Behaviour Change for Net Zero

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Thursday 31st March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

As I mentioned in earlier answers, we have a range of strategies in place to support people to make their green choices. We have the boiler upgrade scheme, which is launching next month with £450 million-worth of support over three years, to help people to make a green choice in their heating. We have the phase-out of petrol and diesel cars by 2030 to help people to make green choices in their transport. We have the jet-zero initiative, to help people to make green choices in flying and transportation. So we think the better approach, rather than trying to dictate people’s behaviour, is to support them to enable them to make green choices.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, late last year, the Centre for Research into Energy Demand Solutions, involving many prominent UK university academics, produced a report showing that the UK can halve its energy demand by 2050 and still improve the quality of life. That group suggested four possible approaches to government policy on energy demand reduction, ranging from ignore, to steer, to shift, to transform. How does the Minister classify the Government’s approach?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

We have discussed in this House in many debates a number of the policies that we have to reduce energy demand. I know that the noble Baroness is a keen advocate of energy efficiency, and I agree with her on that. We have a programme of almost £7 billion-worth of expenditure over the next few years to enable energy efficiency improvements, including home upgrade grants, the local authority delivery scheme, the social housing decarbonisation fund, the public sector decarbonisation strategy, et cetera. They are all about decarbonisation and improving the efficiency of our energy usage, which is, of course, the best form of renewable.