Climate Change Bill [HL]

I support the spirit of this amendment, but I have been in this House long enough to look at the small subsections. Clause 10(3) pretty well covers all the points made in this amendment. It says: "““Nothing in this section is to be read as restricting the matters that the Secretary of State or the Committee may take into account””." One point we always discuss in this House is the extent to which we should take provisions like that and make them explicit. Targets for carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions are strongly related to another environmental point, the question of air quality. In urban areas, that is a serious matter. Perhaps 20,000 to 30,000 people per year in the UK die prematurely as a result of poor air quality—a higher figure than anything we are likely to see in the next 20 or 30 years for those dying prematurely from the effects of extreme heatwaves or other climatic events. The Environment Agency, which is concerned with air pollution, will also be the agency concerned with monitoring the emissions that go into the calculations of climate change controls and regulations. I am sure that the department, the Environment Agency and the climate change committee will bear these points in mind. It would be extremely complex to try to put all that into the Bill. I hope the Minister, in responding to the amendment, will explain how the Government are trying to take—in the words they now use, of which I approve—a holistic approach, considering all the different factors. The other important point that was made by the noble Duke was on the issue of adaptation—and of course adaptation is now in the Long Title of the Bill. But again, adaptation is not going to be part of the responsibility of the climate change committee, for reasons that will be explained more fully when that comes to be debated. Some of the best policies will need to consider mitigation and adaptation together. But in order to restrict its role, the climate change committee will focus on the emission aspects of the problem, and the Secretary of State’s job is to make sure that all these different and complex issues come together. The question is whether the Bill as framed meets these points, and perhaps the Minister will be able to explain that.