‘Britain ready’ to fight climate change, Burnham claims at Cop31 after greenlighting fossil fuel project

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The Prime Minister made the remarks in his address to the United Nations Cop31 summit in Turkey as a decision looms on whether to license the UK’s biggest untapped oil and gas field, Rosebank.

Mr Burnham, speaking to an audience that included London Mayor Sadiq Khan and Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband, said: “The climate crisis is not a distant threat; it is upon us all now, devastating lives and livelihoods everywhere.

“The message I carry here at my first Cop as UK Prime Minister is this: we’re committed to meeting our 2050 net zero target, and committed to working with all of our partners to reach theirs.”

As the United States declined to send a delegation to the summit for the second year running, Mr Burnham insisted: “Britain will live up to its commitments. We will help our friends as they live up to theirs. Britain is back and ready to play its full part.”

But, in the wake of the recent approval of Jackdaw, new analysis from campaign group Uplift suggested that pending North Sea licences, if granted, could generate lifetime emissions equivalent to the UK annual total.

Climate campaigners also appeared unconvinced by Mr Burnham’s rhetoric.

Green Party leader Zack Polanski accused the PM of being “all mouth and no trousers, and no more so than on climate action.”

Friends of the Earth chief executive Asad Rehman said: “If this is all the UK has to offer, then the questions piling in about his climate credibility are more than justified.

“Committing to real, grant-based climate finance, rejecting the Rosebank oil field and saying no to a third runway at Heathrow are just some of the ways he can put the UK on track.”

Uplift executive director, Tessa Khan, echoing calls for a rejection of Rosebank, argued that it is “incompatible with safe climate limits.”

She said: “Burnham needs to choose in whose interests he is working.

“Labour needs to listen to billpayers and the millions of people who understand that this summer’s extreme weather was a warning of worse to come – and less time listening to the whisperings of oil and gas lobbyists.”

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