Lindsey German examines Rachel Reeves’ disastrous move to favour economic growth over the goal of ‘net-zero’ carbon emissions

Rachel Reeves’ bonfire of regulations in the name of growth is predictably disastrous on several counts.

Firstly, it throws away the extremely limited regulations and checks on developments and buildings which exist. This is at huge cost to the environment and to any prospects for net-zero growth. 

A third runway at Heathrow (opposed by Keir Starmer only five years ago) will bring further pollution to the people of London, be extremely environmentally damaging more widely as it encourages more transit flights and will benefit business and the rich at the expense of the rest of us.

Secondly, it destroys any modicum of democracy which gives us any control over our immediate environment, as Reeves has already done with developer-led house building. 

Thirdly, it echoes the growth mantra of Trump which means more drilling and digging to make a small minority even richer. This while (unlike the US) the British economy is tanking and Reeves has absolutely no idea what to do about it.

Finally, as I have said before, Labour is smoothing the path for Reform, which will pose as a friend of working people against big corporations. As one senior Labour MP told the Financial Times, ‘People are holding their heads in disbelief’. This government is bone headed and inflexible as well as reactionary. And it is becoming ever more authoritarian by the day.