Warm Homes Plan

Debate between Abtisam Mohamed and Ed Miliband

Wednesday 21st January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Ed Miliband]

As an MP with park homes in my constituency, I am very sympathetic to the issues facing people who live in park homes. To give the hon. Lady a proper answer, I will take that away and pass it on to the Under-Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, my hon. Friend the Member for Inverclyde and Renfrewshire West.

[Abtisam Mohamed (Sheffield Central) (Lab)]

I, too, warmly welcome the plan and the investment that is coming with it, and I strongly commend the leadership of the Secretary of State in this area. It is great news that small businesses are the vehicle that will drive home the upgrades in our local communities, but they too have struggled. I have over 5,000 small businesses in Sheffield Central. Will he outline how those small businesses will benefit from this plan?

[Ed Miliband]

My hon. Friend is right. Small businesses are eligible for the boiler upgrade scheme and there is a substantial investment in that. We want them to benefit from the solar loans, too. We also want to help them through local authority procurement. She is right that this is a massive job creation opportunity, but we need the SME sector to get its fair share.

COP30

Debate between Abtisam Mohamed and Ed Miliband

Tuesday 25th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Ed Miliband]

I could not disagree more with the hon. Lady. Honestly, this is a really important point: either we engage in international action on the global stage or we do not. We are 1% of global emissions, and unless we engage with the countries that produce the other 99% of global emissions, we will never keep our country safe. Do not look into the crystal ball; look at the record. Thirty years of COPs have reduced global warming forecasts from 4°—indeed 5°—to something like 2.3° to 2.5°. It is about multilateralism and working with others; that is so important. This is about our view of Britain. Are we a small, shrivelled country that cannot have any sway, or are we a country that can engage and stand tall on the global stage? That is what I believe.

[Abtisam Mohamed (Sheffield Central) (Lab)]

I thank the Secretary of State for his update and commend his continued leadership on this issue. I welcome the conference’s focus on strengthening multilateralism, including creating the Belém mechanism for a just global transition. But beyond the walls of the conference, here in the UK we need to be moving much faster away from oil and gas. The UK’s four biggest banks continue to finance polluters, and the drilling licence for Rosebank still has not been rejected. Does the Secretary of State agree that it should be the big polluters subsidising the taxpayer in our climate response and not the other way round?

[Ed Miliband]

I will be brief. My hon. Friend raises the issue of the banks. I encourage her to contribute to our consultation on transition plans for financial institutions and large companies, because that is an important part of making sure that the investments being made are aligned with net zero and the wider argument on tackling the climate crisis. She makes an important point.

COP29

Debate between Abtisam Mohamed and Ed Miliband

Tuesday 26th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Ed Miliband]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine demonstrated the truth, which is that, unfortunately, fossil fuels do not give us energy security. Whether those fossil fuels came from the North sea or were imported, prices shot through the roof; our constituents paid the price, and the Government paid out £94 billion in support. That is why our clean energy superpower mission is so important, to give us the energy security that the Conservatives completely failed to give us.

[Abtisam Mohamed (Sheffield Central) (Lab)]

I commend the Energy Secretary on his work, both in the UK and his global leadership at COP29. Many developing countries continue to face the intensifying effects of the climate crisis. For their sake and for ours, we cannot afford inaction and delay. Can the Secretary of State clarify what specific work will be undertaken to improve global ambitions so that we can transition away from fossil fuels and keep alive the commitment to keep the world’s temperature rise below 1.5°C?

[Ed Miliband]

My hon. Friend asks absolutely the right question. That is the work that we will be undertaking with Brazil and other like-minded countries in the year ahead. Next year marks a very important moment: we have to set our nationally determined contributions for 2035, five years on from the last time the world did so. This is such an important moment, because it is how we need to get back on track for keeping temperature rises down. We will be straining every sinew to work with others to make that happen.