Clause 18
Climate Change Bill [Lords]
6:00 pm
Gregory Barker (Shadow Minister, Environment, Food & Rural Affairs; Bexhill and Battle, Conservative)
Amendment No. 35 opens a new chapter in the story and direction of the Bill. It proposes that the Secretary of State report to Parliament on the reasons why, and solutions for, having exceeded a budgetary limit. The report should include a list of
“sanctions against those responsible for budget excesses.”
We cannot support the amendment for a number of reasons. First, it goes against what I like to call the opportunity agenda around climate change. My party likes to make both business and the public realise that, in the climate challenge, there also lies an enormous economic opportunity and the chance to live more fulfilling lives. We believe in the power of “can do”, not the dour politics of “cannot” that the Liberal Democrats are so fond of.
The Bill currently sets a long-term framework and clear road map within which business can work with confidence towards developing new technologies, growing new markets and processing the challenge of decarbonising our economy. The vehicle for getting there can be found in policies outside the Bill. My party has announced incentives such as feed-in tariffs for microgeneration, an emissions performance standard for electricity that is generated in the UK and a new green exchange market to kick-start investment in our low-carbon economy. There is plenty more where that came from, but the place to legislate for such policies is not in the Bill, which should remain a lean, focused framework document.
To include a list of sanctions on any group that breaches its budget, as the Liberal Democrats propose in the amendment, is beyond the remit of the Bill. Who would decide those sanctions—the Secretary of State or the Committee on Climate Change? Under which legislation would they be empowered to lay those sanctions? Presumably, the sanctions would take the shape of either a monetary fine or additional legislation.