The government of the United Kingdom has responded to a petition brought by the Harrogate Agenda, which calls for the UK government to hold a Brexit-style national referendum on Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s pledge for the country to attain net zero emissions by 2050.
The petition argues that since all major political parties in the UK are in broad agreement on the net zero pledge, the people of the nation are, in effect, without a true voice on the subject. Or, as the petition itself explains, “net zero target lacks legitimacy and without a referendum the current climate change policy lacks the explicit consent of the people.”
The government’s answer? Basically, be quiet and obey.
“National referendums are a mechanism to endorse major constitutional change; debates about national policy are best determined through Parliamentary democracy and the holding of elections,” the UK’s Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) answered the petitioners.
Under UK law, the government must give an answer to any petition that reaches 10,000 signatures. The current petition asking for a national referendum has reached just over 20,000 signatures, prompting the BEIS response.
The petition has until April 27 of next year to gather 100,000 signatures, which would trigger consideration for parliamentary debate on the subject. After quickly gaining the initial 10,000 signatures after it was issued several weeks ago, signatures have stalled at approximately 20,000.
A similar petition eventually led to the Brexit vote in 2016, but the current government believes that opinion polls show strong public support for the net zero pledge.
“It is clear that public concern about climate change is high, having doubled since 2016, with 80% of people in the UK either concerned or very concerned,” The BEIS pointed out. “We also know that people and businesses recognise that change must happen ⏤ 80% of respondents in a recent survey believe the way we live our lives will need to change to address climate change.”
If such a huge margin of the public supports the net zero pledge, a referendum on the subject should be an easy win for the pro-net zero crowd ⏤ certainly it would grant legitimacy to the cause and the notion that politicians had an actual mandate to act in such draconian ways on so-called climate change.
The Johnson government argues that net zero will lead to the creation of “thousands of well-paid, quality jobs across the UK, helping to level up the country. Tackling net zero will create thousands long-term jobs in our reindustrialised heartlands.”
That sounds good but many of the new jobs are dependent upon technologies that don’t even exist yet. As for the current technology, it is nowhere near capable of living up to the energy demands of the public.
As Paul Homewood from the website Not a Lot of People Know That points out: “Renewable energy certainly is neither affordable or reliable. As for home-grown, solar panels are largely made in China, as are the batteries and rare earths needed for electric cars and renewable energy.”
It sounds as if many of the “well-paid, quality jobs,” that the government promises will be in China or the nations which mine many of the rare materials needed for the construction of solar panels and electric vehicles.
The BEIS also argues that currently high fuel prices are a reminder that the people of the UK need to kick the fossil fuel habit.
“Recent volatile international gas prices have demonstrated that we need to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels,” the government’s statement read. “We need to protect consumers and businesses from global gas prices by increasing our domestic energy security through clean power that is generated in the UK for the people of the UK.”
Actually, high fuel prices are largely of the government’s making, with their mismanagement of energy supply. Essentially, the UK government is at least partially responsible for the problem that they insist they must solve.
Absurdly, the UK government argues that their net zero pledge is not about telling its citizens what to do: “Transitioning to net zero is not about telling people what to do or stopping people doing things; it’s about giving them the support they need to do the same things they do now but in a more sustainable way.
“Sustainable.” That old United Nations buzzword on which much of their climate propaganda hinges. BEIS also trotted out another UN phrase; one that has also been picked up by U.S. President Joe Biden.
“Taking action on climate is also crucial to strengthening the UK’s place in the global economy as we Build Back Better from the pandemic,” the UK government said.
It seems as if Boris Johnson and the United Kingdom may have removed itself from one extranational influence ⏤ the European Union ⏤ only to serve homage to another one ⏤ the United Nations.
