Net Zero Test

Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts

Thursday 22nd July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

We have not had any discussions about implementing this proposal yet. We will respond to the Climate Change Committee’s recommendations in due course. But we are looking at the impact of climate change across all our policies. As I said, we have a couple of senior Cabinet-level committees, one chaired by the Prime Minister, which take all of these things into account.

[Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, the Climate Change Committee sees local authorities as having a critical part to play in achieving net zero. On 16 July, the NAO revealed

“serious weaknesses in central government’s approach to working with local authorities on decarbonisation, stemming from a lack of clarity over local authorities’ overall roles, piecemeal funding, and diffuse accountabilities”.

Does the Minister agree with its assessment that there is

“great urgency to the development of a more coherent approach”

and can he explain how the MHCLG, BEIS and other departments are responding to this challenge?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I do not agree with the noble Lord. Of course, local authorities are critical in terms of delivering this agenda and I have many meetings with them to discuss a number of the grand schemes for which I am responsible. We have spent something like £1.2 billion in dedicated funds given to local authorities through the local authority delivery scheme and the public sector decarbonisation scheme to help them in this job.