Badenoch ignored Tory opinion research when she abandoned net zero. Why? asks Dave Toke?
As we all know, Kemi Badenoch has broken with the policy of the last three Tory Prime Ministers (yes, even Liz Truss as PM!) and abandoned “net zero”. She says it is “impossible”. “It’s fantasy politics. Built on nothing. Promising the earth. And costing it too.” Why has Badenoch done this? What is remarkable is that the research upon which the Conservatives say they are basing this new policy (i.e. the claim that voters do not want to pay for climate action) actually says the exact opposite of what they claim. Voters are clearly prepared to pay for or support government funding for climate action. So, what is going on?
Essentially, what Kemi Badenoch seems to be doing is to try and steal votes from Reform, even though ditching net zero risks losing many more votes to other parties. Badenoch is no longer playing the game of trying to win the centre ground. Rather, the climate issue is seen as a much more important game, first a battle for supremacy between herself and Nigel Farage, and also a battle with other contenders for her crown within the party.
Contradictions
The Conservative Leadership seems to have made some very strange interpretations about the research made by their think-tank sympathizers called “Onward”.
Previous research by Onward said that the Conservatives would lose over a million votes if they ditched net zero. The latest (2025) research implies that a large majority of voters support both extra Government spending and extra taxes to fund climate action. So many more voters would put at least some money where their mouth is than those who do not want to do so. Support for climate action remains very high among Tory voters.
Of the voters who expressed an opinion in the Onward study, voters believe by a margin of 50 percent to 35 percent that either a small or large amount of extra taxes should be raised to tackle climate change. An even bigger majority (54 percent to 25 percent) say that a small or large reduction in other areas of government spending would be acceptable as a means of funding climate action. In other words, there is a very large majority of those who express an opinion that money should be found, one way or another, by the Government, to pay extra for climate change policies. Much climate action is undoubtedly rather lower cost than the energy measure that Badenoch does support, that is, funding new nuclear power stations.
Research from YouGov indicates that over 60 percent of Reform voters think that too much is being done and spent on reducing carbon emissions. Just under 40 percent of Tory voters believe this, and only 25 percent of all voters believe this. The Conservatives’ policy shift on this issue seems to place them at great peril of being outflanked by the Labour, Liberal Democrat, and Green Parties on this issue.
Two games in electoral politics
The game most commonly assumed is that of trying to win over most voters. This may be about the position on issues, but opinion researchers tend to argue it is more often about parties’ perceived competence to achieve consensus goals. Kemi Badenoch has opted her party out of appearing to be competent on climate action. She appears more interested in a different type of game.
Badenoch seems to me to be more interested in how to ditch Reform than win votes from the centre. Reform is out to cannibalise and replace the Conservatives. This existential crisis means that there is a high premium on stealing votes from Reform. In this existential battle, every vote gained from Reform counts double if the prize is to beat Reform with more votes.
The problem, of course, is that the Conservatives may well lose more than double the votes that they gain from Reform by this manoeuvre. In short, abandoning the net-zero pledge is an act of desperation. Besides this, Badenoch has had a history since 2019 of voting against climate policy measures. She has received money from Neil Record, the Chair of the Net Zero Watch Group.
Badenoch, though she firmly denies it now, may have her eye on the terms of a pact between the Reform and Conservative parties at the next election. This assumes that she is not ousted before then, of course. The political lifetime of recent Tory leaders has been a lot shorter than the length of one Parliament!