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Climate Change Bill [Lords]

I, too, welcome the Bill, which shows genuine leadership on climate change. Indeed, that leadership has brought about a degree of consensus in the House. I welcome the Bill because it imposes a legal duty on the Government to continue to work on the mitigation of climate change, even when in future we may encounter more political pressure for adaptation: the two should not, of course, be juxtaposed. We all know, however, that if we told constituents that we were going to solve their flooding problems by putting up a wind farm, they would laugh in our faces and demand immediate action—on the grounds of adaptation—to address their particular concern. I welcome most, if not all, of the amendments made in the other place. They have strengthened the Bill, but it needs further strengthening. In saying that, I refer Members to the words of Dr. James Hansen who, as many will know, works for NASA at the Goddard space research centre. He said:"““If humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on Earth is adapted, paleoclimate evidence and ongoing climate change suggest that CO2 will need to be reduced from its current 385 ppm to at most 350 ppm.””" At the moment, the Bill is predicated on business assumptions that will take us well over 550 parts per million and possibly into the region of 700 parts per million CO2 equivalent in the atmosphere. Many Members have referred to budgeting to deal with this most serious problem. Bearing in mind such extremely serious figures, I also refer Members to work done by the Tyndall Centre, which has contributed a wealth of information to us, including to the Environmental Audit Committee. It has calculated that if we wanted a pathway that stood even a 30 per cent. chance of not exceeding the 2° C threshold, the UK would have to cut its total carbon emissions by 70 per cent. by 2030 and by about 90 per cent. by 2050. That illustrates the seriousness of the issue of cumulative concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere. If we cannot grip the problem early, we will lose out in the long term. Although I support much tougher long-term targets, from which we can back-cast and figure out where we need to be eventually, early targeting and cuts must bite into the cumulative target-setting process. Clause 3 refers to the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution report, ““Energy—the Changing Climate””, published in 2000, which is seen as a base point for our thinking on climate change. Adoption of the contraction and convergence model was implicit in that report. Some Members might think that I sound a bit like a cracked record, but it is worth stating—the hon. Member for Northavon (Steve Webb) touched on the matter briefly—that one cannot arrive at a figure, whether 50, 60 or 80 per cent., without a distribution of the responsibility for tackling climate change. We cannot simply say that the science tells us that the globe must have an average cut of, say, 50 per cent. by 2050, and that that just happens to be our share. We should ask how we arrive at our share. The RCEP report in 2000 considered the various options, calculations and methodologies, and concluded that contraction and convergence were the most elegant and most likely to succeed. ““Contraction and convergence”” is not a phrase that the Government like to use much. I suspect that the reason for that is that one does not necessarily want to set out one's entire stall before going into an international negotiation. Just as we are showing leadership with this Bill, and taking action before any other Parliament in the world, we should go to Poznan later this year, and Copenhagen next year, and back the implicit principle that underpins our Bill. If people ask us what the report says, and we scratch our heads thinking, ““We can't mention contraction and convergence, which underpins our whole thinking, as that might reveal our hand,”” we will not follow through the leadership that the Bill represents. Thankfully, many more people than perhaps even a year or two ago are coming round to such a way of thinking. Tony Blair now talks about per capita emissions rights being equalised, possibly at 2 tonnes per person globally, although it depends on the rise in global population. Nick Stern, who said in his report that he could not quite get his head around contraction and convergence, now talks about a pragmatic right to the equalisation on a per capita basis of emissions. In January this year, the Prime Minister went to India for the UK-India summit and agreed with the Indian Government that the principle of convergence is very important and deserves serious attention. In Australia, Professor Ross Garnaut, who produced his interim report on climate change on behalf of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, also strongly supports the contraction and convergence principle, arguing in favour of per capita rights to greenhouse gas emissions around the planet. It is time that we urged the Government to consider the principle once again, and to make clear in a new clause in the Bill their methodology for arriving at a figure. Until they produce their methodology, they will always be open to the accusation that they are plucking figures out of thin air. If they do not do so, the independent climate change committee, if it is to be asked to bring forward figures, should be under a duty to produce its methodology. The Bill provides for a duty, but how will we know that it is being taken seriously? The Bill does not provide the means for delivery. A new clause should also be introduced that requires the Treasury to report annually on the effort of UK plc to deliver on the targets under the Bill. As we know, Nick Stern said that it will cost less to avoid the problem if we spend a bit now. In his report, the actual figures—working on the basis of up to 550 parts per million—are that spending 1 per cent. of GDP might avoid 5 to 20 per cent. of damage to GDP down the line. As I said, that 1 per cent. is predicated on a possible 550 parts per million concentration in the atmosphere. If we are talking about a 2° C limit on the increase, many people now know that 550 parts per million is totally over the top. A 4° C or even 5° C increase is more likely. The Government were presented with that science in Exeter, before the Gleneagles conference. Clearly, we should be considering a greater spend. According to Nick Stern, if we wanted to aim for between 450 and 500 parts per million, the cost would be 3 per cent. of GDP. In 2006, when his report was published, that would have been nearly £40 billion—obviously, 1 per cent. is about £13 billion. Have we spent anything like £13 billion, year on year, on tackling the problem? No, obviously not; not even half that, I suspect, although working out what we spend is extremely complex—is it a gross or net figure? The Treasury, not the piddling Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs—not my words, but those of the hon. Member for Northavon (Steve Webb); I do not necessarily agree with his assessment, but it is certainly not an assessment that one could make of the Treasury, the least piddling Government Department—should have a duty under the Bill to report annually on the effort of UK plc to deliver on its targets. I hope that other Members will join me in supporting that principle on Report. With that couple of small caveats, I very much welcome the Bill and hope that it will proceed with all-party support.