Climate Change

Baroness Boycott Excerpts

Monday 14th December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I admire the noble Lord’s ambitions but we only announced the NDC two weeks ago, so we are not about to revise it already.

[Baroness Boycott (CB)]

My Lords, I want to follow up the question from the noble Baroness, Lady Lane-Fox, about behaviour change. The CCC said that the majority of the things we have to do are going to require buy-in from the public. The Minister has said to me previously that the Cabinet Office had set up a dedicated engagement team for COP 26 but I have not yet seen anything about any actions by it apart from a general endorsement for businesses to race towards zero. That is very good, but what about the public? Will the Minister update the House on the progress of this team? I am sure the noble Baroness, Lady Lane-Fox, and I would be delighted to meet him if there is more information that he could give us on its progress.

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I am pleased that the noble Baroness recognises the importance of public engagement, and I totally agree with her. Obviously we have been in the middle of a global pandemic so it has been very difficult for the engagement team to do its job properly in terms of engaging with the public, but she can rely on the fact that we have some ambitious plans to engage with the public before COP next year.