Climate Change Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 22: 22: After Clause 4, insert the following new Clause— ““Budget compliance mechanism (1) In the event that it appears from the annual statement of UK emissions (required by section 12) that the net UK carbon account for a budgetary period will exceed the carbon budget, it is the duty of the Secretary of State to prepare and lay before Parliament within three months a preliminary compliance action plan containing proposals and policies to ensure that the excess is made good during the following budgetary period. (2) In the event that the final statement for a budgetary period (required by section 14) shows that the net UK carbon account for the period has exceeded the carbon budget, the excess amount must be deducted from the carbon budget for the subsequent period; and it is the duty of the Secretary of State to lay before Parliament within three months an action plan containing proposals and policies (which may include the purchase of carbon units up to the limit advised by the Committee on Climate Change in accordance with section 17) to ensure that the UK carbon account does not exceed the revised budget for the budgetary period and takes account of the target for 2050.”” The noble Earl said: My Lords, the amendment inserts a new clause relating to a budget compliance mechanism. I referred to this amendment when I was speaking to Amendment No. 2 because they are linked. To start off, I would like to say how grateful I am that the Government have moved slightly towards us. It is a rather strange situation when a lot of us who are moving amendments are speaking to government amendments that come afterwards. It is not normal, but it is rather fun to do it that way, and we say to the Government that we welcome their amendment. However, it is a rather peely-wally one that does not nearly go far enough. Government Amendment No. 81 refers only to Clause 14. In what period does the Minister expect the corrective action to take place? In his amendment it says only that, "““the Secretary of State must lay before Parliament a report setting out proposals and policies to compensate in future periods for the excess emissions””." It does not say in what timescale that has to happen. There is a real lack of urgency and specificity in his amendment. There is another fault with the government amendment. The final statement for a budgetary period under Clause 14 need not be laid before 31 May in the second year following the end of the period to which it relates. By the time the Secretary of State publishes his action plan to remedy the shortfall, it will be so far into the budgetary period that it may be very difficult to remedy that shortfall during that period. The scenario of falling behind is compounded. That is why the amendment in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Crickhowell is superior to that of the Government. In our subsection (1) we refer to Clause 12, which covers the annual statement that, "““must be laid before Parliament not later than 31st of March in the second year following that to which it relates””." It gives early warning signals for any non-compliance. Therefore, we have divided our compliance mechanism into two parts. First, there is the preliminary plan initiating action to try to prevent the shortfall. Then there is the fall-back position, which is the final action plan, imposing a duty to correct during the following budgetary period—and that period will be almost complete by the time we know what the problem is. We have drawn our amendment widely so that it can include carbon units that can be purchased. It will allow the Government flexibility to limit the timescale for correction. If you cannot purchase units, trying to resolve the problem of falling behind the target will be much harder. I commend our amendment to the Minister, and I hope that this time he will say, ““Yes, you are right. I will take it away and improve our own amendment””. I beg to move.