Durban Climate Change Conference

Debate between Mark Durkan and Chris Huhne

Monday 12th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Huhne]

Yes, I agree very much that the relationships that we are increasingly building with China and India are very valuable and absolutely key to the agenda’s success. We have to make it clear that there is no conflict between the absolutely legitimate expectation of developing countries to be able to raise the living standards of their people and our need to protect our children and our grandchildren, and their children and their grandchildren, from the effects of climate change. One of the most passionate and moving speeches that I heard in Durban was from a Bangladeshi Minister, who described the real threat that there is to his country and to his people if we do not get a grip on climate change.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

I commend the Secretary of State for his statement and the ongoing work that it reflects. He mentioned the resolution on a work programme to look at long-term sources of finance for developing programmes. When does he anticipate the programme commencing? Does he believe that the UK’s input will be on an EU axis, and do the possible sources of finance include in that context a financial transaction tax?

[Chris Huhne]

The work programme will kick off, and it is up to the UNFCCC secretariat to arrange the details, but I do not anticipate any time being lost in setting it up and getting it under way. The details of those represented on it will be settled through the process, but we as a Government are keenly interested and have a lot of expertise in the area, so I hope that we will be able to play a full part and, depending on how that is determined, be represented on any group that pushes the work programme forward.

On the financial transaction tax, the hon. Gentleman will know that we as a Government support financial taxes in general. We have moved on our own banking levy, for example, further and faster than other European countries, and we take the view that we can have further taxes on financial services, but that if such a tax touches areas that are very mobile, as a financial transaction tax obviously would do, it must be concluded at a global level. It cannot be done in only one country, because if it is the activity switches to other centres, and one simply loses out on all the revenue that one anticipated.

With that very important caveat of realism, the issue certainly has been talked about, but I do not believe that it is very likely to make progress, given the stand that other key parties have made against a financial transaction tax—and I am thinking in particular of the United States.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mark Durkan and Chris Huhne

Thursday 1st December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Huhne]

I am sure that Mr Speaker is aware of Yorkshire’s unilateral declaration of independence, which allows twinning arrangements to be entered into between towns in Yorkshire and towns elsewhere in the country.

The hon. Gentleman made a serious point about energy costs. I assure him that we are doing more than was done under the Government whom he supported for 13 years to make this market as competitive as possible. We have just had the Ofgem retail review and its proposals to simplify the tariffs dramatically to make things much easier for consumers. We have introduced a clear limit on the period in which the energy companies have to switch people over. We are doing everything we can to make this a competitive market, at both the retail end and the wholesale end. That is the best guarantee for every consumer in this country, be they in Huddersfield or Stoke-on-Trent, that they will get the best possible deal.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

Will the Secretary of State work with colleagues to establish a cost of warmth index, which could usefully inform the work of his Department, the Department for Work and Pensions, the Treasury and Parliament?

[Chris Huhne]

That is an interesting thought and I would certainly be interested to see more from the hon. Gentleman about this issue. I can see practical difficulties, given that warmth comes from so many different sources. For example, people who are off-gas grid and are reliant on heating oil may have substantially different problems from those who are on-gas grid and are able to avail themselves of a number of things. I would certainly be prepared to look at the idea if the hon. Gentleman put something on paper and sent it over.

Annual Energy Statement

Debate between Mark Durkan and Chris Huhne

Wednesday 23rd November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Huhne]

Nuclear is one of the three key pillars on the supply side, with the fourth pillar being energy saving. Those are the key parts of our policy. We have been meeting all our deadlines except those that arose immediately after the Fukushima disaster when I thought it was important to ask Dr Weightman to come up with a report that answered people’s concerns about making sure that the same thing could not happen here. With that one exception, we have been meeting our deadlines and we are on course for new nuclear without public subsidy.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

The Secretary of State has referred to the carbon floor price and the carbon reduction commitment simplification proposals, both of which give rise to concerns in Northern Ireland that they will have a perverse impact given our market and geographical realities. Those impacts would be counter to the very policy goals that he has enunciated. Is he receptive to those concerns and will he and his colleagues be responsive?

[Chris Huhne]

The hon. Gentleman raises some interesting issues. We are in constant touch with the Northern Ireland Executive and others on these matters and of course we are receptive to concerns and to amending anything that would have a perverse effect of the type he describes.

Electricity Market Reform

Debate between Mark Durkan and Chris Huhne

Tuesday 12th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Huhne]

That is one of the technologies that we are taking forward in the renewables road map, and I want to make progress on it. We have a considerable resource in that technology, which we want to develop further right the way around the United Kingdom’s sea frontier.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

Whatever other concerns the Secretary of State might try to refute in relation to the carbon floor price, he cannot dispute the fact that if levied in Northern Ireland, it would have a hugely distorting impact on the single electricity market—which is based in statute—north and south in Ireland, with its own regulatory framework, and remove the very certainty and clarity for investors, the need for which he has said his reforms are addressing. Does he recognise not only that the carbon floor price will harm consumers and industry in Ireland, but that distorting the single electricity market at this stage would damage the prospect of this island harnessing offshore energy from Ireland in the future?

[Chris Huhne]

The hon. Gentleman is right to say that the electricity market arrangements in Northern Ireland are quite distinct from those in England, Scotland and Wales. There is effectively a single market between Northern Ireland and the Republic, and we need to be aware of and respect that. I gather that discussions are ongoing at official level and elsewhere to ensure that there are no unintended consequences of the changes that we introduce.

Nuclear Industry Safety

Debate between Mark Durkan and Chris Huhne

Wednesday 18th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Huhne]

It is far too early to reach conclusions in relation to the Fukushima accident, but there have been estimates on the basis of past accidents. A comparison of the casualty rates of different generating technologies appeared recently in the New Scientist. We are acutely aware of the issue, but, sadly, casualties and deaths are associated with almost all energy sources.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

The Secretary of State may accept that some of us find the inspector's answers to the essential safety questions as predictable as those of Churchill the dog. As for the question of public subsidy, is he telling us that any additional infrastructural protections that arise as a result of the report will be funded not from the public purse but by the nuclear industry, and that the carbon floor price will not be adjusted in the light of those additional costs to provide additional subsidy?

[Chris Huhne]

The considerations that are taken into account in setting the carbon price support—and, indeed, all our other measures—are related to our need to mitigate carbon emissions and have nothing to do with the costs of any particular technology. In that sense, we are technology-neutral; we want the lowest possible cost response in making sure we have a low-carbon economy. Whether that points to alternative technologies to nuclear will be a decision for the market, not the Government.

Fourth Carbon Budget

Debate between Mark Durkan and Chris Huhne

Tuesday 17th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Huhne]

I certainly do. I think this presents an enormous opportunity for the future. There will be enormous numbers of jobs in energy saving and in the other low-carbon goods and services, and that will be the case right across the country. There will be no bias towards one region or another—no bias towards London and the south-east, for instance—because homes, and therefore the industrial opportunities, exist everywhere.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

The Secretary of State has explained why he is resiling from the Committee on Climate Change advice to forgo the carbon trading option, but is he proposing to sidestep any of its other recommendations? Also, do any of his concerns for ensuring the competitiveness of energy-intensive industries and for signalling certainty to investors extend to feeling regret about the adverse impact of the Chancellor’s raid on the CRC scheme?

[Chris Huhne]

We have not accepted a number of the other detailed recommendations in the committee’s report, but the trading one is an obvious example. It also asked us to set a target for 2030, and we do not see the need for that. I am not a great believer in intermediate targets when we have a very clear overall carbon budget, but given our commitment to a target figure of 1,950 million tonnes for the overall carbon budget for 2023 to 2027, nobody should be in any doubt about the thrust of our policy or our determination to meet our target. I have a very strong preference for achieving what we are actually trying to do, which is to cut carbon emissions, rather than for setting a whole group of intermediate targets, but that we will do.