𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

Two visits by different Tory leaders illustrate just how dramatic a change has occurred in the Conservative Party and the country over the past two decades. It will be 20 years next month since David Cameron travelled by dogsled to a shrinking glacier on Spitzbergen to see the impact of climate change. On Monday, Kemi Badenoch will visit an oil rig to champion new oil and gas drilling.

Mr Cameron’s visit is remembered as his “hug a husky” photo-op, an attempt to convince educated, progressive-minded voters in Middle England that the Conservative Party shared their concerns. His repeated efforts to show a caring side to the Tories – a party that believed in a “big society” and would become bedfellows to the Liberal Democrats in 2010 – delivered results over the years ahead, and he succeeded in turning swathes of seats yellow to blue.

Mrs Badenoch is heading to an oil rig in radically different political conditions. Mr Cameron urged voters ahead of the May 2006 council elections to “vote blue, go green”. The present Tory leader’s challenge is not to win over centrist Labour voters and Lib Dems but to persuade traditional Tories not to abandon her party for Nigel Farage’s Reform UK.

Reform, the number one party in UK polls, openly mocks “net stupid zero” and blames it for Britain’s punishingly high energy prices and the morbid state of the economy. The Conservative leader used the last Prime Minister’s Questions before the Easter recess to push the Prime Minister to tear up Labour policy and grant new licences to drill in North Sea gas fields.

Sir Keir Starmer’s response was utterly bizarre. Rather than defend the position or signal that it was under review, he said it was not up to him.

In a nation that traditionally prizes thrift and self-reliance, it is difficult to argue that sources of wealth should be left in the ground. Labour-supporting unions are also appalled at the prospect of the North Sea industry collapsing, and – in what appeared to be strategic buck-passing – he argued that the matter of licences was not his responsibility.

It is worth reading Hansard to see this rare example of a resident of Number 10 insisting he is not the “decision maker” on an issue of national importance. If she has questions about the use of Britain’s untapped oil and gas resources during a time of war and price hikes, he implicitly said, she should address them to Energy Security and Net Zero Secretary Ed Miliband.

Mrs Badenoch branded his stance “pathetic”, and she has now launched the “Get Britain Drilling” campaign and unveiled a series of pledges to maximise oil and gas extraction.

Not long ago, the Conservatives boasted about Margaret Thatcher’s early appreciation of climate change, and in the last days of Theresa May’s Government, the UK became the first major economy to pass a net zero law, making the cuts to greenhouse gas emissions legally binding. Yet now it seems highly unlikely that Mrs Badenoch will pave the lawn at Chequers with solar panels; the political climate has changed rapidly.

Why? It is not that Britain has become a nation of fervent climate change deniers, but the country and the world have been transformed since Mr Cameron made his dash to the huskies.

The financial crash of 2008 was followed by a decade and a half of woeful wage growth. Britons do not feel as if they belong to one of the richest societies in the world, not when young people jet off to work in Dubai, and China is a colossus of the global economy; the invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent energy price shock have raised frightening questions about the dangers of depending on imports.

Recent polling shows that concern about the environment ranks far below worries about the economy and immigration. People know the long-term consequences of climate change could be catastrophic, but it competes with a host of immediate fears.

The UK cannot prosper when it has among the very highest energy prices and is now confronted with a historic choice. Sir Keir, who faces intense competition in the upcoming May elections from the Greens, insists the “only way” to take control of energy prices is “through renewables”; Mrs Badenoch argues it is “completely crazy” not to grant new drilling licences in the middle of an energy crisis.

The Labour leader knows that he cannot backtrack on net zero and expect to keep Mr Miliband in his Cabinet. When he is already clinging onto power, the resignation of his Energy Secretary on an issue of such importance to the Left could be what it takes to trigger a leadership challenge; Mr Miliband is wildly popular with Labour members, and Right-wingers of all stripes will quiver in horror at the thought of him becoming PM.

The country looks set for a ferocious but vital debate about how we power our economy and heat our homes without bankrupting businesses and families while acting responsibly towards future generations. Mr Miliband is pitted against Mrs Badenoch and Mr Farage.

Centrist Tories will feel nostalgic for the days when their leader cavorted around the Arctic Circle while promoting social liberalism at home. We are in a different Britain now, and at the next election, voters will want a Government with a credible plan to keep the nation’s lights on.