Queen’s Speech

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Thursday 5th June 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I was not here yesterday but I listened very carefully and I was, quite honestly, very disappointed. The Bills that are coming before us offer nothing to the disadvantaged and nothing to the vulnerable. The poor and the disabled are virtually ignored, which means that these Bills will open up the rich-poor divide even more than it has been opened up already by this Government. It is a shame that this is happening, and the Government really have to deal with it. I will raise a few issues that I would like answers on and will flag them up as I come to them.

The idea of infrastructure is always very interesting. For decades now, new power stations, energy supply projects and so on have been put in infrastructure, which means they are relatively protected from funding cuts. However, energy efficiency programmes do not come under the infrastructure tag. Why not? A good energy efficiency programme means that you do not have to build the new power stations, so why is that not infrastructure as well? I would like an answer to that.

Secondly, I assume that all infrastructure projects are assessed for their economic, social and environmental benefits. Are they prioritised according to what is the most beneficial? Many of the policies in the Queen’s Speech do not have any concept of what is good for people and good for the planet. It is obvious that future spending restrictions on capital investment in infrastructure are going to be much less than in other areas, so we really need to put in as much as we can away from funding cuts. That is absolutely crucial.

Finally, the Infrastructure Bill seems to offer assistance to big oil companies and housebuilders but not to hard-pressed householders. It builds on the tax breaks that fossil fuel companies have already been given in the hope that they will find gas and sell it cheaply to bring down bills. If that money were given to householders to insulate their homes, that would be a much more efficient use of the money and, of course, overall much better for the environment. Hoping that the big companies will do the right thing is madness; it is a forlorn hope and we have to think about better ways to protect ourselves. We really should not be spending public funds on the extraction of fossil fuels that would be better left underground. The Government have not understood the IPCC’s recent report, which says:

“There is a clear message from science: To avoid dangerous interference with the climate system, we need to move away from business as usual”.

The Infrastructure Bill also gives new freedoms to the Highways Agency for road construction and introduces planning changes to fast-track developments. With the problems that we have already with our carbon emissions, building new roads is, again, absolute madness. I just do not understand how any Government could think that this is all right.

Global agreements on climate change are wonderful —we really need them—but they come to absolutely nothing if the Governments who are actually setting the policies and spending the money do not understand what climate change means. Specifically, this fracking trespass Bill introduces a new right of corporate trespass for oil and gas companies and threatens home owners across Britain because it will allow companies to run shale gas pipelines under private land without seeking the consent of home owners. I understand that the Prime Minister said today in the other place, in response to a question from Caroline Lucas MP, that it will not be legal to frack against a property owner’s will. Perhaps the Minister could clarify that point and tell me whether the Prime Minister is speaking for the whole party.

The fracking trespass Bill would also decimate our environment and climate infrastructure. It will not only make local conditions very bad because of the pollution that it will cause and the lorry movements and so on, it will mean the development of a whole new fossil fuel industry that will make it impossible for us to keep to our climate change targets.

Thirdly, this Bill suggests that the Government have already chosen National Grid’s slow progression energy scenario but have kept quiet about it. Perhaps the Minister could let me know if that is true. In 2012 National Grid released a report, UK Future Energy Scenarios, which gave three options. The first was “Slow Progression”, which assumed that climate change targets would be abandoned. The second was “Gone Green”, which was to meet climate targets. The third was “Accelerated Growth”, which was about meeting climate targets early. This Bill suggests that the Government have chosen the slow progression and have in effect abandoned the whole concept of climate change targets.

I will now say what I really would have liked to have seen in the Government’s plans for next year. There are four things. The Government could still introduce them. Perhaps we could discuss them afterwards if the Minister would like to take them up. The first is a fossil fuels divestment Bill, which would require the withdrawal of all public funds that are indirectly or directly supporting companies or activities involving the exploration and extraction of fossil fuels, domestically and internationally, and to reinvest all such funds in zero-carbon energy generation and energy conservation measures—a much better use of the money.

The second Bill would be a fair pay Bill, which would set a company-wide pay ratio of 10:1: that is, the lowest paid worker in a company should get 1/10th of what the CEO is paid. You pay the CEO whatever you think he or she is worth but you make sure that your cleaner or your security guard is paid at least 1/10th of that. That would start to rebalance the rich-poor divide that is widening under this Government.

The third Bill would be a public ownership Bill, which would promote public ownership of public services, introduce a presumption in favour of service provision by public sector and not-for-profit entities, and put in place mechanisms to increase the accountability, transparency and public control of public services, including those operated by public companies.

The fourth Bill would be a housing Bill to prevent rent increases above inflation for existing tenants and to increase security of tenure with five-year tenancy agreements. A little of this is being done in London and it looks as though it could be extremely successful. With the problems that we already have with housing in London, it would seem logical to produce something like this.

I do not want to sound alarmist. When I talk about destroying the planet, I am not talking about really destroying the planet; I am talking about destroying the little bit of the planet that we rely on for our existence. The fact is that if we do not take climate change into account, if we continue with business as usual, we are damaging not only our future but that of our children and grandchildren.