LIVERPOOL, England — Prime Minister Keir Starmer must go to the COP climate summit to show “there is still climate leadership” despite Donald Trump’s attacks on the science of global warming, the U.K.’s former climate minister said.
While Starmer’s travel plans have not yet been confirmed, he is reportedly not planning to attend the COP30 leaders’ summit, due to be held in Brazil in November. It would be the first time a British prime minister has skipped the event since 2019.
But Kerry McCarthy, who served as climate minister from July 2024 until a government reshuffle earlier in September, told POLITICO at Labour’s party conference in Liverpool that Starmer should attend to demonstrate the continued “imperative” of international collaboration on climate.
“It was a really important moment when Keir went to COP last year,” McCarthy said. “Particularly because Trump had just won the election, that left a vacuum in terms of international leadership and it was very much seen that the U.K. [stepped in].”
Now, with Trump stepping up his attacks on the climate agenda in his speech last week at the United Nations, McCarthy said Starmer should go to this year’s COP “to signal that there is still that intent to show leadership.”
“There are so many Americans I have met since the Trump win who want to say ‘he doesn’t speak for us,’” McCarthy added.
Starmer attended the COP29 conference in Azerbaijan in 2024 and announced an ambitious new U.K. greenhouse gas emissions target for 2035.
McCarthy conceded, however, that it was probably fruitless to try to lobby Trump directly on climate change. “I’m not sure how useful it would be to have a conversation, given the extent to which he has disengaged,” she said.
No. 10 Downing Street was approached for comment.
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