Climate: Behaviour Change (Environment and Climate Change Committee Report)

Lord Berkeley Excerpts

Wednesday 7th June 2023 Grand Committee

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I had the pleasure of joining the Environment and Climate Change Committee after its work on the report on behaviour change was completed. However, I have read the report and absolutely concur with its findings, very ably articulated today by our excellent chair, the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter.

The report makes it clear that behaviour change is one part of the necessary toolbox to achieve our net- zero target by 2050. Government policies and fiscal incentives can go only so far. There has been a lot of talk of hectoring and compulsion, of the danger of pushing through policies against the wishes of the people, but there is huge public support for actions to tackle climate change. As the ONS report makes clear, 64% of adults say they are worried about the impact of climate change, and 59% feel that this and the environment are among the top issues concerning voters today. People want to do the right thing. What they lack is a clear road map to make the necessary changes in their lives in the most cost-effective way.

Leadership and direction need to come from the top, but when did Rishi Sunak last make a meaningful contribution on the need to tackle climate change? He is remembered mostly for turning up late and leaving early at COP 27.

[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

Using helicopters.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

And using helicopters. He is increasingly pandering to the anti-green faction on his own Back Benches, who put fossil fuels before green energy.

This lack of government leadership and awareness of the scale of the challenge was reflected in the response to the committee’s report. It is, by any measure, disappointing. It refers to a plethora of policies and strategies which we know are not being enacted effectively. This failing is clearly demonstrated in our report in relation, for example, to the delays in the boiler upgrade scheme, which we will debate at a later date.

The government response to the committee also fails to grasp the need for greater co-ordination and leadership across departments to provide the public with a clear narrative about the road to change. Yet when Grant Shapps recently gave evidence to our committee, it became clear that net-zero policies were still not a priority for some of his colleagues.

The government response to the committee also failed to recognise the huge benefits in delivering behaviour change in partnership with civil society, local government and business groups. This is particularly important given that the BEIS public attitudes tracker shows that the UK Government are now one of the least trusted sources of accurate information about climate change, so working with other, more trusted partners is key.

On key policy areas, such as aviation and food production, there was a marked reluctance to intervene, yet we know that individuals will have to make difficult choices in these areas if we are to have any hope of reaching our targets.

Since our report was published, Chris Skidmore MP has published his impressive net zero review, which examined how the UK could better meet its net-zero targets in a changing world. He identifies that huge economic opportunities of clean technology could be taken if we moved quickly and acted decisively. But his report echoes the themes of our report. He emphasises that the Government need to ramp up engagement with the public by publishing a public engagement strategy this year, and he proposes the creation of a carbon calculator to provide consumers with better information to make informed decisions on their carbon footprint.

As the evidence for a proper behaviour change strategy stacks up, I hope that the Minister will feel able to give a more positive welcome to our report’s recommendations in his response.

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[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

My Lords, it gives me great pleasure to take part in this debate and I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, on her chairing of this committee and the content of its inquiry. It is a novel and important subject, which really emphasises the importance of lifestyle and personal involvement.

Reading it through, I think the government response is rather sad, really. The Government seem to agree with everything the reports says, but say that they are doing it already and lots of money is being spent—that is about it. I do not think that is quite true. I am sad that there is not more discussion about the fuel duty and train fares debate. Obviously, the committee talked about net-zero air services—we have heard a few comments from noble Lords about that—and of course charging points, which we deal with quite often.

We need behaviour change, however. I want to concentrate my remarks on active travel, which is recommendation 32 in the report:

“The Government must deliver on its ambition to improve active travel infrastructure and local public transport systems by providing the necessary resources and supporting local government bodies to implement projects on the ground”.


Paragraph 64 of the Government’s response says:

“Government is investing more than ever before in walking and cycling”.


The National Audit Office has published, today, a report on active travel. The NAO says that the Government will miss all their targets for 2025 after years of stop-start funding. The report also reveals that there are new cuts of 20% year on year in revenue funding for active travel in 2023-24. This is the kind of money spent, for example, on Bikeability, which is training for school- children so that they can cycle more safely.

This comes on top of a three-quarter cut for dedicated capital spending, announced in March. It is good that the NAO supports active travel, but it says that there needs to be long-term ring-fenced funding to address its requirements. It goes on to say that those investments, which are quite small in transport terms, represent very high value for money—4.3:1—and contribute to many good targets in different departments. The sad thing is that it says that the Government will miss at least three of their four targets on active travel by 2025. These are increasing annual cycling stages and annual walking; increasing the percentage of children aged five to 10 walking to school; and increasing the percentage of journeys of under five miles in towns and cities that are walked, wheeled or cycled.

I could go on citing that NAO report for a long time and I hope noble Lords will read it—it has come out today. A statement in paragraph 64 of the response says:

“Government is investing more than ever before in walking and cycling”.


I am sure they can arrange for some figures to demonstrate that that is true, but it certainly is not enough and we need to be very careful and support the NAO and press the Government for some responses on this issue.