Peter Rhodes on equality, zero-carbon and how to compel without compulsion
You may believe that if you don't replace your gas boiler with an electric heat pump by the year 2035, the zero-carbon police will either forbid a gas replacement or confiscate your home and sell your children into slavery. I forget the details but it was something pretty stern.
However Keir Starmer now says there will be no arm-twisting over phasing out gas: “I don’t think that is the way that we’d take anybody through a transition. This is not about a government that is going to go round the country saying ‘you can do this, you can’t do that’. That isn’t the way to bring about the transition.”
This is undeniably good news. But the lesson of history is that if you announce a policy but fail to enforce it, nothing changes. People need to be nudged. In a government already famous for inventing buzz-words, I look forward to the emergence of “compulsion-free persuasion.” You read it here first.
