The Climate Emergency

Part of Debate on the Address – in the House of Commons at 2:08 pm on 17 October 2019.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Sue Hayman Sue Hayman Shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs 2:08, 17 October 2019

That is an extremely important point, and we could do that straightaway, but we need a proper, comprehensive transport Bill to tackle things more widely.

My team will be going through the Environment Bill line by line, but there already seems to be evidence of some weaknesses. The proposals are weak on funding commitments, on enforcement, on genuine independence and on cross-departmental, centrally driven leadership. Caroline Lucas has talked about the time it takes for things to come in, and Greenpeace has exposed the serious loophole in the Bill which means that no legal action could be taken against Ministers on any potential failings in air and water quality, plastics or nature restoration until 2037 at the earliest. The Secretary of State talked about interim targets, but we need serious action now and targets that come much earlier.