Climate Change Bill [HL]

My Lords, it is always a privilege to speak in this House after so many excellent speeches, many of which I largely agree with. This is perhaps one of the most far-reaching and fundamental Bills that Parliament has ever had to deal with. It calls for action to deal with climate change which threatens the future well-being of the human race, if not the human race itself, but certainly affects the existence of many types of life on the planet for hundreds of years ahead. A sceptical commentator in the Sunday papers, who has already been referred to this afternoon, ridiculed the idea of legislating for the future. But as the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, mentioned, 200 years ago Parliament discussed the global problem of slavery. The UK legislated to prevent it where it had the power—the Royal Navy was a factor, of course—but it took more than three-quarters of a century for the rest of the world to be convinced. This Bill also concerns the UK’s contribution to a massive problem that can be solved only through joint action, particularly by the developed and industrialised countries. It is essential that the mitigation of climate change is dealt with more urgently by the world than in the time it took to deal with slavery. Climate change legislation has to address many issues—scientific, political, economic and even ethical—using new words whose meanings need to be clearly explained. The guidance to this Bill is helpful but more needs to be done, especially where the clauses are vague and aspirational, for example Clauses 47 and 48. The noble Lord, Lord Waldegrave, suggested that the new committee might have a role in the public explanation of the Bill. I declare my interest as a professor of climate modelling and someone who helps to direct some environmental non-governmental organisations. The climate science background for this legislation is well covered by the POST leaflet in the House of Lords Library, which does not seem to be selling very well so I recommend noble Lords to have a look. It makes a point referred to earlier by a noble Lord on the Conservative Benches who was sceptical about the whole business. He was quite right to point out that there has not been a rise in the global average temperature since about 1999. This followed a very rapid rise in the 1990s and since then there have been large oscillations in the world, particularly associated with oceanic effects and the El Niño oscillation. The information that I have from the Met Office and other scientists is that this oscillation is expected to end and a rapid climb to occur probably in the next few years. It shows the vital importance of ocean research and monitoring, which are just as important as atmospheric research. The UK Government are contributing strongly to the floats in the Pacific Ocean which indicate these profound changes. If the greenhouse gases emitted are controlled along the lines suggested in the Bill, according to current UN recommendations there will still be an average temperature rise of about 2 degrees Celsius over this century. A more realistic estimate might be 3 or 4 degrees but the large variations in temperature and rainfall over days, months and years will most affect people and natural processes. We are already seeing phenomena that probably have no parallel since the last ice age. Research supported by the Natural Environment Research Council has shown how the largest temperature rise in the world of 3 degrees in the last 50 years took place on the Antarctic peninsula. It was associated with westerly winds and complex fluid dynamics with which I am involved. This caused an area the size of Wales to break away and this area of ice—the Larsen ice shelf—had been the same for the last 20,000 years. Record temperatures over several days in 2003 led to more than 30,000 deaths in European cities. Some researchers, particularly in France, conclude that such high temperatures may well last longer in future, which will have devastating effects. Colleagues from the Indian Parliament in the GLOBE organisation describe the unique disaster of no rainfall occurring in the wettest place in the world in 2006, which is probably associated with the changing meteorology of the Himalayas and other mountains around the world. The atmosphere is changing, causing more intense rain and, as we saw in the UK, damaging floods. It is also leading to changes in crops worldwide—a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Kimball. Current estimates are that there may be a 20 per cent reduction in food in some areas. Reports by the IPCC showed that the recommended scenario means that global greenhouse gas emissions must stop over the next 30 years and then be reduced to levels significantly below current levels. This must be done by 2050, and preferably sooner. If that action is delayed, there will be really damaging effects on human health and food supplies and there will be natural disasters associated with damaging the infrastructure. However, through policies of mitigation and adaptation, this gloomy future for the climate is not completely inevitable, nor are all the damaging impacts on communities inevitable. Following the reports of Socolow at Princeton and Stern here in the UK, the Royal Commission report and today’s CBI report, there are a multiplicity of mitigation measures that could be used to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Those should be within the means of an economy such as the UK and eventually will be within the means of economies such as India and China. That will take many decades to achieve. Those measures involve either reducing the use of energy through greater efficiency and conservation and a move to more sustainable lifestyles and consumer demand, or replacing fossil fuels through the use of renewable and nuclear energy sources. The Japanese Parliament decided that lifestyle was important, and noble Lords will know that it adopted a new clothing style associated with trying to reduce energy. Members now wear a loose fitting uniform in the summer, and some Japanese parliamentarian—they do not make many jokes—said, ““It is rather cool, don’t you think?””. This evening, I had to take off my jersey as I came into the House of Lords. I had been in an economical university department earlier where I had my jersey on; then I came into this hothouse. Clearly, we have something to do to lead the rest of the UK on these matters. The Bill states that the UK needs to reduce its emissions by 60 per cent or more by 2050 by stages that are legally enforceable through rolling five-year targets. The challenging target for the UK is to take into account the fact that countries with lower standards of living and energy use will be increasing their emissions for the next 30 to 50 years before they start to make these changes. An important feature for the future, and one which gives us great optimism, is the use of solar energy, as mentioned earlier. The UK has perhaps some of the world’s greatest scientists dealing with the possibilities of plastics and nanotechnology, which may be able to cover roofs the world over. I have the vision of a man in Africa going on his bike to the local store and coming back with a light plastic sheet to put on his roof. At the moment, that would fizzle in the sun, but the research being done may enable us to see something different in the next five to 10 years. Another reason for being hopeful is more down to earth. Even with technology that was 10 years old, the borough of Woking, not so far from here, showed that it is possible in its building and transport facilities to reduce carbon emissions by 70 per cent and its use of energy by 45 per cent. If Woking can do it in the 1990s, surely we might be able to do it by the 2050s. That point was made in two of our reports. The organisational plan for implementing the Government’s policy is quite complicated. As the GLA pointed out in its briefing—it is nice for the GLA to make some organisational comments, because it gets a lot of flak from this House—with new organisations, there is a great danger of them treading on the toes of existing ones. The method of the Government here is a mixture of market forces based on carbon trading and administrative and fiscal measures. The latter are not particularly well set out in sufficient detail in the Bill for us to understand how they will be used and whether the advice of the Committee on Climate Change, which I very much welcome, will be sought as actively as on carbon budgeting. In particular, will the committee be able to investigate the plans and practices of public organisations, which I am pleased to see will now have obligations? Will the committee be able to quiz government departments? Will it be able to quiz the Treasury about the Budget before it makes the Budget? From my experience and that of many others of running government agencies—which in the UK employ more than 2 million people—the Government have often been reluctant to use those powers to help policy objectives. This new initiative will be a bit of a challenge for the whole governmental system, and I look forward to seeing how it works out. Christian Aid and other organisations are arguing that the Bill should include regulating the significant emissions of UK-based companies. The question of the role of local authorities was the dog that did not bark in the night. I gather that the committee under my noble friend Lord Puttnam wrestled with this but came up with a damp squib. It did not recommend that the Government should empower local government. Local government has shown that it can do it; it has shown that it can have leaders around the country. They will be the people who will be looked at to see whether this is happening. Whitehall is very remote for most people—