98: A new dawn for net zero? A forward look at Labour’s plan for government

Matt and Fraser return after a (washout) summer to share their expectations, hopes and any potential concerns about the new Labour government's Net Zero manifesto and policies.

There is also an important update on the future of Local Zero.

Linkedin - Local Zero Podcast

https://www.localzeropod.com

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

[music flourish]

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.

Fraser: Summer is coming to an end, although judging by the weather in Scotland, you might have missed it actually starting. But we are back and with plenty to discuss.

Matt: Indeed, we are back and we will be coming to you monthly for the next three months. But don't worry, these episodes will be packed full of news, case studies, analysis from the UK and far beyond.

Fraser: If this is your first time listening to the Local Zero podcast then thank you and welcome. We are here to highlight and showcase local climate action happening on your doorstep and provide examples of small changes you can make that go a long way to helping our planet.

Matt: And on occasion we'll do deep dives into climate and sustainability issues to find out what impact decisions made on both a local and national level might have you, our listeners.

Fraser: Now, in our last episode, before the summer holidays, we had a general election preview, still worth a listen if you didn't catch it with the Sir John Curtis and Daisy Powell Chandler.

Matt: Yeah, and an excellent one it was, but this time, with the election now firmly behind us, we'll be taking a forward look at the new Labour government and what this might mean for future climate action and how it affects us all.

Matt: Fraser, summer is over. As you say, It never really began in Scotland, every turn on the radio, having my breakfast, it begins something along the lines of, and another blistering day, and you wait and there's a pregnant pause in the South of England. We haven't really had one, have we? And as I stand here, it is a third day of torrential rain and I'm readying the earth.

Fraser: Yeah, it's quite, quite miserable to be honest. We've got a scorching 11 degrees here today up in the northeast. It's, um, that's quite pleasant compared to what we've had over the last week or so. Um, but yeah, it never really got going, sadly.

Matt: It's been awful. It's been awful. And I mean, yeah, anyway, I don't know whether this is climate change or it's just, just miserable Scottish summers or whatever it is, but, um, we'll probably have a glorious September, although that's what I keep telling myself.

Matt: Anyway, have you had a good one. Have you had a good break? Because I think the last time we sat down to do this, this is pre election. We're going way back in the annals of time, um, to when we still had, uh, a, a conservative government, which does feel like a very long time ago. So what have you been up to?

Fraser: Um, well, to be honest, Matt, because we have a new Labour government who are hell bent on actually doing stuff, it's been, um, it's been quite busy. And if I could make one plea to them, it would be just, just, Slow down, just a minute. Let's make sense of what it is that you're trying to do. Just slow down. We can catch up.

Fraser: So a lot, lots happening. It's been very, very busy. Not much, not much of a break, but it's exciting. It feels like we're, we're, we're now starting to make the progress albeitrt of in small steps to begin with, but make some progress and get that action going. One colleague described it as we spent the last, you know, maybe 10, 14 years banging at this brick wall, trying to get net zero stuff done, and now the brick wall doesn't exist anymore.

Fraser: And we've got all this pent up energy and aren't quite sure how to channel it just yet. It's a little bit of soul searching, I think.

Matt: Well, and I think this, this episode is going to be all about that and trying to unpack that. But yeah, summer for me survived another school summer holiday. You've got all this to come.

Matt: Congratulations. I am now full speed ahead on the Strathclyde Institute for Sustainable Communities, which sponsors the podcast. And so we've got a lot of exciting stuff in the pipeline, not least around community benefit funds, which we'll talk a little bit more about and the connectivity with renewables, uh, but plenty more.

Matt: However, uh, over the summer we had some, um, how should we frame this? It was certainly bad news, uh, maybe a little bit surprising too, but, um, unfortunately, um, for our new listeners, you may not know who we're referring to, but for our long term and long time listeners, you certainly will know her, is that Becky has, uh, decided to step away from the podcast because she has got some fantastic new and rather exciting, um, activities on her plate.

Fraser: Unfortunately for us, we should say.

Fraser: Not unfortunately for, for, for Becky, who's onto a new and an exciting challenge.

Matt: Not unfortunately for Becky. No, no, no. She never stands still. And, uh, we wish her all the very best because Becky's been here since day one. Um, so she was a co founder, co host, uh, but she hasn't gone forever.

Matt: She will come back for a hundredth episode. And if my math serves me correctly, Fraser, we are on 98, right? So she will come back, um, to great fanfare for a long, um, retrospective really over the previous 99 episodes. So really looking forward to that and we'll give her a good send off.

Fraser: Definitely. Definitely. And I think we've, we've taken it as a little bit of a catalyst, Matt, haven't we, to do some soul searching with the pod and come up with some new and exciting ideas and formats and things that we want to pursue. So absolutely. Um, anyone listening and just now keep it, keep an eye out because we've got a lot of exciting things to come.

Matt: This episode. It's just you and I, and we have. A really meaty topic to sink our teeth into, which is what do the next five years of a Labour government look like, or what do we think they might look like with regards to climate action, climate policy, and crucially, what does it mean for listeners? I think the first thing to note, and without me then going on a sort of monologue for 20 minutes, I wanted.

Matt: Just in the round to get your kind of first gut reaction. What, where's it hit the right notes, the wrong notes or no notes at all.

Fraser: So I'm going to speak to energy specifically, because that's fairly much my sort of wheelhouse, my, my domain professionally. And I think from the manifesto. I want to say there was a fairly overwhelmingly positive, um, expectation around, around the manifesto when it was announced it was front page of the manifesto making, making Britain a clean energy superpower.

Fraser: There were big promises around GB energy, which, you know, again, we'll get into, um, but also big promises around planning, around getting things built around warm homes, which was in the manifesto, but we haven't seen an awful lot of yet and we'll definitely come back to in the round, Matt. I think I was, I was quite excited.

Fraser: by the manifesto, cautiously excited because we've been burned before. I'd say the actions that Labour have taken since the election in terms of, uh, ease in planning regulations, in terms of their sort of signals around investment and things like offshore wind, I think they've, they've, uh, laid down a nice marker in terms of wanting to, to, to get on with things.

Fraser: So I, I feel, I feel optimistic about it, but there is still a little bit of, um, there's a little bit in the back of my mind, mostly around in the next five years, at some point, we're going to have to start wrestling with citizens and communities. There's only so much we can do on the big ticket stuff before people start really noticing and wondering why maybe they're not feeling the benefits as they've been promised in the past.

Fraser: Um, so cautiously optimistic, I would say, what was, what was your gut reaction, Matt?

Matt: Yeah, I, I think similar, I think my sense of it is that he didn't take a radically different approach to net zero than say the former government, or at least the former government five years before, or maybe three, if I'm being kind and what I mean by that is, I think that.

Matt: Maybe taking a similar approach, but maybe just sort of doubling down in certain areas that might get us to net zero that bit quicker. Um, but yeah, that point about where you start to bring people into this and communities, and there was a very interesting piece, um, from Emma Pinchbeck, who is the CEO of energy UK in the Guardian this morning, and her basically saying the same thing.

Matt: Is some point you're going to come up against this brick wall of people and feelings and norms and routines and, um, values. And unless you start to resonate with people and find a sort of common ground with them. Um, it's going to be really difficult to move forward on the big, tricky, complex stuff, particularly that demand side.

Matt: And when I say the demand side, I'm talking your home, your car, your workplace. I feel like there was some very important green shoots in that regard. We'll get into all of this, but things like devolution. Giving more power back to, um, well, there were three kind of, I thought there were three kind of key elements of devolution maybe, and we'll, we'll talk more about this, but one was giving, uh, more power to, um, metro mayors, city mayors, uh, a lot of it was kind of.

Matt: Pointing back to kind of local councils and an emphasis on decision making a lot of primary decision making sitting with them around local growth plans, local action plans, but there was also a big emphasis on pressing the reset button with the devolved nations, scottish government, welsh government, northern irish and I think that was really valuable because I don't know about you Fraser, but from where I sat, I felt that relationship had really broken down in Scotland. And that, that doesn't help anybody regardless of your, your political persuasion. So, uh, in, in terms of actually getting things done on the ground, you, if you have a country where you have devolved and reserve powers, as we do, you kind of, the machinery isn't working.

Matt: It does come unstuck. And I think it had So, um, and I go back to, To Emma's point and your point about coming back to people and citizens is, I think they're starting to lay some of the groundwork there, people in their communities, part of the neighborhoods are going to be able to make some decisions.

Matt: Okay. With the apparatus that is there. And one of the things that kind of came to the fore and again, we'll get into this is a things like public transportation in your local area and buses franchises, and where people can actually make these decisions about, you know, where, where the buses run and there'll be sort of, you know, opportunities.

Matt: Uh, to sort of consolidate instead of having multiple companies and those companies would be, would be managed and governed by, by, by the sort of, you know, local city, city government. So I think we've maybe taken one important step. The manifesto, which I've just read through again for the third or fourth time, I don't think really tackles issues around equality and a just transition in the round.

Fraser: This is, I guess, part of the caution going into it, is we don't necessarily have, or rather the government doesn't seem to currently have the answers, or at least they've not made them public. What I think is happening, my sort of assessment of the situation, is you have a new government who's come in, who have identified some, let's say, you know, it's not small stuff, but it's low hanging fruit, reform planning, so that you can get offshore wind, onshore wind built, make Offshore wind, less risky, put some more money into it so that investors come forward, get the big renewable stuff done, start decarbonizing the power system.

Fraser: I think it's important to note that they haven't rolled back on net zero power system by 2030. That's a very ambitious target, which even their head of mission control friend of the pod, Chris Stark, has been on record before saying, you know, it's, it's going to be a, it's going to be a tricky one to meet.

Fraser: Yeah, but I think what's my, as it connects to people, citizens and communities before we get into the community energy side of things, GB energy side of things, my sense is that win trust by doing the big stuff that you can do and showing benefits as you're doing it. your big renewables, your big transmission, as the case may be.

Fraser: And then the other stuff, you have a little bit more backing, a little bit more good faith from the public. You've made progress. You've done it in a good way. Maybe you've knocked a few quid off bills, but that's a big challenge still. And there's a risk there. What you can't afford to do is use that as a reason to kick the can.

Fraser: You have to be ramping up to the people, citizens, community stuff now.

Matt: And I think they've been canny in terms of pushing harder in areas where the public. We're probably going to be more receptive to more sweeping and structural change. So you take, for instance, the railways, the buses, a mess generally, um, in terms of the cost utilization, um, need reform.

Matt: I mean, the very, again, for me, I think this is a cross parliamentary perspective. It's even if you are a strong kind of support for privatization, if you're commuting in and out, you're going to feel those pains. Okay. I think water, yeah. Again, really heavy on that people are paying more and getting less, not just less, you know, individually, but, but, uh, from a communal perspective, you know, you just have to trot down to your local river or lake or, or, or coastline.

Matt: So, you know, people were. We're going to be receptive to that energy bills. You know, they've, there's no love lost, I think, for your average bill payer over the last few years with, with the large oil and gas companies and energy suppliers. And so there's, there's been a sort of doubling down there on, on some of the kind of the supply levies and emphasis on, on, you know, no new oil and gas licensing.

Matt: I think there was actually some really ambitious stuff peppered through this, which I think could have a really major impact. And I think they've been kind of focusing on the areas which are not working rather than targeting the few areas of our, of our society and economy that are humming along nicely, not many.

Matt: Um, I'm picking those up and then ripping them, uh, you know, shreds and rebuilding them. So, you know, it's called politics, I think.

Matt: I wonder whether you wanted to maybe pick up a bit more about the, the GB energy coupled alongside the, the sort of national wealth fund trying to sort of leverage huge sums, right? Huge sums of money. And Chris Stark will be very happy in his new role, potentially coming down the tracks to build this stuff.

Fraser: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So I think, um, moving, moving into this, this section of the pod, we want to, we wanted to pull out a few key issues from the manifesto and that have happened since the election to highlight things to look forward to in the next few years. And I think the big one that was on everyone's lips, it was the cornerstone of Labour's election campaign.

Fraser: Um, and it's certainly something that's had a lot of discussion. It's now, it's been in the King's speech. It's had its first. Sort of inclusion within legislation now, and that's, that's GB Energy. Before the election, GB Energy kind of meant everything to everyone, depending on where you came from. It was a publicly owned energy generation company that was going to supply everyone with cheaper electricity, or it was a private investment vehicle that was going to whip all of the wealth out of the UK and send it off to international developers.

Fraser: The reality is that it's some kind of nuanced mesh of the two of those things. A vehicle that will take a public ownership stake of new clean energy developments. It'll maybe take 10 percent if it goes into partnership with a developer. Maybe it'll develop its own projects entirely and that money goes back into UK government PLC.

Fraser: Coffers to be to be reinvested. There's some suggestion. They might also work with local communities, community energy groups and stuff, but we've yet to see what that looks like. So this is one component of GB energy on the generation side. The other component is that it's working in partnership with developers to Air quotes, de risk investments.

Fraser: The way that we read that is to take on some of the very early development style stuff, particularly around big ticket items like offshore wind, doing your kind of environmental assessments, understanding where it needs to link into grid infrastructure, port, et cetera, et cetera. Taking some of that early stage risk out of it so that projects can more or less hit the ground or hit the waves running as is the case in some instances.

Matt: And it's probably worth just sort of in a nutshell. Relaying how the government are framing it. So, um, just, just to kind of these points about public ownership. Okay. So great British, and I'm quoting here from their founding statement, the great British energy founding statement, great British energy, and I'll refer to GBE on this, GBE will be a publicly owned energy company.

Matt: There was a capitalization of 8. 3 billion pounds over the term of the parliament. So split that over the next five years. GBE will own, manage and operate clean power projects. And then your points about working partnership and leveraging private sector all there. Okay. So that's about agreed about de de risking.

Matt: But there is this, there is this public ownership. Okay. So, you know, I think many of our listeners. Um, may not be old enough to remember an energy system pre privatization. Okay. Some, some of you will, some of you won't. Uh, but this is this again, this is subtly radical, actually, to start to build, once again, publicly owned energy infrastructure.

Matt: Oh,

Fraser: radical for what we've been used to, bear in mind. Most of our clean energy is, yeah, most of our clean energy is publicly owned, it's just by Denmark and the Netherlands.

Matt: This almost could be the new name of our podcast, Relatively Radical, actually, not too much, just enough. Um, what is maybe a bit more radical even.

Matt: I go one step further is that they will be looking to invest in areas where investment maybe isn't forthcoming. And so these may be higher risk technologies and I think they actually name things like marine energy in their title stream or floating Wind and that makes a lot of sense You you mentioned the other part of this Which many of us including myself are waiting with bated breath to hear a little bit more about which is the local power plan And I think you've written A couple of pieces on this.

Matt: I've certainly been close to this, but what's your understanding of what that is and what it will do. And crucially, what gap is it filling?

Fraser: So the local power plan, they've penciled in 3. 3 billion of investment to support greater municipal and community ownership and delivery of energy projects. So it's very much sort of strikes at the heart of local zero.

Fraser: It's kind of delivery of, of local energy projects, predominantly owned by, by local people, local places. The gap that it fills is, It's fairly hefty, particularly in England as it stands. In Wales you have the energy service, in Scotland you have things like CARES, the Community and Renewable Energy Scheme, that already sort of stump up a bit of money towards this to support the development of local and community energy.

Fraser: But it provides funding on a scale we haven't really seen recently outside of, let's say, you know, research or innovation style funding into the local energy space. This is, this is quite significant, I think. Um, and it's a very, very strong Signal that Labour seems to understand that the energy transition is not going to look the same in Orkney as it is in Oxford or or Dundee as it is in Derby and and recognizing that local people do do want to stake in this.

Fraser: And I think this is a common thread through through GB energy, or at least what we've heard so far is that actually public ownership, whether nationally, whether locally, whether communities directly is immensely popular in the public. But it's also probably necessary to get the scale of change that we're looking at right now to, to get that done.

Fraser: The, the upshot of that is, you know, while you, you might need to build a bit of capacity locally to help sort of deliver bigger projects, the upshot is that the scale of the prize, the social, the economic value, the revenue for communities, the wealth that can be generated, the jobs and skills captured locally is also immense.

Fraser: So it's, I think this is a massively exciting thing. We don't have the details on it yet, but well, I would say it's very exciting. I know you, I know you care a lot about this as well, Matt.

Matt: Well, and I do, I think I would echo everything you've said. I think it is a real potential game changer. A couple of things to note.

Matt: One, you mentioned public ownership. So I think this is where you're starting to bring public ownership. Um, you Uh, down to the neighborhood level, or at least the kind of council level. Okay. And I think when we talk about GB energy, you're talking about real big kit. Okay. Offshore wholly or partially owned, uh, renewable power plant.

Matt: Okay. Might be a floating offshore wind farm, right. But that's the nationally owned here. We're talking about kit infrastructure at the local level. And I think that public ownership is nested. Okay. So it depends, depends on the scale, but also the geography of that investment. So I'm very. Very happy to see that.

Matt: And I think it also opens up huge opportunity for local authorities to partner with community organizations. Uh, because this, this pot of money here is meant for both three, the capacity issue you mentioned that is captured in here, there will be funding available for that. And in the founding statement that makes, makes it clear.

Matt: There's no point in having millions of pounds of capital expenditure available without having the people, the organizations, the projects to be able to draw that down. A note of warning or caution is that Whilst many of these investments and actually reading through the founding statement, the local power plan was one of the few that wasn't actually fully costed out.

Matt: So we had, had heard pre election, uh, the number of 3. 3 billion pounds being noted. And I think the Energy Savings Trust reported on that amongst many others. It isn't in the founding statement, which does make me wonder what, what amount of money will actually be available going forward, but make no mistake about it.

Matt: This is a game changer for local authorities and communities to tool up and roll out. Renewable energy projects that are wholly or partially owned by local people.

Fraser: Absolutely, absolutely. There's another, another dimension that we've been thinking about a little bit at Regen, and we'll be putting something out on this in the not too distant future, um, is around that shared ownership as well.

Fraser: So you might have local authorities and communities, you might have communities on their own, or. But what are the other on their own? But there's also scope here as developers are building even more ambitious projects, bigger projects that maybe a community couldn't take on on their own without great difficulty is the opportunity to support more shared ownership arrangements as well.

Fraser: So this kind of this this theme of of partnership, I think, is a really, really interesting one and one that anyone who's who's worked in the Specifically local energy, but the general energy space will know that a kind of that joined up approach is critical to getting anything done full stop. But it's also really, really important.

Fraser: And I want to, I'm going to continue to stress this, as I always do throughout this episode, is Local ownership, community ownership, public ownership, all of this has to be a means to capturing the massive value on offer from the energy transition for people, for places, for the country, if I can be a bit patriotic about it.

Fraser: And I think that has to remain the core driving mission, if it should be. If it slides into being, you know, GB energy, we do bits of ownership, but more, we're kind of just de risking private investment. And then that's, that's going to leave whatever local community or I think that's a surefire way to seed sort of resentment among the public for that project where the signals are strong.

Fraser: The signals are positive right now that that's unlikely to be the case. But I think if we could give one piece of advice to the Labour government, it would keep that, keep that in mind. Keep, they love their missions. They're driven by their missions. Keep that sort of that national wealth, community wealth, local wealth as the primary driving mission of this.

Fraser: And we will go so, so far.

Matt: I agree. And I think maybe what leads on from discussion around the local power plan, um, we nodded to this earlier, which is some of the local powers and, uh, planning reforms that are coming down the tracks. And in general, a lot of this is about creation or granting of new powers.

Matt: To combined authorities, local authorities to design and implement strategic spatial plans for that area. And that really matters because coming back at the local power plan, you know, you're having this sort of these billions of pounds over the next five years available for community and local authority led projects.

Matt: Well, the question is what plan they fitting into what they need to do is sit within a broader plan. For prosperity and economic development and infrastructural renewal in these cities and towns, but to then sit alongside the powers that that are provided to those governing bodies, whether they're Metro mayors, local authorities, combined authorities to actually implement those plans.

Matt: Because we've talked about the local power plant that gives you some of the money for the power infrastructure, but not not necessarily the other stuff, the transportation, the heat and to have this kind of systems thinking. So if I can simplify, it feels like Labour have introduced three or four critical pieces of the jigsaw that are going to enable local communities.

Matt: Towns cities to really hit the afterburners on net zero, but the fine detail matters and that that is what I think the next few months are all about. So their first 100 days and my BDI will be all over it.

Fraser: What was that phrase you used there, Matt? Hit the afterburners on net zero. Probably

Matt: a bit, a bit hydrocarbon heavy, that analogy.

Fraser: I thought it was very good. Sound like you're in campaign mode for a minute. I'd vote for it. Yeah.

Matt: So I think phrase is one of the other things to note. And this was a big announcement from Ed Miliband, who is, you know, is leading the kind of energy and climate agenda, uh, for the Labour government is around the scrapping of the onshore wind ban or the de facto ban. Okay. So this has been in the news in and out, in and out.

Matt: It finally, it has gone. Um, I know for, you know, Scotland, wasn't an issue, England it was. But there is, if you travel, you spend half the amount of time that I do in the north of England, um, traveling across the A66 and anywhere across, you know, basically north of Birmingham, uh, there's plenty of opportunities for this.

Fraser: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh no, I'm, I'm delighted by it as a, as an ardent Scottish nationalist and, you know, England can stop leeching energy off of us and get your own. That'll be about time. About time. Um, yeah, but this is a very positive thing and it's. You know, speaking to people in particularly local authorities, community energy sector, as we often do, um, they see a sort of revival of big opportunities that had sort of faded a little bit.

Fraser: Now, some things were still getting built, but nothing of any any real scale, whereas whereas now there's there's more opportunities for those local smaller scale style projects to bring some some real value. It's yeah, positive news across the board.

Matt: I mean, before we maybe turn to what was possibly missing, I think it's also worth noting that, you know, our, our remit here is, isn't just energy, isn't just climate, but sustainability much more, much more broadly.

Matt: No, there was, there was some other elements in here, which caught the eye reintroduction of the 2030 ban sales of new petrol and diesel cars, which was you know, met with much consternation when, uh, former prime minister Sunak pulled that away. I should say that sits against some very warm words for car owners generally in the manifesto and a reticence really to, to, to recalibrate how we think about mobility.

Matt: But that, but this, this, this, this does sit alongside some really interesting policies around, uh, public transport. So buses about giving new powers for local leaders to franchise local bus services, uh, lift the ban on municipal ownership. And then that's sitting against rail in terms of great British railways and really reinvigorating public ownership of our rail system.

Matt: And one of the things that really caught the eye. In that because there's a whole load of things about just making rail easier and more affordable for people, but there was one thing I've highlighted here, which was better integration with other modes, such as buses and cycle hire, and this integration of public transportation with active travel, but just, I mean, even just on, on, we've covered maybe some of the transportation issues, but if anything jumps off the page there, I'd be really interested to hear it because, you know, it's, it's been something that's been long neglected and something we have talked about a lot on this pod in the past.

Fraser: No, it is, of course. And you know, in the UK, you're one of two types of voters, aren't you? You're either someone who glues themselves to the motorway to protest the climate, or you're someone who runs protesters over. There's no in between in our bipartisan system. So it's nice that we're trying to bring both of those together a little bit for more integration.

Fraser: This is what happens when it's just you and I and no supervision. But no, the integration thing is, is absolutely spot on. I think the, the legacy that, that Labour picked up thinking about, you know, the real strikes, which are still ongoing, they've not been, they've not been resolved yet. Um, although there was some resolution around the junior doctor strike, which is, which is interesting.

Fraser: The sort of legacy that they've inherited from the Conservatives and the disarray that particularly real. I

Matt: think we just need to be, be fair and also accurate in terms of as, as, and when we're talking, I think as, and when we're talking that I think the RMT union has settled a very long run dispute over the last two years.

Matt: But as we're sitting here in Scotland, there is still an ongoing dispute. Um, I think it's just, it's worth reflecting that the big, the big focus for Labour government In the last month or two has been about settling these trade union disputes and these industrial disputes across the board. This isn't just energy and climate and transport, but that does speak, I think, to part of their ideology and the way that they're going to govern, which raises interesting questions about the oil and gas industry, which we might come to in a moment.

Fraser: Don't get us started. Um, no, no, I, I agree entirely. And I think again, it's that we talked before that sort of signal of intent, um, as it seems to be the case again, it's, it's, we're, we're not into the weeds on those, on those discussions, but speaking to the broader, broader public transport point, the idea of integration is right.

Fraser: The idea of, in my opinion, at least municipal ownership is right. Uh, bear in mind, Scotland did renationalize rail. a couple of, a couple of years back to, to mixed experience, I would say. Um, but absolutely, if we're going to do any of this climate stuff, you, the key, we hear it time and time again, the key thing to get people out of the cars is to have the alternatives there and ready to go and working well and affordable and convenient.

Fraser: And any step towards that, based on what we have already, I, I would argue is, is positive, but big challenge.

Matt: Yeah, wrestling. I mean, we'll come to heat in a moment, but there was a line about not wrestling people's boilers off their walls. My, my sense of the British public is they'd much prefer you to wrestle a boiler out of the house and their car keys out of the, you know, the little tiny drawer with all the other stuff, you know, that you don't necessarily need, but taking a car off somebody's, you know, It's quite the thing to do.

Matt: So good luck Labour um, and I, and I can kind of see why that isn't in the manifesto, because I don't think it's necessarily realistic to assume that car use globally and it's on the up and up and up can just be replaced.

Matt: Last point I wanted to raise before we maybe turn a bit more of a critical eye is water. Okay. So water is something we've, we've covered off before Hugo tag home and others have, uh, talked about this at length. It's a subject that I've become really interested in over the last couple of years at the time of recording.

Matt: Fergal Sharkey has just published a piece calling for further action in terms of cleaning up our rivers and other waterways. What people really want to hear is about the big fat cap bonuses and all the rest. And I think there's, um, There is stuff in here. Okay. So, you know, giving regulators the much maligned off what powers to block bonuses and pursue criminal convictions for water companies and to put failing water companies under special measures.

Matt: There's some stuff in here, whether it will actually do the job remains to be seen. I'm not expert enough in this area, but my understanding, again, reflecting a lot on what Sharkey and others have said is that bill payers are now being expected to potentially pay even more to right the wrongs of the past.

Matt: And yet the dividends of, of our, this natural monopoly are going elsewhere, not back into either reducing our bills or into the pockets of the people as it is torrential rain outside once again, Fraser water's never far from the minds of, of, of the, of the average Scott.

Fraser: Yeah. Oh God, it's never far from the living room floor of the average Scott.

Fraser: Um, I'm trying to think of the right word to describe what's happened in water over the last couple of years. But again, particularly in England, but Scotland has not been immune to this, Wales has not been immune to this. Um, but in terms of the way that that's, that's panned out, there's a general resentment towards the way that regulation has happened or not happened when it, when it should have.

Fraser: The way that things have not already been enforced when they should have been enforced. And I think people are rightly pissed off that there might be any expectation that increased bills would go to reimbursing, whether it's profits or whether it's investment of companies who have made such a royal arse of of their operations.

Matt: Right. So I think it's for us to get on our respective soap boxes actually, and to reflect on maybe what was missing from that manifesto and what was missing from the King's speech. From your perspective, what was lacking?

Fraser: Heat, heat, heat, and heat. This was the big one. So we know that over the next 10, 20, 50 years, we're all going to have to switch off gas boilers, oil boilers, etc onto heat pumps, district heat networks, or similar. This is an enormous challenge. It's something that is underway in earnest, but a very, very small scale. Um, and it's something that while Labour in the manifesto did mention the warm homes plan, which is more focused on insulating houses to bring down bills, but also potentially supporting other measures such as solar PV and heat pumps.

Fraser: There wasn't a A huge amount of detail that hasn't been a huge amount of detail since I appreciate it's not been. It's not been all that long, but this in terms of the social challenge of net zero of the things that we have to get done that are going to affect people in their houses. I don't know that there's a, um, there's a bigger issue than than the heat transition.

Fraser: I don't know that there's a sharper issue in the than than the heat transition, something that affects us all as directly as that. My sense is, and we picked up on this a little earlier, is that you do the bigger ticket stuff, you deliver some of the benefits from that, you sort of build trust a little bit, and then next election is, or next parliament, assuming that you're planning for, for two terms, is when you, you get into that sort of naughtier stuff.

Fraser: But again, it's not one of these things that you can really afford to, to kick down the road in terms of the, the scale of, of what needs to be delivered, the number of heat pumps into people's houses. And remember, the conservatives had committed previously to, was it 600, 000 heat pumps per year? Homes with 600, 000 heat pumps per year by 2027?

Fraser: That's not all that far away. And I'm not, I'm not gonna, I wouldn't necessarily put my money on us achieving that, um, at this stage, but it's, I think this is, this is the issue that everything else needs to be gearing up towards. This is where we're kind of gonna. Standard fall 2030 35 and 40 on on on net zero in my opinion.

Fraser: Um, but I don't know Matt What was your thinking around this?

Matt: Well, heat, or a variety of that word, i. e. heating or heater, was mentioned four times in the manifesto. Yet, you know, how many people were able to adequately heat their homes? Or how many people were not able to adequately heat their homes over the last three years?

Matt: Conspicuous by its absence, I'm very worried about it. It'll be something That I hope is dealt with in their warm homes plan. It's something I fear might not be thought of in the kind of systems thinking way that it demands because it isn't just heat pumps. It isn't just district heating. You know, you have to be going around to individual properties and thinking in the round about what best type of heating solution will suit that home.

Matt: And then you've, you know, after taking a fabric first approach, but that this is not simple stuff. This is, this is really complex. You know, our housing stock is, is so, uh, heterogeneic, even you just walk up in my street, right? Each home is different. Um, and so, yeah, we've gone through this, we've talked about this, you go into episodes and type in heat and you will find how much we've talked about this, um, for it to be absent basically absent in this, in this manifesto, worries me, but it isn't too late. Okay. That warmer homes plan could, um, include this. I imagine it will include this. How heat will be dealt with really does remain to be seen.

Fraser: You used the word canny before Matt, and I think that's probably part of it is they wanted to avoid We discussed this with Professor John Curtis and with Daisy Powell Chandler in the last episode.

Fraser: They wanted to avoid an out and out net zero culture war. There was no real sense that the UK public, the UK voters, were interested in an out and out net zero culture war. uh, culture war, regardless of your Telegraph headlines. Um, so I, I think that it has been dodged and it's been quite cutely dodged as well, but it, you know, it, it will rear its, it will rear its heads, um, over the, the coming years.

Fraser: I think there's also, as you're kind of, you talked earlier about the, the different plans that are in place, sort of devolution of, of powers and energy planning, climate net zero planning, local development planning, all these, all these other things. It's very, very difficult to do any of that comprehensively.

Fraser: when at such a significant component as heat is, is not necessary. You're not clear on what the support looks like. You're not clear on what the funding looks like. You're not clear on what the policy looks like. The other, the other dimension of this is we're just off the back of two years, two and a half years of record high energy prices.

Fraser: record high energy debt, record high fuel poverty, and, and record high sort of levels of, of hardship that's, that's happened to people who haven't been able to, to afford their bills. Now, while Labour have talked an awful lot about bringing bills down, talked an awful lot about, you know, the role that GB Energy might play, or building more renewables might play, or, you know, market reform over, over the coming years, there is no current sort of clear plan for how are we going to support the people who are struggling in fuel poverty looking ahead to a winter of still very, very high energy prices compared to 2020.

Fraser: And going up.

Matt: Again, you know, we've just had an indicator. 17, 1800

Fraser: now from Cornwall Insight. So we're, we're not clear. We've had murmurings that there might be discussions about a social tariff for anyone who doesn't know a social tariff is where, you know, the first certain amount of your energy It's covered either very cheaply or for free if you meet certain, uh, criteria around income or vulnerability.

Fraser: So we've heard murmurings that this may, may be in the offing, but nothing so far, and certainly nothing in the manifesto for, you know, cheaper bills in five years or 10 years for more renewables is great, but there's, we, we're still, you know, In the throes of a crisis that never really went away.

Matt: You know, I mean, the warmer, warmer homes plan, I think is roughly doubling the investment into, into energy efficiency.

Matt: And we assume clean heat that is currently available. That is according to their manifesto. One that occurred to me and is a kind of a broader point is, is, is Labour or is this Labour government going to take a joined up approach to net zero solutions? And what this means is. Are we going to continue the kind of siloed approach where you're going to, you know, Put a heat pump in here or an EV there without considering the system that it's sitting within the knock on effects of that, the trade offs that that's going to have, and you go back to water, right?

Matt: Think about water and I've been to a few really interesting talks of late thing, you know, when you're talking about water, you're having to think about a catchment area, what obviously flows downhill. You've got issues upstream will affect those downstream. And it's a, you know, it's a multifaceted source of value, but also a source of conflict.

Matt: And, and associated issues. So when you're thinking about clean water, or you're thinking about access to water, you're also having to tackle other issues about, uh, runoff from fields. You're having to think about flood management. You're having to think about the placement of homes. You're having to think about, uh, water infrastructure and about where that's going to connect supply and demand.

Matt: You're having to think about this, applying a systems thinking approach in order to avoid flooding to deliver potable, uh, reliable supply of water and so on and so forth. So just, I cannot really get my head around how this government is going to operate ideologically, systematically, any different to tackling these problems.

Matt: And I think that's not even a political statement. It might be one of governance and about how we set up Whitehall departments to tackle these issues. And, and any, uh, initiatives to kind of connect those together and, and, you know, there were elements of kind of constitutional, uh, governance reform in here, emphasis on things like, uh, House of Lords and the rest.

Matt: But I do, I just don't think we can do net zero in, in, in a just and fair manner without these departments working together, without ministers around that cabinet table working together. And I didn't see much evidence of that. In the manifesto, and that maybe was never meant to be in there. It isn't a vote winner, but maybe it's a vote loser if you don't do it right over the next few years.

Matt: So I'd be really interested to hear from people like Chris Stark and is, um, you know, clean energy mission control. Like how are they going to connect the dots to do that?

Fraser: Yeah, I think that's a fair point. I think it's a very fair point. We have even, I was, I was about to back back there with the example of, of energy again.

Fraser: Um, this sort of the new institution that Ofgem and the national energy system operators set up the regional energy strategic planners, um, which are meant to do this kind of joined up thinking at a regional level across all different energy vectors and linking into different local authority plans and strategies, et cetera.

Fraser: But even that, as we understand it is energy. Right. It stops short of house building, stops short of transport to some degree. It's still not, it's still not completely incorporated within that as much as there will be some, some consideration of it. So yeah, I agree wholeheartedly. And I think it's that that systems thinking needs to be at the heart of a problem as big and complex as this, but something else that was missing that I'm keen to get your perspective on.

Fraser: And we've discussed this also. on the pod before is community benefit. And specifically here, we're thinking about the building of new infrastructure, mostly things like transmission, pylon, substations, but also turbines also, you know, roads, housing, rail, whatever it might be.

Matt: Yeah. So maybe, and I'll be very brief on this because I think we'll, we'll, we ought to schedule, um, An episode explicitly on this is a lot of work going on in this area, but I guess when we're talking about energy, let's just take energy as an example, energy projects in terms of let's call it direct community benefit that can, that can flow either in terms of financial direct benefit can either either flow through ownership.

Matt: And we've talked about the local power plan, which might unlock doors for that. But currently a lot of this is around community benefit funds, which are form, we're not meant to call it this. And in fact, Scottish government explicitly states that it isn't this, um, but it is essentially a form of compensation, um, to, to local communities who are normally in close proximity to these sites.

Matt: Now, transmission you mentioned, um, we're going to have to build out huge huge, um, swathes of, uh, transmission infrastructure, particularly across, uh, Highlands of Scotland to connect that new supply to, to centers of demand. And the last government identified that there was a need for community benefit payments for each mile installed and potentially some reductions on people's bills.

Matt: What isn't there, and this is, we will talk about this in a specific episode, are really formal guidelines about how much should be spent, it's voluntary, you know, in terms of installed capacity or mile of installed transmission line, and how that, those funds should be managed and distributed. It's a real grey area.

Matt: Real gray area and it's growing and growing and growing. And I think for some people listening to this pod, they will have direct engagement with these community benefit funds and payments, but it's just, it's going to be a big hairy beast that's going to grow and grow over the next five years. Um, and I think Labour need to get ahead on it.

Matt: So, on that note, maybe if we just sort of turn to the defining moments over the government's term, if you can peer into your crystal ball, please, Fraser, and consider what, what might be in the intre not maybe now, but soon for this government.

Fraser: I think that the big thing for me is This, this, this big sort of central promise they made about reducing bills.

Fraser: It's, it's going to be very difficult to do that over this term of parliament. We know that, you know, the plan is that we get more renewables online, more of our energy is clean, therefore it's cheaper. The logic is fine. It's completely sound and the analysis stacks up, but we have a connections queue of over a decade as it stands.

Fraser: So how do you get all this on online and how do you get those bills done in that short term? How do you deliver the benefits to people directly in a way that they feel them so that they trust you to then, you know, come into the house and rip out the gas boiler and whatever else you need to get done.

Fraser: So this, I think is the, In terms of the things to watch for the next government, this is the thing that I'll be looking at and, and, you know, shouting about, um, as, as much as possible. There are other ways to, to bring down bills. You think, you know, that we don't need to get into the, the sort of how an energy bill is determined and what goes into it, but there are bits of energy bills that can move, that could leave, that could be covered, et cetera.

Fraser: So there are ways to do it. But I'll be very, very interested and certainly sort of supporting wherever we can to, to, to try and make sure that happens. But I, I think for me, Matt, that's going to be the, that's the metric, you know, every government has a, you know, measure us on this one thing or determine our success or failure on this one thing.

Fraser: For me, this is, this is it for them. Energy bills.

Matt: Yeah. Yeah, I think that's, I think that's a solid one. And there's some really exciting ways of doing that. Okay. And I think if you look at the ripple energy model and you wonder whether that could kind of be extrapolated through the local power plan, where for the uninitiated ripple energy, an energy cooperative, you can buy a share of, uh, you know, like a bit of a wind farm and that bit of wind farm will yield, uh, Uh, dividends, which are actually just taken as savings off your energy bill.

Matt: And this is where I think, you know, the octopus model and their fan club, and they're starting to kind of point towards this, where if you are co located, uh, next to some infrastructure, you can have lower bills. Um, I think that needs to be formalized and the government could do a lot to, to promote that, but yeah, lower bills, plenty.

Fraser: p`penty of market reform underway with, with opportunities to build some of that.

Fraser: And what, what about you, Matt? What's your,

Matt: Um, well, we're kind of. Touched upon it earlier, but I just think the way that this government's come out, the traps, um, around, and rightly so, I think, you know, there's been a lot of long term industrial disputes that really needed just cauterizing and dealing with, uh, managing, um, particularly with the way that sort of inflationary pressures have been and wages haven't been keeping up.

Matt: But once You know, to settle with one union and not another and to go, I'm just looking down the tracks and thinking as you close a steel fabrication facilities, oil and gas refineries, the kind of the real heavy carbon infrastructure, much of which might be closing regardless of net zero. I do see some major industrial disputes coming down the tracks.

Matt: As net zero rolls on and I just wonder how this government, the party of the trade union born out of the trade union movement, how it will tackle that. And I think that'll be really interesting in many respects. I think it would probably be easier for a conservative government to manage this, but if they do it right, and I think if it is framed in the way that we hear all the time, and it's in this manifesto, I might add that net zero and sustainable development is a huge opportunity for our workers.

Matt: It's a huge opportunity for citizens in terms of owning a stake in that economy too, and workers are both, then it's all to play for. Okay. But it's about messaging that and structuring that in a way that, uh, workers feel like they're being taken along for the ride, but not for a ride. Okay. And that is, that's really important.

Fraser: Some of the, the discussions around, you know, there's, there's obviously big challenges and In clean energy as well with things like supply chains, just now costs have been up globally with inflation. It's really difficult to get the bits that you need in the services that you need. Some of the, um, you know, the early commitments to we want to reinvigorate manufacturing in the UK and I think it was Ed Miliband who'd said, you know, we're prioritizing areas of sort of de industrialization that were maybe left behind in the coal transition.

Fraser: And again, the signals, it seems like the signals there. However, a slight, a slight pivot to, to close this out because politics doesn't only happen in the UK apparently, um, but there's some, some other things happening elsewhere that might have a bearing on this kind of thing.

Matt: Yeah, the US election. Okay. So, I mean, this is, this is the year we've talked about this.

Matt: This is the year of elections. We mentioned this on the last episode, US election. I mean, if Trump gets in the U S pulls out of the Paris agreement, again, very likely there is real big emphasis on protectionism, potential trade wars, geopolitical tensions, if Harris. Gets in, uh, or remains in, however you want to look at it.

Matt: And the Democrats stay in, they continue with the inflation reduction act. They, they push, push, push hard on the U S leading from the front in terms of, let's say net zero industrial strategy for want of a better word. And Paris agreement stays intact. I mean, it is almost like looking, it is a sliding doors moment.

Matt: And I've mentioned this before, you know, full on climate anxiety about every U S election. But this is just almost takes your breath away.

Fraser: Yeah, it's a, it's a biggie. It's a real, real biggie. The Inflation Reduction Act as well, it's been sort of lauded globally by, you know, certainly people in our sector and people that we talk to.

Fraser: You rarely hear anything particularly bad of it, quite the contrary. The scale of the ambition in it is is really, really immense. Um, so I guess, yeah, it will be, it will be a big one. Feels like, feels like the tides sort of on, on Harris side, on the Democrats side at this moment in time.

Matt: It’s a long, it's a long game.

Matt: I mean, I don't want to use another footballing analogy or a soccer analogy in this context, but yeah, I mean, look, I'm just from a pure climate perspective. I pray to God that they, um, they succeed, but I don't think it's the only, um, Geopolitical issue. I kind of see two others. And I think the, the second kind of maybe follows the first, which is about geopolitical tensions.

Matt: And I think whoever wins the U S election, that will dictate a lot of the, um, how other tensions play out, whether that be Israel, Palestine, whether that be Ukraine, and I certainly don't want us to get into those. Right. But what I do want to flag is how those are managed. Then we'll have a ripple effect.

Matt: With regards to, um, international relations and that will then have an impact upon the trading arrangements between key countries. And you start to get into the question marks about, well, you know, who's China, China going to trade with, or, you know, what, what trade restrictions or embargoes are the U S going to place in terms of tariffs, say on Chinese electric vehicles or solar panels, and.

Matt: This raises real questions about net zero and supply chains in terms of Labour, in terms of the products and services that you need to deliver this also the finance to bankroll this. So yeah, I, I, it will be a ripple effect and I don't know where it leads us in terms of, in terms of that. And maybe if we can just add in just climate breakdown more broadly across the planet Fraser, cause it's been the hottest year on record.

Matt: Despite, despite our mild and wet summer. Yeah. Despite our washout summer, yeah, despite the 12 degrees in mid August here, you add that into the mix, and that will stoke conflict and tension. So I just hope, you know, as a kind of global community, we can overcome that and still keep the climate action and sustainable development going.

Matt: Show on the road because it's the only way we get through this, but there will be, there'll be some big distractions along the way that could, could really derail things on that uplifting note.

Matt: Yeah, perfect. Well, look, we've, I think we've set up about a year's worth of podcast episodes, don't you? So, um, you've been listening to local zero. If you enjoy the pod, there are some very quick things you can do to really help us out. Can you tell us what these are please Fraser?

Fraser: I certainly can. Number one, rate Local Zero wherever you listen.

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Matt: Absolutely. But really the single most powerful tool for growing the pod and reaching more people is word of mouth and personal recommendations.

Matt: So hit the share button and send us onto your friends and family and let's grow the local zero community. But for now, thank you for listening and goodbye. Goodbye. Bye bye.