Luke Pollard MP appeared on Sky news this morning in response to a new report which states that the UK is already undergoing significant disruptive climate change, with increased rainfall, sunshine and high temperatures.

In an interview with presenter Adam Boulton, Luke urged ministers to decarbonise the economy faster and take urgent action rather than rely on soundbites and press releases.

Luke Pollard has issued a statement saying:

“As today’s report warns, the more severe impacts of climate change, extreme heat, wildfires and flash floods, are happening here and now.

“But re-announcing inadequate funding plans can’t hide the Government’s woeful failure to protect communities and businesses.

 

“The Climate Change Committee warned in June that the government is failing to build the efficient homes, strengthened flood defences, and resilient natural habitats necessary to adapt to rising temperatures. Those failures are putting people, nature, and our economy at risk.

 

“Wake up call after wake call still isn’t shocking this Government into the urgent action we have to see on the climate and ecological emergency. Labour’s Green Economic Recovery would see £30 billion in planned capital investment supporting up to 400,000 new, clean jobs in manufacturing and other key sectors.”

In his Sky News interview today, Luke said:

“We really do need to see a faster decarbonisation of our economy, and we need to see faster work to protect biodiversity, to protect nature. We have far too many species facing extinction, far too many habitats being destroyed. All of that means that I think we need to recognise that ministers will need to do things in a different way than we’ve seen so far, we will need to accelerate programmes to reduce emissions from our housing, (and from) our transport systems as well.

 

“The floods that we’ve seen in the last week really need to be a wake-up call that we won’t solve the climate crisis, we won’t protect vulnerable communities, if all we’re doing is issuing press releases. We need to see proper delivery and action from the Government, and I’m afraid that’s just not what we’re seeing at the moment.”

You can watch a clip from Luke’s Sky news interview below.