11:15 Angela Eagle (Labour)

[The details are as follows: Managing Flood Risk, Third report from the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, HC 330, and the Government response, HC 706; The Levy Control Framework: Parliamentary oversight of the Government levies on energy bills, Eighth Report from the Energy and Climate Change Committee, HC 872.]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend and I know that she has raised this matter with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. I cannot promise a statement, but I will of course look with our colleagues at whether, in the light of these events, there is something we can do, in addition to the debate I announced, to enable us at an appropriate time to look at all the issues relating to resilience and climate change adaptation and mitigation.

Lord Lawson said on the radio this morning that there was no evidence to link climate change to floods. The Energy and Climate Change Secretary is due to give a speech saying that Conservatives who deny that human activity causes climate change are ignorant, and contribute to extreme weather events such as the recent flooding. Now the Energy Minister, the right hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Michael Fallon), has said:

“Unthinking climate change worship has damaged British industry and put up consumer bills.”

May we have a debate on climate change so that the coalition parties can have this out with each other once and for all?

The Government’s position is very clear. We, as a country and as a Government, are among those at the forefront of tackling climate change and recognising the risks it represents. Speaking personally as somebody whose constituents have included many of those who work at the British Antarctic Survey, I have never been under any illusions about the man-made impacts on global warming. But that does not mean we should ever close down a debate that says we understand—it is exactly this point—the nature of man-made impacts on the climate. What we have to understand equally are the causative effects that that leads to and how we can adapt and mitigate those, as well as trying to minimise man-made impacts on the environment.

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