What Boris Johnson Can Learn from Britain's Greens
Brits have grown increasingly supportive of policies to fight climate change. A new poll suggests voters are even willing to pay more for them.
Big goals; big costs.
Photographer: Jeremy Selwyn - WPA Pool/Getty Images
When U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson told President Biden's Earth Day summit that protecting the environment was not “some expensive, politically correct, green act of bunny hugging,” supporters laughed, opponents were outraged and Greta Thunberg changed her Twitter bio to “Bunny Hugger.”
But Johnson hit on an important fact, the significance of which it’s not clear even he realizes: British support for all things green has become both broad and deep. In other words, there is no excuse not to enact policies that help Britain meet its ambitious net zero goal. And given the steep path to achieving that goal laid out by the International Energy Agency in its new net zero report, the prime minister can’t afford to delay the implementing policies.