Article: ‘Now is the time’ for a carbon tax, says Zero Carbon Commission

Introducing an economy-wide carbon tax would support efforts to create a green recovery from Covid-19 and would be supported by the public, according to the new Zero Carbon Commission (ZCC).

“People want a green recovery from Covid-19. They support the idea of government placing environmental conditions on the help they provide to businesses, and they think using environmental charges to fund some of our recovery is a good way to kill two birds with one stone,” says its interim report, released today.

The ZCC was formed in February by luminaries such as Lord Adair Turner, former chair of the Committee on Climate Change, John Sauven, the executive director of Greenpeace UK and Baroness Bryony Worthington, who drafted the Climate Change Act 2008.

The report has been written by Rachel Wolf, co-author of the Conservatives’ 2019 manifesto and now a partner at PR agency Public First, which forms the ZCC’s secretariat. It proposes a “phased, sectoral approach” for carbon charging, with a tax of £55 per tonne of CO2, applying for most economic sectors from 2025, rising to £75/t by 2030. “The revenue would be used to support investment in green alternatives, provide funds to cushion households from cost increases, and contribute to core government spending in a way that also incentivises consumer and business behaviour.”