Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Greg Hands and David Evennett

Tuesday 16th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sir David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con)]

T7. I welcome the steps the Government have taken in the last month to reinvigorate the UK’s nuclear industry. Does my right hon. Friend agree with me that, thanks to this investment, we will have a cleaner, greener and more secure energy system that is less dependent on volatile fossil fuels?

[The Minister of State, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Greg Hands)]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his long-standing interest in this question. He will certainly know that, although nuclear is 16% of our current electricity generation, 12 of the 13 current nuclear power plants will be decommissioned or will no longer be producing by 2030. It is absolutely vital that we renew our nuclear capability, and I look forward to my right hon. Friend helping and supporting us in that effort.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Greg Hands and David Evennett

Tuesday 21st September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Greg Hands]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. Of course, we look carefully at what the Climate Change Committee has recommended at all times, and we are in the process of meeting last year’s recommendations very well. I can tell her that the climate checkpoint will apply to all future licensing rounds. Cambo is of course already licensed, and projects that are already licensed are already accounted for in our projection of emissions from future oil and gas production. So those emissions are already accounted for in our plans.

[Sir David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con)]

I would like to welcome my right hon. Friend to his new position, and I wish him well. May I also welcome the Government’s new target to cut our carbon emissions by 78% by 2035? Does he agree that this ambitious world-leading target puts us on track to get to net zero by 2050 and shows how we are leading the world in building back greener?

[Greg Hands]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his question. Referring back to the Climate Change Committee progress report, I read an interesting comment in it at the weekend while I was learning into my new brief. It states:

“The rate of reductions since 2012…is comparable to that needed in the future.”

That is not a reason for complacency, but I would point out, as my right hon. Friend has done, that the UK has an enviable record in this space. We have grown the economy by 78% since 1990 and reduced our emissions by 44%, showing that the right way forward is to grow our economy while simultaneously reducing emissions.