Ed Miliband debates Green policies in Oxford 27/07/09

On Monday evening, Energy and Climate Change Minister Ed Miliband spoke to hundreds of people in Oxford about the government's plans for a low Carbon Britain. The one-off meeting was an idea of Miliband's, and was organised by Friend's of the Earth Oxford, whose aim was to challenge him on government policy towards climate change ahead of the Copenhagen talks in December. Friend's of the Earth had engaged a soon to be unemployed wind turbine manufacturer and four high-profile climate change scientists and activists to speak with Miliband.

He looked nervous as he waited for things to begin, probably because of the extra act that had been added to the bill to speak before him: David, one of 500 employees at Britain's only wind turbine manufacturing plant. The announcement in April that the plant on the Isle of Wight is going to be shut down, when the government's low-carbon transition plan is meant to create 1.2. million "Green Jobs", has caused many to ask why it has refused to step in to save the plant. This is the question that Miliband spent his speaking time answering.

"It's not about the money", he said. Vestas, the Danish company that owns the plant claims to be shutting it because there is no market in the UK for what it produces. 60% of planning applications for onshore wind farms in Britain are turned down because of local opposition, so the company is stepping up production in the US and China instead. Miliband argued that as the government could not just nationalise the plant, and that no other company had come forward to buy it from Vestas, its closure was unavoidable. The claim that nationalisation was impossible was met with opposition from the audience; one man cited the wave of recent government takeovers of companies hit by the credit crisis, but Miliband stuck to his position, citing the bad impression it would give to businesses wanting to invest in the UK.

The speakers following Miliband were Mark Lynas, author of 'Six Degrees', Oliver Tickell, author of 'Kyoto2', Ian Leggett, director of People & Planet, and Dr. M.A. Khalid, of Earthwatch. Leggett challenged Miliband on the government's plan for a replacement for Kingsnorth coal-fired power station, and on its failure to lessen the now state owned RBS's heavy investment in fossil fuels. Lynas, Khalid and Tickell made more general points, about the latest science on climate change, the view from developing countries, and how to break the climate deadlock at the upcoming talks in Copenhagen respectively.

People were clearly much more interested in the event than Friends of the Earth had planned for. With a vast amount of people unable to get in to the small collegial room that had been booked in the Town Hall, we had to move to the biggest room in the place, where hundreds of people were eventually seated, or stood around the edges. There were huge cheers for the Vestas workers, and for certain audience questions. 'Why doesn't the government do more to educate people about the dangers of catastrophic climate change?' got the biggest, and 'Why is it cheaper to fly to Rome than to take the train?' got another. Answering the first, Miliband agreed, but said that constant scare warnings were counterproductive, claiming that you have to offer people something positive to get them to change. To the second, he said: "domestic flights have got to become more expensive...We have argued strongly for aviation to be included in the European Emissions Trading Scheme. Personally I think aviation is undertaxed." However he didn't go far enough for some of the audience, continuing with: "we have an 80% reduction target. If we cut aviation emissions by that by 2050, we'd go back to 1974 levels of flying. But the world is getting closer together, not further apart." He concluded by saying that flying is so important, especially for the young, that cuts would have to be made in other areas.

Miliband used the phrase 'let me be candid with you' about seven times during the evening, but overall he was actually pretty good, addressing all the questions fired at him, and exhorting us to generally give the government a harder time about climate change, and to get involved in activism ourselves as we approach Copenhagen, especially regarding wind farms. He claimed that the silent majority in favour of wind power must do more to stop planning applications being rejected by a small vocal minority.

A green activist I spoke to after the event thought that Miliband could have been pushed to give more details on what exactly the Labour government was doing on the issues raised. While the activist thought it was fantastic that the event was put on, he said he wished that the questions on government policy could have been more focused. I imagine he had wanted the evening to show clearly to Miliband that a large section of the public wanted him to go much much further in his green policies than the government is presently doing. Things could have been more like this if the four speakers had not been talking about completely different things. The set-up as it was was good for people who wanted a chance to hear Miliband's policies on a number of different issues, but frustrating for those who knew what the policies were, disagreed with them, and wanted to see Miliband properly grilled.

Ian Leggett concluded by saying that Copenhagen would probably be the most important climate talks ever to take place. Britain is now one of the leading nations in advancing policy on preventing catastrophic climate change, so it will indeed be interesting to see whether Miliband will live up to the expectations of his audience in Oxford.