Clause 34
Climate Change Bill [Lords]
10:00 am
Joan Ruddock (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs; Lewisham, Deptford, Labour)
As has been noted, we believe an adaptation sub-committee of the Climate Change Committee would have a useful role, but we think that it should be a more technical one in line with the rest of the work of the committee.
The committee’s role on adaptation should be consistent with its work on mitigation; that is, it should involve technical advice and analysis, and scrutiny of progress. That means that it should provide technical advice to the Government and the devolved Administrations on the risk assessment, and progress reports to Parliament about the Government’s adaptation programme.
The other place agreed that the committee should not be a policy-making body. Many sensitive decisions will have to be taken in order for us to reduce our emissions and adapt to climate change. They properly should be taken by elected representatives in Parliament and in the Government. The committee will have a vital role in providing impartial advice and scrutiny, but we do not think it appropriate for an unelected body to make, or be seen to be making, policies. The individual decisions that will directly affect families, communities and businesses should be made by Parliament and the Government.
With that in mind, Government amendments Nos. 12, 19 and 20 delete the current roles of the sub-committee, and Government new clause 3 gives new functions to the main committee. The new clause sets out the first new function that we are giving to the committee, which is to give advice on the risk assessment required in clause 55. Expert input to the risk assessment will help to strengthen the evidence base that will underpin the Government’s adaptation programme. Independent review will add to the transparency of the assessment and, therefore, the basis upon which the programme is built.
The committee’s role will be to provide expert advice on the preparation of the risk assessment to ensure that it is as robust as possible. That is wholly in line with the committee’s wider role, which is highly technocratic and focused on specialist advice on carbon budgets. With the committee advising on the risk assessment, we do not see the need for specific provision to be made giving the Environmental Audit Committee an additional role in this area. For that reason, we tabled Government amendment No. 20, which would remove the duty currently in the Bill requiring the Government to invite the EAC to review the risk assessment. The EAC will still be free to look at the adaptation work, or any other area of work, should it chose to do so. Indeed, it has already considered adaptation as part of its work on climate change and local and regional government.
For the Government to ask a parliamentary Committee to consider a particular piece of work would be an anomaly in the Bill because it could be seen to interfere with the EAC’s independence. We expect that the advice of the Committee on Climate Change, together with the likelihood of further parliamentary scrutiny, will ensure that the risk assessment is robust and transparent. We also hope that adaptation will be considered—I am sure it will be—by a wider range of parliamentary Committees, because clearly it is not simply an environmental issue, but one that will cut across all aspects of the economy and society. If we receive advice, we will be sure to make use of it, which is why we tabled Government amendment No. 19, which ensures that the Government must consider the advice of the Committee on Climate Change before laying the national climate change risk assessment before Parliament.
In conclusion, the advice on the risk assessment from the adaptation sub-committee will add value to the Government’s adaptation work and complement the committee’s wider work. It would be inappropriate for the Government to have to invite a parliamentary Committee to review its work, as the decision on whether to review should be a matter for that Committee itself.