COP26

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Philip Dunne

Wednesday 10th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con) [V]]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for your generosity in this debate.

Although it may have been a little hard to determine from the remarks by my immediate predecessor in this debate, the right hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), he welcomed this debate and I join him in doing so. I congratulate the hon. Member for Bristol North West (Darren Jones) on his opening remarks. He is right that there is a consensus across the House. We all want to see COP26 as a hugely successful conference, not just for the UK but for the whole world, to set us on a path to zero emissions by 2050, an ambition that was set out some time ago.

The objectives for the COP26 series of discussions, which of course were due to have taken place last year had it not been for covid, were actually set at Paris five years ago. It is worth reminding ourselves, at the outset of my remarks, of the four particular commitments that were set for the forthcoming conference. The first was to enhance Governments’ nationally determined contributions. This will be the first time since Paris that they will have been ratcheted up. The second was to invite each country to provide a long-term strategy, to give a pathway to decarbonisation by 2050. Where I agree with the right hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington is that it is beholden on the Government to set out clarity over the path to 2050, not just the target.

The third commitment was to do with finance. There was $100 billion per annum mobilised for the poorest countries to help them green their economies and adapt to the impact of climate change. We need to see how that is going to be delivered when we get to Glasgow.

Finally, there was the issue of the rulebook for a global carbon market to avoid double counting and to set the standards. Here, I think the UK has a great opportunity to show its famed global leadership. This conference will be the largest ever held in this country in terms of the number of countries participating, and I hope that most of them will be able to be here, in one form or another, in person. It is a real opportunity for the nation to lead the world and for the Prime Minister to put his stamp on the future.

As the UK is acting as host country—with Italy, as has been said—we will act as a neutral arbiter in these negotiations. We need to ensure that every country—every Paris signatory, at least—is supported in bringing forward its updated nationally determined contribution. At the beginning of the Paris conference, 186 of the 196 parties attending had presented their nationally determined contributions. I know that progress has been made, but we have a long way to go to match France’s performance when it hosted the last of this series of conferences.

The UK announced its contribution, a 68% reduction in emissions against the 1990 benchmark, last December. Several other countries have set out high-profile ambitions since, including China, Japan and South Korea looking to get to net zero by the mid-21st century, and some presenting nearer-term targets ahead of COP26. However, we still have to see progress from some major economies, including Russia, Brazil and Australia—and I know that the US will now be joining; we need to see where it gets to, too. Perhaps the COP26 President will update us on his discussions with President Biden’s special envoy, John Kerry, who was in the UK very recently.

I want to touch on two other aspects—first, how does Parliament engage in scrutinising progress? The Environmental Audit Committee—in common with other Committees, as we have heard—has undertaken various sessions in relation to COP26. The first was a year ago, when we engaged with stakeholders who were involved with previous COPs to establish what the Government’s preparations needed to focus on. We then had a session with Nigel Topping and Fiona Reynolds in May last year on the role of finance in leading the way for the upcoming COP, and we also questioned Christiana Figueres, the former executive secretary of the UN convention, last year. We questioned my right hon. Friend the COP26 President, who was then President-designate, in September last year.

Nine Select Committees have locus in relation to this issue, and we have all agreed to work together in scrutinising the UK Government preparations. We, as the Environmental Audit Committee, will lead the first of those scrutiny sessions, on cross-Government arrangements and the machinery of government, tomorrow morning. I am very pleased that my right hon. Friend the COP26 President will be attending, with two of his senior officials.

The eyes of the world will be on us to make a credible success of COP. The challenge is across many areas. We need to use the national events that we have to demonstrate UK leadership. The UK has met the first and second carbon budgets and has already reduced emissions below the level expected in the third carbon budget, up to 2022. However, as is widely acknowledged, we are not on track to meet either the fourth or fifth carbon budgets, which were legislated for on the basis of an 80% cut in emissions using the 1990 baseline by 2050, rather than the more ambitious net zero target that we now have in legislation.

A major ramp-up is needed, as is acknowledged by the Committee on Climate Change, to achieve that, and the UK will have to make more progress. Although it has been succeeding in the power sector, emissions are either not falling or not falling fast enough across transport, agriculture, housing and industry. Bringing forward the petrol and diesel car ban is welcome, but it is not the only measure that the Government have to take—[Inaudible.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. The right hon. Gentleman has exceeded the time limit. I was trying to give him a little leeway, but the system will not allow me to let him finish his sentence. We therefore go to Kilmarnock, and to Alan Brown.

Environment Bill

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Philip Dunne

Report stage & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 26th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Philip Dunne [V]]

It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell). I thank him for his support for my private Member’s Bill, which I will touch on briefly. But my thanks primarily go to the Minister, who was generous while talking about my campaigning efforts to improve the water quality of our rivers, which I wish to talk about under part 5 and, in particular, in support of amendment 3 to clause 82 and amendment 42 to clause 78.

It has been clear to me for many years, but particularly this year as I have been campaigning to improve water quality by reducing sewage pollution to our rivers, how significant this issue has tragically become. Many people have been in touch with me through campaigning groups, all urging the Government to get behind my Bill.

I was delighted on Friday, when I was unable to be in the Chamber to debate my private Member’s Bill because sittings had been suspended, that as something of a consolation prize the Minister announced the Government’s support for the aims of my Bill. I look forward to a second consolation from the unfortunate development today—we hear that the Environment Bill will be deferred until the next parliamentary Session. I invite the Minister to use that time to work with me to bring into the appropriate legislative and regulatory space the many measures in my Bill that have significant support: they have support from 135 Members of this House today, on both sides of the House. I hope that, when she responds to the debate, she will give some encouraging noises to give me hope that that will happen. I am also grateful to her for establishing the storm overflows taskforce, which is the mechanism through which she is seeking to get advice from industry and campaigning groups to try to identify the measures that need to be undertaken.

Through the Environmental Audit Committee, we have launched an inquiry into water quality and we will be providing recommendations to the Government. The delay may mean that we are in a position to provide some recommendations through that Committee prior to the Bill appearing in the other place. I very much hope that the Minister will be able to use this time to introduce relevant amendments to the Bill as it passes through the Lords. We also hope to provide some help in assessing what the suitable water targets are under the Bill, which are so welcome, through the drainage and wastewater management plans laid out in the Bill.

I support the measures that I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne (Sir Charles Walker) will talk about shortly. I also support the initiative of my right hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling), whose new clause 4 is widely supported by my constituents, not least members of the British Hedgehog Preservation Society, which is based in my constituency. It acknowledged the inclusion in July last year of the hedgehog in the red list of endangered British mammals.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

After the next speaker, I will have to reduce the time limit for Back-Bench speeches to three minutes, but with four minutes, I call Sir Charles Walker.

Public Health

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Philip Dunne

Monday 4th May 2020 Commons Chamber

[Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con) [V]]

Madam Deputy Speaker, I am grateful to you for calling me on my first occasion of trying this virtual system.

I would like to take this opportunity to put on record my thanks to the Minister and his team for the extraordinary efforts they have displayed during this crisis in galvanising both the health service and the entirety of Government to get behind combating this disease. This is no easy task, and I think they have done it admirably, if I may say so. I would also like to pay a brief tribute to everybody working in the NHS, in the care sector and in the public services generally—local authorities, emergency services—right across the country and particularly in Shropshire in keeping a grip. As some other speakers have said, we are some way behind the rest of the country, being a rural shire county, but that does not mean to say that the disease is not now present and, regrettably, killing people.

On the debate today, it is very clear that we are making regulations that are unprecedented in scope in taking away people’s liberty. It is therefore absolutely right that Parliament, which regards itself as the beacon of democracy around the world, is here to scrutinise, to hold Ministers to account and to hold the Government to account. I share the comments made by earlier speakers that it is absolutely right that we have the ability to review these measures every 21 days, and I encourage Ministers to acknowledge—perhaps the Minister can do so in his winding up—that it is the Government’s intent to speak to the measures as they are either repeated or relaxed over the coming weeks.

I would like to make three quick points in this debate. First, and directly related to the regulations before us, some of the most heartrending cases I have heard of during the weeks of lockdown have been the difficulties for family members of those who are patients in intensive care units in hospitals, where they quite properly cannot be visited because they are on incubator ventilators. However, when that treatment does not succeed and, regrettably, there is a tragedy and the death of a patient, it has been difficult for family members to be able to come to terms with their own grief because they are initially not able to attend either burials or cremations. I warmly welcome, first, the announcement by the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government that close family members should be able to attend burials or cremations, but also that this is being confirmed in these regulations.

I would just like to add my support for care, when the Government look at relaxing the regulations, and for not imposing age-related restrictions on individuals. As we have seen all too vividly, it is possible to reach 100 and to walk—with assistance, but to walk—and take exercise in the way that Captain, now Colonel, Tom did so magnificently and galvanised the nation. We cannot introduce specific restrictions for those aged over an arbitrary limit—70-year-olds have been mentioned —without imposing very great inequality, in my view, on healthy individuals, so please do not do that.

Secondly, it is very clear from the Government’s five markers for relaxing restrictions that testing is one of the key platforms. I take my hat off to the Government again for the extraordinary effort in galvanising academia, the scientific research laboratories, the NHS laboratories, industry and even the military in achieving the very demanding testing target set by the Secretary of State for April. It is a tremendous achievement. However, these tests have all been swab tests—the antigen test—which tell whether an individual currently has the disease, so such a test is of limited use for as long as that individual is presenting symptoms. It does not help in identifying whether they have had the virus. Therefore, the antibody test is vital in order to allow us to get back to normal. It would be helpful if the Minister could give an indication to the House of what prospects we as a nation have of moving towards an antibody test that is effective.

Finally—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. I trust that the right hon. Gentleman is going to conclude very soon, because his five minutes are up.

[Philip Dunne]

I apologise, Madam Deputy Speaker. I would just like to echo the comment made by my hon. Friend the Member for Yeovil (Mr Fysh) that the contact tracing and tracking app needs to be introduced on a voluntary basis, and the Government should take great care in explaining to the public why it is such an important tool in fighting this disease.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Once again, the Opposition Member who was next on the list is not now going to participate in the debate, so I go to another Government Member, Sir John Redwood.