Science and Technology Committee

Martin Whitfield Excerpts

Thursday 5th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Norman Lamb]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his kind comments. There is clearly an enormous opportunity to help decarbonise our electricity generation capacity in this country. It is clear from the evidence we received that there is great opportunity to increase offshore wind capacity around our shores.

[Martin Whitfield (East Lothian) (Lab)]

On a personal note, I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his chairmanship, guidance and education during my short time on the Science and Technology Committee. It has been a great pleasure to serve under his chairmanship.

The report is hugely important and young people have managed to get climate change back on the front pages. Is it not the case that there is no single magic bullet to perfect what we need, but that the Government and all those involved must look at all the answers holistically and address all our suggestions and recommendations so that we can honour our young people for putting climate change back where it belongs?

[Norman Lamb]

I thank my friend for his massive contribution—when he has not been dragged away by HS2. It has been a great pleasure to work with him. He is right: this requires action on all fronts. There is a particular need to focus on the heating of buildings and on transport. We have made very little progress on those matters, and urgent progress is essential. Unless we attack where we put carbon into the atmosphere on all fronts, we will fail to meet the targets, and fail future generations.