Labour would take global lead on climate - Miliband

Comments come despite party's reversal of some green pledges this year

- Jessica Elgot

Labour will promise to take the lead on global efforts to tackle the climate crisis, filling a "vacuum of leadership" on the world stage and proving that Rishi Sunak's U-turn on net zero has been a "historic mistake", Ed Miliband has said.

The former party leader, who is the shadow secretary of state for energy security and net zero, said the UK needed to change course and was "off track".

Labour drew widespread criticism this year from economists, industrial leaders and environmentalists when it cut its green investment plans by half, rolling back on a pledge to spend £28bn equipping the economy to reach its climate target.

It has also been locked in combat with the Tories over the costs and benefits of a green transition and has given way in certain key areas. Last week Miliband said he would scrap the Tories' 2035 gas boiler ban.

But Miliband says the party would put the climate front and centre of its plans in government.

He promised to reverse the ban on onshore wind in the immediate days after parliament returns following the election. Miliband also said it was a chance to fundamentally change course on climate and to make that case on the world stage.

"We have taken the manifesto position we have because we think it is the right thing now. But it is also right that we fill the vacuum of leadership on this issue," he said in an interview with the Guardian.

"We now have a government that is explicitly going along with the climate delayers. We have to change course as a country and as a world.