Paris Agreement on Climate Change

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Wednesday 7th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mary Creagh]

I strongly agree that what investors and businesses want is certainty. Members of the Conservative party may want to see outcomes, but one way of achieving those outcomes is to set a strict framework and then stick, within that framework, to the interim targets that we wish to meet. The hon. Gentleman has played an important part in the Environmental Audit Committee, sharing with us not only the Scottish experience, but his wider global experience.

As we know, 23 countries have now ratified the agreement, and over the past week the United States and China have come together. Given that they represent 40% of the world’s carbon emissions, this is a really significant moment. It seems to me that they are firing the starting gun for the next big industrial revolution. Britain led the way in the first industrial revolution, with the spinning jenny, electricity and other forms of energy, and the steam engine. The second industrial revolution, in the 1990s, introduced technological change which has revolutionised the way we think and do business. This will be the third great industrial revolution of our time. Whichever country first gets to market with individual transport solutions that are non-emitting—solar-powered cars and battery storage—will have a massive competitive advantage in the global race.

We have heard about the Climate Change Act 2008. That was Labour’s achievement, but it was a cross-party achievement in that only five Members voted against it. It committed the United Kingdom to reducing its emissions by 80% of the 1990s level by 2050. It has been copied, replicated and imitated across the world because it gives investors certainty, which is crucial, particularly at a time when, following the referendum result, there is a great deal of uncertainty in our economy. The Act sets out long-term goals, but it also gives Governments flexibility to decide how they want to meet those goals. Our Government also introduced feed-in tariffs and the renewables obligation, which brought about an energy revolution in this country. In 2005, none of our energy was being produced from renewable sources, whereas at certain points last year, 25% of our electricity was coming from such sources.

I want to say something about the work of the Environmental Audit Committee. I have here a copy of an excellent report that we published about 10 days ago, entitled “Sustainability in the Department for Transport”. It did not receive quite as much press coverage, or Daily Mail pick-up, as the microbeads report, which is a great shame. I am sure that no Member who is present, or anyone sitting in the Galleries, uses microbeads. I must say that we are all looking very polished and relaxed after our summer break.

What the Committee found was concerning. We found that the UK is failing to reduce its carbon emissions in the transport sector, that air quality targets that were supposed to be met in 2010 will not be met until 2020 at the earliest—and the only reason there is a plan for developing them is the United Kingdom’s membership of the European Union, and the threat of action against us by the European Commission and the European Court of Justice—and that although a year has passed since we discovered, on 18 September, that Volkswagen had fitted cheat devices to a range of cars, the Government have yet to decide what action, if any, to take against the company. As far as I am aware, not a single Volkswagen has been recalled in this country for any sort of fix or refit. That is completely unacceptable to Volkswagen customers who, for instance, may wish to change their cars and are unable to obtain a fair valuation.

Domestic transport is the single largest emitting sector of the economy, accounting for 22% of UK emissions. Those emissions need to fall by 31% over the next 10 years. We found that the UK is on course to miss that target by 50%. So demand for transport is growing and, despite marginal falls in average car and van CO₂ intensity, this is driving up emissions. Therefore, we are not going to be on the most cost-effective pathway to those 2030, 2040 and 2050 targets. That is deeply worrying, because if we are not on the most cost-effective pathway, it means we are idling along in the slow lane, hoping that something will turn up to suddenly help us meet those carbon budgets later on down the road, literally and figuratively.

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

Does the hon. Lady agree that the Scottish Government proposition to make sure that all towns, communities and cities are free of fossil fuel vehicles by 2050 is the right approach? Does she agree that the UK should be looking to follow the example of Norway and the Netherlands, which are looking at banning all new petrol and diesel vehicles by 2025?

[Mary Creagh]

What I would say about a 2050 target is that it is long enough away for none of us to be accountable for it, because most of us will be dead by then. [Interruption.] Well, some of us; I probably will be—no, I will be enjoying a long and fruitful old age, as I intend to live until I am 100. I want to see interim targets, so if there is a 2050 target I would be interested to see what are the 2020, 2025 and 2030 targets, because faraway targets can always be our children’s problems.

The issue in the report about our transport sector is that we are not doing enough now, and I want to develop my theme because transport emissions increased in both 2014 and 2015. Some 94% of those transport emissions are from road transport, and we were concerned that less than 1% of new cars are electric. There is a good reason for that: they are very expensive—£30,000 or £32,000, perhaps. The Committee on Climate Change says that we need 9% of all new cars to be ultra-low emissions vehicles by 2020 if we are to meet those targets at the lowest cost to the public. We should match what the Committee was saying with the Department’s forecasts; the Department was saying, “Well, actually 3% to 7% of vehicles will be ultra-low emissions by 2020, but our average central point is 5%.” So the Department’s central forecast is 5%, but the Committee on Climate Change says it should be 9%.

That is worrying, because the next target—the 2030 target—is that 60% of all new vehicles should be low-emissions. If we are only at 5% by 2020, I cannot see a way of getting to 60% of low-emissions vehicles without some spectacular change in the way we buy cars in this country, and we did not hear any brilliant bright ideas from the Department for Transport. We heard of the money that was committed, but we did not hear a strategy for getting that mass take-up. That means we are playing catch-up and we are not going to follow the lowest cost route to decarbonise the economy.

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[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

I am particularly grateful to have caught your eye, Madam Deputy Speaker, having missed the start of the debate. I apologise to the Front-Bench speakers for that, but I was detained in the Procedure Committee, where we were taking evidence on the effectiveness or otherwise of our EVEL—English votes for English laws—procedures. I look forward to that issue returning to the Floor of the House in due course.

I was particularly inspired to try to catch your eye, Madam Deputy Speaker, by the comments of the hon. Member for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood) about the impact of climate change on people in developing countries. As she said, and as I said in my intervention on her, the poorest and most vulnerable people around the whole world, who are often those whose historical carbon emissions have done the least to cause climate change, are feeling the impact of climate change first and hardest. That is why, in this debate and in the negotiations that took place in Paris, the concept of climate justice is so important. As I said in my intervention, the Scottish Government have really embraced that concept, as can be seen in a range of policy interventions. The former First Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond), spoke about this concept at the central party school of the Communist party of China in Beijing, no less, which shows the Scottish Government’s ambition in this area.

Along with this Parliament, the Scottish Government have set some of the most ambitious carbon reduction targets anywhere in the world. Earlier this year, we were able to announce that the commitment to reduce carbon emissions by 42% on 1990 levels by 2020 had already been met this year. Of course, 42 is the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything, according to “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”, but I am sure that it was just a coincidence that that was the target.

The other innovative approach the Scottish Government have taken is through their climate justice fund. I have had the privilege of seeing that in action at first hand in Malawi, a country with which I have become very familiar over the years. I have seen the impact of climate change in that country, as rain patterns change significantly from what people were used to. Periods of drought are followed by periods of intense rain, which makes the cultivation of crops incredibly difficult. Of course, most people in that part of the world rely on their crops as they are subsistence farmers. The changing weather patterns that result from climate change are having a huge impact on the day-to-day lives of the population of that country and the wider region. The region is, of course, facing a drought at the moment.

The climate justice fund has been able to help people to adapt to the impacts of climate change, often by using innovative methods that are energy-efficient and environmentally-friendly in their own right. For example, I visited a community in Dedza where people were able to irrigate their crops thanks to a reservoir built at the top of a hill. Without the need for any kind of electricity or pumping—just through the force of gravity—that irrigation allows people to grow crops and cultivate their food, whereas previously that would not have been possible because of drought or the erratic rain patterns. Likewise, in Chikwawa, in the south of the country, a solar pump is harnessing the extreme power of the sun that is felt in that area and turning that into green energy which, again, has allowed crops to be irrigated and food to be grown.

[Drew Hendry]

My hon. Friend mentioned innovation, particularly in a country such as Malawi. Does he agree that there is an opportunity for hydrogen technology and storage to be deployed to meet some of these ambitious targets? Many of us here hope to be around in 2050 and the Scottish Government have targets for emissions up to then. We have not heard a lot about hydrogen today, but it could also be used in vehicles, as we are doing in Aberdeen, where hydrogen buses and council vehicles are running now.

[Patrick Grady]

I wholeheartedly agree with my hon. Friend. That is an example of the kind of innovation we see in small countries such as Norway, which was mentioned earlier, Malawi and Scotland. What is particularly important about the Scottish Government’s climate justice fund is that it is additional to the international development fund that they make available for mainstream international development programmes. It is encouraging that the Minister for Climate Change and Industry was formerly a Minister in the Department for International Development. I hope that will mean that there will be joined-up conversations across the Government as we take forward these important concepts.

The other matter on which I wish to reflect briefly, which I mentioned in an intervention, is the message from Pope Francis about climate justice and tackling climate change, and our own personal responsibilities to take action in our daily lives to reduce our footprint on the planet. Much of this has already been discussed in terms of where our energy comes from in the first place and clean electricity generation, but we have a responsibility to drive demand reduction through the more efficient use of electricity and by purchasing more efficient electrical appliances. We do not need to live in the stone age, but we should make much more efficient use of the energy that is generated, hopefully in a clean manner. The idea of climate justice is due to the fact that people who have contributed the least to climate change and can least afford to deal with it are experiencing the greatest impact.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

I did not realise that I was at a “Star Trek” convention, but we learn something new every day in this place.

This has been an incredibly important debate. There have been a number of excellent speeches from all parts of the House by Members who really know this subject inside out and upside down. The debate was opened with a formidable tutorial by my hon. Friend the Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner), who mentioned the Government’s woeful record.

[Drew Hendry]

On the subject of the Government’s woeful record, does the hon. Gentleman agree that a missed opportunity was not supporting the alternative air fuel scheme, proposed by British Airways, which would have transformed 575,000 tonnes of London’s waste into fuel and allowed BA to operate its flights twice over for a year from London City airport? Does he agree that that was a missed opportunity by the UK Government and that they should revisit it?

[Bill Esterson]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his exceedingly early intervention in my speech. Of course, there are many examples of the kind that he gives.

We heard from my right hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband) about the worrying loss of UK influence on tackling climate change, like so much else that results from the Brexit vote. He also mentioned his grave concerns about the damage being done to the international community’s ability to tackle climate change, given our leading role up till now and the likely dramatic reduction in our influence outside the European Union.

We heard contributions from my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test (Dr Whitehead), who reinforced the importance of the UK’s role and the implications of Brexit. He questioned whether Government policy meant that we were on track to meet our obligations. That theme was picked up by other hon. Members later in the debate, including my hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield (Mary Creagh). We heard from my hon. Friends the Members for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood), for Copeland (Mr Reed) and for Llanelli (Nia Griffith), among other contributions.

Earlier, the Minister spoke about what he called the Government’s fantastic record, but he rather ignored the fact that investor confidence has plummeted, subsidies have been cut and jobs, not least in the solar industry, have been lost. He blamed the European Union for our not having ratified the Paris agreement, while acknowledging that other European countries had done so. The Government and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills have been happy enough recently to act against the rest of the EU. The UK recently blocked action by the rest of the EU to protect our steel industry. The Government are happy enough to take unilateral action when it suits them, but we had enough false claims about the EU during the referendum campaign, thank you.