Tony Blair.

In an interview published in the New Statesman in July, Tony Blair said that the British public should not be asked to do a ‘huge amount’ to tackle climate change as ‘one year’s rise in China’s emissions would outscore the whole of Britain’s emissions for a year’.

The Office of National Statistics estimated the UK emitted 331.5 million tonnes of CO2 in 2022, whilst the International Energy Agency approximated China to have emitted 12.1 billion tonnes of CO2 in 2022. So, whilst this ‘outscoring’ is certainly true, what he didn’t appear to acknowledge, was the part Britain (and the rest of the world) plays in facilitating China’s carbon footprint.

China is the UK’s 3rd largest import partner. The value of goods imported to the UK from China in the last ¾ 2022 and ¼ 2023 was £66.2 billion. 10.4% of all goods imported by the UK during the last ¾ 2022 and ¼ 2023, came from China.

To dismiss our own efforts in reducing climate change, and point the proverbial finger at China, really doesn’t tell the full story. We are intertwined with China’s carbon footprint, not separate from it. And whilst reducing our own carbon footprint in the UK might not have a huge impact globally, we do have a moral obligation to do just that, particularly given Britain has been the eighth biggest emitter of CO2 since 1850, according to an article published in the Times newspaper.