Richard Burgon MP: Climate-Related Speeches In Parliament
Richard Burgon is the Labour MP for Leeds East.
We have identified 19 Parliamentary Votes Related to Climate since 2015 in which Richard Burgon could have voted.
Richard Burgon is rated for votes supporting action on climate. (Rating Methodology)
- In favour of action on climate: 16
- Against: 0
- Did not vote: 3
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Richard Burgon's Speeches In Parliament Related to Climate
We've found 9 Parliamentary debates in which Richard Burgon has spoken about climate-related matters.
Here are the relevant sections of their speeches.
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12 Nov 2024: Oral Answers to Questions
The devastating scenes of flooding in Spain remind us all of why urgent investment is needed to deal with the deadly consequences of climate change. Does the Minister agree that that investment should be paid for by the polluting companies that have caused the climate crisis?
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18 Apr 2023: Oral Answers to Questions
7. What assessment he has made of the implications for his policies of the sixth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, published on 20 March 2023. ( 904476 )
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New analysis shows that, if the Government allow the Rosebank oilfield off the Shetland Islands to go ahead, it will blow the UK’s climate targets. Rosebank’s developers will get billions in tax breaks due to the deliberate loopholes that the Government have put in their windfall tax, but it will do nothing to lower people’s bills. The United Nations Secretary-General, the International Energy Agency and leading scientists are all saying there should be no new oil and gas, so is it not time for the Minister to rule out Rosebank?
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19 Dec 2022: Seafarers’ Wages Bill [Lords]
19:38
The Bill does not protect all seafarers, by the way, as has already been mentioned in discussion about workers in the offshore renewables sector. If we want, as we do, a future of well-paid, green and unionised jobs that help us to tackle climate change and solve the ongoing energy crisis, we need to ensure that those jobs are well paid, secure and unionised, not part of a race to the bottom. We need to ensure that offshore workers in the green sector have proper protection as well.
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31 Oct 2022: Public Ownership of Energy Companies
16:51
Even before the current energy crisis began, domestic energy bills steadily increased by 50% in real terms—inflation-adjusted—from 1996 to 2018. We see and people out there feel what privatisation means in practice. In practice, privatisation of our energy system means higher bills than needed. Research shows that prices are 20% to 30% lower in systems with public ownership. Privatisation means, in practice, wasting vital funds on lining the pockets of shareholders. Privatisation means, in practice, failing to invest enough in connecting renewable energy to the grid, with the needs of the current fossil fuel firms put first.
What is the way forward? This petition, signed by well over 100,000 people, shows the way forward: nationalise the big five energy supply retail companies, most of which are just owned by bigger companies anyway. I welcome the plan from the TUC setting out how a publicly owned energy retail system could deliver a social pricing structure that lets everyone afford the energy they need to cook, clean and stay warm all year round, while the wealthiest with extravagant energy use pay more per unit. The way forward is also to bring the privatised monopolies of the National Grid and regional distribution into public ownership to help us prepare for the energy transition that we need. The way forward must include introducing permanent—and high—windfall taxes on North sea oil and gas companies that use the revenues to cut people’s bills, invest in renewable energy and pay for further nationalisation policies that will benefit the country.
We must create a new state-owned renewable energy company to ensure that the errors of privatisation are not repeated. It is useful to reflect on the fact that nine out of 10 countries leading on green transition have a state-owned company leading the way on renewables. We cannot become fixated on continuing and defending privatisation because of ideological dogma and the hero worship of the Thatcher period. As someone once said, “What matters is what works.” Public ownership works; privatisation has failed. Let us have an energy system that puts people and planet before profit. If we do, that is a good way to set about helping to get people through this cost of living crisis and making way for a better, greener, fairer and more decent future.
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8 Sep 2022: UK Energy Costs
14:04
The profits of fossil fuel companies are being put before the people and before the planet. This approach is quite simply failing people who are today hit by higher bills, and I am afraid that it will also fail future generations hit by climate catastrophe.
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2 Nov 2021: Budget Resolutions
18:24
The second point I wish to make is that this Budget was a chance for the Government to put their money where their mouth is and fund a green transition to avoid climate catastrophe, which is the greatest example of free market failure. We needed a green new deal that created millions of decent, unionised, green jobs, transforming the basis of our economy while preparing us for the challenges of the future. Instead, the Government’s pledges fall tens of billions of pounds short of the levels of green investment we need to hit our carbon targets. So many people watching at home were shocked—they thought they had misheard—when in the Budget the Chancellor announced that he was slashing taxes on UK internal flights. People could not believe their ears. The Government are also sanctioning new oil and gas fields. We should be tackling the high-polluting lifestyles of the wealthy, which are fuelling the climate crisis. That is why I have called for a tax hike on the incomes of the richest 1%—those on more than £150,000 per year.
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21 Oct 2021: COP26: Limiting Global Temperature Rises
14:55
We are living in the most important moment of human history, when our actions will determine whether we prevent climate catastrophe. If we fail to rise to the challenge, billions of lives will be devastated, unimaginable numbers of lives will be lost and the existence of much of life on Earth will be put in real danger. When the IPCC warns of code red for humanity and NASA scientists warn of climate emergency, we must act like we are in an emergency—because we are.
But there is hope: we have the policies needed to prevent catastrophe, summed up in a green new deal. We have the alternative technology; currently, we do not have the political will. Climate catastrophe does not have to be our destiny: it is a matter of choice.
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4 Mar 2021: Income Tax (Charge)
15:21
The Government may counter that they are fixing the economy and that a higher tide will lift all boats. That is simply a lie. The Budget will see Britain continuing as a low-growth—just 1.7%—economy once the end-of-lockdown boost wears off. We have low growth, falling living standards and hollowed-out public services. For most people, I am afraid that it will feel very similar to the last decade, but it does not have to be. This should have been the Budget to invest massively in growth, in tackling inequality, in jobs, in tackling the climate crisis, in rebuilding our public services, in social housing and in moving us to a high-skill, high-wage economy.
Instead, public investment will remain pathetically low, and the main stimulus is a £25 billion corporate handout that may bring business investment forward but, as the Government’s figures show, will not increase overall investment levels. Those funds should instead have gone into a huge state investment programme also funded by record low borrowing costs and taxes on the super-rich, starting with a 50% rate on those on over £125,000. That could spur a shift to net-zero with a green new deal, build modern transport and infrastructure fit for the 21st century, lead to a mass house building programme, and renew our public services, all boosting growth, which is the best way to pay off the debt, but also creating decent jobs and helping to rebuild communities left behind for far, far too long.
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23 Apr 2019: Topical Questions
Climate change is now receiving the public attention that it merits. Greta Thunberg is in the House today, and my party pays tribute to her work. All too often, however, our justice system restricts the ability of citizens to take legal action against environmentally damaging decisions. Last month, the United Nations criticised the Government’s failure to meet their international obligations relating to access to justice in environmental matters.
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