‘This absolute nonsense that you come out with. You do need to actually look at the facts.’
Zia Yusuf, head of Reform UK’s so-called ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ was called out by Labour MP Barry Gardiner for saying that climate change does not pose a threat to the UK.
Yusuf said on GB News that while the “British way of life” is under threat, “If there’s one thing it is not under threat from, it’s climate change”.
Gardiner, the former shadow secretary of state for Climate Change highlighted that scientists across the world “agree that climate change is a huge threat to our way of life. And yet Zia won’t accept that we need to do anything about it”.
Gardiner pointed to the fact that China has committed to reaching peak carbon emissions before 2030 and achieving net-zero emissions by 2060.
India has committed to achieving net zero by 2070.
Yusuf responded claiming that the President of China Xi Jinping and India’s prime minister Shri Narendra Modi “are laughing at us” by committing to net zero, but burning more coal than ever.
Both China and India have rapidly growing economies, and richer countries are outsourcing their manufacturing to East Asia, which is pushing up fossil fuel use.
The MP for Brent added: “The idea that China and India are in cahoots against the rest of the world is complete nonsense.
“If you knew anything about international diplomacy and the geopolitical situation you would know that China and India are against each other. India is extremely afraid of what China is doing.
“You’d also know that India is trying to ramp up its production of renewables to compete with China. So this absolute nonsense that you come out with. You do need to actually look at the facts.”
Yusuf went on to attack climate science. He said: “Decade after decade after decade, a UN report in the 1960s, another one in the 1970s, claimed that there was going to be some sort of climate catastrophe that was going to be the end basically of civilisation within 20-25 years.”
“Every time it’s been proven to be wrong. The reality is these scientists have no ability to predict any of this stuff.”
He also challenged Yusuf to name one such report. Yusuf floundered, before saying: “People can go and Google this stuff.”
“You can’t, because they don’t exist,” Gardiner added.
During a speech in Parliament yesterday, the Energy Secretary Ed Miliband presented the findings of the Met Office’s annual review of the UK’s climate.
He also said that politicians who rejected net zero policies needed to be accountable for their decisions, and called for opposition parties to unite around the need for urgent action.
Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward
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