After all the turmoil of recent years, you might think British politics had lost its capacity to shock. But a week in which some of the angriest voices raised against this week’s shameful climbdown on net zero come not just from passionate greens, but from car manufacturers and the energy industry? Now we really are through the looking-glass.
What happened this week was the most surreal opening to a long election campaign – for that’s surely what it was – I can recall. For the leader of the erstwhile party of business to water down climate policy and still somehow contrive to end up getting furiously attacked for it by Big Auto is surprising enough. Managing simultaneously to leave Boris Johnson claiming the moral high ground and Liz Truss looking relevant, given she had just called for such a retreat, is something else.
