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Local Government and Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

In view of the time limit, I shall confine my remarks to some of the matters raised by the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee regarding the draft Climate Change Bill and the Government's response. I welcome the all-party agreement of the Committee, on which I serve, on the principal purpose of the Bill: to enshrine national carbon emission reduction targets in law. We will be the first country in the world to do that, which is hardly an indication that the Government are running out of ideas and commitment, as some hon. Members have suggested. Doing so will not only firmly place such issues on the political agenda and the Government's agenda, but strengthen the will of the Government to create and deliver the certainty that is essential so that businesses and other organisations can be confident that the matter is here to stay for decades to come, and that investment can be put in place and decisions taken in the knowledge that the Government will not back off. That crucial political aspect of the Bill is absolutely essential and is entirely consistent with the message of the Stern report, which described climate change as the"““greatest and widest-ranging market failure ever seen.””" Stability and certainty in policy and the political will will be crucial if major players in the economy are to tackle that market failure. The draft Bill proposed that, by 2050, carbon dioxide emissions must be at least 60 per cent. less than they were in 1990. The Committee heard evidence that the science on which that figure was based has moved on. However, we did not think that, as politicians, we should just pluck another figure out of the air. We thought that the expert committee on climate change would be best placed to make recommendations on the matter and that that committee should be free to alter targets—certainly the 2050 target, and also the interim 2020 target. The draft Bill did not allow for that, so I was pleased that the Government's response indicated that the climate change committee will have the power to do that and that it must report on the target by autumn 2009. I would like the report to happen a little earlier because I understand that the Government intend that the committee should exist in shadow form before the Bill is enacted. That will be helpful, and the committee is bound to be doing some work on that while it is thinking about the period of the first carbon budget. The public will be looking to the committee to do so. The 60 per cent. target will be very tough in itself. The CBI has signed up to it, but I understand that some of its members are moaning and groaning. That is all the more reason why, if we are to end up with the higher target that I think we will need, the argument for it must be based on science. However, there is not yet a consensus on the science. For example, the Tyndall centre for climate change research argues for a 90 per cent. reduction from the 1990 base. It recommended that figure in a report that it prepared for Friends of the Earth, which gave evidence to the Select Committee, but Friends of the Earth did not adopt that figure and went for 80 per cent. There is not yet consensus, but the science is moving on.