The Climate Emergency

Karin Smyth Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

On 1 May, the Labour Party, led ably by my hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Sue Hayman), forced the Government to declare a climate emergency. The motion gave the Government six months to bring forward urgent proposals to restore our natural environment and deliver a circular zero-waste economy. Six months on, the clock is ticking, and what did we see in the Queen’s Speech: piecemeal measures—some welcome—to tinker around the edges while the rate of climate change accelerates in the UK at an alarming rate.

This Queen’s Speech was used for propaganda by the Conservative party. The Prime Minister promises the earth, but he will deliver nothing and continue to ignore the enormity of the threat. Obviously, recycling and plastic waste are important, but they are not the critical issues facing people in my constituency. We need urgent support and investment in energy-saving measures—in solar, heat and water heating—and in our housing stock. This is a massive infrastructure issue. It is also a massive opportunity to bring decent jobs to the people I represent, but it is being missed by the Government.

In Bristol South, my focus has always been on post-16 educational opportunities, health and housing. Those are the key things that matter to my constituents, some of whom face the greatest deprivation in this country. Transport—to get jobs to them and them to jobs—is the other key issue. They can all be improved with better policy proposals and investment, which could also help us to meet the climate change challenge, but the Government are not bringing forward any measures for them.

There are some measures that we can welcome in the Environment Bill. In particular, I and my Bristol colleagues welcome the location of the new office for environmental protection, but that body needs teeth. At the moment, it is not truly independent or set up to really hold the Government to account, so we have some concerns about that. I hope that it will bring decent jobs to my constituency and that it focuses on the issues I have identified, as this would help people, particularly those in fuel poverty and in poor-quality housing, to achieve the standards we desperately need to meet.

When I first entered this place in 2015, my surgery was full of young entrepreneurs in Bristol South who had had the legs cut out from under their businesses by the Government’s changes to the infrastructure support, particularly for solar heating and so on. The Government have never supported businesses in Bristol South. I would really like to see them start to reverse that type of policy. Brexit dominates most of our debates at the moment. The idea that the Environment Secretary and the Prime Minister want stronger protections and greater investment in communities facing poverty, particularly fuel poverty, and the devastating effects of climate change is for the birds.