Climate Change Act 2008 (Credit Limit) Order 2021

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Tuesday 15th June 2021 Grand Committee

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

That was a very interesting introduction from the Minister. I would like to explain the whole concept of urging economic growth when we live on a planet with finite resources, but I will have to leave that for another day. I would like to tackle quite a lot of what the noble Lord, Lord Bourne, said. The noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, said that making reductions is going to require more effort, which is absolutely true. He also asked whether we can trust other countries’ measurements—that is a perfectly true point—and talked about a stronger, more resilient future. I would argue that this Government do not have a clue how to get us to that future. It is going to take government resolve, the noble Lord said. Resolve is not something this Government are very good at. They are very good at making promises—and at breaking them.

The noble Lord, Lord Bourne, congratulated the Climate Change Committee on its budget and said that the Government had overachieved. They overachieved by cheating, essentially, by not including shipping or aviation. That is how they cut carbon emissions. Of course, they have now included those, so we might actually get some more accurate figures. The noble Lord also mentioned the G7 and said how wonderful the Government were. The most leaderly thing I saw at the G7 was President Macron telling the UK to honour its treaty promises. Let us hope that the Government will do so.

For me, this statutory instrument is nothing more than an accounting trick that takes us further away from tackling the climate emergency and runaway global heating. The Government should be ashamed of themselves for not listening to the Committee on Climate Change, which said that these credits should be set at zero, as the Minister said. However, the Government knew better and instead of listening to what the Minister called “independent, expert advice” from the committee, chose to do their own “robust analysis” of the situation and came up with a different answer. Which part of government did that robust analysis? I would really like to know, so that I can target my comments a little more closely.

So, instead of following the advice, which was to set these limits at zero, the Government have allowed for an additional 55 million tonnes of CO₂ to be spewed into the UK atmosphere and then bought back from other countries. Essentially, the Government are like a fire brigade that says, “We’re going to let these 55 houses burn to the ground, but it’s okay because we’ve paid for 55 houses in other countries to be saved—and it’s cheaper anyway”. That is the most appalling way to run a country and an even worse way of trying to deal with runaway climate change, which is what we are facing.  It is absurd to try to trade these things when we should all be racing towards net zero across the world.

The Government talk about showing global leadership, but then they create loopholes to avoid doing much of anything. I accept that they have made moves in the right direction, including adding shipping and aviation when counting CO₂ emissions, but how are other countries going to look up to this Government on anything to do with climate change when they will not listen to their own Climate Change Committee, which gives them independent expert advice? Quite honestly, the Government are cheating the system, and I think it is appalling. Each time I get a glimmer of hope that this Government understand the real emergency we are facing and the damage it could do to all of us, the rest of the planet and every economy worldwide, my hopes are dashed by statutory instruments such as this.