Net-zero Carbon Emissions: Behaviour Change

Lord Oates Excerpts

Thursday 16th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Oates (LD)]

My Lords, I declare my interest in the register as chair of the advisory board of Weber Shandwick UK. I am delighted to follow the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone, for bringing this important debate and all noble Lords for their contributions to it. As other noble Lords have said, it is particularly timely as we look forward to COP 26 in November, when we as a country have a clear responsibility to show leadership. I also thank all the organisations that have briefed us. I very much endorse the proposal of the noble Lord, Lord Browne of Ladyton, for a portal on which all these things could easily be accessed by us—and perhaps more importantly, they could be on the register.

Sadly, on the issue of the public engagement that will be needed to achieve the behaviour change required to achieve net zero, our Government are failing to show leadership in the UK, let alone in the world. Worse, as my noble friend Lady Randerson said, the Government are promulgating the fantasy that we do not have to significantly change behaviour in, for example, transport, because technology will take care of it—the cake-and-eat-it approach. That just will not wash, given what we face.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone, mentioned, Article 6 of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and Article 12 of the Paris Agreement both set out responsibilities on the parties to take to engage their citizens and measures to enhance climate education and awareness. The noble Baroness, Lady Bull, made a compelling point on the importance of education in this process.

At this point I want to take on some of the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford. He made an attack on XR, which he said had done untold damage to the issue of the climate. I disagree with some of the tactics of XR, but I understand the reason for them. As I said in the debate on the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill earlier this week, the reason XR and others are taking action on the streets is the reckless failure of this Parliament to take sufficiently urgent action to address the climate emergency, and the years of deniers and now delayers. I also reject his view that we cannot as a country have influence and that it is all somehow hopeless.

In 1940, when Britain stood almost alone against fascism, we did not say, “We cannot do this because it is too expensive, no one else is doing it and we will probably be defeated anyway.” Actually, some people did say that, but thankfully they were not heeded. Instead, we recognised that we faced an existential threat and had to do whatever was necessary to counter it, whatever the cost. We had to lead the world until others stepped forward to join us in the fight. Thank God that approach was taken.

As I have said, lack of public awareness of the scale of the challenge we face and the changes we have to make is a real problem, but there is also a lack of understanding of the benefits that can accrue to our economy and our quality of life. It really is the responsibility of all of us, but particularly of the Government, to take the lead in engaging the public.

[Lord Howell of Guildford (Con)]

I agree with a lot of what the noble Lord says, but he has not quite understood my message—of course, that is my fault for not having the time or the clarity. The contribution this nation ought to be making is going to be very expensive and very extensive and could be very effective. What I am arguing is that the contribution we are making now—and putting the resources where we are, like removing gas boilers from 27 million homes—is not the way to do it. Vast resources are required to be transferred to the developing world from us—$100 billion has been mentioned and probably at least one nought should be added. It is not a question of not contributing; it is a question of making the right contribution.

[Lord Oates (LD)]

I thank the noble Lord for his intervention and I take his point, but we have to do some of the things in regard to decarbonising our homes as well. We face a vast challenge and we cannot duck any of it. I hope that he therefore very much supports the position of my party and of many Peers in this House, which was absolutely against the cut in the 0.7% of GNI going to those economies that he mentions.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone, and other Peers have mentioned, the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change argued in its excellent report on the role of behaviour change in delivering net zero that we need to focus very much on key measures that people need to take, and not to overwhelm them with all the measures it would be possible to take. Among those are reducing car and air travel and, as other noble Lords have mentioned, a cut in dairy and meat consumption, which is often not understood. The noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, shared some of the figures that were set out in that report—I think they were BEIS figures originally—on public attitudes and public understanding, and they show a great deal that needs to be done. I think his suggestion of a simple public information document to every household to start this process would be a good thing.

My noble friend Lady Sheehan referred to the Climate Change Committee report that argued that public engagement should be an absolutely key priority for government. According to that report, 62% of measures that are needed to reach net zero require change to public behaviours and we need a meaningful effort to engage across all areas of the country, particularly those dependent on high carbon-emitting industry. We need to ensure that there are a diverse range of messengers giving these messages. They have to be not just us as government or organisations talking down to people; they have to be about interactive communications and participatory engagement.

We all have a role in changing our behaviour—government do, business does and academia does. Perhaps most importantly or very significantly in the business world is the finance industry. The noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, mentioned what we can do, and what organisations such as the Church of England do, in terms of investments, but we really need the finance industry and the regulators to put in place measures to ensure that capital does not continue to be misallocated, as it is now, towards those industries that threaten our climate and instead is allocated to those industries that can help rescue us from the situation we find ourselves in.

The difficulty we have is that, given the importance of behaviour change and given its vital role in reaching the Government’s targets, which the Government acknowledge, it is deeply alarming that the Government appear to have no strategy at all. I reinforce the question from the noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone: can the Minister tell us whether such a strategy will be in the net-zero strategy, because it is clearly a priority? We also need to learn from international partners. The noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone, mentioned some countries, including a domestic example in Scotland, but our COP 26 partner, Italy, is a leader in public engagement on this subject and we should learn from it. We should also learn from and work with local government, because it is a trusted partner that can help to deliver some of those measures on the ground.

As the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Blackburn said, we cannot just expect people to change their behaviour if we do not give them the opportunity to do so. There are so many policies that need to change if the Government are to allow people to make the changes they often want to make. You might want to change your car to an EV but you do not have off-street parking and there are no chargers on your street, or if you use a commercial charger, it costs you six times as much as if it is from your domestic electricity supply. There are all sorts of things like that that need to be fixed as well.

We all know that climate change is not waiting on our procrastination; it is taking advantage of it. We also know that public engagement and awareness campaigns cannot be effective overnight, but more often take a period of years, which underscores the urgency of action now. The Government need to get on with this, to correct their lack of strategy and to do so now. They need to show a lead in this country and a lead in the world.

Climate Change

Lord Oates Excerpts

Tuesday 7th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

Achieving the targets that we have already set will be difficult enough. I like the noble Baroness’s ambition to go even further and faster, but I think that we will stick with what we have got for the moment.

[Lord Oates (LD)]

My Lords, a year ago when I asked the Minister whether it was not about time that the Government had a credible short-term action plan to tackle the climate emergency, he replied:

“Indeed, and we will be setting this out in due course.”—[Official Report, 6/10/20; col. 517.]


In light of the IPCC report, which makes it clear that global warming of between 1.5 and 2 degrees will be exceeded this century without drastic cuts in emissions, when can we expect to see that credible short-term action plan? I emphasise “credible”.

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

As I said in response to the previous question, we have published a number of our strategies. The heat and buildings strategy is to be published shortly; the net-zero strategy will be published before COP. We need to set an example, and we intend to do just that. These are difficult decisions involving a lot of different players within government, but we will endeavour to do so as quickly as possible.

Human Rights Due Diligence

Lord Oates Excerpts

Tuesday 20th July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

The noble Baroness is right; this is indeed a complicated subject with a lot of different areas for consideration. We need to be careful not to impose undue burdens, particularly on small businesses.

[Lord Oates (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I hope the Minister will agree that Governments as well as businesses have a moral duty of due diligence on human rights. Can he therefore tell the House what due diligence the Government conducted prior to chartering a flight to deport Zimbabwe nationals tomorrow to a country where human rights are consistently violated? Will the Government now halt that flight and place a moratorium on further deportations until the Zimbabwean Government can demonstrate that they respect the human rights of their citizens and the rule of law?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I admire the noble Lord’s ingenuity in getting a question on deportation flights into one considering forest communities. I do not have the information about that particular flight—I was not aware of it—so I will write to him.

Hydrogen Economy

Lord Oates Excerpts

Monday 19th July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

The noble Lord makes some good points, but the reality is that we do not yet know what the best make-up for heating will be further into the coming decades. It will likely be a mix of fuel pumps, hydrogen heating and heat networks.

[Lord Oates (LD) [V]]

My Lords, the Minister has told us that the Government are pursuing a twin-track approach between green and blue hydrogen, but they have allocated nearly £200 million to five blue hydrogen projects and none for green, despite the fact that the Government do not anticipate blue hydrogen projects coming onstream until the mid-2020s. What immediate steps do the Government intend to take to develop our green hydrogen industry and ensure we do not squander the competitive edge we currently hold in green hydrogen technology?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

My Lords, the reality is that we need to develop both. The UK has expertise and assets to support both electrolytic and CCUS-enabled hydrogen production, and by enabling multiple low-carbon production routes, we can drive cost-effective supply volumes through the 2020s—in line with the 2030 strategy that I mentioned earlier of 5 gigawatts of hydrogen to be produced.

Steel Sector

Lord Oates Excerpts

Monday 12th July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I am pleased that the noble Lord welcomed the decision that was taken with regard to the recommendations of the Trade Remedies Authority. Of course, we keep all these matters under constant review but, as I said, we will continue to work with the sector to see what new opportunities there are and how we can help it in future.

[Lord Oates (LD)]

Can the Minister tell the House what plans the Government have to exploit the UK’s lead in the manufacture of the electrolysers used for green hydrogen production—manufacturing which is based in the great steel city of Sheffield—in order to make the UK the global hub for green steel production?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

The noble Lord is quite right that hydrogen-based steel making is one of the many technological approaches we are looking at for the sector’s future. We announced the £250 million clean steel fund to support the UK steel sector to transition to low-carbon production, and we plan to establish the net-zero hydrogen fund with £240 million of capital co-investment to 2024.

Climate Change

Lord Oates Excerpts

Tuesday 29th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

As I said in my earlier answer, the noble Lord will have to be a little bit patient and wait for the sector strategies that are coming out, which will help to address his point—but I do not accept that we have not done anything. We have taken action on transport with a £5 billion package and we have spent £3 billion on buildings and £1 billion on carbon capture, et cetera, et cetera. So we have done a lot, but I totally accept that we have much to do.

[Lord Oates (LD)]

Can the Minister assure the House that at the very least no decision to approve the Cambo heavy crude field, or any other oil and gas field in UK jurisdiction, will be taken without subjecting it to the test of whether it is compatible with the UK’s legally binding net-zero commitment?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

As I said in my answer to the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker, the report itself recognises that there is ongoing demand for oil and gas, including in all scenarios for how we meet net zero. We have worked closely with the sector and across government to agree a North Sea transition deal, delivering the skills, innovation and infrastructure required to decarbonise North Sea oil and gas production.

Climate Change Act 2008 (Credit Limit) Order 2021

Lord Oates Excerpts

Tuesday 15th June 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Oates (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his introduction to this statutory instrument, which could not have been clearer. Its clarity is the reason I oppose the order. It is clear that it is unnecessary, ill-advised and sends precisely the wrong messages about what we as a nation will do when the going gets tough on meeting our climate change targets. As the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, and other noble Lords have said, and as the Minister pointed out, it is opposed by the Climate Change Committee, the Government of Scotland and the Government of Wales.

The Government have two arguments that they deploy in favour of these 55 million credits. First, they say they are on track to meet the fourth carbon budget, but they need to have flexibility just in case they do not. The Minister told us that 55 million credits were in place for the second and third carbon budgets. While I think there should be zero credits, in line with the views of the Climate Change Committee, the least the Government could have done is to begin to ratchet them down as a proportion of the budget. The Minister said that they represented 2.8% of the budget; he could have brought that down to 1% or 1.5%, but he and the Government have chosen not to do and are sending very worrying signals about what they will do.

The Minister said, as the Explanatory Memorandum points out at paragraph 7.5, that the UK is currently projected to meet the fourth carbon budget. The Climate Change Committee says that the Government are not on track to meet the fourth or the fifth carbon budget, so I wonder whether he can explain that discrepancy and who is advising the Government on their projections to meet the climate change budget.

The second argument that the Government use is:

“The ability to purchase credits could also enable the UK to support mitigation action in developing countries. A purchase of credits would contribute to the development of a global carbon market, which would reduce the global cost of action on climate change.”


This is of course an utterly spurious argument. Nothing would prevent the Government, if they set the credit limit at zero, purchasing credits and contributing to supporting developing countries in this way. This measure is a “get out of jail free” card for the Government when they start finding things difficult, and it is clear that things are going to be much more difficult politically if we are to meet our targets. We all know that. We know that the decarbonisation of our economy to date has been driven largely by the decarbonisation of the power sector. Although that has had impacts on the public, they have been indirect, and they are very different from what will happen as we move forward.

We absolutely need a signal of resolution from the Government and not a signal that they have a way out of this, not least because we are talking here about the fourth carbon budget, which, as I have said, the Climate Change Committee says we are not on track to meet. The fifth and sixth carbon budgets are much more demanding. If the Government are giving themselves wriggle room already on these budgets, it sends a very worrying signal.

There is an Arab proverb which I often quote in the context of climate change, because it is very apposite: commitments are cloud, but implementation is rain. This Government are extremely good at making commitments; they are extremely poor at bringing forward the actions needed to implement them. Not only are they bad at acting to implement them; they often do the opposite. Whether it is air passenger duty, coal mines or in other areas, not only do they not act but they do not signal the action that is needed. I hope that we can retain the cross-party consensus that existed when we set these targets, so that we can act to meet them. But we all need to work together and show absolute commitment to doing that, and we must not give ourselves wriggle room to get out of the commitments we have made.

Contracts for Difference (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2021

Lord Oates Excerpts

Thursday 10th June 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Oates (LD)]

My Lords, I feel privileged to be in this very elite grouping discussing this statutory instrument. However, the limited number of us participating should not take away from the importance of what is proposed here. I hope the Minister will be pleased that I welcome these regulations without a “but”. I have an “and” and some questions, but overall I think the regulations are very welcome.

As the Explanatory Memorandum points out, the private-law contract nature of CfDs provides the certainty needed for investment in these green technologies. It is very important that we get this part right. It is the CfDs that have led to such a dramatic reduction in the cost, for example, of offshore wind.

I welcome the fact that the regulations will remove biomass conversion from future allocation rounds, which seems sensible, and that floating offshore wind will be put into a separate pot. I hope that, in future, CfDs may be extended beyond just this sector so that we can look at how they—or similar mechanisms to provide certainty—might be applied to technologies such as green hydrogen. That is an important thing for the Government to look into.

The regulations, as the Minister pointed out, strengthen the supply chain policy, which is aimed at a more open and competitive supply chain and at promoting innovation and skills. I welcome that but, given that the Secretary of State has the power to refuse to provide an eligible generator with such a statement, can the Minister give us some understanding of the basis on which such refusals would be made?

Paragraph 7.11 of the Explanatory Memorandum explains:

“These Regulations also extend the confidentiality provisions relating to the disclosure of information that may damage the commercial interests of any other person”.


I do not think the Minister touched on this in his opening remarks; can he explain why that change is felt to be needed now? I am suspicious of extending confidentiality provisions beyond what is absolutely necessary.

I was going to criticise the lack of clarity in paragraph 7.12 of the Explanatory Memorandum, which seemed almost incomprehensible to me, but then the Minister read it out almost word for word. I do not think that particularly helped to explain anything. Can he perhaps ensure that these Explanatory Memoranda explain things a bit better?

I have a couple of further points. Paragraph 7.27 states:

“These Regulations amend the Allocation Regulations by amending the way the budget operates to provide the flexibility to decide … whether each capacity cap, maximum and/or minimum … would be applied as a ‘soft’ or as a ‘hard’ constraint.”


What will the considerations be in determining whether a hard or soft constraint will be applied, as that was not clear to me?

Finally, paragraph 7.30 makes it clear that the regulations are amended to make it

“explicit that the overall budget, both monetary and capacity may be varied using a budget revision notice.”

Can the Minister tell us what that does for the level of certainty he referred to in his statement as being extremely important for industry? I note from the consultation responses that there was a good deal of concern about this change. The Government argue that it is not a change but simply makes something explicit. I am a little sceptical about that argument on the basis that, if the Government had the power to do it anyway, I suspect they would not be giving themselves the power to do it. Can he give us some more information on that?

However, as I said at the start, on behalf of the Liberal Democrats, we welcome these proposals. We welcome the extension of the period, which will give greater certainty, and are pleased that the regulations have been brought before the Grand Committee.

Carbon Budget Order 2021

Lord Oates Excerpts

Thursday 10th June 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Oates (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his clarity in introducing this order. I welcome it, the ambition it sets out and the decision to follow the Climate Change Committee’s recommendations—particularly its recommendation to include the UK’s share of international aviation and shipping. I was concerned that that was not included in the order before us; I am grateful for the Minister’s reassurance that it is simply because of differing statutory deadlines. He said in his letter to me that it would be laid in due course, which was a worryingly vague term, but he has given some clarity today. I thank him for that.

We urgently need to address these issues, not least around aviation. On that point, we are still awaiting the publication of the Government’s net-zero aviation policy. However, the Climate Change Committee has already told us that adequate airport capacity already exists to meet the future levels of demand that are compatible with a pathway to net zero. Does the Minister agree that, until the Government have developed their net-zero strategy for the sector—including a national strategy for airport capacity—the only responsible approach is to impose a moratorium on all airport expansion? If he does not agree with that, can he explain how we can have any chance of meeting the sixth carbon budget unless we are able to take the decisions that are consistent with it?

As I said, the Liberal Democrats very much welcome the ambition of these targets, but we remain concerned that the Government seem much more ambitious about target-setting than they do about action-taking. I do not know whether I am becoming more conservative in my old age or the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, is becoming more liberal, but I agreed with every word—I was going to say almost every word—he said. He will be pleased to know that quite a lot of it is in the Liberal Democrat manifesto.

The noble Lords, Lord Lansley and Lord Moynihan, made the point that delivery is key now. We have had a whole series of target-setting. We have the net-zero target, which I welcome. We now have the 78% target by 2035; we had the 68% target by 2030. These are all good things to point towards. However, they are worthless if we do not actually take action to get there. The noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, said that, without that action plan, they are nothing more than a worthy objective—I agree. It is good to have worthy objectives but it is important to have action.

I agree 100% with the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, that fiscal incentives are absolutely critical. We have to start shaping our fiscal system to take into account what is the biggest economic and existential threat to us. We cannot just keep putting it off. We cannot keep taking decisions that are entirely contrary to the targets we set. The consultation on air passenger duty that the Government have embarked on is completely the wrong approach. We should be reflecting much more along the lines that have been taken in France: they are restricting domestic flights where train journeys can get you there within two and a half hours, I think it is. We should place that on all carbon-emitting domestic flights but we should have an exemption for all clean technologies. That would also be a way of advancing clean technologies in the aviation sector.

We cannot go on with a situation where, in 2016, we scrapped the net-zero carbon homes standard. Again, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, that one of the good things about climate change policy in this country is that it has been, in general, cross-party. The one real exception was George Osborne’s occupation of the Treasury where, despite a guarantee that they would be the greenest Government in history, throughout the time of the coalition Government, the Treasury was the major obstacle and a lot of promises were made in that regard. I am glad that we have moved on from that time, but we must get back to what should have been the 2016 target.

As the Climate Change Committee points out, since then, we have built a huge number of houses that are going to have to be retrofitted. That makes no sense at all. We have to tackle the building sector. I know the complications and difficulties in that, but we must learn from the mistakes we have made in the past and not keep repeating them. I know that the Minister agrees on that. I suspect that the Treasury is again the problem. The stamp duty relief that the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, mentioned is an idea that must be implemented. We must get on with this stuff to give people incentives; even then, it will be very difficult.

I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Lilley, on one point, if not on many others: that there is a nonchalance about how we are going about this. We must get on with this and we have to be clear about what it means.

This morning, I was speaking to sixth-form students at a Roman Catholic girls’ school. Among the many questions they asked was, “When are adults really going to understand the urgency for action?” I hope that the Minister will understand the urgency for action, not just target-setting.

Ecodesign for Energy-Related Products and Energy Information Regulations 2021

Lord Oates Excerpts

Tuesday 8th June 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Oates (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his introductory comments and his explanation of this statutory instrument.

I note that the Explanatory Memorandum states:

“this legislation will protect the Great British market from the risk of ‘dumping’ of less efficient products which do not meet the minimum standards in the EU and in Northern Ireland ... For some products, without this SI suppliers may need to have two product lines—one for the GB market and one for the EU and Northern Ireland market ... Suppliers may also have to undertake dual conformity assessment procedures to ensure compliance with both sets of requirements. This legislation avoids this outcome and the associated costs to business.”

I am sure that the Minister will agree with me that this is a powerful argument for regulatory alignment and, indeed, for membership of the single market and, in order to influence the single market, membership of the European Union—but that is perhaps for another day.

I wonder whether the Minister can answer a few questions about this SI. Paragraph 7.8 of the Explanatory Memorandum states:

“In order to demonstrate or measure conformity with the ... Labelling requirements introduced by these Regulations, designated standards must be used ... However, none of the standards for the requirements in these Regulations is available to be designated yet due to their ongoing development.”


Is it usual to introduce legislation imposing labelling requirements where standards have not been designated? I understand that some of the products covered will be expected to use existing standards, but the Explanatory Memorandum states:

“For commercial refrigeration and welding equipment, for which there are no existing Regulations nor a transitional method of measurement, we expect suppliers to use the best available standards.”


Can the Minister explain what that means and how conformity will be achieved between different manufacturers? Who will decide?

Could the Minister also explain why the regulations do not apply to appliances that are battery operated but can operate via a separately purchased AC/DC converter? Can the Minister also tell us what the practical difference is between the EU provision, referred to in paragraph 7.12, for a “product database” and the UK Government’s proposal for a “publicly accessible website”? Can he explain how those two differ? Can he also tell us when the designated standards are likely to be available?

Finally, I note that, while the standards for the appliances under this regulation relate to energy efficiency, products covered here include dishwashers and washing machines. I wonder what plans the Government have—or whether there are different measures by which they can set standards for water usage. People who took part in the debate on the Environment Bill will know the difficulties and pressures that are caused by excess water usage, so I hope that the Government will consider how these may be brought in in future.