Appendix 1: Notes from October CMM

Quarterly meeting with Witney MP Charlie Maynard to discuss Climate Change and related issues

11th October 2025 from 11am in the Winchester Room, St Mary’s Church, Witney


The meeting was chaired by Gavin Fielding, who began by congratulating Charlie (CM) on being appointed Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury. He then asked him to update us on recent matters of interest to constituents.


CM The battle with Thames Water continues and is the biggest challenge of the moment. The government is trying to keep them out of bankruptcy, but they are massively in debt and so cannot make necessary investments. It is essential they go into special administration. The LibDems would like them to mutualise and be owned by Thames Water customers. The government wants to keep them in private hands (a market-led solution). OfWat is the regulator but a very bad one, as it doesn’t enforce the rules, and avoids doing so. The LibDems want the creditors to be tagged as “ultimate controllers”, which means they in fact have a material interest and so cannot be in charge. Contrary to some myths, putting the company into secial administration would not, in the end, cost the taxpayer anything – even Thames Water themselves have said that.


  • Gaza. Bombs have been dropped indiscriminately by planes on populations, and some are F35s, for which the UK provides many replacement parts through Lockheed and US systems. Charlie is on a Select Committee with responsibility for arms export controls, chaired by Liam Byrne, who strongly supports challenging the relevant Ministers (Defense, industry, foreign affairs).


  • Growth. Our country is not growing – over the last 10 years, the UK economy has gone sideways. We need to get our economic policy right. Charlie is pro-growth, so that our taxes can fund public services. So he is excited to be given his new role to advocate for better solutions and opportunities. He wants to go into the next election with the electorate trusting the Lib Dems – the 3rd party in parliament – with the economy.

  • Environment. Charlie is in a WhatsApp group led by Pippa Heylings, Lib Dem spokesperson on energy security and net zero. There is a Lib Dem consensus that there is a need not merely to cheerlead but to act. Charlie asks where can we get a real grip? One example is our electricity networks: because of Brexit, we are no longer part of the European-wide market for electrons, where there was an automated system of trading with countries that have a surplus (“single day ahead coupling”) selling to those with a deficit. These algorithms work more efficiently over a bigger space, and are cheaper. The group is pushing government to go after this harder and faster.


  • Another issue relates to local food: our local abattoir closed. Charlie worked with a pro bono accountant friend to probe what is going on, as our animals are likely now to be trucked to Gloucester, or further, rather than being killed here, which is good neither for farmers nor for animals. Another matter is flooding, and here Charlie is working with WASP over the issue of managing rivers through catchment areas and guaranteeing flood insurance schemes.



Gavin Thank you for this. Let us reflect on the meeting MP Watch Witney staged in Oxford on 18 Sept at which Lord Deben, Roz Savage and Pete Sudbury spoke – focusing on why government is so slow to work on climate change issues? Clearly what emerged was the need for longer-term political planning than governments working within 5-year electoral cycles can risk. China is notably engaging in considerable long-term planning and is more stable as a result, heavily investing in renewable energy.


CM I had come prepared more to speak about climate adaptation – which will now be the subject of our next meeting in January. But would just like to flag up that the WODC has issued details of the next phase of its local plan to 2043. We are all invited to react online in November and December. It is really important for everyone to feed into this.


It covers

  • Where new housing will go

  • Transport

  • Waste

  • Water

  • Ecology


This was our ‘homework’ and genuinely makes a difference and matters. Charlie asked Hugo and Grant to bang many drums on Witney Radio to ensure that there is a lot of good input and everybody knows about it.


Coming to Gavin’s point about China, Charlie said it is of course an autocratic country with a lot of bad garbage in tow – not least coal production and use. However, it is worth noting that in 2024, China implemented the same amount of renewable power as the rest of the world taken together.


Moreover, a lot of the solar panels we use are made in China, not to mention EVs etc, as they are so much cheaper. The economics of producing these things we need is so obvious. Another new product coming up is sodium batteries for storage of intermittent energy supplies (e.g. sun, wind). This can be thought of as “economic vassalhood”, given that China dominates so many products - batteries, turbines, solar, EVs - but they are far ahead now and have made better decisions.


China is making a lot of money out us which is good for their country. However, we need to watch the economic power this gives China. All these products have chips in them feeding back data to China, so can the government there then control us, or hackers break into the systems? Can GCHQ monitor what is happening with the chips? At the moment we are sleepwalking into this. Not everyone is our friend. We have to consider this early and not downstream.


10 years ago there was consensus in parliament over the realities and risks of climate change. Now 2 of the 5 key UK parties are outright climate sceptics (Reform and Conservative). We need to listen to people’s fears.


Gavin Our politicians are focused on the polls – but these fluctuate wildly. Do sceptics get more media attention? Do they really speak for half the electorate? We need real political leadership – we don’t have it – people are scared.


CM Ed Milliband is trying hard and has stuck his neck out despite the right-wing press going after him. The Labour party has allowed him to get on with a pretty green agenda (so far) so he is not showing signs of being restricted by the polls. He is supported by the Lib Dems and Greens but not proving effective enough. It needs a robust economic case to be made to underpin it. Let’s help people spend money (on solar panels and EVs) so they can save money as a result.


Gavin Question: should climate change not be dealt with on a cross-party basis, given that it is a genuine emergency, comparable with a war situation (as in WWII)?


CM A government of “national unity” is not strictly democratic, and CM would be loath to drop that: Democracy is the least bad form of government, and it is important to empower and encourage everyone to be part of a democratic process.


Gavin But the result is an autocratic government with a big parliamentary majority to do what it wants for 5 years, and the only way to get involved seems to be by protesting, as do XR and Just Stop Oil.


CM 33% voted Labour and yet they took 2/3 of the seats. This is not democracy. Our system is not democratic enough. Any proposed amendments to any Bill which the government doesn’t like go straight into the bin as a result. Under a PR system things would be very different as all issues would have to be talked out in much more detail, and better legislation would result. There are signs of possible change in this direction. Welsh and Scottish parliaments already use PR, and Britain may be heading that way.


Meanwhile the weird results emerging even at local government level demonstrate that our present first past the post system is not fit for purpose. Reform is currently shouting for PR but Conservative and Labour are not, arguing that the present system gives us stable government. Recent history does not support this! The Tories are currently on track to be adversely affected by the first past the post system, and possibly even Labour too.


Gavin Question from Victoria Bull about large vehicle emissions and use – these much bigger cars, SUVs in particular, are harming the planet.


CM Where is the data behind this? China, Japan and India have mostly small cars, so one cannot say 54% of all vehicles are SUVs. (In fact the source material behind this speaks for new cars sold in Europe.) The move to EVs is gathering pace and regulation can help this – there will be a rapid swing in this direction, though the grid must get ever greener (and this needs to happen faster than at present).


It is better still not to use a car at all, which brings us to building the West Oxon railway line. It is good to give people real alternatives, carrots not sticks. However, this in turn raises a big question over tax: there is a big tax on petrol. Who will pay for our roads when everyone has EVs, so tax from petrol and diesel will plummet? Can there be a road mileage scheme? There needs to be a plan. People can be nudged towards using smaller cars (with a cheaper road tax). Electric SUVs are heavy because of their necessarily large batteries.


Meetings continue on the subject of the railway, focusing on getting funding for the 1st phase (£180m from Homes England and the developers of the land). Phase 2 would extend to Carterton. The local plan has the railway in it, with a designated corridor being safeguarded. There is a considerable response in favour of the Witney line, but it needs to be pushed harder.


Gavin Question about freight and the high emissions involved on rail and roads.


CM The Oxford rail station expansion is likely to solve the bottleneck at the Botley Road bridge caused by the freight line from Southampton to the Midlands. Goods exports are going down sharply however (largely because of Brexit). Witney won’t have much freight to handle except from RAF Brize Norton, so it is unlikely to require a designated freight line. The passenger trains will be battery-powered, with no overhead cables or diesel. (Question – could they have solar panels on the roof?) Freight trains however run on diesel and in the middle of the night and mess up timetables of passenger trains. There could be a rail/road interchange coming from Southampton, at Ardley, where the last section of the journey would be done by road (in electric vehicles), leading to a reduction in road freight.


Question What about the monorail proposal?


CM The point about a network is that it can connect into a bigger network. A bespoke monorail is brilliant in principle but doesn’t connect into the existing network. From Witney, 31% of passengers want to go to Oxford but 53% to London (Cotswold line via Hanborough, Charlbury, Kingham stations etc). The transport system has to support the travel people actually want to do.


Hugo What about the A40 bus lanes?


CM The Eynsham Park & Ride was a Conservative idea, but then there was not enough money, so the bus lanes between Eynsham and Wolvercote will not now be built. It would be much better to put money into the railway line than bus lanes. One might think bus lanes are cheaper, but roads cost colossal amounts of money – comparable to railways. You have also to take into account the prolonged disruption while new lanes and junctions are being built, compared to building a railway.


Margaret Walker asked Charlie to endorse the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty and sign early day motion 111. The Treaty would provide a road map to limit fossil fuel. It would involve all countries in the world and is already supported by many governments and world personalities. Countries like Vanuatu and Tuvalu are losing their land space: who is going to take in their populations? Some UK people living in coastal areas are also going to be affected.


CM Apologies for not knowing enough to answer! What are the benefits of it? What does it do that the Paris agreement doesn’t do? He undertook to give a proper answer after research.


Question: What are the prospects in the face of more and more data centres and AI? The scale up everywhere is huge, and few people can get their heads round what this means.


CM The increasing monopolies (in particular Elon Musk, and Open AI) represent huge concentrations of power, but also huge existential risks if they fail. Politicians are uncomfortable about facing up to this. We need to talk about the threats. AI often obviates the need for much of a work force. The speed of change is dizzying. But there also big upsides.


Question on engagement with young people, who are not reading newspapers but engaged with social media.


CM I lived happily without social media until a few years ago. Now I engage with Facebook, Instagram and X – and need to look at Blue Sky, TikTok and LinkedIn too. Communication is more via video than still messages, and very brief. I dislike it. Our press is regulated (albeit not brilliantly), but there is no regulation of online communication, and it is not news. “Cockroaches in your head” is how someone described it, leading down some very dark rabbit holes, a threat to our society.


Gavin closed the meeting at 12.30, after thanking Charlie for his time and open engagement. The audience very warmly applauded. The next constituency Climate Matters meeting will be in January and will consider climate adaptation and resilience across our constituency (with input from our District Council) and the movement towards honesty in politics with an important update promised by Charlie.