After Uxbridge, le deluge. In Manchester at least. In parts of Greece it was wildfires. For Rishi Sunak it was just a bonfire. A bonfire of green policy. The world was not quite warm enough. What the UK needed was a culture war. Who would have guessed that the result of one byelection in west London could have such far-reaching consequences? The message Labour took from Uxbridge was that maybe Sadiq Khan would like to rethink his Ulez scheme with a general election due in less than 18 months. When it should have maybe pointed out during the byelection campaign itself that the clean air scheme had actually been introduced by the Tories. And that the then transport secretary, Grant Shapps, had written to Khan to enforce it. Instead, Labour had tried to disown it entirely, hoping voters would ignore it. Go figure. Let the public die.
For the Tories, Uxbridge was a clear opportunity. Labour had lost a byelection that it would otherwise have won on a single issue. A green issue. Therefore the message was clear. The environment was a vote-loser. So what better time to appease all the halfwits on the Conservative right and start ditching green policies? Hell, we’d even drawn a crucial Test match because of the rain and Lee Anderson and the rest of the GB News team had spent the weekend inside, wrapped up in sweaters, trying to dodge the cold. Global warming? You must be having a laugh. Save that for your southern Europeans. Serve them right for staying in the EU. Their punishment for believing the climate science. Wish fulfilment and all that. All it took to stop global warming was not to believe in it. Simples. So over the weekend, briefings from Downing Street had been leaked to the media that Sunak’s government was having second thoughts about its environmental agenda. No matter that polling has consistently found that green policies are popular – most of the country understands the climate crisis; the Conservatives were going to play devil’s advocate. Drive a wedge between them and Labour. Attack Keir Starmer for misdirecting the nation’s resources on preventing something that may never happen. They knew better than the scientists. Besides, it was all such a long way off so we didn’t really need to think about it. Something like that. On Monday morning, Sunak was up in Birmingham on a pointless visit to promote a housing announcement that Michael Gove was making back in London. Understandably, the media were mainly interested in the changes to his net-zero targets. Rish! looked irritated. Partly because he always does when challenged. He hates criticism, believing himself to be right on all topics. But also because he is genuinely uninterested – incurious even – in green politics. It’s a sideshow. All that matters is inflation and growth. “No,” said Sunak. Nothing had changed. The government was still committed to doing the bare minimum that would cost virtually nothing. To prove his enthusiasm, he had even taken the helicopter. And it had been a hassle as his normal one had been double-booked. But it was important to make a point. That totally unnecessary air travel was totally necessary. Even if it took longer than the train. You couldn’t expect a prime minister to take Avanti. You wouldn’t believe the trash that travelled in first class these days. Imagine having to share a toilet with a stranger. And the coffee was filthy. Net zero must be pursued in a “proportionate and pragmatic” manner, Rish! insisted. As in, disproportionate and unpragmatic. Because if the government was interested in a proportionate response, it would already be doing more. We’re already doing far too little. And unpragmatic because by doing too little we risk making no discernible difference to climate collapse. So it’s a waste of money and the planet gets trashed anyway. Or a win-win, as Sunak would probably call it. The way Rish! sees it is like this. Far better for the Tories to come up with an outside chance of winning the next election than to worry about something that might happen some time further into the future. What the world definitely needs is more Rish!. And if it gets that, everything will be fine. You can get too hung up on climate science. So doing less to prevent global warming makes total sense. Typical woke lefties, trying to make people care about something existential. Things would work out one way or the other. So southern Europe might have to adapt a bit. People might have to learn to live underground. Or just reverse their days. Sleep during the day and work all night. It certainly wasn’t a problem for the UK. And if the Maldives disappeared under water, people would just have to find somewhere else to go on holiday. It was no biggie. What the world needed was for the UK to take a back seat. To do as little as possible while still pretending to give a shit. Having laid out his green credentials, Sunak went back to housing. The government was going to meet its promise of building 1m new homes in this parliament. Time was, the government doing what it said it was going to wouldn’t merit an announcement. But these days it’s a total outlier. Worthy of a lead item on the evening news. And any number of helicopter rides. Shame it wasn’t one of Rish!’s five vague aspirations. None of which look likely to happen. Sadly, Sunak was inadvertently also able to confirm that another of his housing policies – to build 300,000 new homes a year – was not going to happen. Unless you counted those homes that only existed in his imagination. Because 300,000 new homes a year equates to 1.5m over the parliament. A complete non-starter. No wonder Sunak thinks the UK could do with some more maths lessons. Starting with him. Down in London, Michael Gove was giving his big speech in King’s Cross. Like most things the Govester does these days, he managed to sound bored and semi-detached throughout. Pining for the crack den on his department’s roof, no doubt. Or just numbed by the realisation that his announcement didn’t amount to much. Just a few policies reannounced with a few bits of wishful thinking thrown in. Let’s face it, doubling the size of Cambridge in the foreseeable future just isn’t going to happen. The Govester is sharp enough to know this. So he just goes through the motions barely making the effort to summon the pretence. His eye is mainly on what comes next: his future after government. He’s not a man who wants to sit for long on the opposition benches. He can see this won’t end well. That he’s making promises in speeches he will never deliver. There’s only so much futility the man can take. Depraved New World by John Crace (Guardian Faber, £16.99). To support The Guardian and Observer, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.