No, I certainly will not do that; gas is a key part of our carbon plan, and I hope that the hon. Gentleman will look at the gas strategy as a whole.
Setting a target now to come into effect next April would mean not waiting to consider what is happening in the wider economy, for example, the progress being made in the commercial deliverability of carbon capture and storage, how that could contribute to decarbonising our energy supply, and the take-up of electric vehicles in the coming years. Therefore, setting a target now risks imposing additional costs on the economy and on consumer bills in the future in order to meet the target, and that would not be helpful for anyone.
The Government believe that the right approach is to make a decision on whether to set a target in 2016, when we can consider the whole picture. That already means setting the target range 14 years before it is due to be met. That is even longer than is required under the Climate Change Act 2008 in respect of carbon budgets, which are set 12 years ahead. Setting it now—in effect, asking Ministers to set it at Christmas—means that we would be doing so 17 years ahead. I suggest to the House that there is no certainty for investors in setting a target before we can possibly know how we can meet it.
That takes me to my second point, which is that the Secretary of State can only make a decision on whether to set a target when considering the trajectory of the whole economy towards our 2050 target in a way that is consistent with the overarching framework provided by the Climate Change Act. The timing is important. There is significant interaction between the electricity sector and other sectors of the economy, especially those, such as heat and transport, that might well become more dependent on electricity as we move into the 2020s and 2030s. That will in turn have an impact not only on overall demand for electricity but on when that electricity is needed.
Such questions must all be considered together when thinking about the best way to decarbonise electricity generation as part of a least-cost route to meeting our obligations under the Climate Change Act. It is therefore vital that a decision to set a target range is not taken in isolation, which is the approach suggested by my hon. Friend the Member for South Suffolk and the hon. Member for Brent North, but in the context of considering the pathway of the whole economy towards our 2050 target. That date will be in 2016 and not before, because 2016 is when we are due to set in law the level of our economy-wide fifth carbon budget, which will cover the corresponding period between 2028 and 2032. At that point, we will be able to consider the pathway of the whole economy towards our overarching 2050 target and understand better the most cost-effective way to achieve that. If at that point in time it is decided that a target range is the right approach, we will have the legal authority under the Bill to act swiftly to set a binding target at the right level.
I believe that my hon. Friend the Member for Wealden (Charles Hendry) was right to say in an article last weekend:
“My difficulty with the target…is that we would be requiring it to be set without knowing that it can be met, and that cannot be a responsible decision for government to make, when the costs of getting it wrong would have to be picked up by consumers for decades to come.”
His argument is that given the uncertainties about the relative costs and potential of different low-carbon technologies, it would not be right for a Government to set a target now without first having thought through precisely how a particular level would be achieved. I agree with him and believe that that is why we should consider setting a target range in 2016 in the wider context of setting and determining how we will meet the fifth carbon budget.
That takes me to my final argument, which is that amendment 14 requires that the level of the decarbonisation target range must not exceed that recommended by the Committee on Climate Change. I fully agree that there should be a role for the committee and our proposed approach takes that into account.