Climate Change Bill [HL]

My Lords, let me make it clear at the outset on Amendments Nos. 22 and 81 that I fully accept that we are aiming at the same goal to strengthen the Bill’s framework. I hope that I can put some meat on to that in my brief remarks. We have discussed previously how the targets and budgets under the Bill will bite on the Government. As we have already said, we believe that by putting the duties into law we are giving them constitutional significance that will inform every level of decision-making. It remains the case that any failure would carry the risk of judicial review with a remedy at the discretion of the court. The Bill’s existing provisions ensure maximum transparency on whether a budget or target has been met, which means that there would be a considerable penalty in terms of parliamentary opinion—and in the court of public opinion—if it had not been met. However, we have carefully considered the suggestions made in Committee that the Bill itself should prescribe an automatic penalty in the event that the Government miss a budget. I do not wish to undermine the Bill’s existing framework, so the transparency provisions and the option for judicial review remain, but I am proposing a more specific addition to that armoury. Government Amendment No. 81 therefore requires that in the event of the net UK carbon account for a budgetary period exceeding the carbon budget, the Secretary of State must lay before Parliament a plan setting out proposals and policies for making up the shortfall in the carbon budget. The plan must be published as soon as reasonably practicable after the final statement for the budgetary period is published. Moreover, as with the existing proposals and policies for meeting budgets, if the plan refers or relates to policies or proposals of any of the other national authorities, it must be prepared in consultation with that authority. This amendment—I shall discuss Amendment No. 22 in a moment—draws heavily on an amendment tabled by the noble Lords, Lord Crickhowell and Lord Teverson, and the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, in Committee. We believe that this new requirement will focus still further the mind of every Government on practical matters: the need to meet each budget and what they will have to do in the unlikely event that the budget is not met. Before I come to Amendment No. 22, it is worth responding to a couple of points made by the noble Earl when he asked about the timetable for taking action required by the government amendment. Under the Government’s proposals, we obviously hope that the budget will not be missed but, if it is, the Government of the day will be under enormous public and parliamentary pressure to make up the shortfall as soon as possible. We must leave it to the Government of the day to take those decisions. The noble Earl also asked why the Clause 14 report will not be published until 17 months later. It appears that this is the earliest that the information will be available. The emissions figures for the last year of the budget period will not be available until 15 months later, which leaves only two more months for the Government to buy credits and so on to meet their targets. That is the reason for the 17 months. Both noble Earls asked about things going badly during the budget period. This is the whole point of our proposal for an annual indicative range, backed by the annual progress report of the Committee on Climate Change to Parliament. There will be full transparency about progress during the budget period. Amendment No. 22 clearly has much in common with government Amendment No. 81, but government Amendment No. 81 is a better way forward in a number of ways. First, proposed subsection (1) in Amendment No. 22 seems to duplicate the existing reporting provisions of the Bill. The Bill already has a clear, transparent mechanism for an annual assessment of progress through the Committee on Climate Change’s report to Parliament under Clause 28. As I said, we have also proposed amendments, which we will come to later, that will strengthen this annual reporting progress, including ensuring that the Government respond to the points that the Committee on Climate Change makes. Proposed subsection (1) in Amendment No. 22 seems to repeat much of this but with no role for the Committee on Climate Change and we ask how this would sit alongside the committee’s annual progress report under Clause 28. Proposed subsection (2) in Amendment No. 22 clearly has, as I said, a lot in common with both the amendment that we discussed in Committee and government Amendment No. 81. However, a number of issues still need to be addressed. Amendment No. 22 does not, for instance, address the role of the devolved Administrations if a budget is missed. Will they have a role? Obviously government Amendment No. 81 sets out a process for consulting the devolved Administrations. As I said in my opening remarks, the amendments aim at the same goal—to strengthen the Bill’s framework—but we think that government Amendment No. 81 is the better approach. I say to the noble Earl that I, too, would be much more relaxed if the groups of amendments were such that I could present the Government’s response to Committee to kick off the debate, but there is a procedure for dealing with amendments. I can kick off the debate on some—the next group, for example—but I have not been able to do that so far. I understand that that would be more convenient and make the debate flow better. Effectively, I am technically reporting back to Parliament at Report stage with suggestions from the Government, having listened to what was said in Committee and not trying to do a Committee stage again.