Scientists, health professionals and Extinction Rebellion warn of “High-Risk Climate Gamble” at Labour Party Conference

Liverpool, Monday 29th September — Scientists for Extinction Rebellion staged a protest outside the Labour Party Conference, warning that the UK Government’s climate strategy is a “high-risk gamble” that locks in fossil fuels and delays urgent action.
The group is calling for a reset of UK climate policy—away from unproven technologies like Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS), and towards proven solutions such as wind, solar, energy efficiency, and nature-based climate action.

“I’m here as a scientist and as a mother,” said Dr Ann-Marie Williamson, a retired industrial scientist from Sheffield. “The Government is gambling with our children’s future. We already have clean solutions that work—wind, solar, efficiency, and restoring nature. They’re safer, cheaper, and fairer than throwing billions at risky CCS schemes designed to keep fossil fuels alive.”

Key Scientific Concerns

• Paris Agreement breach: Scientists determine that the UK must reach net zero by the mid-2030s to do its fair share. The current 2050 target allows a carbon budget almost double its equitable share.
• CCS dependency: The Government’s 2050 plan treats CCS as essential—but the technology is unproven at scale, plagued by cancelled projects, spiralling costs, and underperformance.
• No Plan B: If CCS fails, there is no backup plan to meet the UK’s legal climate commitments.
• Fossil fuel lock-in: £22 billion of public money is being committed to CCS-linked infrastructure—gas-fired power stations, “blue hydrogen” plants, and biomass facilities like Drax.
• Methane emissions overlooked: CCS-linked gas projects rely on imported LNG, which leaks methane—a far more potent greenhouse gas than CO₂. Studies show two-thirds of gas’s climate impact comes from upstream emissions CCS can’t touch.
• Scientific warnings ignored: Last year, leading scientists urged ministers to pause CCS plans until safety, effectiveness, and full life-cycle emissions were independently assessed. DESNZ has failed to engage with the evidence.

Even Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee has called the CCS programme a “high-risk gamble”, warning that if it fails, households will bear the cost through higher energy bills while private companies profit.

Scientists’ Call to Action

•Invest in clean energy, efficiency, and nature-based solutions
•Support communities, not polluters
•Ensure transparency, accountability, and climate justice
“The climate crisis is here—and time is running out,” added Dr Williamson. “Every pound wasted on CCS delays real solutions. The UK must act on the science, not industry spin.

“No More Carbon Karaoke”

Protesters brought a “white elephant” (operated by Sheffield folk) to symbolise wasted billions on unproven technologies, while Discobedience — part protest, part performance — transformed the streets into a satirical “greenwash disco.” The spectacle called out theatrical pledges and empty promises before shutting down the music with science, solidarity, and sound.
“We’re done dancing to delay,” said Dr Nickie James, lead organiser and climate justice advocate. “This isn’t a party. It’s a planetary emergency. No more performative pledges, no more carbon karaoke — we demand real action, rooted in science and justice.”
The protest comes as expert bodies, including the Climate Change Committee, the Tyndall Centre, and the National Engineering Policy Centre warn that overreliance on speculative technologies like carbon capture, along with continued methane leakage and fossil fuel expansion, put the UK far off track for net zero.
“The government’s CCS plans are a disco ball of distraction,” Dr James added. “They sparkle, but they don’t deliver. We need radical emissions cuts now — not techno-fixes tomorrow.”
Campaigners also highlighed Drax Power Station, the UK’s largest single source of carbon emissions for ten years running. In 2024, Drax burned 7.6 million tonnes of wood, mostly imported from biodiverse forests, while receiving £2 million a day in subsidies.
“Drax is the glitterball of greenwash,” Dr James said. “It dazzles with PR, but behind the scenes it’s burning forests and cooking the climate.”
Despite being classed as “renewable,” Drax’s biomass emissions exceed those of the UK’s six most polluting gas plants combined. Campaigners are demanding that subsidies stop and that Drax’s emissions are counted honestly.
Activists are calling for:
•Binding near-term emissions targets aligned with 1.5°C
•Full lifecycle accounting for CCS and hydrogen projects
•An end to biomass subsidies and reclassification of Drax emissions
•Investment in community-led renewables and nature restoration

Health Workers say End Fossil Fuels to Save Lives

The Labour Party Conference in Liverpool has been chosen as the next stage in a national banner tour to highlight how the climate emergency is seriously harming people’s health. Huge banners were flown at Liverpool’s Pier Head on Monday to draw the attention of elected leaders and the public to the urgent need to “End fossil fuels, Protect Public Health and Save Lives”.
Dr Katharine Fallon, a retired GP from Cheshire, said the banners were deliberately similar to those used during the Covid pandemic. “Politicians made sure we understood the health risks of Covid, but they aren’t explaining the risks of death and illness from the climate emergency. These deaths are already happening and, If we don’t act now, will continue to increase,” she said.
The UK has just seen nine of the 10 hottest years on record and an increase in extreme weather, heatwaves, floods, and wildfires. This, along with air pollution from traffic and industry, is causing greater illness and tens of thousands of unnecessary additional UK deaths each year. The elderly, children and people who are disadvantaged or in poor health are particularly at risk.
Doctors are seeing an increase in nutritional problems as drought and floods damage crops, which, in turn, increases food prices. Climate warming means that diseases spread by mosquitoes, such as dengue fever, are spreading towards the UK.

As global heating accelerates, the NHS itself is at risk. Heat has already crashed the computer systems at major London hospitals and risks damaging the supply of water, drugs and equipment on which the NHS depends.
“Our banners help explain that, in order to protect everyone’s health and our NHS, we need to take urgent action including ending the extraction and burning of fossil fuels. Current plans, including those to expand airports, are taking us in the wrong direction.
Other changes such as clean energy, insulation, restoring nature and expanding public transport, walking and cycling, are great for health and will also reduce demand on the NHS. These are win-win solutions” said Dr Fallon.

“At the moment, government plans include unproven technologies like carbon capture and storage (which will lock us into continued fossil fuel use for decades) and so-called sustainable aviation fuel which doesn’t exist” said Dr Fallon. “We want to see our elected leaders telling the truth about our health and the climate, and acting on it immediately”.
The banner will continue it’s tour to other iconic UK locations, having already visited St Michael’s Mount, Plymouth Hoe and Hound Tor, Dartmoor.