Martin has campaigned tirelessly at local, national and European level for tougher action to stop climate change – and for smart planning for the inevitable effects of climate change too.
As an MP, he was a member of the Aldersgate Group which brings together leading MPs, businesses and green organisations committed to fighting climate change and was on the advisory board of the Energy & Climate Change Information Unit which actively promotes accurate and accessible facts about climate change in the UK media. As his party’s shadow environment minister, he jointly tabled the amendment to the 2008 Climate Change Bill that raised the UK carbon emission reduction ambition by 2050 from 60% to 80% and helped to develop Liberal Democrat policy that went much further and aimed for Zero Carbon Britain – a policy which other parties are gradually, painfully catching up with only now. He opposed new coal-fired power stations, supported a moratorium on fracking and spoke out in parliament in favour of more wind, tidal, solar and other renewable forms of energy.
As an MEP, Martin raised climate issues on everything from trade to transport. He voted for the European Parliament’s declaration of a climate emergency and for the Green New Deal for the whole of Europe brought forward by his liberal renew Europe colleague Pascal Canfin MEP. Watch short videos from Martin as MEP on EU policy affecting rainforests here, on local renewable energy here and on trade deals that support climate action here. It is tragic that Brexit cut off our participation in climate initiatives like these when climate change is so obviously a challenge that one country can’t possibly tackle alone.
As a Cheltenham councillor, Martin has backed Cheltenham’s Lib Dem council in its declaration of a climate emergency here and its plan to get Cheltenham to Net Zero by 2030. He worked on the plan to get all Cheltenham’s taxis to zero carbon by then and pushed for all new private sector housing to be zero carbon. Cheltenham’s very first zero carbon private sector homes were built in Leckhampton and the new development along the Shurdington Road will also have solar panels and air source heat pumps built in from the start.
Martin was proud that LibDems in the coalition government achieved great progress on the environment:
- the biggest carbon dioxide reduction on record for a growing UK economy
- the world’s first Green Investment Bank
- investment in low-carbon energy locked into UK energy markets through the Energy Act
- 200,000 green jobs
- a million trees planted
- renewable energy generation in the UK more than doubled with solar energy generation going up 60% just in the last year
Environmental policy went into reverse when the Conservatives took power on their own in 2015. Support for renewables was cut, the Green Investment Bank sold off, targets for electric cars were axed, the energy efficiency Green Deal plan scrapped with no replacement, green lights given to new coal and oil exploitation and greenhouse gas targets missed. And they kept putting back the target for all new homes to be zero carbon – the coalition set the date at 2016 so every new home built in the UK for the last seven years would have been climate-friendly. The new Labour government has improved the situation on some fronts but is also threatening to tear up environmental protections in the name of economic growth and has given the go-ahead to the long-opposed new runway at Heathrow.
Martin has consistently spoken out for tougher action both to stop making climate change worse but also for adapting to the now inevitable impacts of climate change. You can watch Martin’s 2014 speech to the national Lib Dem conference here.
As a result of his efforts for the environment, Green Liberal Democrats elected Martin as their President, a position he still holds today.
