Businesses in the UK must become more “political with a small ‘p’” in order to leverage their position and help shape energy efficiency policy, a panel at today’s Clean Energy Summit has said.
Mike Barry director of Marks & Spencer’s Plan A initiative, said: “Businesses have become quite good at lobbying over climate issues, but they’re going to have to get braver again and have a political voice.”
Barry’s sentiment was widely supported by both other members of the panel which included IKEA’s Joanna Yarrow, Coca-Cola’s Joe Franses, Nestle’s Andrew Griffiths and Heineken’s Anne Ollivier, and members of the audience.
Barry continued by stating that businesses in the UK, particularly large corporates, were in an ideal situation to lobby government over policy change, and that it would become vital for them to do so.
His comments followed concerns raised by Franses over the changing policy environment which has occurred during the current parliamentary term.
“It’s amazing how quickly things change in policy and it can be difficult to keep up,” Franses said, adding that last year’s COP21 summit agreement in Paris needed to translate into more policy certainty from the UK government.