Baroness Boycott
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Spending Review 2020
Baroness Boycott Excerpts(3 years, 11 months ago)
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Baroness Boycott (CB)
My Lords, I too welcome the spending commitments the Government have made to help us meet net zero. However, I feel that there is a bit of a disjointed approach with some of the announcements: for example, spending vast amounts of money on roads, which will only increase emissions, and a relatively small amount of money on proven, nature-based solutions.
There is at present a great distance between the committed expenditure and the expenditure needed to get us on to the right trajectory. As the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, has just said, the IPPR thinks that we have committed only 12% of the funds we need.
The Chancellor said at the beginning of the pandemic that he would do whatever it took to save livelihoods, but will the Treasury take the same approach to reaching net zero? When the Sixth Carbon Budget is published next week, and then the UK’s own NDCs, will the Treasury make funds available to departments so that they can enact these policies?
I do not wish to unduly criticise the Government, and I really welcome the inclusion of net zero and the environment in the Treasury’s Green Book review, as well as the confirmation that a net zero road map is in the works. It is important that the transition is well thought out, to maximise the benefits to people’s health and well-being. With that in mind, perhaps I may also ask the Minister whether that means that, going forward, all spending commitments will be compatible with the 2019 amendment to the Climate Change Act.
Following on from that, and finally, in anticipation of the publication of the Dasgupta review, I ask the Minister: is the reason that this spending review, and indeed the 10-point plan, is really light on nature that he and his colleagues are waiting to respond to the Dasgupta review before making further commitments? I am sorry to labour the point, but will the Dasgupta review form part of the foundation of the Green Book when it is finalised next year?