The Conservatives said on Tuesday they will seek advice from some of the world's biggest companies on how to cut emissions from government departments by a tenth in a year if they win an election due by next June. Skip related content
The Conservatives, leading Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Labour in the polls, said it will work with Tesco, the world's third biggest retailer, telecoms company BT and B&Q, owned by Kingfisher, Europe's biggest home improvement retailer.
Shadow Chancellor George Osborne said government buildings should be much more energy efficient and public departments should use more electric vehicles.
The finance ministry will put pressure on ministers and senior state employees to find other ways to cut energy consumption in their departments. Those that fail will lose part of their funding, Osborne added.
Their success, or lack of it, will be published in real time on the Internet, he said. Senior party members representing each policy area will unveil their plans to target climate change in speeches this week.
"We are deadly serious about achieving this 10 percent reduction," Osborne told students at Imperial College London, a science-based university founded in 1907. "We have set ourselves a very challenging target of doing it within 12 months, knowing full well that people can hold us to account."
With countries meeting for U.N. climate talks in Denmark next month, both the Labour Party and Conservatives have been keen to promote their environmental credentials.
Osborne said Britain's finance ministry had traditionally been "at best indifferent, at worst obstructive" towards environmental policy.
"That attitude is going to change if the government changes," he added. "I want a Conservative Treasury (finance ministry) to be in the lead of developing the low carbon economy and financing the green recovery."
Under his proposals, Osborne said the government will save some 300 million pounds a year.
The government would begin talks on establishing a new investment bank that would consolidate all existing government funding of new environmental projects, Osborne added.
The public would be able to invest in tax-free savings accounts that fund "green" initiatives and the Conservatives would set a 10-year minimum tax on burying household waste.
Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband dismissed the Conservative pledges as "greenwash" and said the plans were not backed by promises of new money.
"The truth is that the Tories have opposed Labour's extra public investment, including the 400 million pounds allocated at the time of the budget for new green industries," Miliband said in a statement. "So why should anyone believe a piece of greenwash from George Osborne?"
Britain was the first country to set legally-binding targets to cut emissions. It aims for a reduction of 34 percent by 2020 and at least 80 percent by 2050, compared to 1990 levels.
(Additional reporting by Sumeet Desai)
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