Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Gardiner Excerpts

Tuesday 20th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Claire Perry]

My right hon. Friend makes a valuable point. It is said that fracking is this new thing, but in fact we have been doing it for many years, including using it to extract oil from sites close to both of our constituencies. It is a perfectly safe technology. We have to be clear, however, that we are doing this in an environmentally sensitive way. Of course nobody wants environmental regulations that they cannot defend to their constituents, but we are going through this calmly and soberly; we have excellent science and so far the process is delivering shale gas from these very exploratory fracks, which is something we should all welcome.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

On 21 May this year the Minister met a number of renewable energy companies. That meeting was properly recorded on the ministerial register of meetings to ensure transparency. On the same day the Minister also met all the key fracking companies including Cuadrilla, INEOS, iGas and Third Energy. That meeting somehow failed to make it on to the transparency register. Would the Minister like to take this opportunity to apologise for the concealment of that information, and by way of penance would she like to confirm when she will finally visit local residents at Preston New Road to explain why the 36 earthquakes that have occurred since Caudrilla began fracking operations are simply the equivalent of dropping a bag of flour on their kitchen floors?

[Claire Perry]

I am glad the pantomime season is coming up as there is some good auditioning going on. Let me explain. I know that the hon. Gentleman is aware of the ministerial code, and I am told by my officials that when they did not disclose the meeting of 21 May it was because the ministerial code does not require Ministers to disclose meetings that they drop in on, as opposed to host in their office. I have made it clear to my officials that any meeting ever held with anyone related to shale gas should be recorded, whether or not that is in accordance with current guidance. The hon. Gentleman will also know that at that so-called secret meeting with the fracking companies were the Coalfields Regeneration Trust, the GMB union, representatives of local government and UK100 chaired by the doughty Polly Billington, former special adviser to the right hon. Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband). The idea that I would hold secret meetings with an industry that is so potentially vital is, frankly, ridiculous. I have also appointed a superb former colleague of the hon. Gentleman’s, Natascha Engel, as my commissioner for shale gas, and she has been out there very consistently meeting local groups and residents in all of these fracking areas. I would be delighted to visit Preston New Road. Unfortunately, however, as I was aggressively approached by a protestor who threatened to visit my home because he knew my children were home alone, I have been advised for security reasons to be very careful about engaging with the protestors. Of course when I go, unlike some Opposition Members, I will make sure to visit the protestors and also those exploiting the resource to create jobs. Those of us on the Government Benches believe in jobs, not mobs.

Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Gardiner Excerpts

Tuesday 16th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Claire Perry]

It is always a pleasure to meet the hon. Gentleman. The problem we have with feed-in tariffs is that we have spent nearly £5 billion since 2011, through consumer bills, on supporting some often very uneconomic projects. Quite rightly, particularly given the reduction in the cost of other renewable energies, the decision was made that that was no longer affordable. I support that. He asks whether there are other ways to continue to invest in the sector, and he is quite right that solar has an important role to play in the system. We have just finished the call for evidence and are considering the responses, and I hope to come back to the House soon.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

Yesterday, the Minister requested that the Committee on Climate Change update its advice on the action necessary to respond to the report on 1.5° by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. For a brief moment, I thought she had done the right thing, but then I read her letter, which says:

“Carbon budgets already set in legislation…are out of scope of this request.”

The committee has already written to her twice, warning that the country is not on track to meet the lesser targets in those budgets. By saying that those budgets are out of scope, the Minister is pushing back the necessary change by 12 years. When did she become a follower of St Augustine—“Lord, make me virtuous, but not yet.”?

Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Gardiner Excerpts

Tuesday 12th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

In 2015, the then Secretary of State said that 2018 would be the year for the UK to ratchet up our Paris climate commitments and our progress towards sustainable generation, but in the past three years the Government have capped support for low-carbon energy and destroyed 12,000 solar jobs. Clean energy investment, which fell by 10% in 2016, fell by a further 56% in 2017 to its lowest level in a decade. How about the Minister comes down off cloud complacency and finally gives investors certainty about the renewables industry, starting with a date for the consultation on the post feed-in tariff framework?

[Claire Perry]

I think that the question in all that preamble was, “What is the date?” As I said, we will be announcing that soon.

Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Gardiner Excerpts

Tuesday 1st May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Claire Perry]

Joining the skills that we already have in one sector with those in another is an excellent suggestion, and I will be delighted to meet my hon. Friend to discuss it.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

Offshore wind is an integral part of the clean growth strategy, which the Government have submitted to the United Nations as their official mid-century decarbonisation plan. However, the independent Committee on Climate Change says that the strategy will fail to meet even our existing targets for 2030. Will the Minister tell us when “mid-century” shifted forward 20 years? Why do the Government think a plan that fails even to deliver a 57% reduction in emissions by 2030 is appropriate to meet the much tougher reduction of a more than 80% reduction by 2050?

[Claire Perry]

Once again, I am amazed at the hon. Gentleman’s ability to turn one of the great success stories of this country—in fact, he wrote an article about this last week that was so poor that he did not even retweet it. The point is that we have—[Interruption.] If he stopped chuntering, perhaps he might learn something. He is most impolite. We have led the world in decarbonising our economy. As the hon. Gentleman knows, we were the first country to set up statutory carbon budgets, and we are on track to meet the first three, as well as to get close to the budgets, based on current policies and proposals, in 10 and 15 years’ time. He will also know that we are the first developed nation to have said that we want to understand how we will get to a zero-carbon economy in 2050, and my request to the committee—[Interruption.] He is doing it again, Mr Speaker; his mother would be horrified by this level of discourtesy. We were the first country in the world to ask how we will get to a decarbonised economy in 2050, and I would hope that we could enjoy cross-party support for something so vital.

Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Gardiner Excerpts

Tuesday 7th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

Because we need both. Our ambition is to make this country one of the best connected in the world so that it is possible to go from the capital to our midlands, northern cities and beyond quickly and efficiently, and have more capacity to move freight around the country. I would have thought, given the importance of the motor industry to Derbyshire, that the hon. Gentleman, as a Derbyshire MP, would welcome the investment and progress in the sector, including £250 million invested by Toyota in its excellent plant.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

Germany has said 2030; Norway and Holland are aiming for 2025. The Chinese owners of Volvo say that all their new models will have an electric motor from 2019. As the climate conference in Bonn begins, does the Secretary of State consider that the UK Government’s plan to ban the sale of fossil fuel vehicles from only 2040 is somewhat lacking in ambition, failing to provide strong leadership, or downright pathetic and making the UK a laughing stock?

[Greg Clark]

If the hon. Gentleman reflects on our reputation in the world, he should know that, for international leadership on climate change, it is very strong. He would do well to commend rather than undermine that. In the past few weeks, we launched the clean growth strategy, which commits, across a range of areas, not just to meet our legal commitments and generate jobs in those important technologies, but to lead the world in exports. I would have thought that he would use his time at the Dispatch Box to commend the Government for a document that has been well received across the world.

Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Gardiner Excerpts

Tuesday 12th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Claire Perry]

I think the hon. Gentleman is showing the effect of our late sitting hours with his grumpiness. He should be celebrating the fact that Britain has led the world in decarbonising our economy, while growing the economy at a greater rate than any other G7 country. If he wants more affirmation, he should read the PwC report on that. What we have to do now is set out a very difficult and long-term plan to meet the fourth and fifth carbon budgets and to go beyond. As always, that requires all of us to support this difficult progress right across the economy. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will have a cup of coffee and cheer up.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

The Minister is right to say that we have an excellent method of calculating our emissions, but she might have pointed out that other countries do not, and that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is currently preparing updated guidelines on how best to account for emissions. Will she confirm that, for that vital work to proceed, the UK Government will be one of those who increase their financial contribution to the IPCC to make good the shortfall left by President Trump’s decision to pull out of the Paris agreement? Does she also agree, now that the cost of offshore wind energy has fallen by a half in just two years, that those are the easiest emissions to calculate, because they are zero?

[Claire Perry]

I hope that the hon. Gentleman will celebrate the fact that we entirely agree and have committed to increasing our contribution to the funding of that agency, directly as a result of the pull-out of the USA from the Paris agreement—although technically it cannot withdraw until 2020.