Greenhouse Gas Emissions Trading Scheme (Amendment) (Extension to Maritime Activities) Order 2026

Lord Geddes Excerpts

Thursday 12th March 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

The noble Lord almost pre-empts what I was about to say, so I thank him. As if this is not enough to give politics a bad name, the events of last week, I am afraid, leave a nasty taste in the mouth. The Northern Ireland Assembly’s DAERA scrutiny committee met last Thursday and heard from Stena Line, the key ferry company linking GB to NI, and the UK Chamber of Shipping. All parties there, bar the Alliance, expressed concerns. The Minister is an Alliance member, of course. The committee was ready to reject the order but was told that there was a Northern Ireland-specific impact assessment around, and agreed to postpone its decision until Monday this week so that members could read the impact assessment. On Monday, the committee met again and was presented with no NI impact assessment because no such impact assessment existed. Officials suggested that the impact on Northern Ireland was already assessed but, again, this is not true.

The Frontier Economics study often cited was commissioned in 2023 by Whitehall departments, not the NI department. It mentions Northern Ireland a few times but provides no quantified estimates of the impacts on Northern Ireland’s consumers or business. It also spends a lot of time emphasising cruise liner shipping, which is not even covered, and barely touches on freight routes. The Government have acknowledged that Northern Ireland is more exposed to cost transmission through maritime freight but surely then there should have been a dedicated economic impact assessment carried out. Did the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland ever even discuss it with Secretary of State Miliband to point out the unfairness? Sometimes we almost question the role and purpose of the Northern Ireland Office. The impact assessment statement was just a ruse to prevent a vote last Thursday that would have gone the wrong way, and to buy the Government time.

Over the weekend, Northern Ireland officials lobbied MLAs very hard. Even the Secretary of State was engaged in texting and maybe even telephoning party leaders with the argument that had never been mentioned in the other place when this was discussed, saying that the entire EU reset would be threatened if the Assembly blocked the SI. The people of Northern Ireland expect their Secretary of State to at the very least put forward the arguments as to why they should not be subject to discriminatory treatment, leading to higher fares. It is clear that Northern Ireland does not have a Northern Ireland Office that works for the people of Northern Ireland the way in which the Scotland Office does.

The committee voted by five votes to four to approve the SI. One MLA, Michelle McIlveen, described these events in the following terms in the Assembly. She stated:

“What happened was, frankly, disgraceful. Last-minute pressure was placed on parties by UKG. A new dimension associated with CBAM and impact on EU negotiations was introduced. No facts, detail or proper briefing, just smoke and mirrors. That is not the way that we should do our politics, and interference at such a late stage is highly suspicious”.


The EU reset argument is nonsense. It played on the suggestion that if this order is not passed, that would be the end of any discussion on maritime greenhouse gases. In truth, however, as noble Lords know, regulations are pulled fairly regularly to make corrections and replaced a few days later with a new set of corrected regulations with “(No.2)” added at the end. The order that we are discussing is blatantly discriminatory and I call on the Government to commit at the very least to withdraw it and table a draft (No.2) order, which can have the same wording as the current order but applies the same exemption to Northern Ireland or Scotland. I appreciate that there may be noble Lords who wish to mention some other areas of the United Kingdom that have not been exempted.

Stena Line and the UK Chamber of Shipping have asked for reasonable adjustments: a 12-month delay to allow them to prepare, a Northern Ireland-specific economic assessment, a phased introduction period, and revenues raised to be targeted towards maritime decarbonisation. All those seem eminently sensible to me, as I hope they do to other noble Lords. I support the regret amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, but I feel very strongly that we are fed up with regretting things—regret does not change anything. That is why, unless we get a very strong response from the Minister—although I appreciate that he is not making these decisions—I believe that, for the sake of the people of Northern Ireland and for the sake of decency and fairness, I will be forced to push this to a vote.

I will mention something that came up in the other House. The honourable Member for North Antrim and the honourable Member for South Antrim both spoke against this and the Conservative Members voted against it in Committee, but of course with the huge Labour majority it went through the House. The 50% reduction was raised, which Northern Ireland is of course getting. The Minister there responded by saying:

“I wanted to clear up a couple of points … The 50% reduction that applies to Northern Ireland is there to create parity between vessels that operate between Great Britain and Northern Ireland and those that operate between Great Britain and the Republic of Ireland”.—[Official Report, Commons, Second Delegated Legislation Committee, 3/2/26; col. 13.]


Of course, the Republic of Ireland is under the EU’s 50% reduction. The honourable Member for North Antrim responded:

“The Minister is telling the Committee that parity with the Republic of Ireland is more important to him than parity with the rest of the United Kingdom”.—[Official Report, Commons, Second Delegated Legislation Committee, 3/2/26; col. 14.]


That tells us something. I beg to move.

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Geddes) (Con)]

My Lords, I should inform the House that, if this amendment is agreed to, I will be unable to call the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, by reason of pre-emption.