Clause 2
Climate Change Bill [Lords]
9:30 am
Linda Gilroy (Plymouth, Sutton, Labour)
I want to follow on from what my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test said earlier and to try to follow the logic of where this argument is coming from. I had a lot of sympathy with what some Opposition Members were saying, particularly because of the discussions that I have had with the climate change panel that I have been working with throughout the pre-legislative process.
A lot of debate stems from the question of whether or not there is an analogy with the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England. Again, I think that the debate that took place in the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, under the chairmanship of the right hon. Member for Fylde (Mr. Jack), when he pressed the chair of the Climate Change Committee very hard, casts very interesting light on the argument that the hon. Members for Bexhill and Battle and for Vale of York are trying to put.
I have a lot of sympathy with the idea that this committee should be independent, in the sense of the MPC. Another analogy that I discussed with my committee change panel was the Low Pay Commission. In a way, the Low Pay Commission might be a better analogy, given the complexities with which it must deal.
Adair Turner pointed out the differences. First he said:
“the Bank of England itself does not even recommend on what the target should be; it simply has to take the target as actually defined by the Chancellor...The 2 per cent. plus or minus 1 per cent.”
On one level, therefore, the MPC is less independent than the Climate Change Committee. However, he also pointed out:
“in relation to inflation policy you can define one specific lever, the interest rate, and you can give that to an independent body to call up or down.”
He also said, and I really plead with Opposition Members not to get into too much of an “angels dancing on the head of a pin” debate about this:
“You cannot really do that for the Committee on Climate Change, because otherwise you would have to give them pretty much the whole of government policy because the levers that we could pull cover building regulations, they cover speed limits, they cover appliance regulation, they cover the design of the EU ETS”—
the emissions trading scheme—
“they cover taxation, et cetera.”
He cast a very interesting light on the issue and went on to debate what would happen if the Government disagreed with the committee.