13:08 The Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Greg Clark)

Does my right hon. Friend welcome our ranking in the climate change performance index? The UK is fifth in that index, ahead of Finland, France and Germany.

Does my right hon. Friend agree that carbon capture, utilisation and storage has enormous potential? I had a meeting with the Carbon Capture and Storage Association this morning, in which it emphasised clearly that a development pathway in 2019 would have enormous benefits for our ability to deliver a net zero target by mid-century.

[Source]

13:31 Chi Onwurah (Labour)

In the same month that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the leading authority on climate change, set out the devastating consequences for human civilisation of a business-as-usual approach and the scale of ambition needed to avoid dangerous climate change, what did the Chancellor do? He did not even mention climate change, and the Red Book was little better. The Chancellor left the carbon price support unchanged and said that the Government would seek to reduce the rate if the total carbon price remains high—that is as clear as mud. The Chancellor tinkered at the edges of the climate change levy, a policy introduced by Labour but undermined by his predecessor, George Osborne, who removed exemptions for renewable energy. The Government did announce a £315 million industrial energy transformation fund to support businesses to increase their energy-efficiency. That sounds good, but when we realise that it will be paid for entirely by money saved from scrapping capital allowances for energy and water efficiency, which enabled businesses to claim back the costs of investments, we see that it is really just rearranging the furniture.

What else was there? As has been said, the Government announced £20 million for nuclear fusion. I do not know whether the Chancellor’s understanding of nuclear fusion is as limited as his understanding of blockchain, but these figures should illustrate the challenge here: £20 million is 330 times smaller than the €6.6 billion the EU will contribute to one nuclear fusion experimental facility in France—this is not even a drop in the nuclear ocean. Of renewable energy—wind, solar and tidal—not a single mention was made, at a time when electricity and gas wholesale prices are rising, and we enter another winter with household bills surging and millions facing fuel poverty. There was £10 million for urban tree planting and a commitment to purchase £50 million-worth of carbon credits from tree planting, although it is unclear whether that is new funding. The lack of action on climate mitigations is disappointing.

Labour is serious about achieving a net zero emissions economy before 2050. We are developing policies to dramatically decarbonise energy and insulate 4 million homes in our first term, as part of our green jobs revolution. We believe in the power of people, the power of leadership and the power of government to address what are frankly existential challenges. After eight years of austerity and counting, it is evident that the Tories have given up on this. This Budget shows the Tories giving up on the planet, too. They lack both ideas and the courage to do what is needed. They must step aside.

[Source]

14:07 Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)

The Office for Budget Responsibility is stating that the outlook for oil and gas is showing a rise from £1.2 billion to £2.2 billion per year on average. Production statistics are up on 2014-15 levels by more than 23% and oil and gas sales values are up by nearly 20%. New fields such as Capercaillie, Achmelvich and Nexen’s phase two in the Buzzard Field underline the remaining potential. A study at Aberdeen University suggests an extra 4 billion barrels of oil from offshore, on top of 2017 estimates, yet the sector is still ignored. [Interruption.] Some Conservative Members are chuntering that the Greens will not like that. Let me tell them that, unlike the Chancellor’s passing mention or the green UK statement that came out, I intend to mention climate change in my speech. That neatly leads me on to say that the Government, having ignored the oil and gas sector, a sector vital for the coming decades— [Interruption.] I am going to make some progress. The sector is vital in the coming decades while we transfer to low and zero carbon. It is an utter disgrace. A sector deal must be brought forward now. It should include national hubs for underwater innovation, transformational technology and decommissioning.

Where was the UK Government’s manifesto pledge that committed them to working collaboratively with the Scottish Government for an ultra-deep water port for decommissioning? Oil and gas has always been a poorly discharged duty by successive Westminster Governments, complete with ministerial pinball and 20 energy Ministers in 20 years. This Government, however, are also falling asleep over their duties to climate change—

We need, and will need, oil and gas for our future heat while we transition to low and zero-carbon fuels, but meeting the Paris climate change targets means real investment in the technology to manage that switch. Anyone with an ounce of sense knows that carbon capture and storage is a vital component to achieve targets that are so important to us all.

Now the UK Government are back talking up carbon capture and storage, three years later. However, they say that they can catch up with only 10% of the original budget—which, incidentally, is the same amount that they squandered on the preparation work for Peterhead. You could not make this up. It is nothing more than lip service. With a will, however, the Government could sort this. There are still opportunities, including at Grangemouth, but the longer the wait, the more difficult and expensive it becomes, especially to man-made climate change. The Government must now fess up, about turn and push the pedal to the floor, properly fund the technology and at long last live up to the Paris commitments.

[Source]

15:30 Mr Adrian Bailey (West Bromwich West) (Lab/Co-op)

Part of the problem is due to the chilling effect of Brexit, and I recognise that there is a limit to what the Chancellor can do about that, but the fact remains that consumer choice of new cars is heavily influenced by company car taxes and vehicle excise duty, and the current regime is both damaging to the industry and bad for the environment. The current messaging around diesel fails to recognise that new diesel engines have no more NOx emissions than petrol-driven cars and produce 20% less carbon dioxide. Perversely, the current move to petrol-driven cars is actually increasing carbon dioxide emissions.

[Source]

15:41 Albert Owen (Ynys Môn) (Lab)

There was a missed opportunity on low carbon and climate change. A decade after we in the House of Commons introduced the Climate Change Act, which I was very pleased to vote for, the Government had an opportunity to move forward. They have invested in some low carbon measures through the growth strategies, and I welcome the nuclear sector deal, but one area where investment is greatly lacking is marine and tidal technology. The Government are missing a trick there, because many companies now want to invest in this country, and are doing so in research and development, but the money simply is not there for them to go from prototypes to actual commercial delivery. The Government need to look at that, because many of these companies are international and they will go elsewhere and manufacture the prototypes in other countries, and Britain will lose out.

[Source]

16:30 Anna Turley (Labour)

I am deeply worried by how little we saw in the Budget for Teesside. We have the potential on the site not just to turn things around for the people of Redcar and Teesside but to show the way on the sort of economy we could have in this country: a leading hub for green industries, creating jobs and helping us meet our climate change targets, carbon capture and storage, hydrogen economy, recycling and energy generation. We have a great future in Teesside—the brains, the hearts and the hands. We can make it happen.

[Source]

17:20 Sandy Martin (Ipswich) (Lab)

What my constituents will notice is the effect of all the things the Chancellor is not doing. Significantly, he is not deploying the significant capital investment in our economic capabilities that Labour promised in our 2017 manifesto and that we have reiterated at every opportunity since then. Conservative Members consider themselves to be the party of business and constantly call for tax cuts rather than spending increases. But in an economy that suffers from low productivity and a lack of demand, the sensible approach is to massively increase the Government’s capital expenditure. Where is the national transformation fund that Labour promised? Instead, we get a pathetic additional £200 million for the British Business Bank—that is about £2.50 per person. Where is the green investment bank? Where is the financial support for greening the economy through investment in renewable electricity generation, through zero emissions vehicles and through insulation grants?

[Source]

18:04 James Frith (Labour)

I draw hon. Members’ attention to my declaration in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. The Government’s party conference this summer boasted of opportunity, but this week’s Budget smacks of a wasted opportunity. It is a wasted opportunity to present an economy that embraces the challenges and sees them as opportunities for all, and it fails to address the urgent threat of climate change or the chance to reskill for automation. It is a vision lacking in imagination on how to renew our towns beyond rate reductions. There is a much-needed and overdue injection of cash for our NHS, but the King’s Fund and the Health Foundation say that it is still not enough. The party that says “F— business” on Brexit still gives us FA for FE, with colleges not even mentioned. There is no intervention to move from low-skilled to high-skilled work and no plan for the rise of the robots and the promise of AI and automation. Wages and growth are not moving and public services continue to be ignored. Austerity continues—it does not end—and the Government have no vision for what is next.

Just three weeks after the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s landmark report highlighting the grave threat of climate change, there was not a single reference to climate change in the Chancellor’s speech. There is nothing on investing in new national industries or renewable energy and the creation of new jobs, and there is nothing to tackle air pollution and the chaos facing commuters in Bury or on plans to switch polluting buses to new, clean-energy vehicles.

[Source]

18:09 Darren Jones (Labour)

My reaction to the Budget is less positive, because it was a Budget of bad jokes and little else. It failed to recognise the biggest issues facing the economy—economic growth, Brexit, austerity and climate change—and then failed to set out what we were doing about them. On economic growth, it is a plain and simple fact that we have gone from being one of the fastest-growing major economies in the world to one of the slowest. We rely on economic growth to fund our public services, and many workers in Bristol are already taxed enough, at a time of stagnant or painfully growing salaries and a rising cost of living.

[Source]