- Select Committee statement
- 12:58 pm
- We now come to the Select Committee statement. Darren Jones will speak for up to 10 minutes, during which no interventions may be taken. At the conclusion of his statement, I will call Members to put questions on the subject of the statement, and call Darren Jones to respond to those in turn. Members can expect to be called only once, of course. Interventions should be questions and should be brief.
- 12:59 pm
- This morning, I had the privilege of launching the report of Climate Assembly UK, “The path to net zero”, along with the Chairs of the five other Select Committees that commissioned the citizens assembly back in 2019. This afternoon, as Chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, I am launching a high-level inquiry into the findings of this groundbreaking report. I am keen, as I know other members and Committee Chairs are, that we take forward the work of the climate assembly by examining the policies that can deliver on net zero and provide solutions that are fair and equitable.This major inquiry of the BEIS Committee will take a two-pronged approach. First, we will launch an overarching inquiry into the findings of the assembly in order to review, on a regular basis, the Government’s engagement and interaction with the findings of the assembly and progress in implementing its proposals. We will do this by monitoring progress in relation to this important piece of work, and working in close collaboration with the other Committees that commissioned the assembly.Secondly, and in addition, the Committee will mainstream the work of the climate assembly. We will undertake detailed scrutiny of its proposals within the context of other existing and future inquiries. For example, the Committee is currently undertaking work on net zero and COP26, and we will shortly announce details of a series of new energy and climate change inquiries that we have selected following our recent My BEIS inquiry, which will focus directly on some of the energy recommendations in the assembly’s report. We will also examine issues around net zero and the green recovery during the course of our post-pandemic economic growth inquiry.The findings of the climate assembly will therefore shape and inform the Committee’s programme of inquiries for the duration of this Parliament. I know that other Select Committees are considering how to use and take forward the findings of the assembly’s report, and we will no doubt have further announcements in due course.Just to put the assembly report into context, it may be helpful to remind the House of its origins. More than 10 years ago, the House passed the Climate Change Act 2008. It has since declared a climate emergency and set a statutory target to reach net zero by 2050. We have already provided international leadership on decarbonisation, but the pace of reform has slowed and we must get back to business. However, meeting a challenge of this nature and this scale is clearly going to affect the lives of every citizen, organisation and community across our country. So everybody needs to understand why they are being asked to take action and what changes will need to be made, from how we eat to what we buy, how we heat our homes, how we do business and how we travel. That is exactly why the six Select Committees came together to establish this first ever UK-wide citizens assembly on climate change—an example of this House leading the public debate, but on the basis of informed public perceptions.
- I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s statement. I agree with him that this is a very fine report. I think there are two reasons why this project has been so powerful: one is the nature of the attendees at this assembly and how they were selected, being representative of the whole country; and the second is the proportionate nature of the recommendations in the report. Does he agree that the considered, measured and tolerant approach that has been adopted is a good example for all those individuals and groups who wish to contribute to the climate change debate?
- I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his question. I think the point he makes is really important because, for some in this debate, calls for action on climate change are demeaned as being from activists or not being supported by the British people. The citizens assembly report shows that these are pragmatic, considered and evidence-based decisions with support from a whole cross-section of the United Kingdom. That should give Ministers the confidence to take action in line with the recommendations in the report, and I know that it gives the right hon. Gentleman and his Committee, as well as the rest of us, the confidence to hold the Government to account very strongly in the implementation of those policies.
- This has been a fantastic initiative. It is obviously important that politicians take the report and its recommendations seriously.One important theme in the report is consumer fairness. It is crystal clear that we need to be fair to consumers, which means more direct investment in heat decarbonisation and energy efficiency from the Government, but it also means greater consumer protections. Does the Chair of the Select Committee agree that that means learning from mistakes, such as the green deal mis-selling by companies such as Home Energy and Lifestyle Management Systems, or HELMS? We need to look at those mistakes, learn from them, make recommendations to improve consumer protections, and get that fairness for consumers as we go forward to net zero.
- I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question and for his continued work on consumer protection, which I know he advocates on the Committee that I chair, of which I am grateful that he is a member. He will know, and Ministers will know, that we have written to the Secretary of State about the Government’s energy efficiency programme. The consensus in the report is that we need to take these actions, but that that should be done with clear, strong leadership from the top that puts fairness and equity at the heart while providing the choice that consumers need from providers and different technologies in the home. We also need to ensure that there is protection and enforcement at the end of that, lest things go wrong. I know that Ministers are considering those issues. They have brought forward the TrustMark for the energy efficiency programme, and I know that we will continue to ensure that consumer protection and fairness to consumers are at the heart of the Government’s response.
- I congratulate the hon. Member on presenting the report, and I look forward to working with him on this on the Select Committee. One of the themes that have come out is that of course the environment is key, but so is ensuring that the economy is well managed. Does the right hon. Member—I mean, the hon. Member—agree that covid has had a financial impact on the business sector and that we will need to do more to help businesses to help us to achieve net zero?
- I thank the hon. Lady for my elevation to the Privy Council, for which one can only hope. I agree absolutely that the consensus in the report and in our conversations on the Committee is that our economic recovery from the pandemic and our transition to net zero are no longer distinct issues but one and the same. They have to be embedded, and that requires Government to work in partnership with business. Some sectors will be affected more than others, and it will be difficult for some important parts of the British economy to make these changes, but I am confident that we can make them together. I know we will do that work on the Committee and bring forward proposals for the Government to do so.
- If we are to meet net zero, including targets on the electrification of transport and the decarbonisation of heating, either by electricity or by hydrogen produced by electricity, as the citizens assembly highlighted, we will need a lot of power, but not all of this can come from intermittent renewables. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is time for the Government to get serious and set out plans for all the low-carbon generation we will need, including nuclear, which provides high-skilled jobs for his constituents and mine?
- I thank my hon. Friend for her question. I know that she represents many workers in the nuclear sector in her constituency, and I know why that is an important issue to raise. The report made it clear that the energy mix is something that the public have clear views on, and I am sure they have the same anticipation as we do in the House for the arrival of the energy White Paper, which I am promised is due in advance of the Budget in the coming weeks, at which point we will get into these issues. It was clear from the report that there is a preference for onshore and offshore wind and solar, but a recognition that that has to come with investment in our network, our storage and our flexibility capacity, and that until we do that, there is absolutely a preference for low-carbon sources of energy.
- I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s inquiry. Does he agree that the fairness aspect of the report is particularly important? People are sometimes put off by the idea that the affluent are telling those on low incomes that everything about their lifestyle is wrong—where they work, what they drive, where they go on holiday. There needs to be a greater understanding that some people might like to make certain changes, but do not have the means to do so at the moment.
- This is really very important. A member of the Committee asked the assembly in a private briefing this week how it defined fairness. The answer is really important because it was defined by the assembly members—they were not given a definition—and because the assembly represented a plethora of different types of people across the country: rich, poor, from different locations, with different levels of education, maybe activists and campaigners on climate change, maybe people sceptical of climate change. They came to that consensus on what fairness means, and they see no reason why we cannot deliver that through all our policies.
- I congratulate my hon. Friend. He was launching the report at the same time as DEFRA questions this morning, so will not have seen the Government Front-Bench response, which I thought was slightly disappointing in treating it as just another report. One of the top issues in terms of pure policy in the report is protecting and restoring the natural world, which is very timely given the Living Planet report. Does he agree that we will tackle that only with international co-operation, which is why it is so very important that we abide by international law and rules?
- I did not see the DEFRA Secretary’s answer, but I would be disappointed if that was the case. I wonder whether he has not read the cross-departmental memo, given the comments of the BEIS Secretary this morning at the launch, welcoming the report as an important and substantive contribution to Government thinking. We should remember, of course, that BEIS has the responsibility to co-ordinate net-zero decarbonisation across every Department, including DEFRA, so perhaps the BEIS and DEFRA Secretaries could talk about the importance of this report.
- As chair of the net-zero all-party parliamentary group, I thank my hon. Friend and the other Select Committee Chairs for commissioning the citizens assembly and for the holistic and well-rounded nature of the report. Citizens assemblies could form an important part of our pre-legislative scrutiny and policy making in Parliament. Does my hon. Friend agree that we should utilise such assemblies much more widely in the House?