Political round-up Net-zero rhetoric becoming apocalyptic

The net-zero debate is hotting up.

The rhetoric of the United Nations is becoming ever-more apocalyptic with the latest references being to global ‘boiling’ rather than ‘warming’. Closer to home, Sir Tony Blair and other commentators are asking pertinent questions about the impact on individual liberty and economic prosperity of imposing ever more uncosted controls over our daily lives. One aspect of this debate over self-contradictory policies was highlighted in the Environment Audit Committee’s last evidence session before the Parliamentary Recess. The subject was the Climate Change Committee’s adaptation progress report and, in particular, the need to keep buildings cool during heatwaves.

One in five English homes overheats during the summer. With the prospect of hotter summers and warmer winters, I enquired as to why Government policy is designed to make buildings hotter, for example with more cavity wall insulation and reduced natural ventilation. Baroness Brown of Cambridge who heads the Adaptation Sub-Committee on Climate Change, conceded that lack of ventilation in insulated homes can cause problems including damp.

I asked her whether energy performance certificates (EPCs) should be able to take into account not only heat lost in winter through lack of insulation but also the need to reduce increased heat in the summer through natural ventilation.

Her response was that ‘We should move away from EPC to a much better system of green building passports that take into account insulation and net-zero but also homes being prepared for the future climate’. She cited the need for ‘homes in flood-prone areas to have property-level flood resilience levels’.

The Baroness also conceded that an EPC is ‘a measure with a number of problems and is not even a very good indication of the insulation quality of a house’ and agreed that ‘It would be good to replace EPC with something better’.

She did not accept, however, my suggestion that people should be free to decide these issues for themselves. n A Christchurch Liberal Democrat councillor has since shown how out of touch he is with public opinion by posting an incendiary tweet showing a church hall meeting being held to protest about an ultralow emission zone with the comment that he would ‘happily fill the room with carbon monoxide’.

Public reaction to net-zero zealots is ever-more resentful that people are being dictated to and are not being allowed to use their own common sense and judgment on these matters. Our discussion took place before voters in the Uxbridge By-Election underlined this very point by rejecting the imposition of a £12.50 daily surcharge on tens of thousands of vehicle owners living in or visiting London.

At the time of writing, the Liberal Democrat Party is yet to respond.