UK Suppresses Climate Security Report While Appointing Its Author

The UK government still refuses to publish a classified report warning that ecosystem collapse threatens national security — even after handing the official who led the report a new advisory role on Thursday.

Prime Minister Andy Burnham announced the appointment of Madeleine Alessandri, a long-serving civil servant and former head of the UK's joint intelligence committee, as his adviser on climate security. The JIC is the committee of the UK's spy chiefs, which oversees the work of MI5 and MI6.

Alessandri spearheaded the climate report, which found that food shortages, food price rises, mass migration and nuclear conflict overseas could result from the failure to prevent the collapse of key ecosystems, including the Amazon rainforest.

Why does the report stay secret?

The report was supposed to be launched at last year's Cop, but was suppressed by Keir Starmer's government. The Guardian revealed its key contents through a leak ahead of the intended launch, and early this year a redacted version was published. Foreign secretary Ed Miliband has briefed foreign governments on the findings, and the report clearly influenced Burnham's decision to appoint Alessandri. The full document remains under wraps.

Burnham addressed the Cop31 climate summit in Turkey on Thursday, one of the few western European leaders to do so. "The message I carry here, in my first Cop as prime minister, is that the UK remains determined to reach net zero by 2050 and to work with our partners to build a clean energy future," he said.

"The world has changed. The consensus we once enjoyed on science and climate action has broken down. We will not stand by, and that's why I've pledged a new era of British leadership over the next decade."

He embraced the summit's focus on electrification. "If we depend on energy we do not control, we depend on prices we cannot control. The shift to clean energy is the only route to energy security," he said. He also pressed industry to help deliver the green transition, citing electric cars and heat pumps: "If you drive a new electric car today in the UK, it costs less than a petrol equivalent. Get on the right tariff and a heat pump can be cheaper to run than a gas boiler."

Who inside government is resisting climate action?

Burnham's public declaration that the climate crisis poses a major national security threat cheered Cop31, and governments worried about global heating's impact on food supplies, the cost of living, migration and infrastructure took note. But campaigners, experts, green businesses and investors question his commitment.

Chancellor John Healey is known to view economic growth as taking priority even if it locks the UK into expensive fossil fuels. Louise Haigh, first secretary of state and a key Burnham ally, is thought to share that view, along with business secretary Jonathan Reynolds. Senior government members share these concerns behind the scenes.

Notably, Burnham has no dedicated climate adviser working for him in Downing Street, despite climate ranking as an important issue for many voters. Senior insiders told the Guardian that a series of major climate-related decisions are being taken largely in isolation, without regard for their cumulative impact.

While Burnham spoke at Cop31, his ministers were putting the final touches to a weakening of the mandate requiring carmakers to switch a rising share of sales to electric vehicles. Burnham has also greenlighted the Jackdaw gasfield, cut funding for heat pumps and is mulling backing the new Rosebank oilfield. Healey has told MPs on the Treasury committee that Labour backs a third runway at Heathrow.

Campaigners and business figures told the Guardian the prime minister appears swayed by short-term economic thinking from advisers not up to speed with a vastly changed energy world.

What did critics and allies say?

Ami McCarthy, head of politics at Greenpeace UK, said Burnham's speech "hit the right notes, but noises offstage about a massive new oilfield and looser rules on electric cars almost drowned him out."

"Appointing the world's first climate security envoy is a welcome move, but approving Rosebank would only increase the climate threat level to communities in Britain and around the world," McCarthy said. "There are so many elephants in the room, you'd think it's a zoo. Burnham needs to start bridging the widening chasm between words and deeds on climate action."

Burnham has influential supporters too, who believe he understands the climate crisis and backs efforts to tackle it.

At Cop31, he missed a bilateral meeting with Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, whose resounding re-election has given renewed hope to leftwing parties fighting the far right. He did meet Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency and the world's foremost energy economist. Between football talk — Burnham is famously an Everton fan and Birol follows the Premier League — they discussed how cheaper renewable energy and greater electrification of the UK economy could cut the cost of living.

"I can tell you that his mind and heart are fully behind the electrification of the UK energy system. I can put my name behind it. I had a very good and in-depth discussion with him," Birol told the Guardian.

The government was contacted for comment. The test now is whether Burnham's Rosebank decision and the EV mandate rewrite confirm his critics' fears or vindicate his allies' faith.