Douglas Carswell MP: "I was wrong about the Climate Change Act...The Climate Change Act is giving us a low carbon economy the way that pre-industrial Britain had a low carbon economy"

Douglas Carswell | Home

My biggest regret as an MP is that I failed to oppose the 2008 Climate Change Act. It was a mistake. I am sorry.

On the very day the Labour government passed this fatuous attempt to "stop global warming", it was, if I remember rightly, snowing. Had I opposed the Bill, it wouldn't have made much difference, but I feel I should have known better.

Unlike much of the gesture legislation that goes through Parliament, this law has turned out to have real consequences. The Climate Change Act has pushed up energy prices, squeezing households and making economic recovery ever more elusive.

The aim of the Climate Change Act was to create a low carbon economy. I fear the Act will do that, but perhaps not the way intended. The Climate Change Act is giving us a low carbon economy the way that pre-industrial Britain had a low carbon economy.

Cutting carbon emissions by 26 percent by 2020 – as the Act requires – means, in effect, making energy costs so high that some will have to go without. How is that progress?