A study by the Worldwide Fund for Nature [WWF] has suggested that eco-friendly policies outlined in the March 2021 Budget equate to 0.01 per cent of UK GDP.
WWF say that the spending is far short of what is required to help avert climate change, after the government’s own Climate Change Committee said that one per cent of UK GDP must be spent annually to keep the country on track with its climate goal of hitting net zero carbon emissions by 2050.
WWF’s Isabella O’Dowd said: "It's not yet too late to prevent global warming from rising above 1.5 degrees Celsius - it is in our hands.
"But to do that, the UK government must play its part by keeping every climate promise it has made."
The pressure group has also said that some policies within the March Budget - totalling some £40 billion in investment - actually increase pollution and have received a significant amount more funding that greener policies have.
This is vindicated by the fact that the government pledged just £12 billion to its own ten-point plan for a “green industrial revolution” in November last year.
Research also suggests that the Treasury’s fuel duty freeze has led to an increase of carbon emissions of up to five per cent and has seen the Treasury lose out on £11.2 billion in the 2019/20 financial year.
A spokesperson for the Treasury has said that a comprehensive finance strategy for the “green industrial revolution” that the government has promised will be unveiled in the autumn of 2021.
The spokesperson added: "The UK is a world leader in the global effort to tackle climate change, growing our economy by 78 per cent while cutting emissions by 44 per cent over the past three decades and being the first major economy to legislate to reach net zero emissions by 2050."
However, WWF insists that one of the key milestones in the road to net zero, a 78 per cent reduction in carbon emissions by 2035, will not materialise if the current rate of annual spending on green initiatives continues.
In the wake of the WWF study, the Climate Change Committee chief Chris Stark commented: “We estimate the cost of reaching net zero to be around one per cent of GDP per year, a mixture of public and private money.
"Not all of that funding will be reflected in the government's Budget, but it's vital that a net zero test is applied to the Treasury spending review in the Autumn if we are to have a fighting chance of delivering net zero."
Meanwhile, a report from the All-Party Parliamentary Climate Change Group indicates that just 61 out of a total 135 green policies recommended by the Climate Change Committee have been implemented.
The PM has promised that the UK will present several green policies ahead of the nation’s hosting of the UN climate summit, COP26, in Glasgow this November.
Some climate experts have suggested that the UK must take the lead in decarbonising its own economy to demonstrate to other nations that it can be done. In the meantime, backbench Tory MPs have called on the government to come forward with financing plans for the move toward a green economy as soon as possible, amid concerns that the UK will implement expensive plans to reduce CO2 output while other countries do not reciprocate.
Elsewhere, last week saw Scotland’s first minister Nicola Sturgeon write to the prime minister asking him to reassess plans to develop a new oil field in the North Atlantic west of the Shetland Islands.
Sturgeon said that the plans for the Cambo oil field had to be reconsidered after the IPCC’s recent report hammered home “the severity of the climate emergency”.
If given approval by the Oil and Gas Authority, drilling at the site could begin as early as next year, with the field forecast to produce oil and gas for a period of around 25 years.
While the prime minister favours a swift transition over to renewable energy sources, the UK government has acknowledged an “ongoing demand” for oil and gas.
Furthermore, the oil and gas sector in Scotland supports over 100,000 local jobs, and should the development of the Cambo field go ahead, it is likely to generate thousands more.
