Burnham approves Jackdaw – and Labour’s unity on climate action is imperilled with the stroke of a pen | Zoe Williams — SkimNews
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- The UK government approved the Jackdaw gasfield after parking the decision during the Holborn and St Pancras byelection, with the Rosebank oilfield still awaiting a verdict.
- Shruti Suresh, speaking at a Guardian climate event at the Royal Geographical Society on behalf of Global Witness, urged the audience to protest both Jackdaw and Rosebank; she was met with "audible dismay" when the news broke.
- The Jackdaw field is not large, will peak quickly and will not lower household energy bills, which are set on global markets, according to the column.
- The 1.5C target that the UK signed up to under the 2015 Paris agreement is "deader than a doornail" per 2024 scientific consensus, and this week's emissions-gap report says the threshold will be breached without urgent cuts.
- Chris Stark, former CEO of the Climate Change Committee, said Jackdaw and Rosebank have "sucked all the oxygen out of the debate around what to do about climate change."
- The Jackdaw decision is, in Williams's reading, principally about optics — a reassurance to the fossil-fuel industry, a "toxic smoke signal" to the US that Britain isn't aligned with climate action, and Labour politicking to deflate the Conservatives' anti-net-zero messaging.
Why it matters: By greenlighting a small, short-lived field that won't reduce bills, the government forfeits moral authority on climate and signals to industry and the US that it won't enforce its own commitments — while Williams and Stark note that a warm-homes programme would create more jobs and cut bills faster than new drilling.
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