FM: Bad fossil fuel transition could be ‘disaster’

Failure to secure a “just transition” from fossil fuels could open the door to authoritarian leaders, Nicola Sturgeon has said.

In a speech during a visit to Washington, DC, the first minister said she believed one of the reasons for the rise of populism across the world was due to “the sense that people have been left behind”.

She stressed the need to ensure that areas that currently benefit from fossil fuels are not abandoned by the move to renewables.

Speaking at the Brookings Institution thinktank in the US capital, the first minister said: “One of the reasons for the wave of populism we’ve seen in many countries in the developed world – including in both the UK and the USA – is the sense that people have been left behind, that they’ve been ignored and disregarded by their governments.

“That sense has its roots in the economic changes of the 1980s, and it was compounded by the impacts of the 2008 financial crash.

“And so if the move to net zero turns out to be yet another economic upheaval that is done to people and communities rather than done with and for them – if people don’t have the chance to influence the changes they see in their lives and if they cannot see and feel any benefit from those changes – then there is a real danger that communities will feel abandoned again, that faith in politics will be further undermined and more countries will become susceptible to the populism of strongmen leaders.

“That would be disastrous for our environment, detrimental for our already fragile democracies, and deeply dangerous for our national and international security.”