Sam Hall: Towards a Conservative Environmentalism

That the environment has long been a political monopoly of the left is beyond dispute. The truism largely holds to this day owing to the hyper-regulatory and redistributive programs that the traditional left and green parties jointly advocate in pursuit of a greener society. This has put conservatives with more liberal economic dispositions on the back foot, stereotyping their preference for free-market alternatives as a prejudice against any action at all on the climate. Sam Hall of the Conservative Environment Network (CEN) discusses here the challenges he faces when advocating for market-based solutions to the challenges of conservation and decarbonisation. A thought leadership hub in Westminster that both drafts policy and acts as a caucus for concerned Tory MPs, his is one of many groups that work to realign the politics of the climate question towards less heavy-handed state intervention, helped partly by the piling costs of most present policies, whether from Brussels or in a newly sovereign Britain.