Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill

Chris Vince Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 11th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Chris Vince (Harlow) (Lab/Co-op)]

I take this opportunity to wish everybody across the House a happy Carers Week.

It is a pleasure to speak on Second Reading of the Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill. I know that many Members think that I make my speeches up as I go along, but I want them to know that I wrote this in advance and I did not wing it. Members will also be happy to know that that was my last joke in this speech. I will just say quickly to the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Luke Taylor) that he should never apologise for using an equation in a speech.

As Members across the House will be aware, although I do not have an airport in my constituency, Harlow starts at the very end of the runway at Stansted airport, and thousands of its residents work at the airport in a variety of roles. I briefly pay tribute to the work of Stansted airport college in investing in training the local workforce.

As the Minister is aware, Stansted is part of Manchester Airports Group, which is focused on the development of SAF. Like this Government, the group recognises that SAF is the future. I will also briefly give a plug for the Harlow Group, which is involved in machining vital aircraft components, and so is in line with the airport on that.

As Members will recognise, the UK has a world-class aviation sector and a proud history in the field, from R. J. Mitchell to Morien Morgan. I am proud that this Labour Government are promoting growth, as well as decarbonisation, in the sector. SAF will help us deliver our clean energy mission and our growth mission, allowing the UK to be a world leader in the field once more.

Compared with fossil jet fuel, SAF will reduce gas emissions by around 70%, and we can all welcome that. The Bill will introduce a revenue certainty mechanism to provide a price guarantee for SAF producers. The Government believe that that will increase investor confidence in SAF production, and having spoken in depth about the issue with Stansted airport, it is clear that that is the stumbling block for greater SAF production and use.

In conclusion, I welcome the Bill and the Government’s ongoing commitment to decarbonisation and tackling climate change. I also welcome their commitment to being a world leader in the field.

[Mrs Sureena Brackenridge (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way right at the end. Just like him, I welcome the announcement. As we hear from across the aviation sector, there is much to be championed in the transition to sustainable aviation fuel that will be enabled by the Bill. Although Collins Aerospace in my constituency does not produce SAF, it does develop the components and systems that mean that 100% SAF flight is a reality. Does my hon. Friend agree that that backs both the green transition and the industrial future for places such as our regions and Wolverhampton and Willenhall?

[Chris Vince]

I thank my hon. Friend for her contribution. She managed to get in just before my last words, so I shall have to make up a new conclusion. I absolutely agree with her point. The point I was going to make in my conclusion is that this Bill is really important for climate change and meeting our decarbonisation targets. We all know about the impact of climate change on the planet that we live on, and we only have one planet so we have to get this right. She is right to say that there is also a massive economic advantage to this.

I was really proud to mention two aviation pioneers from the United Kingdom earlier, and I think this country should be ambitious. We should once again be at the front of the queue when it comes to aviation technology and aviation pioneers. SAF is a huge part of that. This is not just about climate change; it is also about jobs and opportunities, and I am really excited that this will mean more jobs and opportunities for my constituency of Harlow as well as for Wolverhampton. I am delighted to support the Bill today, and I look forward to hearing many more contributions. I also look forward to this Government continuing with their flying start.

Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill (First sitting)

Chris Vince Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 15th July 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Luke Taylor]

Q Thank you for joining us. I think we are in a slightly unusual position, in that we are all competing to try to make slight improvements to legislation that we all agree is necessary and positive. My question is about the source of the funding for the RCM. The Government made it clear that their preference is that it comes from a levy on users. An alternative, which we see in other jurisdictions, is that it comes from ETS sources, which would slightly more directly couple the emissions component to the consumption. The intention to not predicate the source of funding on the money being provided is clear. Do any of the panellists have an opinion on those two options and the path that the Government have taken for the funding source?

Gaynor Hartnell: There are really only two options for the levy: airlines or aviation fuel suppliers. A large part of why aviation fuel suppliers were chosen may have been because, administratively, they are the obligated party when it comes to the mandate. They are expected to pass the cost of the mandate through to airlines—their fuel customers. They would be expected to pass the cost of the levy to airlines, or indeed, if the levy actually brings in money—these are very small balances of money in comparison with the balances to do with the mandate—they would be expected to pass those costs back to the customers. The aim is to deal fairly with a fairly small amount of money. It is not the additional cost of the sustainable aviation fuel; it is just the cost of levelising and stabilising it, which is a sliver in comparison.

Rob Griggs: For us as airlines, the funding is a critical issue about fairness and accountability. As Gaynor said, the understanding is that the levy will be on the supplier. The issue for us is that we understand that the costs are likely to be passed through to airlines. We just want to make sure that that is transparent. We have seen through the early stages of the mandate that there is some concern that excessive compliance fees are perhaps being put on to the SAF. Voluntary SAF seems to be a lot cheaper than mandated SAF and there is not necessarily a clear reason for that. We want transparency in terms of how the levy is passed through.

As Gaynor said, in theory, if the market price for SAF is high—if there is relatively little of it—it is likely that the suppliers will actually pay into the counterparty. We want to make sure that if money is essentially being paid back to the counterparty from the producers, that money does not just go to the suppliers and sit there. There should be a transparent mechanism, however it works, through which that money then comes back to airlines and airline customers. It has to work both ways, essentially.

How do you do that? We have looked at ETS for a long time. You are right that in the European Union, the emissions trading scheme funds are used: for example, to help to close the price gap on SAF. We are not doing that, which has competitiveness implications for UK SAF, separate to the RCM. Of course there are ways to make sure that it is a two-way street.

Paul Greenwood: We have to recognise that if the desire is to pass the cost on to the passengers, the airlines and the people who are shipping freight around the world by plane, then we should put the charge on them. That is the most direct way of doing it. There are charges now that are put on airlines and on freight directly. There is no reason why you cannot do this as well. I do not buy the argument that it is a relatively small amount of money, therefore we should just put it on to the fuel suppliers and they should deal with it. I do not think that is right. I certainly do not agree with the idea that this is because “the polluter pays”—that is erroneous and a false statement.

We do not know how much this will be, because we do not know how many projects there will be, what the costs will be, or how the CFD mechanism will go. We do not know what the cost of this will be. I support what Rob is saying: if this is something imposed upon us, I do not wish to profit from it but I do want to pass 100% of it on to the consumer of my fuel. The only way I can do that is if I know what it is ahead of time, so that I can bill them the exact amount of money so they pay the exact amount. At the moment, this legislation talks about market share, but market share moves and changes. Therefore it is a very imprecise way of doing that.

Ours is a very fine margin business. If you get this wrong, you will make the UK a less attractive market. We have to understand that fundamentally people will do different things around their molecules. One data point worth remembering is that about 70% of the jet fuel consumed in the UK at the moment is imported. Effectively, we rely on people bringing jet to market to sell it profitably. If they are uncertain around the cost of that jet fuel, they will potentially look to sell it into different markets, which can lead to energy security and market dynamic issues. There are unintended consequences here that need to be thought through very carefully.

[Chris Vince (Harlow) (Lab/Co-op)]

Q I thank the panel for coming to give evidence. Rob, in your opening statement you spoke about this being an enabling Bill. Could you touch on what you think the next steps would be were the Bill passed? I also have a basic but important question: what do you all see as the impact of this Bill, whether positive or negative, in terms of environmental and economic benefits? Is there a risk in not getting on with it?

Rob Griggs: To take the second point first: on the environmental side, UK aviation is committed to net zero 2050. We have not wavered from that commitment, and SAF is a hugely important part of that. It is doing the physical and metaphorical heavy lifting for our road map to get there. We need to do a lot of things—there is no silver bullet—but the last industry road map we all agreed had SAF at around 40% of the decarbonisation to 2050. That number will obviously change, but it is hugely important. The UK has a world-leading aviation industry, which does a huge amount for the UK economy. We believe we can grow and decarbonise, but we cannot do that without SAF. It is hugely important for both its economic and social benefits.

In terms of next steps, we fully support the Bill, and we hope the process can go as quickly as possible to get that certainty for investors and help to get those first plants built. For us, it is then down to the importance of scheme design and ensuring that we look to get that balance right for the most cost-effective decarbonisation to meet all those objectives: what size of scheme, how many and what type of projects are supported, what proportion or volume of SAF it would be looking to support and, through that, how you ensure there is competitive tension between those projects that are bidding for support and those projects that do not think they need support. It is about getting that right to ensure that we are getting best value from the projects that will deliver best bang for their buck and can produce the volumes that we need quite quickly. There are a lot of different technical elements.

Then there is funding and the transparency around that—how do we ensure it works and is accountable? If we have a scheme in place that is delivering SAF as cost-effectively as possible, it is starting to produce some, we have the quantities we need by 2030 and we are avoiding buy-out—if all those things happen together, enabled by the RCM, that is the outcome we are looking for.

Gaynor Hartnell: In terms of what is next, yes, there is a lot of detail involved in thinking about how the contracts are structured. We expect to engage with officials in great depth on that.

You asked about the environmental benefits; do you mean the environmental benefits of SAF generally, or the specific environmental benefits of producing SAF in the UK, which is what the Bill is about?

[Chris Vince]

Q Yes—I recognise that there are a lot of benefits of SAF, but I am wondering how the Bill can help that along.

Gaynor Hartnell: I think it is worth mentioning some of the environmental benefits specifically of producing SAF in the UK. They are focused on the second generation—that is, SAF that comes from waste. We have problematic waste to deal with in the UK, and it is better in terms of the proximity principle if we deal with our own waste domestically. There are various different feedstocks that the SAF mandate is seeking to encourage that have not traditionally been used, so it is aiming to expand the feedstocks to things such as end-of-life tyres. We currently export a lot of that waste to India, and we have heard in the news about the devastating environmental and health impacts that that has. If we deal with our own waste domestically, that is an environmental benefit; we will import somewhat less, but the aviation fuel we use at the moment is largely imported.

The main benefits of producing the SAF in this country are economic. The Government have realised that and they support it as part of their growth agenda, which it plays to.

Paul Greenwood: To round that out, if you listen to Rob’s comments, which I thought were very insightful, about the complexity of this and the need to ensure you get the right projects, with the right feedstock, at the right size and with the right basis, that to my mind is classic market distortion. Fundamentally, you are intervening in a market and saying, “I’m going to decide what is going to happen in this marketplace and I’m going to incentivise it to happen with a tariff.” The best way to do that is effectively to set a very clear demand signal, which happens through the SAF mandate, and let the market go and work that.

I do not buy into this idea that the market is incapable of supplying second-generation SAF; I had breakfast this morning—not because I was coming here today—with an Asian supplier who I deal with, who let me know that they had taken a final investment decision on a second-generation SAF plant in Asia that will be starting up in 2028. These things are happening; the market is responding. You are deliberately intervening in the marketplace with very good intentions, but it will distort that market signal. There is no doubt about it.

[Mr Paul Kohler (Wimbledon) (LD)]

Q Mr Greenwood has made a compelling critique of the basics—“We have a mandate; why do we need the RCM? There might be unintended consequences.” I know you disagree with him, but I would like to hear why you disagree with him.

Gaynor Hartnell: These projects are first of a kind, pretty much. This waste-based stuff is not being produced at scale anywhere in the world yet. It is very challenging to build one of these projects. There are numerous risks. You have Philip New coming later to give evidence; he has written a report on that, so you could ask him what those risks are. This addresses the showstopper risk if you like, which is the revenue certainty that a SAF producer can rely on when going to a bank and asking to borrow the millions or billions of pounds that it costs to build one of these projects.

In the UK, we now have many precedents of other large-scale projects that are driven by environmental requirements, from renewable electricity generation to carbon capture and storage. Those various different projects are all supported by some sort of equivalent to the contracts that will be let under this revenue certainty mechanism, whether it is a contract for difference for electricity or whatever. It is par for the course. We are not asking for this just because everyone else gets it so we should get it too. There is a competition for capital, among other things. If there are supported projects in terms of revenue stability, it will be easier for the capital to flow to those projects. This is a new mechanism. We are seeking new types of SAF production pathways. It is incredibly complex, and it is necessary.

Underlying all of this, the SAF mandate creates a market for greenhouse gas certificates, and the price of those certificates will be variable. It is very much built on a preceding policy—the renewable transport fuel obligation for road transport. That was just a demand mechanism without any accompanying equivalent to this revenue certainty mechanism. We import 85% of our road fuels, and we are not doing a very good job, I must say, given the opportunity, at preserving those early movers of projects that were built in the early days. Getting project funding is challenging, and it is not made easier by the fact that we have some early movers that are not managing to keep their renewable fuel projects going. I am talking about the bioethanol producers.

Rob Griggs: I agree with what Gaynor says. Ultimately, UK SAF projects are competing for investment against other renewable projects across the UK economy that have similar types of support—CFDs for energy and hydrogen and other types of things. In some way it is levelling the playing field a little for SAF compared with other forms.

I am here representing airlines; I am not representing producers. We want and we need SAF, and we want it as cost effectively as possible. We have seen all the evidence, given the nature of our mandate, its design, the global market and the work of Phil New that Gaynor referenced, which specifically asked that question: you have a mandate; why do you need an RCM? Everything suggests that given all those dynamics, without some form of revenue certainty you will not get that investment in the first-of-a-kind plants that we need to prove out the technology and get that initial set of volumes on a really aggressive timeline for 2030.

As airlines, on balance, we want the system to be competitive. We expect there to be imports as well as domestic production, but we think that without that UK 2G supply kick-started by the RCM, we will struggle and then we risk the buy-out. That is why we support it. On top of that, if it goes right, you get a UK industry better for your security, and jobs domiciled in the UK. It is a win-win, notwithstanding that as airlines, that is not necessarily our primary goal, but it is a huge benefit, so why not support it?

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[The Chair]

I will call Chris Vince, then Euan Stainbank and Luke Taylor—will you go one after the other, please?

[Chris Vince]

Q I will be very quick, Mr Pritchard. Thank you all for coming to give evidence. Graeme has stolen a little of my question, which was to understand what you see as the risks to your industry if the Bill does not go forward or, in fairness, if it does go forward. I want to understand the risks involved.

[Euan Stainbank]

We have talked about targeting. Would you support any further specific policy interventions to help to stimulate advanced 2G SAF technologies that might otherwise struggle to scale up?

Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill (Second sitting)

Chris Vince Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 15th July 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Ms Julie Minns (Carlisle) (Lab)]

Q I should have said this morning that I previously met with Alfanar prior to the publication of the Bill. Mr McKiernan, it is quite clear that you are very proud of your company, and very ambitious for its future. Do you think the SAF mandate is challenging enough, or could it go further?

Doug McKiernan: That is a good question. I am not a particularly good judge of financial investment—I am a technical person—but I looked at the quotas for the e-fuels, and if they went further, I believe they would drive the development of the technology harder, because it would bring more investment into that particular area. To me, 3.5% by 2040 seems quite low—I think that we could probably scale up and do blends where that would be significantly higher.

[Chris Vince (Harlow) (Lab/Co-op)]

Q Partly because you are based in Oxfordshire, my mind goes to universities. I wondered—based on what was said by a previous contributor—where we are with this technology compared with other countries. I do not know whether you are working with universities, but I am sure you are working with young people to develop skills. Is there is a risk, if the Bill is not passed and we did not get the RCM, that some of the skills that you are developing will be lost to other countries?

Doug McKiernan: There is no question about it. The people who we have recruited have been researching, and have done not only doctorates but post-docs in this area. They have been working in it for nine or 10 years, hoping that there was a company out there that would recruit them and turn their R&D into a reality. These people are very passionate about their career and what they want to do. They are not going to work for the money; they come to make a difference. We have recruited a lot of those people. They will go wherever the company is that will make what they want to do happen.

[Mr Kohler]

Q Have you overcome the technical problems? Once you have the CO₂, is the technical process now scalable, or are there still many issues involved in it?

Doug McKiernan: Our technology at the moment has to be scalable. When I go to the Jet A-1 ASTM committee at the end of the year, it has to be scalable. That is part of getting of getting the certification. We have to have a scalable process as well as a quality of fuel—so yes, we are there.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tom Collins (Worcester) (Lab)]

Q You have just mentioned that you are looking broadly at SAF production and how that is going to play out into the future. Compared with other northern European countries, the UK has excellent access to renewable energy, and we had a very early responding hydrogen industry. What do you see as the UK’s unique opportunities in SAF production?

Ruben van Grinsven: There are two elements. One is the fundamentals: affordable renewable energy, other feedstocks, then the cost of building plants, labour, and everything else. At the moment, in terms of the fundamentals of renewable electricity, the UK does not have a clear advantage because power prices are slightly more expensive, and most of the renewable power in the UK is intermittent. That is an important thing that needs to be overcome.

You have a slight disadvantage compared with, for instance, the Nordics, such as Sweden and Finland; they have a lot of hydro and stable baseload renewable power. On the fundamental side, especially for power, I think there are other places that are currently a bit more competitive. However, many of the other elements, such as feedstock supply, labour and knowledge, are quite similar.

The biggest differentiator is probably the legislative and regulatory landscape. You are creating a market through mandates, which I think is extremely powerful. If you also increase investment certainty through an RCM, that element is unique and, at this point in time, very helpful.

[Chris Vince]

Q Obviously, the Bill is trying to make it easier for us to produce SAF in this country, which is really important. I gather—if this is correct—that part of your role is to source SAF around the world. Do you feel there will be a greater need, and therefore a strong argument that we should be pushing ahead with SAF and producing it here in Britain? Although you said you cannot commit to where you will buy your SAF because of cost, would you say you will be in a place where you need more and more—and so it is very likely that you will have to source SAF from Britain, because you will need as many sources as possible?

Ruben van Grinsven: Especially for the second and third generation, SAF needs to develop. I think the consensus is that HEFA-based SAF is, at this moment, the most mature and affordable, so it is a great option. However, we also all believe that we are going to run out of feedstock at a certain time.

If you want to continue decarbonising aviation, you need additional forms of SAF—and that is where the second and third generations come in. We need to start developing those now, to learn how it is done and establish the technology and the fundamentals behind it. Starting that now is essential, and doing it in the UK could potentially give you a head start. If you do this before everybody else, you would have a technological and commercial head start, which could be an advantage.

[Greg Smith]

Q If the Bill becomes an Act, Shell will find itself in a peculiar place given that it will be both a levy payer, as a fossil fuel producer, and a developer of SAF potentially looking to benefit from the strike price. The Government put an analysis in the public domain on Second Reading: they suggested that the ultimate cost to the end user, such as somebody getting a flight—there will be a different calculation for those using air freight—will be plus or minus £1.50. Witnesses earlier suggested that that might be a “conservative” estimate—in their own words. Where would Shell see the ultimate cost pass on to the end user?

Ruben van Grinsven: The principle makes sense: at the end of the day, additional cost will find its way to the end user. We do not have enough information at this point in time to calculate what the cost is going to be because a lot of the details of the Bill are unknown. We would like to better understand how this is going to work, what the volumes are, what the timing is going to be, and how we will organise the contracts between the supplier and the off-taker. There are a lot of things that we do not know at this point, and therefore it is difficult to model what the final cost of the levy is going to be for the end consumer. I do not know; it is difficult to answer.

On top of that, I think it is going to change over time. Over time, if the market is short and the prices are high, money might flow towards the levy, so it would be like a negative levy but then it might turn into a positive levy. It is very difficult to assess that and put a number on it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Greg Smith]

Q This is my final question before we get to go through the Bill in detail on Thursday and next Tuesday. Accepting the agnostic position, has anything you have heard today from the various companies who have given evidence, be that global giants such as Shell, UK-based innovators such as Zero Petroleum or the companies developing SAFs from waste, changed your thinking on whether there might be emerging winners and losers, given some of the challenges that we have heard about—not least the municipal waste challenges?

Mike Kane: As the Minister leading on the Bill, I would say, “My kingdom for a chemistry degree.” Actually, Mark said something that I thought was very pertinent towards the end: we just have to allow the technology to emerge. That way, as we get to the power-to-liquids and the harder piece to do, in five, 10 or 15 years, there will be a market for it. The beauty of the Bill is that we can let contracts over five or 10 years.

Personally, even though Exxon has reservations about this measure, the only emotion I would convey to Exxon is thanks for producing this fuel now, in this country. Exxon is happy about the SAF mandate; its issue is with the revenue certainty mechanism. That is an area where, once the market is established, the Government have an exit strategy; once the market begins to work, the then Secretary of State will have ways out of it, because Government will not need to be in it once we have established it.

[Chris Vince]

Q The evidence session has been very positive—I think you would agree—with a lot of positive evidence about the Bill and sustainable aviation fuel in general. I have the same question that I have asked a number of those giving evidence today: will you elaborate on what you think would be the risks and potential disadvantages to the UK, if we were to stall on the Bill and not pass it on Third Reading?

Mike Kane: First, I thank you, Chris—you have been a great advocate for aviation since you came to Westminster in 2024, with Stansted airport near your constituency. The No. 1 risk is not doing this—that is the risk. I think Matt from Heathrow and Rob from Airlines UK said that in our approach to getting to net zero by 2050, we have a number of Government policies—airspace modernisation, leadership at CORSIA, the emissions trading scheme, the £2.3 billion investment in the Aerospace Technology Institute and hydrogen regulatory development—but that 40% of that pathway is the Bill. If we do not pass it, we are in serious trouble about decarbonising the industry. That is the key risk.

[Tom Collins]

Q We heard some of the evidence about how effective the RCM could be in light of the difference that CfDs have made. You have already explained how to manage the levers and the number of contracts allocated to get the economics right, but can you explain how that sits alongside the SAF mandate to help us to steer UK innovation and maximise the opportunities for the UK to lead in this sector?

Mike Kane: When we came into Government in July, we had two key aviation policies. The first was airspace modernisation, and we set up the UK Airspace Design Service and passed it into legislation just the other week. In addition to improving resilience in our skies, we hope that that measure will stop planes circling and allow those that currently do not fly in a straight line to fly in a straight line, which reduces the cost of fuel—to go back to the shadow Minister’s point. Lahiru from easyJet said in his evidence that the best energy is the energy we do not use, and airspace modernisation helps us with that piece.

The second part of our manifesto commitment was SAF. After we were elected, we laid the mandate for 2% of all aviation fuel in the UK to be SAF. That came into force on 1 January. Airlines are sourcing SAF and getting supplies of it, but too much of it comes from abroad. While we have a good industry in the UK, companies need the confidence to scale it up.

I will make no party political points, but four or five years ago we were promised that by 2025 five plants would be up and running. If I were going there, I would not be starting from here, but we are getting on with doing this now. I think everyone on this Committee can be extraordinarily proud that this will be the moment that we stepped up and began to decarbonise the aviation industry.

Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill (Third sitting)

Chris Vince Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 17th July 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Mike Kane]

I thank hon. Members for their contributions. Let me start by addressing the point made by the Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for Mid Buckinghamshire, about the overview and ambition of this legislation. We are the first legislature in the world to attempt to create this revenue certainty mechanism. The SAF mandate was a key commitment in our election manifesto last July, and the eyes of the world, as some of our witnesses said the other day, are on us doing this work, because people are following our lead. I therefore want to bake in the competitive advantage of being ahead of the game in this area, and being a world leader in this area too.

[Chris Vince (Harlow) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Western. The Minister talks about all eyes from across the world being on the Bill. I must declare an interest, because I have an international airport on the very edge of my constituency, which obviously serves Harlow and where people from Harlow are employed. It is the industry itself that is really looking at this debate, and it was very clear from Tuesday’s evidence that the industry, particularly airports such as Stansted and Heathrow, are in favour of the Bill and moving it forward as quickly as we can.

[Mike Kane]

My hon. Friend is a doughty campaigner for Stansted airport, which is near his constituency. Stansted is part of Manchester Airports Group Ltd, or MAG, which I know is extraordinarily keen—along with other airports, AirportsUK, airlines and nearly all the other people who gave evidence—that we pass this legislation.

Coming back to the Bill, new clause 2, which was tabled by the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam, would make it a requirement to carry out a review of the impact of levy regulations on sustainable fuels and the industry in the UK 12 months after they are introduced. The levy regulations will not have a significant impact in the 12 months after they are made. Contract payments will form the majority of levied costs. However, contracts need to be negotiated and signed, plants built, and SAF produced and sold before costs are incurred, which is very unlikely to happen in the first 12 months. Also, review clauses are commonly included in secondary legislation and we do not need separate powers in the Bill to include them in the levy regulations. The levy regulations will be subject to the affirmative procedure, which will allow Members of both Houses to scrutinise them. Given that, I ask the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam not to press the new clause when we come to it later.

I turn to new clause 6, which was tabled by the hon. Member for Wimbledon. I understand his concerns about the effectiveness of the SAF revenue certainty mechanism and how our policy aligns with the ECAA. I assure him that the UK’s overall SAF framework and requirements have many similarities to those of the EU, generally allowing the same certification schemes to be used, reducing administrative burden and minimising market access barriers. We actively monitor the SAF market including policies elsewhere in the world, just as the world is monitoring this Bill, to ensure that we provide the right level of support to the sector.

As I have said, I am proud that we will be the first country in the world to introduce a dedicated SAF revenue certainty mechanism. Alongside the implementation of the SAF mandate from 1 January 2025, we are leading the way in having clear and effective policies, grounded in legislation, that address the demand and supply of SAF. International Governments and stakeholders frequently point to the UK as an example to emulate, based on our forward-leaning and comprehensive SAF policy framework.

The UK plays a key role in international discourse on SAF and has cultivated strong bilateral relationships on SAF with countries worldwide. The UK promotes co-ordinated international action on aviation emissions through the International Civil Aviation Organisation. Given the active measures that we have in place, I ask the hon. Gentlemen not to press the new clause to a vote.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 6 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 7 to 9 ordered to stand part of the Bill.