The Climate Change Committee is getting restless. It’s sense of frustration with the current Government is palpable, with it saying: “Notably, there has been no change in addressing this risk with the change in Government.” It’s almost as if the incoming regime promised much more than it’s delivering.

It goes on to note that over half of England’s top quality agricultural land is at risk of flooding, 6.3 million properties in England are in areas at risk of flooding from rivers, the sea, and surface water and over a third of railway and road kilometres are currently at flood risk.

After water there’s fire: the CCC notes that heat-related deaths already occur in the thousands each year but could rise several times over to exceed 10,000 in an average year by 2050. This increase is driven by the effect of climate change on a growing aging population, which is increasingly vulnerable to extreme heat.

Economically, it suggests that unchecked climate change could impact UK economic output by up to 7 per cent of GDP by 2050, creating challenges for driving sustainable long-term growth across the country.

Baroness Brown, chair of the Adaptation Committee, said: “We have seen in the last couple of years that the country is not prepared for the impacts of climate change. We know there is worse to come, and we are not ready – indeed in many areas we are not even planning to be ready. The threat is greatest for the most vulnerable: we do not have resilient hospitals, schools, or care homes. Public and private institutions alike are unprepared.”

The Adaptation Committee is required to review the UK’s progress on adaptation every two years. The vast majority of the assessment outcomes for the 2025 report had the same, and not very good, scores as in 2023.

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