The Reform party is associated with a degree of scepticism on net-zero targets, but that impression could be wrong. More than half voters who had planned to vote for Reform UK in local elections actually support climate policies.

Polling from Focaldata for the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) conducted the week of the local elections has found that more than half (54 per cent) of voters who planned to vote for Reform UK support “policies to stop climate change and put in place targets accordingly to keep the UK on track”.

The Conservatives were even more positive. The party that originally committed the UK to net-zero under Theresa May had two-thirds of its voters (66 per cent) saying they support “net-zero by 2050” despite successive leaders declaring it more of an ambition.

Of those who voted Labour at the general election last year but now planned to vote Liberal Democrat or Green, 60 per cent said they would be more likely to support a party that pledged to go faster on polices to tackle climate change and reach net-zero.

Alasdair Johnstone from the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit said: “Efforts to mislead over what net-zero actually means distract from the reality that the clear majority of Reform UK voters want climate change tackled even if it’s not their top issue and may well have tuned out of that bit of the party’s pitch.”

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