Oral Answers to Questions

Edward Miliband Excerpts

Wednesday 1st December 2021 Commons Chamber

[Alok Sharma]

The make-up and structure of the Government are obviously a matter for the Prime Minister—I know my right hon. Friend will have raised that issue at the Liaison Committee—but our current NDC is aligned to net zero.

[Edward Miliband (Doncaster North) (Lab)]

I want to commend the COP President, or should I say No Drama Sharma, for his efforts in Glasgow. He is right that we have to spend the next 12 months maximising the pressure on the big emitters, and we can make a difference with the UK-Australia trade deal. Australia’s 2030 target is consistent with 4° of warming. Will he tell the Secretary of State for International Trade to rewrite that trade deal, and not to water down commitments, which is the current plan, but to make it conditional on Australia, as well as the UK, having 2030 targets that are consistent with 1.5°?

[Alok Sharma]

I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on his new role. My only disappointment is that the phrase “shadow COP President” does not appear in his title—that is where he could take some lessons from the deputy leader of the Labour party about how to expand his number of portfolios. On the point about Australia, I confirm that the trade deal will include a substantive chapter on climate change, which reaffirms both parties’ commitments to upholding our obligations under the Paris agreement, including limiting global warming to 1.5°.

[Edward Miliband]

I know I am shadowing the Department that the right hon. Gentleman would quite like to run, so perhaps that announcement will be forthcoming in the future. I am mildly encouraged by what he says on Australia.

Let me take two other issues where he can show leadership: the Cumbria coalmine, and the Cambo oilfield, which are the equivalent of 18 coal-fired power stations running for a year. He knows that we need to get others to phase out coal, and that we need to phase out fossil fuels. Surely the right way to send a proper signal to the rest of the world ahead of COP27, is for the whole Government to start practising what he is effectively preaching, and put a stop to Cambo and Cumbria.

[Alok Sharma]

We have previously had discussions at the Dispatch Box on both Cambo and Cumbria, and the right hon. Gentleman will know that they are being looked at by independent regulators and that pronouncements will be coming forward. We have significantly reduced the amount of coal in our electricity mix. Indeed, there will be no more coal in the UK electricity mix from 2024.