British schools are crumbling, houses remain generally unaffordable and hospital waiting lists are so long that tens of thousands of people are dying before receiving treatment. Yet Rishi Sunak, who once talked of weaning the country off the “magic money tree,” has green-lighted the UK’s biggest one-off financial contribution to a fund for tackling climate change.
Taxpayers will now be forking out £1.62 billion—which equates to $2 billion, or just under €1.9 billion—for the Green Climate Fund (GCF). A fund within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the GCF supports developing countries to reduce global emissions.
This pledge is 12.7% higher than the UK government’s previous contribution to the GCF. It is, according to the prime minister’s office, Britain’s “biggest single financial contribution to helping the world’s most vulnerable people adapt to and mitigate the impact of climate change.” Mr. Sunak celebrated that
The UK is stepping up and delivering on our climate commitments, both by decarbonising our own economy and supporting the world’s most vulnerable to deal with the impact of climate change.
This is the kind of leadership that the world rightly expects from G20 countries. And this government will continue to lead by example in making the UK, and the world, more prosperous and secure.
The sum was announced on the final day of the G20 summit in India. It comes just months after leaks from within the government suggested its £11.6 billion international climate funding pledge was set to be dropped. To reach this target, the Foreign Office would have to spend 83% of its official development assistance budget, according to The Daily Telegraph.
It appeared back in July as though government officials had come to realise such commitments were a “huge challenge,” to say the least. But the latest announcements suggest this was merely wishful thinking.
