Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Barry Gardiner and Jesse Norman

Tuesday 13th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Jesse Norman]

I simply repeat that the matter is under review. We have not seen what the agency will propose, but we will look at it closely when we see what it suggests.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

The Minister talks about stability, but there has in fact been a 93% drop in solar installations this year. Following a 64% cut in subsidy to solar and an eightfold hike in the proposed business rates, it would appear that the next attack on solar renewables is already being planned. Will he tell us whether it is through incompetence or calculation that the changes to grid charges put forward by the regulator to end the unfair advantage to highly polluting diesel generators will in fact have a negative impact on small-scale renewables such as solar?

[Jesse Norman]

It is widely understood that the sector needed some changes to the feed-in tariffs, because their effect was to hit consumers very hard in the pocket. These charges are paid by consumers. Let us not forget that 99% of all the solar panels installed have been installed over the past six years.

Paris Agreement on Climate Change

Debate between Barry Gardiner and Jesse Norman

Wednesday 7th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Jesse Norman)]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. This is my first time at this Dispatch Box. I have often wondered what the view would be like, and I must tell you that it is really not bad. [Laughter.] And I do not just mean the Scottish National party. I was lured, without difficulty but with great regret, from the Culture, Media and Sport Committee because of the challenges involved and the extraordinary fascination of the issues. I discovered on my first day the challenging, testing and strenuous nature of the Department: the Canadian swim technique of being welcomed to the Department, briefed, and then invited to manage two statutory instruments within four hours—on carbon budgets, I might add. I could not have been more pleased to do that, given the importance of the issue.

We have heard many passionate speeches about climate change from Members on both sides of the House. We have gone from the Oracle of Delphi, to the Philippines, to Swansea, to Malawi. We have gone from “Star Trek” to logarithms, and from bogs to lagoons. It has been a fascinating debate. There has been great expertise, some humour and some real wisdom displayed across the House. However, one very odd thing is that this has been an Opposition debate with remarkably little true opposition. We heard very eloquent words from the right hon. Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband), who was very kind about the new ministerial team. We have had the hon. Member for Southampton, Test (Dr Whitehead) welcoming the fifth carbon budget. We have had the hon. Members for Wakefield (Mary Creagh) and for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood) praising the Home Secretary. Their tone has been absolutely admirable—constructive, bipartisan, intelligent and right— and it has been echoed by other colleagues across the House, particularly the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Callum McCaig).

What a contrast with the manufactured indignation of Opposition Front Benchers. You may know, Madam Deputy Speaker, that John Gielgud’s Hamlet was famous for its choked ferocity. He had the capacity to bring a tear to any eye, such was the intensity of his engagement. The Opposition spokesman managed to bring a tear to the eye of those in the House but, alas, it was a tear of laughter. He reminded me more than anything, in his histrionics, of Dame Edith Evans in the role of Lady Bracknell; but instead of declaiming about a handbag, he gave us a lot of nonsense about the Government’s record.

[Barry Gardiner]

Can the Minister adumbrate one single point that I made in my opening remarks—one single point where I criticised the Government for backsliding—on which I was wrong?

[Jesse Norman]

There are many that one could pick on, but my point was a matter of tone.

[Barry Gardiner]

So I was not wrong; I just said it in a nasty way.

[Jesse Norman]

I am enjoying the sedentary contributions from the Opposition spokesman, but he has had his moment. Let us focus on the two themes that came through, loud and clear, across all the speeches and interventions today. The first is that the issue of climate change is now in the absolute mainstream of our political debate. Whatever people’s specific views, climate change is recognised across all parties, in all the nations and regions of this country, as a central issue of public concern. The second point follows from that, and it is that we cannot and we must not view this country’s commitments in relation to climate change in a narrowly partisan or party political way. The Paris agreement has been welcomed by Members from across the House, as has the concerted action taken this week by China and the USA.

As the Prime Minister underlined only a few hours ago, this country has long exercised global leadership in this area. It has balanced great ambition with a sober recognition of the costs involved—costs that can hit not merely industry but often, directly and indirectly, the poorest people in our society. There is so much more to do, but what the UK has done is cause for celebration, not regret.

We can all agree that climate change is one of the most serious threats facing the world, and that has been brought home to us again today by the excellent examples highlighted in the contributions of the hon. Member for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady), my hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble (Seema Kennedy) and the hon. Members for Wirral West, for Llanelli (Nia Griffith) and for Wakefield, as well as by my brilliant colleague the Minister of State. We agree that climate change is one of the most serious threats facing the world. We agree that the UK has played, and will continue to play, a unique and important role in global action to tackle the changing climate. We agree that that action is an opportunity for growth, for new jobs and for improvements to health, to cities and to our daily lives.

That consensus is the prerequisite. It is the essential long-term basis for concerted action in this area by all Governments, at any time. It will be especially helpful to us as we look forward to the COP22 meeting in Marrakesh in November, which will help to set many of the rules relating to the Paris agreement and so will mark a shift from aspiration to implementation. That consensus, and the need to maintain it, is fundamentally why I still hope that the hon. Member for Brent North will not press this needlessly divisive motion to a vote.

The Government have made it very clear that they welcome the push by the US, by China and by other countries towards the early ratification of the Paris agreement. We remain firmly committed to that agreement and to ratifying it as soon as possible. The convention, however, is that all European Union member states ratify the agreement together, collectively. We hope that that will happen, as has been said, as soon as possible.

Unfortunately, it is not true, as was stated by the hon. Member for Sefton Central (Bill Esterson), that France has ratified the agreement. The Commons Library briefing of 6 September says:

“As set out on the UK French Embassy website it will not do so until all Member states and the EU are ready to do so, and will focus”—

in the meantime, on—

“encouraging other Member States to make progress”.

France was reported in the press as having ratified the agreement, but it has not in fact done so.

I appreciate that we have heard some perfectly proper concerns about the Paris agreement coming into force before the EU has ratified it. However, there is widespread international understanding that in the event that the agreement enters into force early, countries that have not yet completed their domestic processes to allow ratification to take place—very important processes of consensual ratification—should not and will not be prejudiced. Not to do so would mean that as many as 140 countries, including some of the very poorest and most climate-afflicted nations in the world, would be denied a full seat at the table. COP22 in Marrakesh in November will, I hope, take a formal decision to that effect.

Turning to recent history, few countries have been more active in decarbonisation than this one. We were the first country to set, through the Climate Change Act, a legally binding 2050 target to drop our emissions by at least 80% on 1990 levels. Far from not having a strategy, we have just signed off our fifth carbon budget, which sets the terms for the overall picture. The UK has made great progress in reducing its emissions, which had fallen by 36% by 2014 on 1990 levels. During the past five years, between 2010 and 2015, our domestic greenhouse gas emissions have fallen by 17%, which is the biggest reduction in a single Parliament. We already have domestic obligations that keep the UK well below the 2° rise in temperature goal mandated by the Paris agreement.

Draft Carbon Budget Order 2016

Debate between Barry Gardiner and Jesse Norman

Monday 18th July 2016 General Committees

[Jesse Norman]

I am grateful to the shadow Minister and to the hon. Member for Aberdeen South for their comments. I shall pick up on each of them in order but try to address them collectively.

The hon. Member for Brent North asked why “Climate Change” was removed from the name of the Department. There is a very positive way of seeing that, which is that it is recognised that tackling climate change is a vital part of government: it is understood that it is a central challenge for the next 50, if not 100 or more years, and in a sense it has become part of the furniture of the discussion. The point of this consolidation of Ministries is in part to allow that understanding to spread across our whole industrial strategy. That seems to me a thoroughly important thing.

The seriousness of the Government’s position can be easily gauged by the fact that we have not demurred from the testing targets set by the Committee on Climate Change. That is the overall framework that sets the context for investor decisions, so that is a clear indication of the deep seriousness with which the Government take this.

On investor confidence, that framework is important, but a couple of other things are worth mentioning. First, investor confidence does not appear to be that muted. Siemens has reiterated its investment in the blade plant in Hull, and there are many other indicators that investor confidence remains remarkably high, as the Department and the Government wish it to be: the UK has been the fourth-highest investor in clean energy globally for the last five years; more than half of the total investment in the EU last year occurred in this country; and we continue to increase investment at a rapid rate, especially by international standards. There is no reason why one should feel concerned about investor confidence.

[Barry Gardiner]

The Minister may be aware of the Ernst & Young report on the index of the best countries in the world for renewable energy investment. We never used to be out of the top 10, but in the past two years we have fallen from eighth to 11th to 13th, so there is an independent scale showing that we are going in the wrong direction. He may also be aware that Vattenfall said that in the light of Brexit it was reviewing all its renewable energy investments in the UK, including its £5.5 billion array off the east coast of England. I am not accusing the Minister of complacency, but he must take this seriously.

[Jesse Norman]

I was confining myself to issues specifically relating to climate change, but there are reasons to be confident about the overall position. We have seen enormous further investment in the Nissan Leaf plant in Sunderland and there are other examples of recognition of the progress that this country continues to make.

The question was raised of the impact of Brexit on the EU emissions trading system. Of course, it is far too early to say whether the UK will remain part of the ETS, but the Government take the matter extremely seriously. Even were we to end up leaving the institutions around the ETS, the effect of that would be our having increased flexibility to set our climate change targets as we saw fit. Those targets could be more testing, less testing or exactly at the level required by the ETS itself, so there need not necessarily be anything particularly problematic about it.

On why the submission for the fifth carbon budget was not on time, the truth is that it was important to get the decision right. It will be understood that by 30 June the Government had quite a lot on their plate for other reasons arising over the previous three or four months. I have inquired into whether there is a question about the legality of the budget as a result, and the legal advice has been that it remains intact. There is no reason to think that the legal status of the budget has been affected by the delayed filing. It is also worth saying that we are talking about a period some distance in the future; therefore, we are not talking about something that begins tomorrow.

[Barry Gardiner]

I am grateful for that clarification. Will the Minister agree to provide a summary of the legal advice, or indeed the legal advice itself, so that we can see it and have the confidence he has that there could be no positive legal challenge?

[Jesse Norman]

Legal advice between an attorney and a client is privileged information, so it is not the Government’s practice to publish legal advice that is given, or generally even to publish summaries of legal advice, but I am happy to take the point up and consider it, as the hon. Gentleman has raised it.

On shipping emissions, the International Maritime Organisation has talks under way at the moment. This is an international issue and not something where one can simply make decisions based on simplistic calculations of port of origin or arrival. It is entirely appropriate that the Government continue that process of participating in those negotiations with the IMO. The point is important: shipping emissions, like aviation emissions, should in the fullness of time, if proper methods of calculating an agreement can be reached, be included in the scheme because obviously there are economic impacts and, potentially, perverse incentives that occur from not doing so. The wider point is well taken.

The point about ETS credits reverts to that which I made earlier. In general there is some benefit to having credits because they confer additional flexibility on Government. It would not send a useful signal to investors to have to make changes in policy just because of marginal differences in performance, which credits could address. The position is sensible, but again the point is taken.

Finally, on the 10% gap, I would simply say that we are some way away from the policy development stage. One naturally expects—in particular in an area such as climate change and emissions control—there to be a dynamic response from the economy as these budget constraints start to get set and embed themselves. We are already seeing some of that economic behaviour and one might easily expect to see more of that to come.

Draft Climate Change Act 2008 (Credit Limit) Order 2016

Debate between Barry Gardiner and Jesse Norman

Monday 18th July 2016 General Committees

[Jesse Norman]

I am very grateful to the shadow Minister for his comments. He and I are rapidly turning into the Mutt and Jeff of the climate change world, but it is a pleasure to address the concerns he raises.

Let me remind the Committee that this is not a matter of buying credits; it is a matter of setting a credit limit. The Government have never bought credits and do not contemplate doing so as part of either the second or third carbon budgets. It is also true to say that the Government have not ignored the Committee on Climate Change. On the contrary, we have engaged closely with it and adopted its main recommendations consistently. Here, however, there is some licence to deviate. The Government have done so in this case for the reasons I set out in my opening remarks. The first is following the precedent set by the previous budget. The Government understood that that was potentially problematic from the Committee on Climate Change’s standpoint, but we did that because we sought a degree of flexibility, and that degree of flexibility is again sought today.

That is not a way of getting ourselves off the hook. The progress made under both the second and third budgets is already manifest. In fact, that progress is sufficiently clear that it should not bring into question whether the Government are committed, because we clearly are making very good progress.

[Barry Gardiner]

The Minister and I are agreed that there is little likelihood of the credits being required. The key thing here is whether one follows the advice and whether one sets a precedent. He knows that the really difficult budget is the fourth carbon budget, not this one. Therefore, he has beseeched precedent by referring back to the previous carbon budget, saying, “Well, we allowed it there, so we should allow it here.” That is exactly the precedent that needs to be nipped in the bud because we need to send a strong signal to investors that the fourth carbon budget, which will be difficult to achieve, must be achieved through domestic action.

[Jesse Norman]

I think it is a point well made. I would go further and say that the Government do not disagree that the use of credit limits of this kind are not a way of getting off the domestic carbon policy reduction agenda. That remains central to the focus of the Government and the Department. It is, however, important to recognise that aspects of carbon reduction plans could be set back. For instance, although we have had some rather warm winters recently, it is not impossible that we could have a series of winters of unusual severity. It is not likely to happen and the Government do not believe that that will happen, but it is a possibility.

It is wise to have flexibility in general, provided that it is not open to abuse. Setting the limit at 2% over a five-year period—0.4% for each year—is not a total that can be regarded as abuse. The question is how one balances the direction and principle with an element of pragmatism that allows the Government a degree—but not too great a degree—of freedom of manoeuvre, and that is what the order provides.

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his contribution and reiterate that the Government remain committed to combating climate change. Climate change has not been downgraded as a threat, and is widely recognised across Government as one of the most serious long-term risks to our economic and national security. At the heart of the Government’s commitment is the Climate Change Act 2008 and its target to reduce emissions by 80% by 2050, as against 1990 levels. The interim carbon budgets have been set against that framework, and under the Act, we need to set a limit on the number of international carbon credits that the Government can count towards that budget.

Although we remain on track, it is prudent to recognise and accommodate a degree of potential uncertainty. That is why we have proposed a credit limit of 55 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent—just 2% of the total third carbon budget. That represents an appropriate level of insurance, in case emissions turn out to be higher than projected. I therefore commend the order to the Committee.

Question put and agreed to.