Communities and Local Government/Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

I wish to address the climate change, local government and draft transport Bills. As the hon. Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman) said, they are indeed connected, as they link what we do about climate change and sustainability with the need to widen co-ordinated activity across government. I am delighted that the Queen’s Speech includes a climate change Bill, but I hope that in our debate on the measure we will not restrict ourselves to a sterile discussion of the best targets. Targets do not exist in their own right, as we can see from the discussions that preceded the announcement of the Bill. The original early-day motion was signed by several hon. Members and was linked to a private Member’s Bill introduced in the Session before last by my right hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West and Royton (Mr. Meacher). Over the past year campaigning for a climate change Bill focused on a different Bill promoted by the World Wildlife Fund. The Conservative party subsequently produced yet another Bill, and a further Bill just before the Queen’s Speech. The substantial campaigning that has taken place reflects the changed view of the urgent need for measures to tackle climate change. There is a wide consensus that the House needs to consider how serious climate change is, what we need to do about it, how little time we have to do all that is necessary to stabilise our climate, and the Government’s responsibility in that respect. In the light of the various Bills that have been suggested, the idea of a series of annual climate change targets can be seen as a largely rhetorical device. I congratulate Friends of the Earth, WWF and other campaigning non-governmental organisations which have taken the argument forward, but I hope that when we study the detail of the climate change Bill this Session, we remember that we must concentrate not just on targets, but on the mechanisms whereby those targets can be achieved. That should be the essential element of any climate change Bill this Session. We discussed a climate change Bill in the context of the Stern review, which recently reminded us that we have perhaps 15 years—that is probably in the parliamentary lifetime of most serving Members—to put in place mechanisms, which will be largely Government driven, to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in our atmosphere to a level that allows us to have a sustainable low carbon economy by 2050. The aim of driving down carbon emissions by 60 per cent. by 2050 as the statutory centrepiece of the Bill is both important and welcome.