Climate Change might be the greatest threat to civilised human life on earth but we can be sure that Gordon Brown isn't going to do anything about it on his watch. Yes, he'll go to all the international conferences and make the right speeches. He'll probably encourage his chancellor to put an extra £25 on Vehicle Excise Duty for the largest vehicles and an extra fiver on APD but it is very much business as usual, nothing is going to happen that will upset anybody. Michael O'Leary won't be loosing any sleep. Look at his record. Brown has been chancellor for ten years. He has had 9 or 10 budgets to move the UK to a low carbon economy. But it just hasn't happened. The cost of motoring has barely kept up with inflation and the cost of public transport has rocketed up. Putting renewables on your roof is just as financially unappetising as it was ten years ago.
Miliband was an obvious contender for Labour Party leadership because nobody knows anything about him, well at least that is what Michael Portillo said in the Times. But Miliband has made his mark on climate change. Miliband's early support for Personal Carbon Allowances is a clear indicator that he understood the scale of the problem and wasn't afraid of endorsing solutions that make economists start choking and most bank bench MPs still cannot get their hands around. David Cameron is given credit for getting the climate change bill adopted by the government but I suspect that Miliband had a great to do with that as well. Climate Change is always prominent in Miliband's speeches such as the Fabian Society speech and his recent New Statesman article.
Some commentators argued that if Miliband backed off from being a leadership contender then Brown would reward Miliband with a key cabinet position. But how will this work? Miliband's efforts at DEFRA have been frustrated by Chancellor Brown. Yes, Brown adopted some of Miliband's budget proposals but they were the modest ones. Letter leaked from DEFRA.
The job that Miliband really needs for the sake of climate change is Chancellor. But that's the last job that Brown is going to want to give him, he will be looking for a very safe pair of hands not somebody that wants to shift taxation from labour to energy.
If Labour MPs had got to vote for a new leader this year, it would not have been a choice between a Blairite or old Labour or anything like that but between bringing climate change into centre stage of all government policy where it needs to be or kicking it out into the long grass for another ten years.
Miliband gets it, Brown doesn't - Mark Lynas
At risk of getting off topic
If the Blairite camp have any sense, they will hold off running a stalking horse until this time next year. Let Labour MPs have a nice year of watching Gordon sink in the opinion polls, and then decide.
I can't help wondering if Jack Straw is telling the truth about the number of Brown supporters, after all this is the man who denied recognizing Robert Mugabe when he shook his hand. Brown himself claimed his pensions raid had the support of the business community.