Ed Miliband
MP for Doncaster North · Labour · United Kingdom
“Gentleman raises the issue of arms, and I talked in my statement about the double lock. I want to take on his point on the F-35s. To be clear with the House, we stopped providing direct parts to Israel’s F-35 programme in October 2024, under my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) when he was Foreign Secretary.”
“I thank the shadow Foreign Secretary for his response. It is our first time opposite each other at the Dispatch Box, so let me congratulate him on his appointment—he has a proud record in Parliament as Security Minister and Chair of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, and brings great expertise to this House.”
“Israel has the right not to live in fear of vile terrorism, and the Israeli state has the right to protect its people and defend its territory, but that cannot justify what has happened in Gaza. Over 70,000 people have been killed, at least 20,000 of them children—20,000.”
“Our extension of the global human rights sanctions regime will enable us to target those responsible for violations of international humanitarian law, whether in Gaza or anywhere else in the world.”
“The right hon. Gentleman has an honourable record on this issue. I will quickly clip through his questions, knowing the constraints on time, Madam Speaker. I agree with him on the World Central Kitchen. It is appalling that the investigation has been closed down.”
“Iran must never have a nuclear weapon, so we are also acting this week, alongside our allies, to report Iran to the UN Security Council for its nuclear violations, and I can announce today that we are reimposing major economic sanctions on Iran in line with the European Union and the United States.”
The complete record
Every one of 2,382 lines we hold for Ed Miliband, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 33 of 48.
“This is the last time a Government Minister will be in the House explaining to millions of families why they are plunging them further into fuel poverty. Instead of warm words or platitudes, can the Secretary of State now tell the British people how he can possibly justify this attack on their living standards? Is it not the truth that there can be no defence of it, and that the only right, proper and fair thing to do is to cancel the cut?”
“Next, I have a letter here that Ofgem wrote to the Secretary of State when he was the Energy Minister 18 months ago during covid, warning about “systemic risk to the energy supply sector as a whole”. It said the usual Ofgem mechanism, the supplier of last resort, may not be possible. It went on: “The failure of medium and large suppliers would need to be handled via a special administration regime placing significant burden and costs on government.” So will he answer the question of what planning was done for this eventuality following that letter? Surely the Government should be in a position now to know exactly what needs to be done where there is systemic risk to suppliers. Have they not left the country dangerously exposed, with them scrabbling around for solutions? Finally, we are seven days from the cut to universal credit.”
“On Monday, I said to the Secretary of State that he was being far too complacent about the situation we are facing. Events since have, unfortunately, borne that out: complacent about the crisis in the market; complacent about the impact on families; and complacent about the cost of living crisis. He pretended on Monday and again today that it was normal for a number of suppliers to go down each winter, but what we are dealing with is far from normal: 800,000 customers losing their suppliers yesterday alone and 1.5 million in the last six weeks. So will he now answer the question he has so far failed to answer: does he believe taxpayers’ money will be necessary to stabilise the market? If so, how will he ensure value for money and that we do not simply end up with greater concentration of the big six suppliers?”
“Families looking at soaring gas prices will be deeply worried about how they will pay their bills. One of the reasons UK households are particularly vulnerable is the Government’s failure on home insulation. Emissions from buildings are in fact higher today than in 2015. I am afraid to say that the Secretary of State’s record is abysmal, with the fiasco of the green homes grant, cuts to spending, a heat and buildings strategy originally promised for spring 2020 which is still not published, and no proper plan for retrofit. Will he admit that families this winter will be paying the price of the Government’s failure on home insulation?”
“It is a complete fiasco. The Secretary of State actually cut the money that was supposed to be allocated to homeowners. At least half a million families are going to be thrown into fuel poverty by the rise in energy prices. On top of that, along with national insurance rises, millions of families are facing a £1,000 a year cut in universal credit in just 10 days’ time. It is a Tory triple whammy made in Downing Street. Will the Secretary of State stand up for the millions of people who are deeply worried about their bills and tell the Prime Minister that he should cancel the universal credit cut?”
“Households, businesses and energy suppliers are looking to the Government for support and direction as we face this crisis; it requires not words but action and delivery. It is long past time for Government to get a grip.”
“Our new nuclear programme is stalled, and while the Secretary of State is right that we have made progress on renewables, the truth is that we need to go further and faster, with a more diverse supply. Above all, there is not yet enough of a clear plan from Government for how we meet net zero with affordability and security. People have read what the Climate Change Committee said in its most recent progress report this summer: “It is hard to discern any comprehensive strategy”. Is not the truth that there is a direct line from the delay, dither and failure to the issues we face today? I therefore urge the Secretary of State in the midst of this crisis to use this autumn’s net zero strategy—delayed—the net zero review, also delayed, and the comprehensive spending review to finally put in place a proper plan.”
“Our lack of gas storage was raised by industry, the GMB union and the Chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee in 2019, my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves). A Minister said in reply that “the UK’s gas system is secure and well placed to respond effectively to unexpected changes in supply and demand”. Were the Government not, then as now, far too complacent on the issue of gas storage? Next, energy efficiency could significantly cut the demand for gas, but we have had the fiasco of the green deal followed by the fiasco of the green homes grant and then the delayed heat and buildings strategy, and emissions from buildings are today higher than in 2015. When is the Secretary of State going to have a proper retrofit plan?”
“If he really wants to put consumers first, if he really wants to help working people, and if he really wants to tackle fuel poverty, is it not time, even at this late stage, to cancel this terrible decision on universal credit? Thirdly, we need to learn longer-term lessons from this crisis about the lack of resilience in our energy system that has contributed to very large price spikes. The Secretary of State is right that there are global issues, but the UK is facing particular difficulties. Let me give some examples of Government decision making. In 2017, the gas storage facility, Rough, then 75% of our storage, was planned for closure. The Government could have acted to keep it open but did nothing.”
“On consumer support, he is right to keep the price cap in place—it is a measure I have long supported—but the rise in the price cap of £139 means half a million more families will be plunged into fuel poverty. At a minimum, he should be looking at making the operation of the £140 warm home discount automatic and possibly extending it, but even that will not be enough. Families are facing a triple whammy: rising energy prices, national insurance rises, and, at the end of this month, the £1,000 cut in universal credit. These energy price rises turn the indefensible decision on universal credit into an unconscionable one.”
“I welcome his caution about outcomes that lead to taxpayer subsidy for big companies to further concentrate their market share, but can he therefore explain the alternatives and what he proposes happens to the customers of suppliers that do not get through this crisis? He is making a statement later this afternoon, and it would be good to know what he is going to say. Secondly, on the impact of price rises on businesses and industry, can the Secretary of State set out his plans to support businesses, particularly energy-intensive industries? Has he considered with his colleagues the provision of Government support, including possibly loans, to help businesses facing difficulties?”
“I thank the Secretary of State for his statement and agree that we should not be alarmist on the issue of security of supply, but I fear his statement was much too complacent on the price and economic impacts of the current situation. First, on continuity of supply, we support the Secretary of State taking all necessary measures to ensure that families and businesses continue to have access to energy and that we secure the issue of CO 2 supplies. The Secretary of State says that there are mechanisms in place to ensure that customers of failing companies get taken on, but the scale of the problems in the market will provide an unprecedented test of those mechanisms, so does he believe that taxpayer support will be necessary to deal with the problem? If it is, we must ensure value for money.”
“Yes, Mr Speaker. To follow on from the point made by the right hon. Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper), I submit that it really is not good practice for the Secretary of State to come to this House and say that he will make a joint statement with Ofgem this afternoon to set out the Government’s next steps, but refuse to tell Members what is in that joint statement. The point of his coming to the House is for him to be questioned on Government policy—including policy to be announced this afternoon.”
“The Copenhagen summit of 2009 was undone by deep mistrust of the developed world by developing countries. Rather than learning from that, rich countries are still failing to deliver on the promised $100 billion of climate finance and the billions of vaccine doses still required by poorer countries. Yesterday, shamefully, the Prime Minister decided to press ahead with the cut in our aid spending. When the COP26 President went to see the PM yesterday, did he explain that COP26 is not some international photo opportunity, but a complex and fragile negotiation, and that the aid cut simply deepens mistrust, damages our moral standing and undermines our COP presidency?”
“The COP26 President knows that world leaders and others are asking him why the UK is the only G7 country cutting aid spending in the year that we are hosting the COP. He knows that delivering support to developing countries is not just morally right, but essential to building a coalition to pressure the world’s largest emitters. The most significant of those emitters is China. To have a chance of keeping global warming to 1.5°, we need China to ensure that its emissions peak and start to decline by 2025 at the latest. Does the COP26 President agree? If so, can he tell us what the Prime Minister is doing to engage directly with China on the issue and persuade it to step up?”
“As my hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook) said earlier, the Climate Change Committee’s report card on the Government two weeks ago was devastating: “This defining year for the UK’s climate credentials has been marred by uncertainty and delay”. The Climate Change Committee says that “the policy is just not there”, and: “We continue to blunder into high-carbon choices.” The chair, Lord Deben, when asked to give the Government marks out of 10 for policy, said “somewhere below four”. On any measure, these are failing grades. Who does the Minister hold responsible?”
“I think that is what we call the “dog ate my homework” excuse, and this is where the problem lies. When it comes to investment in a green recovery, the UK Government’s plans per head of population are less than a third of Germany, a quarter of France and just 6% of the US. That is why the Climate Change Committee says that we are just one fifth of the way to meeting our targets in terms of policy. Is it not the truth that, because the Government are not matching their grand rhetoric with public investment at scale, they are failing to tackle the biggest long-term threat our country faces?”
“We need action in the next nine days. The Government must act to keep these protections in place. As we have heard on both sides of the Chamber, they must also give this House the ability to put our national economic interests first in trade decisions. We also need a comprehensive plan to support our steel industry, and deliver the manufacturing and industrial future that we need. We owe it to the communities of our country and to their future to deliver it.”
“To secure a long-term future, we must break this cycle. That is why we need a comprehensive industrial strategy for our UK steel sector, but we still do not see it from this Government. For the first time in nearly 50 years, the UK has sole autonomy and responsibility for our external trade policy. We have to use this opportunity to develop a trade policy that supports an active industrial strategy that will help grow our foundational industries. I actually think that that view is mostly shared on both sides of the House, but that is why the position we have reached is so incomprehensible. We are not debating how we strengthen the protections for our domestic industry; we are desperately trying to cling on to the protections that we used to have. Good rhetoric is not enough to help our steel industry; we need action.”
“The industry says that we need billions for the green steel transition. A £250 million clean steel fund in 2023 is not going to cut the mustard. It is not going to give us the steel industry that we need in the future. There is a big choice for us as a country: do we invest to retain steelmaking capacity, with all the jobs and security it brings; or do we have some kind of neglect of the industry, with devastating consequences? It is true of hydrogen as well. A £240 million hydrogen fund is better than nothing, but the Germans are offering €9 billion to invest in hydrogen. We face uniquely high energy prices, the whole issue of public procurement, whereby we still spend 25% on foreign steel, and an industry that is too often lurching from crisis to crisis, stuck in a long cycle of foreign acquisitions, insolvencies and bail-outs.”
“Our steelworkers and steel manufacturers want to know what the answer is from a Government who say they are standing up for steel. We have made our suggestion about how to deal with this, through emergency legislation. If there is a better suggestion, I look forward to hearing it from the Minister. The Government know in their heart of hearts that they are there in a ridiculous position, but it is time that they did something about it; they owe it to the steel industry to do something about it. There is a wider context that I want briefly to mention, because it is symptomatic of a failure to have the kind of industrial policy for steel that we need. Steel faces a huge green transition—the hon. Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous) talked about it—but let us be clear about the scale of the task that we all face in this House.”
“Paragraph 30 of the TRA’s document says that it has had representations about the interconnectedness of the industry—that we cannot simply separate out products—but it says pretty clearly that that is not really the way it can think about these issues. It cannot look at the interconnectedness of the industry, nor, indeed, a whole set of issues raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Islington South and Finsbury. It cannot be right that the Government implement these flawed recommendations. There is also a wider issue, which is that the legislation around the TRA is clearly not fit for purpose. That is why we have tabled this motion. It is hardly as though we are jumping the gun. We are nine days from the end of this protection. I mean, come on! What is the answer here?”
“I have to say that it does seem extraordinary that here we are, six months after the end of the transition period—when we were told that Brexit would provide stronger domestic protections for our industry—having to argue with the Government to keep the domestic protections that were in place when we were in the European Union. It makes no sense. No wonder our steel manufacturers are reacting with anger and disbelief, uncomprehending, and asking, “How are we even in this position?” It is easy in these circumstances to blame the TRA, and, indeed, I think it has made the wrong decision. But this is also about the remit that it has been given. As you know, Madam Deputy Speaker, I am a bit of a nerd—much of a nerd.”
“It is a balanced insurance policy to prevent the oversupply that the Secretary of State identifies. The TRA is proposing to remove the insurance policy in half the product categories. I have read the TRA document and I have listened to the debate, and the case is simply not made out for that. We cannot argue that these are nine areas where we do not have domestic production, because we do, and we cannot say that there is no risk of serious injury to domestic producers, because the industry itself says there is. It simply leaves us with this argument: that we should have the cheap imports at the expense of our domestic industry. In other words, we are failing to learn all the lessons of the past, and here we are. What is the EU doing? Well, the EU is retaining its existing protections.”
“The EU, of which we were a member…had its own safeguards and tariff protections…We have to try to work out how we navigate this global glut of steel.” Here we have a Government Minister who correctly identifies the problem—the risks of global oversupply—yet his own Government are deciding actively to remove the very safeguards against it, to ignore the warnings of the steel industry and steelworkers, to undermine the promises that the Government are making to the sector and to weaken our domestic steel manufacturers. We should be very clear about that because Members, particularly on the Government Benches, were concerned about it. This is an insurance policy. These tariffs kick in once imports get above a certain quota, set at 111% of historic imports.”
“Indeed, it has been well described by a former steel analyst, who said that “something like 2 billion tonnes are produced every year, and there is a global glut. Lots of steel is being produced, and the real danger is that, somehow, we are exposed to dumping and to people overproducing and, essentially, undercutting our own producers.” That former steel analyst is none other than the Business Secretary, appearing at the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee less than a month ago on 25 May. The Business Secretary went on to say: “This is a problem that is faced by all steel producers. The US has Section 232 tariffs.”
“Member for North East Hampshire (Mr Jayawardena), drew the short straw at the International Trade team meeting by being sent out to bat when the Government have no position, or at least no position that I could comprehend from his speech, but this is an incredibly serious situation. We are nine days away from these protections lapsing. Let us just be clear for the Minister and the House about what UK Steel is saying would be the impact of the measures lapsing: “a hammer blow to the UK steel sector…utter madness…the UK’s new system has failed our domestic steel sector.” The decision reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of the realities of steel production. That is the reality. What UK Steel is saying is not based on ideology, but on a practical assessment of the international steel market.”
“There is no greater test than how we treat the steel industry, because steel supports tens of thousands of high-skilled, high-wage jobs that are the pride of communities across our country, because a strong domestic steel industry is essential to our national manufacturing success and because steel is vital for our national security. We should be using every tool at our disposal to support the industry. That means Government putting their money where their mouth is in enabling steel to navigate the green transition, it means doing whatever it takes to support employment and it means making the right decisions on trade. Let me come to the heart of our motion. The Under-Secretary of State for International Trade, the hon.”
“Friends the Members for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell), for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock), for Blaydon (Liz Twist), for Newport East (Jessica Morden), for Swansea West (Geraint Davies), for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), for Easington (Grahame Morris), for Chesterfield (Mr Perkins) and for Cynon Valley (Beth Winter). As I said, there were great speeches from all parts of the House. At the heart of the debate is a question. We can all talk the rhetoric of building back better, but the question facing us is: when hard decisions have to be made, is rhetoric matched by reality?”
“We have had an excellent debate with noteworthy contributions from all parts of the House. I congratulate the shadow Secretary of State for International Trade, my right hon. Friend the Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry), on securing this debate, and I particularly thank my hon. Friends the Members for Bristol North West (Darren Jones), for Neath (Christina Rees), for Brent North (Barry Gardiner), for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) and for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle), my right hon. Friend the Member for Alyn and Deeside (Mark Tami), and my hon.”
“For a successful COP26, we have a particular responsibility as hosts to build trust with developing countries. The Government’s decision to cut aid spending—the only G7 country to do so—is therefore an appalling one, not just because it is wrong in principle, but because it is staggeringly self-defeating. The COP26 President knows that that decision makes a successful outcome at the conference of the parties harder, not easier, so may I invite him to add his voice to the powerful calls we heard yesterday, including from the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), to immediately restore Government aid spending to 0.7% of GDP?”
“The problem is that cutting aid spending severely undermines the ability of developing countries to tackle the challenges of climate poverty and public health. The COP26 President knows that: it is what developing countries are telling him in the negotiations. We need vulnerable countries to be calling for more ambition from big emitters such as China, but they will be much more reticent in doing so when they do not feel that we can be trusted. Totemic on the issue of trust is the promise made at Copenhagen for $100 billion of public and private finance for developing countries. More than a decade on, it still has not been delivered. It is our job as hosts to deliver on that promise. Can the COP26 President therefore tell us whether the $100 billion will finally be delivered this weekend at the G7 meeting?”
“That is why Jeremy Farrar said recently: “There’s a growing gulf between rhetoric and reality in the government support for science.” It massively ill serves British science and our country to be cutting science spending, and ARIA, welcome though it is—£800 million over five years—simply does not make up for that. To conclude, we support this Bill, but hope, in the spirit with which we have approached it, that the Government will reflect on the constructive concerns raised throughout its passage on the urgent issue of aid spending by Members on all sides, on science spending and on the detail of the Bill. We hope that the other place can build on and improve the Bill as it progresses.”
“There is a very strong feeling about this across the House—quite possibly a majority—and the Government should reverse this cut in funding forthwith. My general experience is that when there is a majority in this House for something, it will find a way to express itself one way or the other. I suggest that the Secretary of State and the Government take heed. ARIA should not come at the expense of cuts to the core science budget administered by UKRI. This year, UKRI’s budget will be £7.9 billion, a cut from the budget last year of £8.7 billion.”
“As the Sainsbury Laboratory, one of the country’s leading scientific research institutes, puts it, these cuts have “pulled the rug out from under many scientific projects that were paving the way to solve urgent challenges in some of the poorest countries in the world.” All this is in the year of COP26, when we are the hosts trying to persuade other countries to accept our moral authority on the climate crisis and development. As someone who was at the ill-fated Copenhagen climate summit of 2009, I want to tell the House that mistrust between developing and developed countries was the biggest reason it failed and is one of the biggest risks at COP26. The cut in aid spending undermines our efforts and undermines trust; the Government are wrong to be doing it, and it is self-defeating for our country.”
“We should not be slashing overseas aid to the world’s poorest people. It is not right morally, and it is not right on grounds of self-interest either. With coronavirus and the climate crisis, our fates are bound together. What is more, these cuts are impacting directly on British scientific researchers doing the right thing for the world on everything from research on infectious diseases to the development of clean water technology. Some £120 million has been cut from the BEIS budget because of the cuts to ODA.”
“If the Government want ARIA to carry the confidence of the public, we hope they will think again on accountability in the other place. Thirdly, as we have heard in the debate, it is essential that each nation and region of the UK benefits from the creation of ARIA—we believe that ARIA should have regard to that when exercising its functions. We have suggested that that could be done through the annual report that is already provided for under the Bill. These are our issues with the Bill, but we cannot ignore in this Third Reading debate the Bill’s wider context, about which I want to speak briefly. ARIA is an important innovation, but it cannot be detached from the wider landscape of Government policy. Today’s amendment on overseas development aid—new clause 4—may not have been selected, but the argument is not going away.”
“There is also a danger, we believe, that ARIA’s resources will be spread too thin. The greatest challenge we face, and this is shared across the House, is the climate and environmental emergency, and that is why we have proposed that fighting it be ARIA’s mission for the first 10 years, but however that mission is set out, I hope this is something that will be returned to in the other place. Secondly, we believe that the freedom provided to those running ARIA should be accompanied by greater transparency and accountability. We do not believe the agency has anything to fear from this, nor is there justification for the blanket exemptions from the Freedom of Information Act and public contract regulations. The Government’s reason for exempting it is that it will be overwhelmed by requests, but that is not the US experience with DARPA.”
“Member for Derby North (Amanda Solloway). I was going to wish her a happy 50th birthday, but I am happy, on this occasion, to be outdone by the Secretary of State. I say a very happy birthday for yesterday to the Minister. As the Bill goes to the other place, we continue to believe that improvement is necessary and possible. As we heard in the debate, the biggest improvement to it would be a clearer sense of mission for the agency. We do not believe that the Bill as drafted provides ARIA with a clear enough mission. Ministers have suggested that it is for the chief executive, once appointed, to establish its priorities. We heard this a lot in Committee and again today, but this is not in our view the best way to meet our national priorities, which we believe should be set by Government.”
“Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah)—I thank the Secretary of State for doing so—for the superb job that she has done in constructively seeking to improve the Bill on behalf of the Opposition. I also put on record my thanks to my hon. Friends the Members for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner), for Brent Central (Dawn Butler), for Luton North (Sarah Owen), and for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Gill Furniss) for their diligent work in Committee, and all hon. and right hon. Members on both sides of the House who have contributed to this Bill. I join the Secretary of State in also paying tribute to all the House staff who have kept this Bill going and on track and all those associated with it. I want to single out the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the hon.”
“In this Third Reading debate, I want to start by putting on record our support for this Bill and the establishment of ARIA. The UK is a global scientific superpower, with a proud past, present and future, of innovative scientists, businesses and entrepreneurs. The success of the vaccine roll-out—I pay tribute to everybody associated with that—demonstrates our world-leading science and research power. What we have seen in the debate today and through the passage of this Bill is that we all want to build on this platform. ARIA has the potential to help fill the gap of high-risk, high-reward scientific investment, which is why we welcomed the Bill and sought to play a constructive role in its passage through the House. I pay tribute to my hon.”
“I want to return to fire and rehire. Chris is a British Gas engineer who lives in Spelthorne, the Secretary of State’s constituency. Chris says: “Working under fire and rehire has been horrific. It has caused stress and anxiety not just for me, but my family. I can’t overstate the effect that it has on mental wellbeing. And the Government and the Business Secretary, who is supposed to represent me…in parliament is doing absolutely nothing about it. I voted for Kwasi Kwarteng in 2019, but he’s failed us on this. A total let down.” Chris met the Business Secretary recently and asked him why he had not acted on fire and rehire. What did he tell him?”
“The problem is that the right hon. Member is the Business Secretary. He is in charge. He promised an employment Bill two years ago. He has had the ACAS report for three months. He is not even telling us what is in the ACAS report. Maybe he can satisfy Chris and millions of people around this country by saying from the Dispatch Box today that he agrees with the principle that we should legislate to outlaw fire and rehire, and he will bring forward an employment Bill to do it. If he does not do that, people will suspect that the truth is not that he is not acting because he cannot act, but that he is not acting because he does not want to act, because he thinks this kind of one-sided power for employers is necessary for our economy to succeed.”
“Can the Secretary of State tell us how far off track he thinks we are for our fifth and sixth carbon budgets? The climate emergency is a massive challenge for our country—the biggest long-term challenge we face. There is also a massive opportunity for our country, with our amazing scientists, our brilliant workforce and our world-leading businesses. But to make that future happen, we need a Government with the aspiration and commitment that matches the ingenuity and aspiration of the British people. Instead of a piecemeal 10-point plan, we need a comprehensive green new deal with the scale of investment and commitment that meets the moment and the emergency. I am afraid that I do not believe the Government’s record measures up to the scale of the challenge we face. We will hold them to account on behalf of the country.”
“Here is the worry I have about the scale of investment. The Secretary of State talks about investment over the decade of tens of billions, public and private, but everyone from PwC to the CCC says that we need that investment not over a decade but each and every year to get on track for our targets. In that context, the Treasury’s crucial net zero review was due in autumn 2020, and now it has been promised for spring 2021. Well, we are in spring 2021. Can he tell us when it will finally see the light of day? It is a crucial piece of work. All this means that we are way off meeting our fifth and sixth carbon budgets. Green Alliance estimates that policies announced will only lead to 26% of the reductions necessary to get the UK on track for 2030.”
“On manufacturing, there was no mention of steel in the statement, which seems a surprising omission, given how crucial it is to our country, our steel communities and the green transition. A clean steel fund of £250 million announced two years ago and only to be delivered in two years’ time is, I am afraid, wholly inadequate. The Secretary of State knows it, his Back Benchers know it and our steel industry knows it. Will he acknowledge that, and what is he going to do about it? On hydrogen, we are investing hundreds of millions, which is welcome, but it is against billions being invested by others. On aerospace, the Jet Zero Council is all very well, but jobs have been lost in aerospace during this crisis, as the Secretary of State knows, and our investment again fails to measure up internationally.”
“Despite the recent progress that he talked about, we are way off that, at less than 15%. We are not financing gigafactories, on which there is a global race. Our charging infrastructure remains inadequate, and the Government have actually cut the plug-in grant. Does the Secretary of State acknowledge that the Government are not investing enough to make the EV revolution happen in the way that is necessary for our car industry’s future and consumers? On offshore wind, we should be proud of our world leadership on generation, and I welcome today’s jobs announcement, but according to RenewableUK, only 29% of capital investment in recent projects has been in the UK. Can the Secretary of State tell us when the Government will finally deliver on their pledge for 60% of the content of our offshore wind to be domestic?”
“We desperately need a comprehensive plan for the massive task of retrofitting and changing the way we heat millions of homes, with the finance to back it up. It is a big task. The heat and building strategy was supposed to be published last year but has been delayed and delayed. Can the Secretary of State promise that when it is published, it will finally contain the plan and the finance we need? Next, let us turn to electric vehicles. Again, we were supposed to see the transport decarbonisation strategy last year. Today, the Secretary of State did not even give a date for publication, so perhaps he can tell us in his reply when we will see it. We support the 2030 phase-out date, but the Climate Change Committee says—this is really important—that we will need 48% of the cars sold in the UK to be EVs by 2025, in just four years’ time.”
“Crucial areas are not being dealt with, and the scale of finance is not being delivered, leading us to be off track on our targets. Let us take a few key issues. The first is buildings, a crucial part of decarbonisation. Last year, the green homes grant—remember that?—was the flagship measure, which the Secretary of State said would “pave the way for the UK’s green homes revolution.” Now it is the policy that dared not speak its name in the Business Secretary’s statement, and no wonder—it has been a complete fiasco, with contractors not paid, installers forced to make lay-offs and homeowners unable to get grants. As importantly, when the scheme failed, more than £1 billion was not reallocated but simply cut from the budget.”
“I thank the Secretary of State for his statement. The climate crisis is the single greatest long-term challenge we face. As Secretary of State, I was proud to pass the world-leading Climate Change Act 2008 with cross-party support. In that spirit, although we believe that the UK should be going further and faster, we also recognise that our targets for 2030 and 2035 are ambitious by international standards. But the Secretary of State’s central challenge is whether targets are matched by the scale of action required in this decisive decade, and once again, his statement showed that the Government are very good at self-congratulation but perhaps less good at self-awareness. The evidence is that there is a wide gap between rhetoric and reality.”