By Barney Rhys Jones, MD, Good Energy

With all parties’ election campaigning reaching fever pitch, I was delighted to attend the Ask the Climate Question hustings at the Institute of Civil Engineers this week. Organised by a coalition of organisations including WWF, RSPB, Oxfam, Tearfund, and Greenpeace the objective was to ensure that climate issues are not forgotten in key marginals in the run up to the vote.

On the panel were the environmental spokespeople from the four main parties: Ed Miliband for Labour, Simon Hughes for the Lib Dems, Darren Johnson for the Greens and Greg Clark for the Tories. The packed audience was a lively mix of journos, activists and green professionals (like myself!). In the chair, Mike McCarthy of the Independent.

The big question for most of us is, why is the environment so far off the agenda this election? Greg Clark’s answer was that the main parties were largely aligned – and agreement makes for poor TV.  However, whilst the parties share some common ground -  notably on the threat posed by climate change (no deniers in this room), the need to improve energy efficiency and support for a green bank - what we saw over the next hour and a half did not quite support his assertion, with some great political point scoring and clear delineation of policy, philosophy and intent.

Ed Miliband as the incumbent was knowledgeable and assured in his presentation, but by asking to be measured on his plan left the door open to the others to challenge Labour’s actual delivery.  The principal challenge from Simon Hughes was that both Labour and Conservatives are proposing too little too late, implying some cynicism in the scramble to be seen as green over the last 18 months, when so little has been achieved in the years leading up to this. 

The Green Party’s Darren Johnson spoke with uncompromising passion and really laid down the aspirational benchmark for the other parties - criticising the Tories for lack of commitment, Labour for insufficient investment and the Lib Dems for not being prepared to make unpopular but necessary decisions.

Greg Clark had to fend off accusations from the Chair that despite the Tories staking a claim to the green agenda, with climate-scepticism worn as a badge of honour amongst Spectator readers there was strong evidence that grass roots Tories don’t take the environment seriously.  This was seized upon by Ed MiIliband who quoted a recent survey in which the environment was rated as 19th out of 19 issues by Conservative candidates.

It was difficult for Greg Clark to recover from those body blows in front of an eco-passionate audience.  Though his conviction that proposed legislation on key issues, such as a floor price on carbon, smart meters and an offshore grid, would be passed in short order carried some weight, in comparison to the Lib Dems integrated manifesto and approach, the Conservative approach seemed less holistic.

With Labour accusing the Tories of being shallow, Simon Hughes commented that despite the Conservatives environmental position being born of a need to detoxify its brand in 2006, their commitment still managed to outshine Labour’s record.

Virtually ignoring an aside from the chairman that the Green Party’s environmental section did not start until page 37 of the manifesto (understandable as the Green’s biggest communication challenge has been that they are not a single-issue party and have other policies) Darren Johnson had to face up to assertions that his party would never be in power so their position was of little consequence.  But his cry for the need for Green representation in Westminster so as to continue the good work achieved at local and European level on key environmental and social justice issues had resonance.

On energy, local authorities have a duty to make contribution to renewable energy targets, Hughes said, listing missed renewable energy and air pollution targets. Greg Clark claimed that setting targets at local level was unnecessary to achieve overall targets.  However, given the degree of NIMBYISM in the UK it does seems unlikely that without top-down targets being cascaded out the commitment will be achieved.

On the contentious nuclear issue: Miliband explained that no low-carbon technology should be ruled out; Clarke claimed that under Tory plans nuclear would definitely not be subsidised by the taxpayer; Hughes explained that the numbers didn’t add up and it would take too long – with Johnson agreeing that even if the numerous issues were resolved nuclear will be too late to help and other technologies would be better served with the same investment.

At the end of the debate, as I walked down Milbank in the sunshine, mulling the spin, the buzz, the accusations and counter-claims, I came away with the sense that we have to balance three things: pragmatic ideas; a track record of commitment to difficult policy decisions; and a genuine feeling that energy issues are central to the philosophy of the party we choose to support.