UN Climate Change Conference: Government Response

Chris Law Excerpts

Wednesday 16th January 2019 Westminster Hall

[Anna McMorrin]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend on that important point, which I will address in my remarks. I hope the Government will respond adequately.

We saw that too many countries came unprepared to agree to those targets, leaving gaping holes in the rulebook. COP24 was a perfect opportunity to achieve two crucial objectives. First, it was a chance for nations to come together and take the deeply troubling recommendations of the IPCC special report on climate change seriously. Secondly, COP24 should have been used to strengthen the pledges in the 2015 Paris agreement, which experts agree is failing to deliver the action needed to meet its ambitious goals. The Paris agreement has us on course to live in a world of between 2.7° and 3.5° of global warming. Yet we are currently set to reach 3° and more.

[Chris Law (Dundee West) (SNP)]

The hon. Lady is giving a really powerful and eloquent speech, I am only disappointed that the debate has been given so little time. There are two nations that are already at 2°: Mongolia and Tibet. Mongolia is the size of Europe; Tibet is the size of western Europe. It is also where 49% of the world’s population get their water from. We are already seeing temperatures in excess of 2°. Does the hon. Lady agree that we have had enough time for talking and counting the clock down? We are talking about Brexit right now, but this should be the biggest issue and much more time should be given in the House for debate on this matter.

[Anna McMorrin]

I completely agree with the hon. Gentleman. This is the biggest issue the world is facing right now. We have been given only a one-hour debate in Westminster Hall—we had to push for that; I am very disappointed that the Government did not make an oral statement in the Chamber.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Law]

To develop that point, I am the climate justice spokesperson for the Scottish National party and a member of the International Development Committee. The Committee recently visited Kenya and Ethiopia to see at first hand why migrants end up in refugee centres, some of them for 10 or 20 years. It is directly related to the climate.

I have two things to say to the Minister. First, a lot of funding that is distributed through the Department for International Development is short term, so the projects that are happening that aim to embrace renewables are small-scale and are for only one or two years, so things are not being developed systematically. Secondly, the World Bank cancelled all upstream oil and gas projects from 2019 so that there will be long-term sustainable renewable projects throughout the world. Unfortunately, the UK Government still fund upstream oil and gas projects throughout the developing world, which will be left with that legacy long into the future. Does the hon. Lady agree that steps need to be taken now?

[Anna McMorrin]

That is a really important point. We need to make sure that adequate steps are taken in all areas of Government and that action is taken to reach out to communities that are suffering on the frontline where climate change is most urgent.

Climate change needs to be a priority. The Government do not see it as a priority, but that must change. We need climate policies and targets that will lead to urgent reductions in carbon emissions. First, we must get working on achieving net-zero emissions by 2045 immediately, not push it down the road. The technology and the infrastructure are there. The Government just need the political will to get moving on the fourth and fifth carbon budgets, and make climate change a priority. The UK was once a global leader on climate change. Let it be that again. The Climate Change Act 2008 was the world’s first legal framework to set binding carbon and emissions targets. It needs to continue to live up to that precedent.

The Minister needs to think more like the Welsh. A commitment to sustainable development has long been a distinctive feature of Welsh devolution. Before becoming a Member of Parliament, I was the specialist adviser for environment and climate change in the Welsh Labour Government, and I am proud of my work helping the Welsh Government to lead the way with a green growth agenda that provides an alternative model for business. Climate policies are entrenched in the Welsh legislative framework through the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 and the Environment (Wales) Act 2016. A future generations commissioner has been appointed in Wales to ensure that that commitment is being delivered, which puts Wales above and beyond many Governments around the world, especially the UK Government. In Wales, a focus on low-carbon communities encourages communities to come forward with small-scale renewable energy schemes and changes to infrastructure and transport. That brings about change from the bottom up and hardwires the ability for our communities to be sustainable, which extends to the way that our housing is built and managed in Wales.

Across the UK, I want to see changes to our building regulations to ensure that we are building sustainable housing, which will make it cheaper and easier for everyone, and that there are energy efficiency targets. Action on fuel poverty in Wales has brought together outcomes on tackling climate change and on local skills training and jobs, and has helped to lift people out of fuel poverty. We need to see such policies across the whole UK, not just in Wales. That change to our economy will ensure that green growth is rooted in our businesses, our services and our communities.

--- Later in debate ---

[Claire Perry]

I will try to leave the hon. Lady a moment to wind up, as it is her debate.

As hon. Members pointed out, the conference was rooted in the IPCC report, which is very much supported by our superb UK science base—another area in which we have led the world in this space. The report gives a very stark warning on what the risks would be. The hon. Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi), who is no longer in his place, referred to the challenge that small islands face. The subject was discussed at length at the Wilton Park forum, which we are proud to co-host with New Zealand and at which we discuss the issues facing countries looking down the barrel of climate change—an existential threat to small island nations.

Of course, it is entirely right that collectively we need to do more. Again, we seem to live in a world of different facts. We were the first Government of an industrialised country to address how we will get to a zero-carbon future. It is not about setting some kind of target for when we will all be long gone—I am sure none of us will be in government by then, and some of us may even be six feet under. It is about “how”. The difference with this Government is that it is not just about empty targets, uncosted numbers or a promise to bring back the proposal for the Swansea power station, which would have been the most expensive ever built in the country and would have created 30 jobs and taken two months of Port Talbot’s steel supply—I can think of much better ways to spend taxpayers’ money. It is about actually setting out a detailed action plan for “how”. That is important because our policy making has to survive the travails of politics and successive Governments.

We have a Climate Change Act that was strongly supported across the parties, and we have budgets—I am not going to go through the debates again. On our current numbers, we are 3% and 5% off the budgets that will end in eight and 10 years’ time, and I am pretty confident that we will get there. We have a Prime Minister who is committed to it, and we have clean growth as a fundamental part of our industrial strategy.

It was suggested in this debate that we have somehow rowed back on our climate diplomacy. The reason we are so successful is that this is a fundamental part of who we are and what we do. Our offer to the world is premised on clean growth. The almost £6 billion of taxpayers’ money that I spend on their behalf as part of international climate finance is focused 50% on adaptation and 50% on mitigation, but we are also thinking about how we can take brilliant British inventions such as the solar fridge funded by the Department for International Development and change people’s lives in the developing world.

[Chris Law]

Will the Minister give way?

[Claire Perry]

Very briefly, but I want to leave the hon. Member for Cardiff North a moment to wrap up.

[Chris Law]

I thank the Minister for giving up such precious time. She makes valuable points about international investments, which is all well and good. However, I would really like a response to my earlier point that in the countries most directly affected by climate change, we have multi-billion pound investments in oil and gas.