Should the government spend £3.85bn a year on average to adapt to extreme heat?

Yes prevailed by a comfortable 22 points, but the comfort was concentrated in one place: voters under 35, who backed the spending with something close to unanimity. Everyone else in the chamber effectively tossed a coin, which is why the headline figure flatters a result that was, beneath the surface, a coalition of the young against the ambivalence of everybody older.

That age fracture is the story here. The 25-34s and 16-24s voted as if the £3.85bn were obviously worth it — perhaps because they expect to live with more decades of summers like June 2026's £2.4bn heatwave than the cohorts weighing in from 55 and above, who split evenly rather than rallying behind the Climate Change Committee's number. It is less a rejection of adaptation spending than a shrug from those who may see themselves paying the bill without banking the benefit.

The pattern echoes the wider tension in Britain's climate politics: net zero and adaptation spending poll well in principle but fracture along exactly this generational line whenever the price tag becomes concrete, much as it did over insulation grants and heat pump subsidies. Here, spread across age groups from 16 to 65-plus, the same story repeats — enthusiasm cools as the electorate gets older.

A yes vote, then, but one built by the young for a future that is, quite literally, theirs to inherit.