Net Zero Test

Lord Grantchester Excerpts

Thursday 22nd July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

Planning of course is extremely important, particularly in terms of delivering net-zero buildings. The noble Lord will be aware of the proposals we have to modify building regulations to reduce the impact of new buildings.

[Lord Grantchester (Lab) [V]]

This is the decisive decade for action and achievements, yet behind the Government’s scatter-gun rhetoric there is only dither and delay to key strategic coherency: the net-zero strategy, the hydrogen strategy, the Treasury’s finance road map, and others. Can the Minister confirm reports that another key strategy document, the heat and buildings strategy, is further delayed? According to Sky,

“Whitehall negotiations are stuck over how best to incentivise the public to change to low-carbon alternatives”.

How will the different strategies combine to support the UK’s climate change goals on both net zero and adaptation, along with wider environment-related goals?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

The heat and buildings strategy will be published in due course. I do not agree with the noble Lord that we are not doing anything. I refer him to action we have taken recently: the energy White Paper, the revised emissions trading system, all of the announcements and investment to do with offshore wind, the pledge to phase out new petrol and diesel vehicles, the transport decarbonisation plan, and so on. Of course, there is always more to do, but I do not accept the noble Lord’s premise.