Ed Miliband ‘praised’ Extinction Rebellion in unearthed remarks

Ed Miliband praised hardline climate change protesters Extinction Rebellion in unearthed remarks from a speech made at a university. Calling the work of XR activists a “fantastic success” Mr Miliband said the protests had “shifted the sense of what is possible” in his remarks made in 2019.

XR protesters caused huge disruption in a spate of guerilla protests across the country in 2019 leading to dozens of activists to be arrested.

Mr Miliband’s comments, reported by The Sun on Sunday, have sparked calls for Sir Keir Starmer to sack the frontbencher from his role as Shadow Secretary of State of Climate Change and Net Zero.

The newspaper reports that in 2019 Mr Miliband told the debate at the London School of Economics that protests like those by XR were “incredibly important” and it should be “sustained — and deepened.”

Conservative MP Tom Hunt told the paper: “First Labour vote against all laws to crack down on these eco extremists. Then we hear they are accepting donations from one of Just Stop Oil’s main backers. Now this.”

And it was reported a Labour insider said Mr Miliband should go.

Mr Miliband’s office said he had criticised the protesters in the past and a spokesman said he had been “praising XR for handing out free tree saplings to MPs”.

This week Mr Miliband addressed the Global Offshore Wind conference outlining his vision for the UK’s offshore wind sector.

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One of the party’s green aims is to quadruple the amount of offshore wind power in the UK by the end of the decade, however, the party backtracked on its promise to spend £28 billion a year on green projects last week, in an attempt to underline its commitment to “financial stability”.

Shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves said that this would instead be a target to work towards in the second half of a first parliament. The target included plans for spending on offshore wind turbines manufactured in Britain by removing barriers to investment.

Current Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has said this week that he believes artificial intelligence (AI) could help Labour achieve its aim of clean power generation by 2030.

Sir Keir said at London Tech Week on Tuesday that Labour’s plan is a “stretched target”, but one that he believes is possible with the help of AI technology.

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