Climate Change Bill [Lords]

Part of Orders of the Day – in the House of Commons at 4:58 pm on 9 June 2008.

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Photo of Peter Ainsworth Peter Ainsworth Shadow Secretary of State for Environment Food & Rural Affairs, Environment, Food & Rural Affairs 4:58, 9 June 2008

I must make progress.

We believe that the Bill, as amended in the Lords, is in pretty good shape. As I have said, we do not want to extend its scope beyond what has already been determined, but in particular we hope that the Government will not seek to weaken it and make it less effective as a means of ensuring British leadership in the global debate and in developing the technologies that we need to de-carbonise our economy.

Conservatives see the challenge of climate change as an opportunity, rather than as a threat. We in Britain are in danger of falling prey to the threat, rather than rising to the opportunity. My right hon. Friend Mr. Gummer, who intervened earlier, was absolutely right—dressing up stealth taxes as green taxes is a sure-fire way of alienating public opinion and should be avoided.

We are all too well aware of the rising costs of dependence on fossil fuels. Last week, the price of oil reached an all-time high. The consequences for consumers everywhere are enormous and bad. The rises in fuel and food prices are of course related. The prospect of an economic downturn only reinforces the need to become more energy-efficient, more fuel-efficient, more aware of the limits set by nature, more sparing of our use of natural resources, and more self-sufficient in energy and food. The need to be both greener and safer has never been more apparent, so this Bill is extremely timely.

As I have said, we do not want to extend the Bill's scope beyond the existing parameters, but we believe it important to retain what it comprises. In particular, we believe that it is important to retain clause 1, which establishes a principal aim

"to ensure that UK emissions of greenhouse gases do not exceed the level necessary to contribute to limiting the global average temperature increase to not more than 2° C above pre-industrial levels."

I was disappointed to hear what the Minister had to say about the clause, but no doubt the issue will be further debated in Committee.

We also believe it right for the Prime Minister to be accountable for progress towards the targets set out in the Bill. I think that the Liberal Democrat spokesman recently said, when we shared a platform at a meeting on climate change—that is an occupational hazard—that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs was a "piddling little Department." I know what he meant, because it is racked by funding crises, unpopular with the Treasury and disrespected by other Departments; DEFRA certainly has its problems. It is our ambition that the Department should do better. It holds a key position in the great debates of our time, on not only climate change—as if that were not enough—but food security, energy security, water supply and pricing, flooding, coastal erosion and the depletion of natural resources. DEFRA should be at the heart of the Government; it should not be marginalised, weak and ineffectual.

The Bill's provisions involve the whole of Government and the whole economy, not just one Department. It is therefore right for the Prime Minister to assume responsibility for progress towards meeting the targets to reduce climate change emissions. To anyone who says that this is unprecedented, the answer must be that we are dealing with an unprecedented challenge and an unprecedented opportunity for our country, and it is therefore right that the Prime Minister should have responsibility for reporting on progress as set out in clause 4.

We also believe it important to retain the provisions that aim to ensure that a majority of emissions reductions come from domestic sources, as opposed to being bought, like indulgences, in the often unreliable international credit market. Thus, I was sorry to hear what the Minister had to say about that earlier. We support these measures, not because we believe in wearing a hair shirt, but because we believe in opportunity—I am referring to clause 25.