Caroline Lucas: The Bill contains a new statutory objective on competitiveness and growth, which ranks those elements above the UK’s legally binding nature and climate targets. Given that a thriving economy depends on a thriving environment, will the Minister look at this again and consider introducing a climate-and-nature-specific statutory objective as well, so that there are two statutory objectives...
Caroline Lucas: I am grateful to the Secretary of State for giving way so promptly. I appreciate that it is a bit unusual to intervene so soon, but I wonder if she accepts that the process by which we are having this debate utterly undermines this House. It is deeply undemocratic that there has not been any way for us to have a full vote on the objectives of each future trade deal or access the negotiating...
Caroline Lucas: The Secretary of State is very generous in giving way. On that point, does she not recognise that the bottom line is that if we are rightly asking farmers to lead the way on more sustainable farming methods, yet at the same time allowing imports to come in that will undercut them—because they are not having to meet the same standards and are therefore cheaper—we are essentially handing...
Caroline Lucas: (Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if he will make a statement on sewage outflows into our beautiful waterways and on our beaches.
Caroline Lucas: I thank the Secretary of State for his response, but I am utterly staggered by his complacency. Following the news over the summer that raw sewage was being pumped into our waterways and along our beautiful beaches, I have received so many messages from constituents who are horrified that water companies are polluting in such a revolting way. Does the Secretary of State recognise that, after...
Caroline Lucas: Last Wednesday, the Business Secretary tweeted his winter energy security update, a plan that fails even to mention energy efficiency, despite the BEIS Committee, the CBI and charities all calling for immediate action on insulation to keep homes warm and to cut bills. The Minister did at least mention efficiency in his statement, but there is still no sense of urgency and no plan at the scale...
Caroline Lucas: If she will make a statement on her departmental responsibilities.
Caroline Lucas: This Government are planning to remove refugees to Rwanda who sought sanctuary in the UK from torture and trafficking. This is a new and despicable low even from this Home Office. Can the Home Secretary confirm whether she has read the medical analysis from the charity Medical Justice, and will she find some moral backbone, immediately release from indefinite immigration detention all those...
Caroline Lucas: The long-term effectiveness of COP26 outcomes derives at least in part from the credibility of pledges made in Glasgow and the serious implementation of climate policies at home, especially while we still hold the presidency. Does the President of COP26 share my concern about yesterday’s High Court ruling that the UK’s net zero strategy was unlawful because it failed to meet the...
Caroline Lucas: The motion is right in one respect. The debate we need to have was never just about one lawbreaking, Parliament-proroguing, office-abusing Prime Minister; it was always about this tawdry, toxic Government as a whole. Every single MP on the Government Benches who stood by the current Prime Minister while he dissembled and denigrated his way through two and half years is implicated in his...
Caroline Lucas: On a point of order, Mr Speaker. On 22 June at Prime Minister’s questions, the Prime Minister agreed to look at the urgent case of Afghan nationals who I am trying to help, and whose lives are at daily risk; they include Chevening alumni. I immediately sent him the details of our four cases, and I have chased him repeatedly and asked a written question. Today I did receive a reply, but it...
Caroline Lucas: (Urgent Question): To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office if he will make a statement on the Government’s preparedness for the extreme heat in the UK.
Caroline Lucas: I thank the Minister for his response. As he says, this week the UK is likely to have its hottest day on record, with the Met Office issuing its first ever red warning for extreme heat for England, and Wales already recording its hottest day. These brutal temperatures pose a very real threat to life and infrastructure, as well as to education, travel and, most importantly, health. It is...
Caroline Lucas: I am hugely grateful to all hon. and right hon. Members who have taken part in this debate. What we have not had in quantity of contributions, we have certainly more than made up for in quality. One theme that has come out is individuals’ love for nature. The right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) talked about how it is central to our souls—nothing less. That, to me, is hugely...
Caroline Lucas: Just to be clear on the record, I absolutely agree that people in developing countries who would otherwise be deprived of their livelihoods if current unsustainable practices are not stopped should be supported into more sustainable practices. We have an absolute responsibility to do that, but the idea that we should go out there and treat increasing GDP as an overall abstract aim is wrong....
Caroline Lucas: I beg to move, That this House has considered protecting and restoring nature at COP15 and beyond. I am delighted to open today’s debate and I thank the Backbench Business Committee for its support in securing this important debate. I also welcome the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the hon. Member for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double) to his new post....
Caroline Lucas: I could not agree more with the right hon. Lady. In fact, I will come on to say a few words about peat very shortly. It sometimes feels that with all the focus on planting trees, which is very important, people sometimes forget that, actually, there is far more carbon sequestered in our peatlands than we will replace with our trees.
Caroline Lucas: I am delighted to agree with the right hon. Gentleman about the Westbury incinerator in particular and about incineration in general. He is absolutely right. The sooner that we can move towards a genuinely circular economy, where we are not producing the waste in the first place, the better. I was talking about the progress at the pre-meeting of COP15 in Nairobi just a few weeks ago....
Caroline Lucas: I am genuinely struggling to know how to answer the hon. Gentleman’s question. I want to say yes, and in a sense awareness is greater now and the general public’s anger at seeing nature decline before their eyes is perhaps stronger. However, although there are some good words, unless we get rid of all the brackets in the texts and get them agreed, and unless, crucially, we have both the...
Caroline Lucas: I am very grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for that intervention. He is absolutely right: that connectivity is crucial to a thriving natural environment. Unless we ensure that we have not just isolated protection areas, but a genuinely joined-up corridor of environmental improvement and even widen out from that, we will not be successful in our aims. I will just wind up by saying that as...
