Inside Labour’s fight with the unions

By the end of the year, Britain may be one of the few countries in the democratic world where the right is losing. In America, Donald Trump is the favourite to win. Ahead of next month’s European Parliament elections, momentum is with Germany’s AfD, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally and Austria’s Freedom party. Migration is the most pertinent issue pushing Europe rightwards, but many voters are also turning to insurgent right-wing parties as a rebellion against the cost of net-zero policies.

Labour sees an electoral benefit in sticking to its green energy plans to stop voters defecting to the Greens

In the UK, the future of green scepticism looks somewhat different. Should Starmer win a majority, the fiercest critics of his green ambitions won’t come from the opposition, but from his own side: the unions.

Unite, the trade union that gives more money to Labour than anyone or anything else, launched a campaign this week complete with banners, billboards and newspaper wraparounds. Its goal isn’t to preserve a Labour pledge, but to get one to be scrapped: Ed Miliband’s plan to block new oil and gas licences in the North Sea.

Gary Smith, the head of the GMB trade union, has ridiculed the shadow energy secretary’s agenda, saying that the only ‘green jobs’ for British workers involve either lobbying in London or counting the dead birds under wind turbines. Now Unite has a similar message. The campaign slogan is ‘No ban without a plan’. Any restriction on oil and gas exploration would badly affect industrial jobs – disproportionately in the north-east. In what way is Labour’s plan anything other than a green version of the Thatcher-era closure of the coal mines and steelworks? It’s a question the party has to answer.