Jobs and Work

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 11th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Umunna]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. I was not aware of that, but I am sure the Business Secretary has heard what he said and will no doubt ensure that his Department looks into those two firms.

We have to build on the national minimum wage. Many Members, for example my hon. Friend the Member for Wansbeck (Ian Lavery), have argued for us to do so. It is currently £6.31 and is due to increase to £6.50 in October, but that is just 53% of median hourly earnings. We want to set—this in part relates to the point raised by the hon. Member for Dover—a more stretching target for the minimum wage for each Parliament, within the Low Pay Commission framework, to increase it faster than average earnings, while retaining capacity to take account of shocks to the economy. We would also give local authorities new powers of inspection and enforcement of the minimum wage, alongside central Government, to ensure it is enforced properly. We would also increase fines for non-payment to £50,000.

A number of measures are contained in the small business, enterprise and employment Bill. We are told, among other things, that the Bill will strengthen UK employment law by tackling national minimum wage abuses. It does not appear, however, that the Government will come close to matching our commitments to strengthen the national minimum wage. There will be no stretching target, no enhanced role for local authorities and much lower fines than we envisage. We will be pushing the Government to adopt our package during the passage of the Bill.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

I am glad to hear that the hon. Gentleman is talking about moving towards something that might eventually look like a national living wage. He will recall that it was the Greens on the London Assembly who made the Living Wage Commission a possibility. Will he also consider, as inequality is such a major issue, maximum pay ratios between the highest and lowest paid in companies?

--- Later in debate ---

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

I have tabled a reasoned amendment to the Gracious Speech because I do not believe that the legislative programme set out for this Session of Parliament puts us on track to either a stable economy or a fairer society, or for that matter a world of better quality jobs. That amendment calls for fair pay for work through a national living wage and maximum pay ratios. It calls for an end to the privatisation of public services and much else besides, but the focus of my comments today will be on the Infrastructure Bill, because one of the main benefits of that Bill is supposed to be job creation.

Of course we need more jobs, but high-carbon investment in new roads and shale gas is not the way to deliver that. There are far more job opportunities in a zero-carbon economy than in the fossil-fuelled economy that it replaces. Indeed, there are already more jobs in the green economy than in the motor and telecom sectors combined. The renewable energy industry in the UK today is a case in point, and supports over 100,000 jobs. That is not a fantasy, eyebrow-raising assumption. It is what we have today: actual jobs all across the UK—and that is without even taking into account future potential.

In 2013 approximately 14,000 full-time jobs were associated with the nation’s solar PV sector alone. That is pretty impressive, especially given that there were an estimated 10,000 job losses in the solar industry as a direct result of the coalition’s cack-handed cuts to feed-in tariffs. These losses have been partially offset by continued job creation in the wind industry: again, many of these will be despite anti-jobs, anti-investment policies from the coalition.

Solar is the most popular energy technology in the UK. Solar PV is also a way for individuals and communities to generate their own clean power, reducing dependence on the big six energy companies, and cutting energy bills. In April this year, two schools in Brighton switched on their solar panels.

[Mr Thomas]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Caroline Lucas]

I am sorry, but there is not time.

As I was saying, in April this year two schools in Brighton switched on their solar panels, while Brighton Energy Cooperative is in the process of raising funds from local people for its fifth large PV system. Yet the Government are now cutting support for large-scale solar, harming jobs and denying communities the opportunity to generate their own power from solar farms in the future.

Commenting on the UK slipping down the ranks of the renewable energy country attractiveness index for the second time in a row, to sixth place, Ernst and Young’s head of environmental finance says:

“Policy tinkering and conflicting signals once again become too much for investors and developers to handle.”

In other words, this Government’s policies are anti-jobs and anti-business, as well as anti-safe as far as the climate for our children and grandchildren is concerned.

The “global race” we hear so much about is getting more competitive. By early 2013, 138 countries had renewable energy targets. This Government are blocking such targets. Some 20 countries had renewable heating and cooling targets, too; we do not. Compared with other countries’ industrial strategies and coherent policy and incentive frameworks for home-grown renewables, the UK is looking pretty poor.

So what sort of policies would we be seeing if we had a pro-jobs Government who were serious about these opportunities and willing to stand up to the vested interests of the fossil-fuel industry, whose business plans are incompatible with a safe climate? We would see the confirming and strengthening of the fourth carbon budget. We would see the ditching of the irrational crusade against a binding 2030 renewable energy target. We would be giving the green investment bank powers to borrow now in order to leverage in the large proportion of private sector investment that is needed for the UK’s low-carbon economy to flourish. And we would be redirecting at least some of the billons of fossil fuel subsidies into renewable energy. We need a just transition—I particularly welcome the work that many unions have been doing on exactly how we will re-skill workers currently employed in high-carbon sectors—but it needs to happen fast. The point I want to illustrate is that the supposed conflict between tackling climate change and creating jobs is simply a political construct that suits incumbent fossil-fuel interests and very few others.

With thousands of people dying every winter because they cannot afford to heat their homes, energy-efficiency should be the No. 1 infrastructure priority for the UK. Hundreds of Brighton residents have written to me in support of the Energy Bill Revolution campaign, which calls for the Treasury to recycle carbon taxes into a national programme of energy-efficiency to ensure that homes need much less energy to heat, so that we have lower bills, carbon savings and, significantly, huge job-creation potential. We could add to that list NHS savings and, fundamentally, an end to people dying prematurely of the cold in winter. A report by Cambridge Econometrics last year found that a nationwide programme to super-insulate 600,000 UK homes a year would create more jobs than any alternative investment or tax break the UK could possibly put in place. So, this Gracious Speech is going in the wrong direction in terms of the economy, the environment and, crucially, jobs.