David Cameron is vulnerable on flood defences, having cut the budget while blowing huge amounts on green subsidies and overseas aid. But who will point this out? Certainly not the Labour Party. John McDonnell, the Shadow Chancellor, was on the radio this morning claiming, bizarrely, that the Tories were quite right to spend so much on climate change because that is somehow tackling the flood problem “at source”.
“If you look at the money we’re spending overseas, and if you cut that… we’re tackling the issue at source. For example, we’re reducing dependency on fossil fuels. If we do that [cut foreign aid] it would be a short-term saving but a long-term cost.”
I’m not sure if he believes the floods to be the direct result of current CO2 emissions and, if so, how he explains earlier, worse floods. But, anyway, the Tories get a free pass: McDonnell instead proposes a cross-party agreement on flood defences on the rather touching assumption that Labour will win the next election and continue the agreement.
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