![Google](http://www.google.com/images/poweredby_transparent/poweredby_FFFFFF.gif)
Ed Miliband's global warming law 'could cost £20,000 per family'
Ian Drury
5/5/09)
Laws aimed at tackling global warming could cost every family in Britain a staggering £20,000 - double the original forecast.
![Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband](http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2009/05/04/article-0-04C6B4B4000005DC-122_233x358.jpg)
Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband admits the cost of laws aimed at tackling global warming has soared to £404billion
Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband admitted the bill for introducing legislation to cut greenhouse gases had soared from £205billion to £404billion between now and 2050.
But in figures quietly released to Parliament, the Cabinet minister claimed the benefits to the UK would be more than £1trillion - a tenfold increase on the £110billion predicted last year.
Last night Mr Miliband was accused of entering 'Alice in Wonderland territory' with the figures in an attempt to stifle concern about the price of bringing in the Climate Change Act.
Senior Tory MP Peter Lilley said Mr Miliband 'heavily massaged' the statistics to 'remove embarrassment' that the laws represented poor value for money.
But ministers insist the costs of not acting on climate change would be higher than the price of acting now.
Under the Climate Change Act, the Government is committed to cut carbon emissions, blamed for global warming, by 80 per cent before 2050.
Originally the Government wanted to cut emissions by 60 per cent, with maximum costs of £205billion and benefits of £110billion. But the figure rose to 80 per cent after a threatened backbench revolt last year.
The extra cost was only revealed after the Bill became law in November. Four months later Mr Miliband slipped out revised figures in the House of Commons Library to avoid scrutiny, say critics.
They show the cost, which the Government says represents the predicted difference between the economy with and without carbon-constraining measures, had soared to a worst-case scenario of £404billion - in the region of £20,000.
Mr Lilley, a former Trade Secretary, said he accepted a reduction in global warming would cost a lot. But in a letter to Mr Miliband he said: 'When it comes to your revised estimates of the benefits we enter Alice in Wonderland territory.'
Mr Miliband said the benefits had risen because a global deal on tackling carbon emissions was more likely because Britain had passed the Climate Change Act. He denied the figures were framed to produce a convenient answer.
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1177274/Ed-Milibands-global-warming-law-cost-20-000-family.html