Barry Gardiner: Labour’s new members will help us deliver victory and a cleaner, greener well-paid Britain

Jobs for wind turbine engineers and solar panel installers, electric bus and car mechanics. Jobs for fitters, joiners and electricians as we insulate our country’s draughty homes, schools and businesses. Jobs for researchers, engineers and software designers as we invest in the cutting edge technology advances that can give Britain a competitive edge in the fast-growing low-carbon industries. Major green projects will be oxygen for the modernisation of our economy and will be at the heart of Labour’s pledge to create a million new secure jobs. That is the commitment that Jeremy Corbyn is making this week.

The Labour party will deliver on building a million homes, including more than 500,000 council houses, producing zero carbon emissions. We will support a groundbreaking initiative supporting school children together with their communities in planting sixty four million native broadleaf trees – one for every person- in our city parks and open countryside. We will end the scandal of fuel poverty.

I want to be part of a Labour government that meets the commitment this country made in Paris last year to hold climate change well below 2 degrees and as close to 1.5 degrees as possible. I want to be part of a Labour government  which strengthens the environmental protections from the EU. This can all be done while bringing our economy into the 21st century, restoring our productivity and ensuring that no community is left behind

It is right that we make sure the older and more vulnerable in our society have warm homes without fear of threatening letters from the big 6 utility companies. It is right that we create for our businesses and industries, our farming and fishing communities, both the clear regulatory framework and the consequent investment they need to thrive for the long term. It is right that workers in industries that are in long-term decline should not be abandoned or forgotten about – we must work with every community to support people who need to move from yesterday’s industries into secure new high value jobs.

These are the things that we, as a united Labour government, can and must deliver – they represent the  strategic foundations for a sustainable, optimistic future.

Creating a world leading, low carbon economy is not a pipe dream. As a leadership team, we are proposing a series of practical, deliverable policies that will provide the economic and social foundation in which this clean, green future can be built. We will use our £500 billion National Investment Bank as an accelerator for the modern sustainable infrastructure this country urgently needs. We will establish a dedicated Advanced Research Agency to take advantage of the rapidly growing global renewable energy market, forecast to reach $630bn worldwide by 2030.

The next Labour government  will re-engineer Britain’s power sector, setting challenging targets to deliver 65 percent of our electricity through renewable energy by 2030. This will rise to meet the Paris commitment of a net zero carbon society in the second half of this century. A National Home Insulation programme will ensure warm homes and affordable bills for four million households in our first term of Government – and new compulsory standards will end the misery of cold rented accommodation.

We will make Britain more democratic, accountable and fairer. Our cities, towns and villages will be actively involved in delivering an efficient, decentralised energy system. We will make sure planners can stand up to developers and protect communities, both when they do want to have an onshore wind turbine and when they don’t want to have a fracking well!

Our plan for one million green jobs could not be more different from the nightmare vision being offered by the Tories –  worsening air pollution, thousands more job losses in our solar industries, our countryside torn up by fracking, the big six energy companies allowed to continue ripping us off and a spiral of decline in the very electricity system we need to keep the lights on.

In contrast, Labour will be the government that ensures Britain excels in the fast-growing global low-carbon goods and services sector, that turns around our industrial decline, productivity crisis and north-south divide and creates quality well-paid jobs in every part of our country, equally for women as for men and equally paid for women as for men. And we will invest in our education system and apprenticeship schemes to ensure we have the skills to rise to the challenge.

A million people in better-paid work, paying affordable rents to live in healthier, greener houses. A million people working to stop climate change. A million people with money in their pockets to spend. Real growth and prosperity throughout this country.

This positive vision is why the Labour Party now has 600,000 members, many of them young and new to politics, many of them worried about the future of our planet. These members will deliver Labour’s election victory. By delivering that victory, and with bold environmental policies driving forward our industrial strategy we can improve the lives of people in this country and in doing so we will meet our Paris Climate commitment so as to make the lives of countless others around the globe better in the process.