Tom Tugendhat says he does not accept the term ‘climate emergency’ in attack on Labour policies

The leadership contender claimed Ed Miliband’s policies are going to ‘destroy Britain’ as he criticised the plans for a state-owned energy company

Tom Tugendhat took questions on the Conservative Party conference main stage (Jacob King/PA) (PA Wire)

Tom Tugendhat said he doesn’t accept the term “climate emergency”, dubbing Ed Miliband’s plan for state-backed energy company “completely insane”.

Great British Energy will provide £8.3m of funding for renewable power projects across the UK and shield consumers from international market shocks. the new Labour government has said.

But speaking on the main stage at Monday’s Conservative Party conference, Mr Tugendhat claimed Mr Miliband’s policies were going to “destroy Britain”, adding: “Every single project he’s got is designed to make electricity and power more expensive, harder to get and to make us more vulnerable to foreign dictators.”

Tom Tugendhat said ‘we need to rebuild trust in the Conservative Party’ (Stefan Rousseau/PA) (PA Wire)

“His project on GB energy is utter rubbish, he’s creating a public sector energy to compete against the private sector and therefore make bills more expensive. It’s completely insane”, he said.

Asked if he accepts the term “climate emergency”, Mr Tugendhat said: “I don’t accept that term.

“What I think is that we need to make sure that we are getting energy independence and energy sovereignty back.”

Labour has Great British Energy will help “to make Britain a clean-energy superpower, with a fully decarbonised power system by 2030”.

He said it would be a “new national champion allowing us to reap the benefits of Britain’s abundant natural resources, with clean power projects in communities across our country, to create the next generation of good jobs, reindustrialising Britain”.

Labour has promised to work with the private sector to double onshore wind, triple solar power, and quadruple offshore wind by 2030.

But Mr Tugendhat accused the government of going too far with plans to reach net zero, saying: “When people hear net zero, too many people forget the word ‘net’ and they just hear the word ‘zero’, and that’s what Ed Milliband is doing.”

In July, the government’s climate watchdog warned that Conservative government left the country significantly off track to meet its international commitments.

The Committee on Climate Change’s report found that policies inherited by Labour inherited would result in only about a third of the emissions cuts necessary to reach the UK’s Paris agreement target.

The report said the previous government “reversed or delayed key policies … gave inconsistent messages on its commitment to the actions needed to reach net zero, with cancellations of, and delays and exemptions to, important policies”.

“It claimed to be acting in the long-term interests of the country but there was no evidence backing the claim that dialling back ambition would reduce costs to citizens,” it added.