The Minister for Climate enjoyed a leisurely hours-long hike up to a glacier while on a taxpayer-funded “diplomatic mission” to Chile. Do DESNZ ministers enjoy a jolly even more than their jealous friends in the Foreign Office?
At the end of March Katie White – a climate activist elected to parliament at the last election and promoted to the Net Zero ministerial team – took a team to Chile (followed by Argentina) to undertake “introductory conversations” with the intention of striking a deal to extract critical minerals from the country. Miliband is going to need to find heaps of copper if he wants to push ahead with his Net Zero project…
One returning last week White said: “I was up at the Juncal Glacier and you can literally see it shrinking in front of you, which is quite something to take in when you’re standing there. You can see what that means for the landscape around it, too, how everything connected to it is shifting.” This is the kind of thing a gap year kid writes to their parents to justify asking for more cash after waking up on a bar floor in Thailand…
DESNZ has now put out a video of White’s stroll up the gentle mountainside – occasionally jocundly jumping over small streams – on its social channels. White spoke to a reporter from POLITICO while on the hike, which took “hours”…
The stroll was apparently also crucial “to prepare for talks with the new government about teaming up on the move to clean power.” Just watch the video…
According to reports DESNZ claimed White and Chile’s new Energy Minister Ximena Rincon agreed to work together “at pace to deliver the energy transition and build out resilient supply chains across renewable energy, electrification and nuclear.” No deal, and that statement does not appear on among DESNZ press releases – is Miliband embarrassed about his minster’s jolly?
UPDATE: A DESNZ spokesperson said:
“We make zero apologies for working with countries to tackle the climate crisis – the biggest long-term threat Britain faces. Minister White, in her role as the UK’s climate minister, championed our world leading clean energy sector to create further opportunities for British businesses in Chile. She also joined scientists and conservationists to see first-hand the immediate impacts of the climate crisis which are being felt all over the world, including in the UK.”
Starmer said to Robert Peston this afternoon:
“I’m fed up with the fact that families across the country see their bills go up and down on energy businesses bills go up and down on energy because of the actions of Putin or Trump across the world.”