generative capacity in an area, you have a real reason to build a relationship with that community, um, you don't just want to build a thing for the least amount of hassle and then go away.

Daisy: Okay. You need some of those people to probably work on, on your thing. Um, they, they're going to be your neighbors for probably at least the next 40 years, um, under new systems. You may well give them an ownership stake, uh, in part of that facility. This is a long term relationship, an ongoing conversation. Um, so there's a much more positive side that can come with a big solar installation or, uh, an onshore wind farm than there might be if you're just putting some transmission through the edge of a local area, for example.

Daisy: So what lessons can we draw from transmission? Uh, into transmission from generation, I think would be a, a really good conversation for us to be having. And I think it is the start of a conversation that we're having, but, but also really drawing out that point of why it's coming. So yes, it's about the, how, how do we do this to communities?

Daisy: And I would argue with the, how it's also about clarity. One of the problems we have with our planning system at the moment, and, and let's hope that labor is true to its word and changes that, is that we tell people we're consulting on. This thing, and first of all, they aren't quite sure how to be part of that, which makes them cross.

Daisy: So they then don't feel like they've been consulted. So what we get in some local areas is they say, Oh yeah, we're really anti the solar farm, but mostly we just wanted to get rid of the housing development on the other end of town, but we weren't consulted on that. So we're going to get rid of the solar farm.

Daisy: And actually they were consulted on both of them with basically the same process, but they didn't notice until it was too late with the housing. So now they've got it in for the solar. So changing the way we consult, but also being really clear about what they can change. So where we're putting in transmission rates, being very clear, this can't change, but you could choose the kind of pylon or, um, it has to come through this patch, but we're open to what the route is, but being really clear what the options are, because people get really frustrated if they're told there'll be a consultation process, but actually the consultation process is, will it be white or green?

Daisy: And, and, and you implied that there was a consultation process on whether they were going to have pylons at all. So there's a how, but there's also a why. Lay out why you're doing it. Consult well. build a relationship.

John: Yeah, but there's also, I mean, it's all very true. There's also some politics, however, and I think this is one of those things where Keir Starmer at the moment, uh, thinks he can take on the NIMBYs and the objectors, but he's probably going to find it more difficult than he realizes because if the Labour Party does win by a very large majority, they will now be representing with good Labour MPs those constituencies in rural and suburban areas, which don't want the pylons going through their local field, etc. Um, and that much of the differences that the Conservative Party has had in the last four or five years, not least with uh, particularly in the area of housing reform, the Labour Party may now find itself with a difficult situation. Because a lot of these MPs, Labour MPs, they'll be representing marginal constituencies, they didn't necessarily expect to win them, they'll be doing their absolute dumbness to try to hang onto them.

John: And therefore they're not necessarily going to support a course in principle. They accept that we need more houses and we need more energy transmission, but not in my backyard, please. Not, not so that it threatens my future political career. So I, the, the internal tensions inside this government over planning reform will probably be rather greater than would be true at the moment when it's a party that only represents, you know, one third of the country.

Daisy: I think that's so true. If you look at the, I think, um, I can't remember off the top of my head, it's either 40 or 60 constituencies affected by HND1. Apologies to non energy listeners. There are so many acronyms in energy, but one of the biggest tranches of pylon plans that we've had through so far, um, 95 percent of them were really quite safe Tory constituencies.

Daisy: I know those don't necessarily exist anymore, but Any labor candidate, uh, in those who is now sent in victory might be more tempted to sign the petition against the local solar or the local onshore wind proposal now than they were three months ago or six months ago, when, when it was easier for a leader to kind of hold people together and say, no, no, we've got, you know, we've, We've got, um, a party line on this and you need to stick to it, but now when you think, well, but it might only be a thousand votes in it, uh, it's harder to keep those activists on side.

Matt: Maybe just finish on this question. Obviously you've identified one of the key challenges for the next, uh, government, whoever they may be, will be about public engagement, community consultation, getting the people on side and bringing them with you to get these changes put in place, whatever they might be.

Matt: Looking forward, what do you think are going to be some of the other. Key net zero challenges, climate challenges, sustainability challenges for the incoming government beyond that. I mean, what is going to be keeping our prospective leaders and their cabinets awake at night? And, uh, I'm not asking you how to fix this, but what, what are they going to be the big, hairy challenges coming down the line?

Matt: Uh, John, maybe. And then Daisy, please.

John: Well, I guess that's very slightly tangentially. I think one of the things we need to appreciate is that the state has limited firepower. It cannot, it won't be allowed to borrow a lot more by the market. So, um, and of course we're actually currently proposing to reduce state led capital infrastructure.

John: investment quite considerably. One suspects, therefore, that at the end of the day, the role of the next government is going to be as much to control and incentivize the private sector to be able to, uh, help it deliver net zero policy rather than it using the direct Now, things like, you know, it's proposals for Thought for investment are clearly part of that is trying to help to try the state using such fire powers.

John: It's got to try and leverage private sector investment, but one suspects that it's a private sector. It is finance capital that are going to be the crucial things they need to get on board. Um, and it's not necessarily going to be a direct state expenditure, um, let alone plans and policies compiled by civil servants in Whitehall.

Daisy: Completely agree with everything John said. And I would, um, add to that, that if you're doing massive works programs, then, um, people is going to come to the fore fairly quickly. And it's really hard to solve skills problems really fast, um, except for by immigration, which, um, is possibly even more of a wedge issue.

Daisy: In fact, definitely even more of a wedge issue than net zero. Um, so I think. That is something that they will probably be desperately trying to avoid grasping, I suspect. That will make it harder to deal with some of their net zero related problems. I would throw in home heating, which we've all mentioned a few times.

Daisy: But, uh, home heating plan, uh, warmer homes plan was one of the big casualties of the 28th. Billion, uh, pivot. Uh, in fact, probably the only really big one that I was particularly worried about. Uh, and yet they still have kept targets in there. They don't technically have enough budget to really meet both their net zero related targets and their fuel poverty targets at the moment.

Daisy: And that's a problem because both of those are statutory targets. So they're going to need to come up with a fix on that pretty quickly. And if you were looking at mainland Europe right now, I think you would also say that they're going to need to get to grips with. farming policy pretty quickly. Um, it's, it's been, there's been a lot of change going on behind the scenes over the last parliament.

Daisy: And, um, you hear mixed views on whether actually that has for the most part be moving in the right direction or whether it still needs to be torn up. I think. Uh, most of us would be tearing our hair out if they started again with elms right now, but we have all seen from France how badly that can go wrong.

Daisy: And we, we know from our own political past that you don't want to piss off the farmers. So that's going to be a problem, but at the same time, they really need to be doing something on nature and adaptation. Uh, because at the moment we are much, much worse on climate adaptation than we are on mitigation for all that we may have frustrations around our mitigation policies.

Daisy: Um, and If we don't come up with a better plan for how we manage nature and the countryside, um, then that is only going to make the farming problem worse.

Matt: Thank you, Daisy. Thank you, John. No shortage of intre for whoever the next government will be. So thank you for your insights. Really appreciate the time and hope to have you again soon when we learn of the outcome.

Daisy: Thank you both. This has been great fun.

John: Thank you very much and goodbye.

Matt: A massive thank you to Daisy and Sir John will include more information about their work in the show notes for this episode. But thank you to you for listening to Local Zero, and if you've enjoyed the pod, here are some quick things you can do to really help us out.

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Matt: And please do reach out to us and let us know your thoughts either at Localzeropod@gmail.com or over on LinkedIn. But for now, thank you and goodbye.

Fraser: Produced paper spoken media.

https://www.publicfirst.co.uk/

https://www.meyland.co.uk/podcast

https://www.carbonbrief.org/uk-election-2024-what-the-manifestos-say-on-energy-and-climate-change/

https://www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/environment-energy-resources/news/2024/jun/comparing-party-manifestos-energy-policy