We rated the party manifestos on social and environmental justice to help you find out who the greenest parties really are.
In the run up to the 2024 UK General Election, we want to put climate justice at the heart of the political debate and combat the growing apathy towards taking urgent climate action. Our next Government needs to be ambitious, committed and transformative in their approach to climate policy and its implementation.
For this to happen, young people have to engage with the political process and vote with climate justice in mind. To this end, we've ranked each of the major parties' manifestos across ten policy areas to help you identify which party holds the highest ambition to tackling climate change in a just and equitable way.
Other regional political parties, such as the Scottish National Party, Plaid Cymru, Sinn Fein, and the Democratic Unionist Parties, as well as independent candidates, may be putting forward candidates in your constituency, so please do your own research on your local candidates to make an informed choice on who will best represent your ambition for climate justice in Westminster.
At a glance
We searched the parties' manifestos for some key words to see how often they talk about key topics. Here's what we found:
Figure 1: Number of times the words 'climate', 'youth' and 'sustainable' were mentioned by each of the parties in their manifestos.
So at a glance, climate and youth issues seem to be a low priority for the Conservatives. Labour puts more of an emphasis on climate policies but their mention of young people is minimal. Only the Liberal Democrats and Greens seem to prioritise climate justice for future generations. But what does each party actually pledge to do, and how well does it align with principles of social and environmental justice? Well, we've ranked and summarised each manifesto based on our own scoring criteria so you can easily find out!
Manifesto summaries
Conservatives
This manifesto does not address most of the issues that we at UKYCC care about. Although the Conservatives intend to 'maintain the leadership on climate change we achieved at COP26', their environmental targets are weak, if not lacking entirely. Youth issues are also noticeably absent from the entire manifesto. Most worryingly, the manifesto takes some serious backwards steps in social justice issues. Instead, the manifesto focuses on economic growth and protecting existing areas of wealth.
Labour
Despite the motto for the Labour campaign being 'change', it is clear from this manifesto that Labour is shying away from more radical changes to appeal to a broader political spectrum. There are some really positive commitments to net-zero and promoting a circular economy. However, they need to be bolder, with commitments to systems change, and far stronger commitments to climate justice and nature protection and restoration.
Liberal Democrats
The Liberal Democrats set out ambitious net-zero targets. In particular, setting out achievable strategies on the transition to net-zero for households, transportation systems and natural resource use. We would have liked to see more detail outlining how renewable energy targets will be met, and a stronger commitment to banning new oil and gas licences.
Green
This manifesto lays out a world-leading pathway to a greener future. Not only are the strategies for reaching net-zero well thought out, they are well funded in a way that will create a fairer society and a more equal distribution of wealth. The manifesto is also strong on social issues, and consistently encourages the redistribution of decision-making power into the hands of the community.
Rankings
These are our headline rankings. Check out our deep dive into each of the policy areas here: https://www.ukycc.com/manifesto-rankings-explained
Keen for more?
See our rankings displayed per party here: https://www.howgreenisyourmp.co.uk/ge-2024
Find out more about how we ranked the manifestos here: https://www.howgreenisyourmp.co.uk/manifesto-rankings-explained
Check out our Youth Call to Action for the next government and view how green is your MP here: https://www.ukycc.com/generalelection2024