Action on Climate Change and Decarbonisation

Jamie Stone Excerpts

Tuesday 5th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)]

I thank the right hon. Member for Ludlow (Philip Dunne) for his thoughtful contribution. Coming from the highlands in the far north of Scotland, I have seen with my own eyes what climate change is doing in my lifetime. As a child, I took a huge interest in butterflies and recorded every butterfly I ever saw. I did not kill them; I recorded what they were. Today, we have species of butterfly in the highlands that we never saw there in the 1950s and 1960s, including the speckled wood and the orange tip, which are now quite common, but we are also seeing some species disappearing, particularly moths. That is because of global warming. It is there; it is real.

As is my wont, I shall make three points that are connected with the needs and requirements of my constituency. In recent days and weeks, there has been quite a lot of press coverage of a suggestion that, as and when a new wind farm is built, perhaps in England somewhere, the nearby households that might be affected would be given a grant of £350 per household. In my constituency in the highlands, we already have a large number of onshore wind farms, so my first plea, which is a pretty obvious one, is that if the Government ever did consider some sort of grant like that, it should also be afforded retrospectively to homes in the highlands and other parts of the UK where there are already wind farms. My part of the highlands is one of the coldest parts of the UK—the village of Altnaharra in Sutherland always has record low temperatures—and average incomes are not large. Transport and getting about are expensive, and given the inflationary situation and the cost of living, a wind farm payment like that would help families who are struggling to make ends meet.

I conclude my first point by saying that I am a great believer in the United Kingdom, and I believe that a family in the highlands, in Wales or in south-west England has the same rights as a family anywhere else. Therefore, if such payments were made, I think that in the interest of fairness, all parts of the UK should be considered, as should my suggestion about making retrospective payments.

I warmly encourage all Members to come and have their holidays in the highlands, but as they drive up the A9, as James Bond did in “Skyfall”, now and again they will come across a vast articulated lorry carrying part of a turbine up to where a wind farm is being constructed. Having those lorries going through the narrow villages of Sutherland, such as Golspie, Brora and Helmsdale, and negotiating the twisting roads is a problem, both for getting parts of the turbine where they are intended to go and because it discourages the local people.

My second point is an old favourite of mine. Recently, a man called Mr Frank Roach, who is a tremendous fellow for developing the use of railways, got a very large consignment of timber moved from Sutherland to markets further south on a very large train. For global warming and net zero, moving by rail makes the most enormous sense; Godspeed the day it is all electrified. My second plea, therefore, is that, where planning consent has been granted for a new wind farm, we should look quite hard at moving parts of wind turbines by rail and not by articulated lorry, consuming vast amounts of diesel as it burns its way up and down our roads. I earnestly recommend that officials in the Government contact Mr Frank Roach and talk to him, because it is really quite extraordinary the way he is getting us all in the north of Scotland thinking about the use of the railway.

My third point is that offshore wind has been proved by the construction of the Beatrice wind farm off the coast of Sutherland and Caithness. It works—it really does. It generates a huge amount of electricity. But there has been sensible talk by the Government and others—it has already been referred to in the debate—about establishing floating offshore wind farms.

Let me make an unashamed plug for the Cromarty Firth in my constituency, which was the great anchorage for the fleet in the first and second world wars because it is such a large and deep anchorage, safe from the weather. It is no accident that some of the mightiest oil production platforms ever built were built there. I strongly advocate to the Government that offshore floating wind systems could be constructed in the area. They could be constructed in Wales and elsewhere, too, but the main thing is that it would be nice to see them built in the United Kingdom. I hope—I realise that I am really chancing my arm—that the Government will look favourably on the bid by the Cromarty Firth to become a green freeport.

In concluding, I want to make two small points. First, this debate is very much in keeping with what we all hear from young people in schools. To use a German word, it is the Zeitgeist—the spirit of the times. Young people are only too well aware of the urgent need to get to net zero. They know all about climate change, and I find that hugely encouraging.

Secondly, I want to pick up on what I think the right hon. Member for Kingswood (Chris Skidmore) was saying, if I understood him correctly. A good number of years ago, I was a member of Ross and Cromarty District Council. We went for a courageous money spending scheme called care and repair, which was deliberately targeted at some of the coastal villages of Wester Ross—Gairloch, Applecross and places like that. We threw what was known as block B capital allocation at doing up houses. That meant that people had their homes insulated.

This was quite a long time ago, but the point was that the money we spent, which was a lot, went into the local businesses—the joiners, the people who installed the solar panels, and so on. They then invested in more equipment and, in turn, bought locally. That money was pumped into the local economy of a remote rural area. That was a financial benefit that we saw in Wester Ross all those years ago. So the money that is spent is spent locally. It boosts the local economy. One could say that the Chancellor’s measures during the pandemic had the same effect; they boosted the local economy. All I am saying is that it is a mistake to think of it as being money down the drain. It is money spent in the UK, to the good of the UK, and that money is recycled, eventually supports the shops and helps to establish the businesses, which can go on to win bigger and better contracts.

I will conclude my remarks with that, other than to say that it is really good to hear a debate of this quality in this place. I know it will strike a chord with my younger constituents. I intend to send a copy of the Hansard record of this debate to my secondary schools as I think they will be interested.

[Bim Afolami (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)]

I rise in response to the challenge from the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone): this debate has to be of such quality as he will send a copy of the Hansard to his young constituents. That puts me under pressure—

[Jamie Stone]

But you will rise to meet it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bim Afolami]

I thank the hon. Lady for her point. The intention behind subsidies—or, to use another word, support—for energy companies is to try to achieve what we want them to achieve. The investment allowances—there are various other things—should be tweaked or changed to incentivise more directly the sort of behaviours that we are talking about. On that, I support her.

[Jamie Stone]

rose—

[Bim Afolami]

I would like to continue, as I am being nodded at by various people because of the time, so I will make a little progress if I may.

We have heard a lot today about buildings and the need for a big insulation plan, for want of a better description. I strongly support that, but micro-measures to help individuals are also important. As Ronald Reagan said, the scariest words in the English language are: “I’m from the Government, and I’m here to help.” We need big, macro ideas. We need the big plans, but at the same time we need to incentivise individuals and families who want to help with the transition, do the right thing and make their own decisions to decarbonise. We can use things such as smart household systems to allow users to manage when to charge their electric cars, optimise when their heating comes on, or when to turn their fridge up.

We could also use market reforms to allow small energy suppliers to supply local areas. When there is a proposal for something in my constituency and I say to the energy company or small supplier, “Can you do something for the local village or local community so that they can benefit from this?”—whatever the form of energy is nearby—they say, “Look, the market isn’t really structured to allow that to happen.” That is a big problem, because it means that we are not getting the support of the local community or tapping into the latent desire to decarbonise—yes, working with Government at a macro level, but also at a micro level.

[Jamie Stone]

The hon. Member need have no fears: I shall put a large red star beside his contribution when I send off the copies of Hansard. If I pick him up right, surely the point is that anyone who thinks that the Beatrice wind farm, which I mentioned in my contribution, came into being without the expertise of oil firms, which have installed mighty things in the North sea, would be very much mistaken. These same oil firms that he is referring to will be crucial if we are to establish large-scale floating offshore wind energy generation.

[Bim Afolami]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that point; I could not agree more. It is a really difficult point to make, because it seems counter-intuitive, but we will need the major energy companies to do their bit and use what they have to achieve what we all agree we need to achieve, which is faster decarbonisation. We need macro measures from Government and we need to work much harder on buildings and insulation, but we also need micro measures to help individuals and small communities invest in decarbonisation and make those decisions themselves.

I commend these estimates. I am sure the money will be spent wisely, particularly if the Government have listened to the quality of this debate.