Michael Gove is a “monster” if he continues to rubbish green policies while fully understanding the urgency of the climate crisis, and Grant Shapps, the energy and net zero secretary, is taking “backward steps”, Zac Goldsmith has said in his first major interview since leaving the government.
In a surprisingly frank conversation with the Guardian, the former international environment minister also conceded that Brexit – for which he voted – could be detrimental for the environment in the end if ministers continued to abandon climate commitments in the face of a rightwing resurgence in the Tory party.
Goldsmith resigned from his post in June, after serving in government since 2019, claiming that the prime minister was apathetic about the environment.
Within a few days, the Guardian revealed that the government would not meet its promised target of delivering £11.6bn to developing countries to tackle the climate crisis. This would have made Goldsmith’s position untenable, as his role was to negotiate with the developing countries expecting the funding.
Talking this week in the exclusive 5 Hertford Street members’ club, which is owned by his half-brother Robin Birley, Goldsmith reflected on the changing attitudes to the environment that he has seen in the Tory party. Boris Johnson may have had a mixed approach to the environment but under his leadership Cop26 in Glasgow was accorded full respect. Now there are fears that Rishi Sunak is rowing back on climate measures as he is lobbied by sceptics on the Tory right.
Smoking a heat-not-burn cigarette, Goldsmith said: “Sunak is obviously talking to a particular gallery. That’s what he’s doing. But I just don’t believe the gallery that he thinks he’s talking to is a gallery that’s in any way going to help him politically. I think the number of people who are truly sceptical of climate change is really pretty slim.”
Goldsmith said he could not relate to Sunak: “He’s not a bad man. He’s not someone who’s hostile to these issues, but he has no authentic interest whatsoever. Maybe something will happen which will make him realise that this stuff really matters. Sometimes it takes an event or a particular piece of news or something for people to wake up to these issues. I find it very hard to relate to people who don’t see the importance of a viable healthy planet.”
The former minister appeared unimpressed by the cabinet’s recent pronouncements on the environment, and said he was “confused” by Shapps, who rather than promoting climate policy, has appeared to mostly spend his time attacking climate activists and vowing to “max out” North Sea oil and gas.
“Grant gets very animated when he talks about climate change, and the new technologies,” said Goldsmith, “So on one level, he likes to see himself as being at the cutting edge and sort of enthusiastic about this transition. But then, you know, we see him relapsing into a kind of caricature of a climate sceptic. I don’t think he is remotely a climate sceptic. I think he understands the gravity of the situation, so to see this kind of backward step is hugely disappointing.”
Goldsmith was also critical of the levelling up secretary, Michael Gove, who recently referred to environment policies as a “religious crusade” in an interview with the Sunday Telegraph, and suggested action on net zero could be slowed down. Gove, who was environment secretary from 2017 to 2019, was previously seen as a green Tory who campaigned for an eco-friendly Brexit with Goldsmith and authored the new nature-friendly farming subsidies.
“Michael is one of the most intelligent people in politics, whether you love him or hate him. He’s got a big brain, and he understands these issues,” said Goldsmith.
“I don’t think you can understand and care about the gravity of this issue, and at the same time, be willing to take your foot off the accelerator for political expediency. I just think that would require you to be a monster.”
Despite his hostility to former colleagues Goldsmith is still, quite literally, in the Tory club: the club he is using as his office for the interview is often stuffed to the gills with influential party members. Liz Truss and Johnson recently spotted having a tête-à-tête in a private room within. Longtime friend Johnson made Goldsmith a peer after he lost his Richmond Park seat to the Liberal Democrats.
Goldsmith was one of Brexit’s biggest champions, arguing that without the EU the UK could implement many animal welfare measures including banning fur and foie gras, stopping live exports of farm animals for fattening and slaughter and banning crates for pigs and cages for chickens, but he conceded that exit from the union could be environmentally damaging, as under a rightwing, climate-sceptic government, protections the UK had in the EU could be rolled back.
“Brexit really was about giving the government or the country freedom to do things that it couldn’t do before. But that also includes freedom to do stupid things, and as we have seen, in the wrong hands, those freedoms can be used for environmentally negative things,” Goldsmith acknowledged. None of the animal welfare measures were passed in the end, and Goldsmith was sacked from his position as animal welfare minister.
“I suspect one of the reasons why I ceased to be the animal welfare minister when Truss became prime minister was because there was just so much lobbying against so much stuff that I wanted to do in relation to that under welfare,” he said. “There are lots of things that could happen because of Brexit and still haven’t happened, and that is obviously disappointing.”
But he still believes Brexit was worth the gamble. “Even if the government today is backing away from these issues, which I just so wish they weren’t but they are, I think public pressure and democracy will push subsequent governments back in line and back in the right direction.”
He continues to wrestle with his decision to resign. “The UK is a pivotal part of forest protection, we need to be at the table, we need to be pushing it forward. Without these packages, I don’t see the Congo basin surviving. Even with someone like President Lula in Brazil, I think they’re going to struggle without international support. All these things are a source of huge anxiety for me. I worry that I know and care about this stuff more than other people in government and I was always worried that pulling out creates a void,” he said.
But the decision is made, so what’s next for Goldsmith? As an influential voice in politics, and the incredibly wealthy descendant of a centuries-old banking dynasty, it is unlikely he’ll be left in the cold. True to his financier heritage, he plans to “leverage philanthropy and the private sector in the most useful way possible to the environment”. But first, exhausted from all the infighting and negotiating, he plans to take his children on holiday, “probably to Cornwall”.
