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Polling by More in Common for E3G (the independent climate think tank) conducted after close of polls on Thursday finds that delivery on climate is emerging as a key test for Labour voters for the new government, and Sunak’s backtracking on climate deadlines seems to have have cost him votes to the Liberal Democrats and Labour.
For Labour and Liberal Democrat voters, climate change and the environment was a top three issue in deciding who they voted for in Thursday’s election (after the cost of living and the NHS). For all voters, climate change and the environment was a top five issue.
Four in five Britons think it’s important that the government cares about tackling climate change - including nearly 80% of 2024 Conservative voters and two thirds of 2024 Reform voters.
Conservative 2019 voters also care about climate change - with 76% of them saying it is important to them that the government cares about tackling climate change. However, only 62% of that group now think the Conservative Party cares about tackling climate change. In fact they are more likely (67%) to say that the Labour Party does.
In fact, in every constituency a majority of people say they are worried about climate change - saying there is no electoral benefit in pursuing an anti-climate policy platform.
More importantly, the cost of living was by far the biggest issue at this election, and GB Energy helped Labour win the argument on cost of living, as the public are three times more likely to think that renewable power will bring their bills down than to think fossil fuels will.
GB Energy is a policy that had remarkably high cut-through in our focus group discussions throughout the campaign, and is supported not just by Labour voters, but by voters of all parties, including six in ten Reform UK voters who think it will be good for the country.
"It sounds like a really good idea and something that would bring the control of an energy company within the public domain to benefit more people. Whether it happens in reality and whether there's the political will to follow through on that is another matter."- Shiza, Psychotherapist, Edington
"I mean I think it's a step in the right direction. You want to be independent, you don't want to be relying on other countries and all that. So I think it's a step in the right direction. Will they deliver? Hopefully, but we'll see."- Eunice, Pharmacist, Altrincham
“Nationalised energy companies and other utilities would definitely be a positive thing, especially how we've heard of the ridiculous amount of profit that these companies have been making.” - Usma, health tech company, Birmingham
A key test on climate action is on energy bills. Three in five Britons (60%) say it is very important that Labour invests in renewable power if Labour is to keep their vote, and for more than three in four Labour voters (76%) say it is very important that Labour bring energy bills down if they want to keep their vote.
The polling also shows that Rishi Sunak’s decision to slow down some of the country’s climate transition timelines damaged him this election.
Sunak’s reversals on climate made it easier for their more climate-concerned 2019 voters to defect to Labour and the Liberal Democrats. For example, while 25% of 2019 Conservatives voted Labour or the Liberal Democrats at this election, that number is 32% for those voters who listed climate as top issue.
At the same time, the climate reversals did not help to stop Conservative losses to Reform UK voters. Even though Reform voters are less enthusiastic about climate policies overall than other voters, climate has low salience for them. Votes for Reform were overwhelmingly driven by immigration and the personality of Nigel Farage. Sunak’s decision to appeal to these voters by weakening our climate stance was ultimately futile because climate is not a highly salient issue for Reform voters.
Few people will look back on Sunak’s decisions to delay climate policies positively. The decisions to delay register for only 6% of the public on the list of Sunak’s achievements, and has much higher salience as one of his biggest mistakes. This has contributed to a broader brand problem that goes beyond Sunak’s specific policy reversals.
In focus groups throughout the campaign, voters frequently used the climate reversals as an example of why they think the Conservative party has become inconsistent and untrustworthy on their promises, and worried about what the reversals meant for their children and grandchildren.
Two thirds of Reform voters think it is important that the government cares about tackling climate change. Asking Reform voters why they backed the party, the overwhelming reason was for their policies on immigration, with 77% selecting this. In contrast, only 4% of people voted Reform for their policies on the environment.
In fact, our question wording experiment with Reform UK voters shows that where they do support scrapping net zero, much of this is really down to support for whichever policies Nigel Farage backs, rather than support for specific policies. You can read more about that in our full report here.