Mel Stride
Main Page: Mel Stride (Conservative - Central Devon)
Mel Stride (Central Devon) (Con)
Does the hon. Gentleman not accept that there are already many positive signals for investors in the marketplace? There is the 2050 target, there is the levy control framework that enables billions of pounds to be contributed by central Government, and there is the Government amendment to the Bill, to which the hon. Gentleman has referred and which allows the Secretary of State to take those measures in 2016.
Is the hon. Gentleman not as concerned as I am—and, indeed, as Professor Dieter Helm was when he gave evidence to the Public Bill Committee—about the possibility that including additional targets that impose restrictions on the marketplace will simply lead to higher costs for both British business and consumers?
Barry Gardiner
I agree that it is important to address the question of what the costs to British industry and British consumers will be. As the hon. Gentleman will accept, the independent Committee on Climate Change has already addressed that question, and, indeed, its remarks and recommendations were based precisely on its assessment of the likely costs and benefits and the signals that currently exist in the market; but he has made a fair point. We certainly need to ask what signals exist, and what effect either costs or benefits are likely to have on our national well-being.
It is heartening to know that the Government want to hear what the Committee on Climate Change wants to say in three years’ time. Perhaps they will now extend that courtesy further by not just hearing but listening to what the committee is saying today.
The other argument that the Government Whips have deployed against the amendments is that sector-specific targets without road maps are meaningless. That is, to a degree, relevant to the point made by the hon. Member for Central Devon (Mel Stride). This is not only about the targets; it is also about the road maps relating to the implementation of those targets, and that, of course, is precisely why we have a levy control framework. It is also why the EMR report of the Committee on Climate Change calls on the Government to extend to 2030 funding allocated to support the development of less mature technologies under the framework, to present
“options to support mobilisation of new sources of finance, including roles for the Green Investment Bank and Infrastructure UK”,
and to publish in the EMR delivery plan
“the amount of capacity that the Government intends to contract”
over the next period.
The final argument that we have heard from Ministers is that they do not wish to sacrifice jobs and growth for the sake of the environment. That is the most fallacious argument of all. It was dealt with very well in some of the pre-Committee hearings. Andrew Buglass from the Royal Bank of Scotland told the Energy Bill Committee that there is a cliff edge and that cliff edge is making it very difficult for supply chain investors to invest in the UK. Overcoming the insecurity created by the 2020 cliff edge does not require more public money or even the promise of more money. It requires coherence in the form of a 2030 target that proves to industry that the demand for low-carbon energy will continue to rise beyond 2020.
The shadow Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Tom Greatrex), has previously quoted comments made by Mr Buglass in an Energy Bill Committee sitting, observing that Mr Buglass stated that a 2030 target
“is absolutely critical from the conversations I have with potential supply-chain investors because they quite rightly point out that it is very difficult for them to take investment to their board if they really only have visibility on three or four years-worth of work.”––[Official Report, Energy Public Bill Committee, 15 January 2013; c. 51, Q154.]
We must put that target in place if we are to incentivise potential investors and achieve the investment in low-carbon industry that we need.