For nearly two decades, Britain's climate lobby has held an iron grip on policy, discourse, and public imagination, promising a utopian future of cheap energy, green jobs, and global leadership. From Westminster's corridors to the BBC's airwaves, the mantra was clear: Net Zero would make us richer, healthier, and safer, all while saving the planet. But the cracks in this narrative are now gaping wounds. Soaring energy bills, crumbling industries, and a public fed up with unfulfilled promises signal a seismic shift. The tide is turning against the climate change agenda, and it's about time.
The climate establishment's dominance rested on a seductive pitch: green policies would deliver prosperity without pain. Wind turbines and solar panels would slash energy costs, insulate us from petrostates, and create a jobs bonanza. As Maurice Cousins noted in his August 2025 Artillery Row piece, this vision transformed environmentalism from a middle-class indulgence into a technocratic consensus, backed by state funding, Big Philanthropy, and celebrity endorsements. Yet, the reality is starkly different. Britain now faces some of the highest industrial energy costs in the developed world, with electricity prices for businesses nearly double those in the U.S. Heavy industry is in retreat, steelworks and manufacturing plants are shuttering, while the UK's reliance on energy imports has surged, exposing vulnerabilities during crises like Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
The public isn't blind to this failure. Polls reflect a growing backlash. While abstract support for Net Zero lingers, a 2025 YouGov survey found 47% of Britons want climate policies scaled back when faced with their costs, high bills, job losses, and lifestyle constraints. Reform UK voters, with 32% endorsing reduced green measures, are leading the charge, but even mainstream figures like Tony Blair and trade unions like Unite are breaking ranks, questioning the feasibility of the green agenda. This isn't just scepticism; it's a revolt against a narrative that promised abundance but delivered austerity.
The climate lobby's response? Double down and deflect. Take the recent video by Simon Clark and Carbon Brief's Dr. Simon Evans, which Cousins critiques as a desperate attempt to "manage" dissent rather than engage with it. Acknowledging rising bills and Britain's mere 1% of global emissions, it dismisses public concerns as misinformation fuelled by fossil-fuel propaganda. This patronising tone, epitomised by praising the "independent" Climate Change Committee, a body of unelected technocrats, only deepens distrust. It's a tired playbook, seen in Brexit and migration debates: label critics as ignorant, pathologise their concerns, and cling to elite authority. But the public's lived experience, bills they can't pay, industries they've lost, trumps rhetorical window-dressing.
The folly of the climate agenda lies in its defiance of economic and physical realities. Low-density, intermittent renewables like wind and solar cannot power a modern industrial economy without massive subsidies and grid instability. The Office for Budget Responsibility has warned that Net Zero's costs, projected at £1.4 trillion by 2050, far outstrip promised savings. Meanwhile, global competitors like China and India, responsible for over 40% of emissions, continue burning coal with little regard for Western virtue-signalling. Britain's "lead by example" approach is not just naïve, it's self-destructive, hamstringing its economy while others race ahead.
This reckoning is long overdue. The climate lobby's promises were always more faith than fact, rooted in a utopian vision that ignored trade-offs. Green jobs? The UK's renewable sector employs fewer than 75,000 people, a fraction of the 500,000 jobs lost in manufacturing since 2000. Cheaper energy? Households face bills 60% higher than a decade ago. Energy independence? The UK imports 40% of its electricity on peak days, often from fossil-heavy grids abroad. The climate agenda's failures are not a messaging problem, they're a policy disaster, colliding with the hard limits of physics and economics.
The tide is turning because the public sees through the façade. From factory workers to suburban families, people feel the squeeze of policies that prioritise ideology over reality. The green backlash isn't just about cost, it's about trust. When elites lecture about "saving the planet" while ordinary citizens struggle to heat their homes, resentment festers. Reform UK's rise and the growing chorus of mainstream dissent signal a broader awakening: the climate agenda, as it stands, is unsustainable.
It's time to pivot. Instead of doubling down on unworkable targets, Britain needs pragmatic policies, investment in nuclear energy, which provides reliable, low-carbon power; deregulation to revive industry; and a frank acknowledgment that global emissions won't bend to Western sacrifices alone. The climate lobby's grip is slipping, and no amount of technocratic spin can stop the public's demand for change. The reckoning is here, and it's about time we embraced it.
The same message for Australian well.
https://thecritic.co.uk/the-climate-lobby-is-losing-control/