Baroness Grender
Main Page: Baroness Grender (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)(1 day, 7 hours ago)
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Lord Katz (Lab)
My Lords, my noble friend is absolutely right in his analysis. The Government agree that the third national adaptation programme, which was published in 2023, was weak, particularly in its lack of clear targets and limited co-ordination across government departments. For the fourth iteration of the adaptation programme, we are putting in place a stronger framework, built on specific, measurable objectives, which will prepare this country for at least two degrees’ centigrade of warming by 2050. This Government are taking a more comprehensive, joined-up and strategic approach to climate adaptation, based on co-ordinating across systems and outcomes rather than simply addressing isolated risks. We have robust governance in place to ensure that departments are fully engaged at all levels to deliver on climate adaptation.
Baroness Grender (LD)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that a year of drought, wildfire and now flood warnings shows that resilience cannot be left to individual sectors, including outside government? Will the Government commit to a national wildfire strategy, as the farmers are urging, and confirm that the review of critical infrastructure resilience standards that is due by the end of the year will include water supply?
Lord Katz (Lab)
The noble Baroness is of course correct in emphasising the joined-up nature of the various threats to our country’s resilience from climate change, whether it is drought, as discussed yesterday, or the problems of flooding, with extremely variable weather systems expanding the problem. On wildfires, she will be aware that the Prime Minister called a wildfire summit at the end of last month, which brought together all the necessary stakeholders to seriously consider how we can improve our resilience to them. She is right in saying that the number of wildfires has increased. Over the summer, there were a record 1,300 wildfire incidents in England and Wales. It is a serious problem. Our focus is indeed on building resilience through better prevention, preparedness, response and strategy, which can help protect communities, nature and critical infrastructure from the growing threat of wildfires.