Environmental Programme: COP 26

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Monday 9th March 2020 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how they will ensure that they will have “the most ambitious environmental programme of any country on Earth”, as stated in the 2019 Conservative Party Manifesto, in time for COP 26.

[The Minister of State, Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Department for International Development (Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park) (Con)]

My Lords, we are determined to cement our position as global leaders on the environment. That is why we have brought forward our Environment Bill, Fisheries Bill and Agriculture Bill. They will transform how we manage our natural resources and set a gold standard on environmental protection. Our policy and legislative programme for this environmental super-year will culminate in the UK hosting the COP 26 climate change conference in November.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

I thank the noble Lord for his Answer. I am sure he is aware that this Government, if they are to achieve this grandiose promise to the British people, need to think more about stopping things such as airport expansion, new road building, building houses that are not zero-carbon, and building new waste incinerators. Can he reassure me that the Government are thinking along those lines?

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park]

This Government are introducing genuinely ground-breaking legislation this year. The Environment Bill introduces world-leading environmental commitments based on environmental principles and with a new organisation for environmental protection to hold the Government to account. The Fisheries Bill puts sustainable fishing at the heart of government policy and the Agriculture Bill scraps the old land-use subsidy system, which many people believe was entirely destructive—I am sure the noble Baroness agrees—and replaces it with a system conditional on land managers delivering some kind of public good, not least environmental protection. That is just the start of what this Government are doing this year. In hosting COP, they have enabled the Prime Minister, whose commitment to tackling climate change is in my view unquestionable, to convene the Government to ensure that we have a whole-government approach to honouring the commitment that this country made to achieve net zero by 2050.