20:07 Claire Coutinho (Conservative)

With permission, I would like to make a statement on the Prime Minister’s announcement on net zero.

Britain has led the world on tackling climate change. We have cut our carbon emissions in half over the past 30 years. We have boosted our share of renewables from just 7% in 2010 to almost half today. We have delivered the second highest amount of recorded low-carbon investment cumulatively across Europe over the past five years. Of all the major economies, we have set the toughest targets, and we have exceeded every carbon budget target so far.

As we look forward to becoming a net zero economy by 2050, we must ensure that our ambitions are practical and achievable—achievable by industry, which is investing billions to decarbonise; achievable technologically, as much of the green tech we will need to hit our 2050 target needs to be scaled up; and achievable for consumers, in particular for the millions of households that are currently struggling to make ends meet.

We will not reach net zero over the next three decades unless our plans for the future are pragmatic and viable. Only 7% of people in the UK currently think that net zero is going to be good for them and their family’s finances in the near term. In Europe, we are seeing people push back at clumsy policy that is negatively affecting our lives. It is clear that if we do not bring people with us, we risk sacrificing the whole climate change agenda. That is why the Prime Minister set out his plans last month for a fairer approach to ease the burdens on hard-working people and keep people feeling optimistic about net zero.

The Prime Minister’s approach includes giving people the flexibility to choose a new petrol or diesel car until 2035; removing the requirement that would have seen property owners forced to spend up to £10,000 or more on energy upgrades; easing the transition to clean heating; and raising grants under the boiler upgrade scheme by 50%, to £7,500—that scheme is now one of the most generous of its kind in Europe. The changes will allow us to meet our international net zero targets while avoiding disproportionate costs at a time when global inflation pressures are challenging the finances of many households.

We are responsible for less than 1% of annual greenhouse gas emissions. While our emissions are down 48%, America’s remain unchanged and China’s are up by 300%. It cannot be right that our citizens face punitive costs here when emissions are rising abroad. As the Prime Minister said, the fear is that if we continue to impose extra costs on people, we risk losing their consent for net zero. I want people to feel optimistic about net zero and connect that with jobs, investment and a sense of pride in playing our part in a global challenge. By taking a more measured approach, we will achieve our ambitious targets with the public’s consent.

The most important announcement made during my tenure has been about the grid. We must make sure that the grid infrastructure is in place to bring new clean, secure and low-cost power to homes and businesses. Four times as much new transmission network will be needed in the next seven years as was built since 1990, so we are bringing forward comprehensive new reforms to help green energy expand faster. We will speed up planning for the most nationally significant projects and accelerate grid connections so that those who are ready can connect first.

Later this autumn we will set out our response to the work of electricity networks commissioner Nick Winser, demonstrating how we are going further and faster on grid, informed by his recommendations on reducing the time taken to develop this critical infrastructure for lower bills, energy security, decarbonisation and economic growth. We will also set out our plans to reform the connections process so that new electricity generators and electricity users can be connected faster, bringing more low-cost, low-carbon energy into the system and connecting up new economic investment quicker. We will set out the UK’s first ever spatial plan for energy infrastructure, to give industry certainty and every community a say.

We have so much to be proud of in what we have achieved so far, particularly the international leadership that we have shown in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The Climate Change Committee has assessed that there is no material difference in our progress to cut emissions by 2030 since its last report in June, yet the changes we have made will make a real difference to the finances of many households up and down the country. The Prime Minister’s intervention means that we are now on a more secure path, because it can command public support, taking the people of Britain with us and delivering net zero in a practical, proportionate and pragmatic way. I commend this statement to the House.

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20:13 Ed Miliband (Labour)

The definitive analysis of the recent announcements came last Thursday from the Government’s own watchdog, the Climate Change Committee. It said this:

“The cancellation of some Net Zero measures is likely to increase both energy bills and motoring costs for households”.

When the Secretary of State dumps other targets, I have to ask: who set these targets and then failed to take the action to meet them? The Government did. Laughably, they say that this is about long-term decisions. The biggest long-term cost that the British people face is failure to act at the scale required to tackle the climate crisis. The Secretary of State says again that the Government are on track to meet their 2030 target, but their own watchdog said in June that they were “significantly off track”. It says—this is from last Thursday—that the Government have not offered evidence to back their assurance

Finally, let me say to the Secretary of State that the consensus on net zero has been hard-won over two decades. We have a duty to debate it on the basis of facts, not falsehoods. I have to say to her that it is deeply regrettable that she used her first major public appearance—two weeks ago at her conference—literally to make up complete nonsense about meat taxes, which I notice she did not defend today, and for which frankly she was exposed on national television. I say to her that it demeans her, it demeans her office and it demeans public debate. The Government said that they were going to move on from the premiership of Boris Johnson, but people will be deeply disturbed to find that that appears to mean dumping commitments to net zero and keeping his peculiar relationship to the truth.

On the question of dietary changes, the right hon. Gentleman might like to speak to his shadow climate change Minister and shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, who both have pushed to treat meat like tobacco in the past. The substantial point that I would make is that we need to be practical about our net zero policy and to make sure that we are having honest debates. We on the Conservative Benches stand by our record. We are proud to be the party that has decarbonised faster than any G7 country, and it is regrettable that the Opposition cannot acknowledge that achievement. We are proud that we have secured almost £200 billion of investment in low-carbon energy projects since 2010 and that we have helped to secure this country’s energy independence by backing North sea oil and gas, protecting 200,000 jobs.

Can the right hon. Gentleman be proud of his record? He said that we should sacrifice our growth to cut emissions and that we should borrow £28 billion in his blind ambition for 2030. He supported coal, before he changed his mind and is now against it. He also said that growing our renewables sector to 40% was pie in the sky, but in the first quarter of 2023, 48% of our power came from renewable energy. He spent years at Gordon Brown’s side and as Energy Secretary but did nothing to boost British nuclear in his time in government, whereas we are forging a new path, with every operational nuclear power station in this country having started life under a Conservative Government. Members do not need to take my word for it that our energy security is safer with us, because just this weekend the owners of Grangemouth made it clear that the threat Labour’s plans pose to the future of the refinery, potentially putting thousands of jobs at risk, would be a danger for energy security. Furthermore, we cannot allow oil and gas workers to become the coalminers of our generation. It has been said that Labour

Furthermore, the right hon. Gentleman talks about uncertainty. If he would like to give the business and industry certainty, he and the shadow Chancellor need to sit down and agree how much money they will actually spend—is it £28 billion or £8 billion? Is it no new money, or is it what we heard over the weekend, which is as much as £100 billion of new borrowing for GB Energy? Conservatives will prioritise energy security. We are set on delivering the most ambitious net zero targets of any major economy, and we will do this all without forcing families to choose between protecting their family finances and protecting the planet.

I warmly welcome what my right hon. Friend has just said about the focus on the grid and accelerating grid access. I hope she will be able to pick up on the report that my Committee is undertaking on that subject and that we can contribute to her deliberations. As she will be aware, I wrote to the Prime Minister on behalf of the Committee in the week following his speech, offering him an opportunity to put some flesh on the bones of what his more pragmatic approach to achieving net zero ambitions actually means. Will she confirm when my Committee can expect to receive a reply to that letter? Will it include an analysis of the impact of the trajectory of delivering net zero on the five-yearly carbon budgets and, in particular, how the announcement we have just had confirmed by the Transport Secretary, who is sitting next to her, on maintaining the zero-emission vehicle mandate will impact on that trajectory?

I thank my right hon. Friend and commend his long-standing work on environmentalism; I have been privileged to work with him on this before. I will be responding to him and I look forward to coming to speak to his Committee in due course. We set out unprecedented levels of detail in the analysis of how we are going to meet the targets earlier this year. I also accept the Climate Change Committee’s analysis, which is that the changes we have made are not materially different in terms of achieving our targets—we are absolutely committed to making sure that we do so. As he rightly points out, the biggest announcement we have made on achieving those targets is the one relating to the grid, which will allow for much greater and quicker electrification of society when it comes to the impacts of other proposals.

What does the Prime Minister do when faced with difficulty? He scraps the energy efficiency taskforce after just six months—it is utterly embarrassing. If this Government were so worried about the affordability of climate measures, why were they offering less support than the Scottish Government for heat pump installation, and why do they keep cancelling successive home insulation schemes? Of course, all this follows the Tories permitting a new coal mine, along with the Cambo and Rosebank oilfields. Is the Secretary of State at all surprised that two thirds of UK voters say that the Tories cannot be trusted on climate change?

Scotland’s ambitions in this area are far greater and faster. Scotland’s Net Zero Secretary, Màiri McAllan, said that the Scottish Government had been

The Prime Minister’s reckless decision, combined with the United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020, makes it extremely difficult for Scotland to hit our targets. Last week, Scotland transferred—it would be an export, post-independence—more than 400 GWh of renewable electricity to England. Many other wind power schemes are in development, including the world’s biggest at Berwick Bank, which will ensure that Scotland is one of the world’s biggest exporters of clean green energy. We also have two hydro schemes ready to go, if the Government were to put the contractual agreements in place.

Scots often ask about the costs and benefits of this unequal Union of ours. Many will now wonder if watering down our climate ambitions or the obligations we committed to at COP26 is too high a price to pay.

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his questions. Let me be clear: there has been no watering down of our targets. We have the most ambitious decarbonising targets of any major economy, and we have not changed those at all. We are resolutely committed to them. By 2030, we will have cut emissions by 68%; the US is planning to cut its emissions by 40% and the EU its emissions by 55%. The people of Scotland will be very proud that we are the most ambitious major economy in the world, and we will work towards that together.

We have worked with the devolved Administrations since the announcement, and I am due to speak to my counterpart in due course—I have been in correspondence with him. One of the biggest things that we will do that will be helpful for the Scottish people particularly, and that will bring benefits to the renewable energy sector, is to improve the grid. Having spoken to more than 100 investors, I know it is their biggest ask, and it will be very positive, not just for Scotland but for the whole of the UK.

I thank my right hon. Friend and he makes an excellent and correct point. While making sure that we grow our intermittent energy sources such as solar and wind, we must also have a stable baseload underneath that. He is right that hydrogen will play an interesting role, and I am speaking to the sector about how we can move forward. It is an exciting policy area and I will explore it in many ways. We also have a trial on heating homes. I pick him up on one point: we will be using gas for a long time. Even the independent Climate Change Committee acknowledges that we will still be using gas in 2050.

When the new Select Committee on Energy Security and Net Zero first met, the first thing we did was to have huge roundtable days with over 50 different stakeholders from the sector. Time and again, those stakeholders talked about the tardiness of getting planning approval and access to the grid, so I absolutely welcome action that will deliver cleaner, cheaper and more secure energy. I also get the point about needing carrots, not sticks, for electric vehicles. In my constituency, those with driveways pay only 5% tax on their electricity, but those who do not have a driveway have to pay 20% tax. That is true all across the country, so will the Secretary of State join me in pushing the Chancellor for those carrots to be fair carrots?

For example, we have heard from the Climate Change Committee that the changes when it comes to landlords and efficiency standards in homes will cost renters an extra £300 a year. The Office for Budget Responsibility is clear that, as a result of the changes that are going to be made, our dependence on gas will cost us more. If the Government really cared about hard-working families, they would not be handing Equinor £3 billion to develop the climate-wrecking Rosebank oilfield; they would be admitting that what the Secretary of State is doing is ripping up the climate consensus for short-term electoral calculation and populist right-wing propaganda.

Turning to Equinor, far from us paying that company money, that is something that will pay tax into the Exchequer, unlocking green investment and allowing people in the wider sector to continue in 200,000 jobs across the economy. Those are jobs, people and communities that we will need in the transition to renewable energy, because they are the same people with the same skills that will be used. It would be right for the hon. Lady to talk to the people of those communities about this issue.

“In Vauxhall these climate policies would help local parents like us to pay our energy bills this winter and keep our children safe and warm. Without these policies children in London face a bleak future as the climate crisis does irreparable damage to the world around them.”

The Secretary of State has suggested that many people have not bought into the concept of net zero. Instead of seeing that as an opportunity for leadership, the Government play into misinformation about made-up taxes and the seven deadly bins. She will be aware that Northern Ireland is already a laggard on climate issues because the Assembly was collapsed just after it had finally passed binding targets, and before it had taken any meaningful action on issues such as retrofitting, planning for renewables and transforming agrifood. Is she also aware that Northern Ireland relies largely on the all-island single energy market for our energy needs, and is she confident that her Government are keeping up with their responsibility to ensure that we match the standards of that market?

We care about climate change, which is why we have the most ambitious targets of any major economy. That is what we have delivered on to date, and that is what we will be delivering on when we get to 2030 as well. As for the single electricity market, I am familiar with that, and we talk to our Northern Ireland counterparts regularly to make sure that it is working in a way that benefits the Northern Irish people.

The Secretary of State is right: we must take people with us on this journey to net zero. When it comes to incentivising people in the take-up of electric vehicles, what more can the Government do to broaden—or turbocharge—the provision of public EV charging points by companies and councils?

It was clear from talking to industrialists about net zero and carbon capture last week that they were exasperated with the Government’s start-stop approach to business, the snail’s pace of decisions and, of course, the lack of clarity. The Chemical Industries Association has reported declining production and said that domestic demand remains low. It needs CCUS, its fellow industrialists need CCUS and net zero needs CCUS. When will we get some final decisions, or are those initiatives also under threat?

Further to the question from my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (John Redwood), synthetic fuels—by that, I mean genuinely synthetic fuels made from green hydrogen and atmospheric carbon capture, rather than biofuels or fuels from waste—are net zero, because the amount of carbon at the tailpipe is the same volume recaptured to make the next lot of fuel, yet the myopic zero-emission vehicle mandate prevents the UK from benefiting from synthetic fuels for our road vehicles. Will my right hon. Friend show the same welcome pragmatism she has shown to the rest of the agenda and revisit the zero-emission vehicle mandate?

We have set out our position on the zero-emission mandate. However, we are also looking at synthetic fuels. As I said, we are consulting on them for aviation, and we can look at them more broadly. However, we have set out the position on the ZEV mandate, which has been widely welcomed.

Given that the rowing back on the commitments towards net zero came on the first day of the parliamentary recess, it looked an awful lot like there was an attempt to avoid democratic scrutiny. The Secretary of State has said that she wants to take people with her. May I put to her a group of people she could take with her by reversing some of these daft decisions: private renters. When I meet families who are renting from private landlords, particularly in the Marsh area of Lancaster, I hear that their energy bills are far higher because of their doors and windows and how their roofs are leaky and not insulated. That rowing back on the standard in the private rented sector is costing families more. Will she please look again at that?

What role does she see for the concept of 20-minute neighbourhoods in helping the United Kingdom to meet its net zero targets?

The point of our proposals is to make sure that people have choice, that we can bring people with us and that people can live their lives in the way they want to. We can enable them through decarbonising the power grid and giving them alternative options, so we can make sure that we can get to our net zero targets in a way that is practical and achievable for families.

At the Democratic Unionist party conference on Saturday past, the Ulster Farmers Union, of which I declare I am a member, had a leaflet on achieving net zero. Can the Secretary of State outline how we will meet our international obligations in terms of net zero with this rollback and how firms and farmers that have already invested in green policies and procedures will be able to compete with those who can go full steam ahead with older practices and no incentives whatsoever to change?

We are not rolling back from our targets at all; I agree with the Climate Change Committee’s assessment that there is no material difference between the projections in June and the recent assessments it made post the announcements. I welcome a lot of the work that many of our farmers are doing to pursue environmental goals. I have talked to many in my constituency who are doing quite phenomenal things at a local level. They will be supported by our agriculture policy, the landmark Agriculture Act 2020 and the Environment Act 2021 that we have brought forward in recent years.

I welcome the Government’s belated recognition that net zero policies are costing individuals in their pockets, costing jobs and of course producing huge profits for the eco industry. But is the Secretary of State not concerned that, by maintaining the legal target for 2050, she hands a weapon to those who want to use the judicial review mechanism either to delay or to stop important decisions on airport expansion, new roads and oil and gas licences—delaying even some of the policies that she says today she wants to delay to save people money?

The Secretary of State is explaining that she is only slowing the Government’s headlong dash to net zero because of waning public support. When did the Secretary of State think that she was ever going to maintain public support for policies that will make our constituents poorer, colder and less free, while at the same time allowing communist China to increase its emissions by more than our total emissions in every year of this decade?

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