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Boris Johnson has warned the Conservatives they will not win the next election by “bashing the green agenda”.
The former prime minister said he had not seen the Conservatives “soaring in the polls as a result of saying what rubbish net zero is”.
Johnson’s intervention comes after Theresa May and John Major criticised the Tories for speaking out against net zero, making him the third former prime minister to step in on this issue.
Kemi Badenoch has committed the party to repealing the Climate Change Act and abandoning the commitment to reach net zero by 2050, arguing that the target threatens to bankrupt Britain.
The repeal of the act would remove the need to meet “carbon budgets” – ceilings, set for five-year periods, on the amount of greenhouse gas that can be emitted – and disband the Climate Change Committee – a watchdog that advises on how policies affect the UK’s carbon footprint.
Badenoch said she would replace the act with “an energy strategy that puts cheap and reliable energy as the foundation for economic growth first”.
Speaking to the Smart Society Show podcast, Johnson said: “Certainly in my party, it’s all about bashing the green agenda, and personally I don’t think we’ll get elected on that. I didn’t see us soaring in the polls as a result of saying what rubbish net zero is. I didn’t see a massive leap in support for the Conservatives.”
As prime minister, Johnson backed Britain’s net zero targets and hosted the Cop26 summit in Glasgow four years ago, which resulted in an agreement to limit the use of unabated coal and a commitment to climate finance for developing countries.
Since being forced out of office, Johnson has said Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the energy price spike that came after had been a “big kick in the teeth” that made it “really tough for people like us to make the case for reducing CO2”.
Outlining his support for net zero, Johnson said he had “lost none of my zeal”, and added: “I still fundamentally believe that it’s the right thing to do, even if you can’t get there as fast as we wanted to do.”
Major, the former prime minister, told a Conservative party lunch on Tuesday that saying “no to climate change” fell outside the “majority of public opinion”. He also said the party’s current approach to not only net zero but overseas aid and Europe “seriously alienates” most voters, accusing the Tories of a “loss of pragmatism, tolerance and nuance”.
“We, as a party, are ourselves in part to blame” for “anxious people … turning to populist politicians,” he said adding, “… when our party says ‘no’ to Europe, ‘no’ to climate change, ‘no’ to overseas aid – it falls out with the majority of public opinion.
“Such policies may delight a minority of opinion, but not the broad mass of electors in our essentially tolerant and kindly nation: it seriously alienates many of them.
“This loss of pragmatism, tolerance, nuance ‒ call it what you will – has left many long-term Conservative supporters politically homeless … Whenever our party lurches too far to the right – or condemns moderate Conservatives – it pulls us further away from the traditional mass of our vote.”
May told peers on Monday the move to scrap net zero targets was an “extreme and unnecessary measure”.
