Great British Energy Bill

Siân Berry Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 29th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Siân Berry (Brighton Pavilion) (Green)]

I am pleased to speak in this debate, and the Green group of MPs is pleased to back this Bill. I will be speaking in support of new clauses 2 and 3, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Waveney Valley (Adrian Ramsay), which are designed to make the Bill even stronger. The new clauses would create a new nature recovery duty for Great British Energy and prevent investments that increase climate emissions.

I thank the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Pippa Heylings) for her statement of support for my hon. Friend’s work and for making the Bill better for nature recovery. I also thank her for her proposals on insulation and community energy, which we support. All those things are vital for the Bill’s success.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

If nature recovery is to be important in the Government’s present drive, does the hon. Member accept that renewable energy has been destructive of nature? Some 17 million trees have been cut down in Scotland to facilitate windmills. Now, there are studies indicating that offshore wind is leading to dead porpoises, dead dolphins and dead whales being washed up on beaches because of the effects of drilling.

[Siân Berry]

I do not agree with all the assertions that the right hon. Member makes, but the duty is intended precisely to ensure that every single project would have a positive impact on nature. Under new clause 3, they would all be renewable projects.

The nature recovery duty under new clause 2 would help GB Energy invest only in projects that deliver significant biodiversity benefits and meet targets under the Environment Act 2021, by building nature-friendly design features into renewable energy projects and creating and restoring habitats on development sites in and around clean energy infrastructure.

The Bill Committee heard from Shaun Spiers of Green Alliance, who made a strong case for a nature recovery duty being created for GB Energy. The ensuing discussion saw the Crown Estate used as an example for how a public body could deliver for nature without having a statutory duty to do so. However, the Crown Estate is a highly relevant case study that demonstrates why non-statutory duties are not enough. The Crown Estate’s lack of a statutory duty to consider nature in its own decision making has led to its involvement in a number of environmentally damaging schemes.

For example, let us consider mining proposals in the Sperrin mountains area of outstanding natural beauty in Northern Ireland. The Crown Estate entered into an initial mineral extraction agreement with a mining company there in 2016, leading to proposals for goldmining. That has provoked significant environmental concern about harmful chemicals and waste from mining operations polluting nearby rivers and degrading the surrounding AONB. An application was submitted in 2017 and is now subject to a public inquiry, following nearly 40,000 objections from local people. So an abundance of warm words about protecting and conserving the environment, and about the Crown Estate’s status as a public body, did not inhibit it from playing a role in a project that threatens nature.

[Sammy Wilson]

The hon. Lady mentioned Northern Ireland and particularly the Sperrin mountains, which is an area of great natural beauty. It has many features, including wildlife and wild uplands, but it has been industrialised. I took a motorbike journey around the area three weeks ago, and there are hundreds of huge wind turbines. The peat has been dug up, the landscape has been destroyed and thousands of birds are killed every year. What has happened in the Sperrin mountains is hardly a good example of renewable energy being nature-friendly.

[Siân Berry]

I am sure we can have those debates in the context of a statutory duty. These are important questions to consider.

I want to give some other examples of public bodies damaging nature, because they abound—from the granting of new oil and gas licences in marine protected areas by the North Sea Transition Authority, to Highways England pursuing damaging road construction projects on the edges of national parks. Without legal backing, nature considerations can be and are brushed aside.

There is no reason to think that Great British Energy, without a duty to consider nature recovery, will be any different. A statutory duty to deliver for nature’s recovery would be complementary to GB Energy’s other objectives around clean energy, energy efficiency and energy security. It would also reflect the Government’s manifesto commitment to tackle the interconnected nature and climate crises together. I hope the Government will carefully consider those arguments.

New clause 3, which was also tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Waveney Valley, is vital to guarantee that our energy investments are not only financially responsible but aligned with the legal requirement to reach net zero by 2050. As legislators, we have a duty to hold GB Energy accountable, preventing investments that will lock us into high-carbon energy pathways and undermine our net zero commitments. The new clause mandates environmental impact assessments before any investments are made, ensuring that each decision is grounded in evidence. It forces us to ask, “Will this investment push us at speed towards, or risk pulling us away from, our climate goals?” Publishing those assessments opens the process to public scrutiny—an essential principle in democracy. The public deserve to know exactly how their tax money is being used, particularly when it comes to funding projects that may exacerbate the climate crisis.

The new clause would also bar public money from being spent on fossil fuel and unsustainable high-carbon projects such as biomass. We cannot ignore the facts: Drax, the largest biomass-burning plant in the UK, emitted over 11 million tonnes of CO₂ in 2023. Worse still, it receives nearly £900 million in Government subsidies a year. If we allow investments in projects such as Drax or new fossil fuel infrastructure, we risk undermining the very goals we are trying to achieve. The new clause would close the door on such contradictions.

When we talk about greenhouse gas emissions, it is crucial to acknowledge that carbon dioxide is not the only danger. Methane is a greenhouse gas with over 80 times the warming potential of CO₂ over a 20-year period. Methane emissions, often associated with fossil fuel extraction and agriculture, must be tightly controlled to ensure that the UK meets its climate commitments. The new clause would ensure that all climate emissions, including methane, are thoroughly assessed before any public investment is made. If we do not account for methane and other greenhouse gases, we risk underestimating the climate impact of certain energy projects, and particularly those related to natural gas production and transport.

Fossil fuel infrastructure does not just burn carbon; it locks us into long-term dependence on dirty energy. Every pound spent on high-carbon infrastructure makes it harder and more expensive to transition away from fossil fuels in the time that we have. This amendment ensures that we avoid that trap, by making it impossible for Great British Energy to invest in projects that would limit our ability to end our reliance on carbon-emitting technologies.

Great British Energy should also be a true trailblazer in the global transition to clean energy. The amendment strengthens that mission by making clear that only projects contributing to emissions reductions should receive investment. With countries around the world watching, we have a unique opportunity to lead by example. A failure to act boldly now will leave us behind in the global race for climate leadership.

We are in a climate and nature emergency, and we cannot afford to repeat the mistakes of the past by further locking ourselves into harmful high-carbon infrastructure. These amendments reflect that. The stakes could not be higher. These decisions are about securing a liveable planet for future generations. I hope the Government will listen.

[Graeme Downie (Dunfermline and Dollar) (Lab)]

Let me begin by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Adam Thompson) on his maiden speech. I am delighted that he gave us a lesson on how to say his constituency name. How can I say “Erewash” to further confuse Hansard? I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Natalie Fleet), who is no longer in her place, but I think everyone in this House felt the passion in her speech. I look forward to hearing more from her on a number of issues.

I will focus my remarks on how to ensure that GB Energy delivers effectively for Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom. To do that, it must generate investment that delivers tangible results and brings jobs and economic growth, along with the energy security that we all want. In Committee, witnesses said that one of the challenges for GB Energy will be finding a balance between accelerating renewable energy delivery and ensuring a return on investment, while supporting less mature technologies. I agree that it will be a difficult balance to strike, but we are more likely to succeed in our investments if they are encouraged in areas where there is likely to be a warm welcome and strong understanding of electricity generation, and where the foundational skills and engineering heritage already exist. They include former coalfields across Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom, including in west Fife in my constituency.

Although the mines closed decades ago, the heritage of electricity generation lived on in the Longannet power station near Kincardine, on the banks of the River Forth. Constructed in the 1960s, Longannet was once Europe’s biggest coal-fired power station and one of the largest carbon emitters on the continent, before shutting down in 2016. Having represented that community as a councillor, I know that people across west Fife accept that coal had to go and things had to move on, but they want something to replace it. Like so much of our past energy infrastructure, and like in so many industries, Longannet was closed down with little or no consideration for what might replace it or how the thousands of jobs lost could be replaced and the skills maintained, particularly in the rural villages of west Fife, where losing even a few families or employees can put their whole sustainability at risk.

I believe that GB Energy and the investment opportunities that it presents is a chance to change that. The site is currently being safely demolished by ScottishPower, but there are still no clear plans for the future of the site. Longannet is perfectly situated to play its part once again in helping to provide electricity for our country and leverage some of the £60 billion possible investment that could be available via GB Energy. The site is designated for major employment, and due to its location right on the coast it is likely to be suitable for major industrial use only. It has the potential to bring jobs and investment to the coalfield villages of west Fife and the whole of central Scotland, securing opportunities for those communities to fulfil the aspirations of the people living there.

Despite being listed as a strategic priority site by the Scottish Government, they have had no plans for it, and from what is available in the public domain, it seems they have not prioritised any action at all in recent years. Promises made of train manufacturing being brought to the site came to nothing, and the decision by that company to withdraw from an agreement came to light only because of a freedom of information request I made back in 2022. Nothing was discussed publicly at all. Indeed, some people in that community still talk about when the train manufacturer is coming. Similarly, both Fife council and Scottish Enterprise have struggled to engage with ScottishPower about the future of the site, although I have a meeting with ScottishPower this week, and I hope to gain more clarity after that. Will the Minister, in winding up, agree to meet me and other stakeholders to ensure that sites such as Longannet, once a symbol of Scottish and UK electricity generation and the skills that come with it, are priorities for GB Energy? How will it work with the industry to create the right plans to bring investment to the area?

We know the wreckage that the Conservative party made of UK and Scottish industry over the past decades: change without a plan. GB Energy offers an opportunity not only to have a plan for our low-carbon secure energy future, but to fix yet another part of the mess left for us by the deliberate actions of the Conservatives and the incompetence of the SNP in Scotland. The Bill is a huge opportunity for Scotland. We must ensure that it is passed today, so it can get on with its work as quickly as possible.