Rishi Sunak’s failure to attend Cop27 will come back to haunt him

The prime minister risks the UK’s remaining credibility over the environment, just 12 months after hosting the UN climate summit, writes Harry Cockburn

Rishi Sunak arrives at Cop 26 in Glasgow with his green budget box where he lead finance day (Getty)

A year after the UK hosted the United Nations’ Cop26 climate summit in Glasgow, the new prime minister Rishi Sunak has said he will not be attending the follow-up conference in Sharm El-Sheikh in Egypt.

After the enormous outpouring of concern in the build-up to Cop26 and the subsequent frustration at not securing commitments to deeper global emissions cuts, it is scarcely believable that the British prime minister will not attend.

In 2021, not only was then prime minister Boris Johnson in attendance but an opening video address was given by Queen Elizabeth II. There were also speeches made by (then) Prince Charles, who described the conference as a “last chance saloon” to save the environment.

Other notable attendees included Sir David Attenborough, Barack Obama, and Sunak himself, who as chancellor pledged to make the UK the “green finance centre of the world”.

Another key member of the UK government present was Alok Sharma, Cop26 president, who admitted he was “almost reduced to tears” in his frustration at some vital policies being watered down at the last minute. The decision by Russia’s Vladimir Putin, Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro and China’s Xi Jinping to not attend was deemed an embarrassment to their countries.

Sunak appears to have taken the last chance saloon metaphor too literally, with Sharma ejected from cabinet but still Cop26 president just two weeks before the conference opens.

The decision not to attend Cop27 casts doubt on Sunak’s climate credibility – just three months ago, during his first, failed leadership bid in which he lost out to Liz Truss – he played up the fact that not only were his two daughters “passionate environmentalists”, but also that through Cop26 the Conservative Party had “a powerful record on delivering for the environment”.

He said: “Last November we led the world at Cop26 with nearly 200 countries agreeing the Glasgow Climate Pact to ‘keep 1.5C alive’. We won historic commitments from countries to act on coal, cars, cash and trees.”

The decision not to even attend the world’s biggest environmental summit leaves Conservative leadership on climate change in tatters – and paves the way for environmental concerns to be dismissed in future.

With public concern about the environment at a record high in the UK, following record heatwaves and droughts, Sunak ignores the plight of the natural world at his peril.

Harry Cockburn is environment correspondent at The Independent