Queen’s Speech

Baroness Randerson Excerpts

Monday 17th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Randerson (LD)]

My Lords, I start by congratulating the noble Lords who made their maiden speeches today. The noble Lord, Lord Coaker, spoke with such passion about poverty that the gods responded immediately with a thunderbolt. In his excellent speech, the noble Lord, Lord Morse, reminded the House that his career at the National Audit Office will greatly strengthen our hand in our role of scrutinising the Government.

In his speech, my noble friend Lord Stunell said that the environmental targets exist, and many of them are perfectly good, but we lack the detailed steps on how we get there. This has been the theme of today. There are no proposed Bills in the gracious Speech aimed at cutting emissions and tackling the climate emergency. The key is there in that phrase: it is an emergency, and it requires government action this year—not next year or the year after. This applies particularly to transport-related emissions, which are responsible for around one-third of the total. They constitute a two-pronged assault on our well-being, causing ill health as well as climate change. There has been significant technological progress, so as a nation we can tackle many of the issues. However, transport is the one sector where, despite having the technology, there has been no reduction in emissions in recent years. That is because we travel more often and further. There are particular problems in relation to aviation and the increased sales of SUVs, which produce much greater emissions than average cars. Those points are being neglected by the Government.

The Government have a unique opportunity, as national life restarts following the pandemic. We can drift back largely to our bad old ways, or maybe even take a step backwards by returning in greater numbers to our cars, or the Government can use this time to steer us into less polluting habits. We urgently need the Government to lead the way, with legislation, investment and a new environmental tax regime, but sadly there was nothing in their proposals. The Government have so far shown little commitment to the steps needed to meet their targets. Rail fares were increased above inflation this year, while vehicle fuel tax was frozen yet again and grants for purchases of EVs were cut. The Government’s spending commitments include £27 billion on A roads and motorways, which academic experts have estimated will produce an astonishing 100 times more CO₂ than official government estimates. How can the Government be serious about leading COP 26 when they remain wedded to that?

The reference to the next phase of HS2 in the gracious Speech was welcome but the omission of any mention of the eastern leg to Leeds undermines the Government’s claims to be levelling up in the north-east. Yet, at the same time, they maintain their support for the outdated and damaging plan for the Heathrow third runway. There is a welcome commitment that public transport connectivity will be extended. In the previous Session, they unveiled their national bus strategy, which the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, discussed, but we are still waiting for details of the long-promised 4,000 zero-emission buses. On Wednesday, here in Westminster, the Campaign for Better Transport is launching its new campaign, “The way forward is public transport”. I hope that Ministers will find their way over to that event and pick up some good key action points.

I very much hope that the White Paper on rail reform is followed rapidly by legislation. The pandemic has stretched the current structure beyond breaking point but, again, we need action now to restructure the industry for the widespread investment in electrification and line reopenings that is so badly needed. Unlike bus services, which can be transformed in a small number of years, transformational investment in railways takes decades.

On many occasions, I have referred to the need for more measures to encourage the take-up of EVs. Motor manufacturers are increasingly concerned at the slow and chaotic development of the infrastructure to support them, including urgent investment in the national grid and a well co-ordinated and massive expansion of urban and motorway charging points. Neither of these can be left to the market alone; they need government leadership.

Then there is taxation. What is the future for vehicle taxation? Will the Government tax EVs as they do petrol and diesel cars or will there be road pricing? There are crucial issues for the future that need to be planned now. Even minor steps, such as changes to vehicle taxation to discourage the use of SUVs, would make a worthwhile difference.

In the Budget, the Government announced that they would remove APD on internal flights. Short-distance flights are more carbon-intensive. There is a need for reform of APD and aviation taxation, and, as my noble friend Lord Oates suggested, we need to follow the French and ban domestic flights that cover journeys of under two and a half hours by train.

The failure to use taxation as a weapon in the climate change fight is noticeable. I will give noble Lords another example: the Government charge 5% VAT on gas for a household boiler, but they charge 20% VAT on home improvements to improve energy efficiency. That is nonsensical.

The Government are also failing to set out the huge benefits that the revolution to come will bring to our economy: the many jobs that will come in building homes to the highest environmental standards and replacing all our gas boilers. The Government must level with the population: our apparent success in reducing emissions has come from relying on other nations to manufacture the goods that we use. If we measure our carbon footprint on the basis of our consumption, it has hardly changed. The scandal of the abandonment of the green homes grant was mentioned by many noble Lords, including my noble friend Lord Stunell. I urge the Government to give it another go, with redesigned policy and financial support.

This has been a very wide-ranging debate. A frequent theme was the notable omission of social care. My noble friend Lady Benjamin talked about the importance of young people and made the memorable statement that “childhood lasts a lifetime”. Very recently, my noble friend Lord Shipley, among others, concentrated on the need for decent affordable housing.

Many noble Lords have expressed serious concerns about the planning Bill: the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, and my noble friends Lady Pinnock and Lady Thornhill. They all emphasised the danger of excluding local voices, and they made the point that there are 1 million homes for which planning permission has been given but which have not been built. The Government really must not let the building industry off the hook on this. My noble friend Lady Pinnock, among others, also referred to the cladding scandal, which the Government must deal with.

In conclusion, I spur the Government on. Social change does happen, underscored by legislation. They must act now to ensure that social change can make throw-away fashion and technology as socially unacceptable as drink-driving. I press the urgency of this. So far, all that we have done as a planet is to slow the rate of the increase of climate change. The concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere has kept on growing. I end by restating my noble friend Lord Oates’s reference to the words of Mahatma Gandhi: the future is decided by what you do today.