My Lords, I was pleased to add my name to the amendment, although I do not pretend to be an expert on exactly how it would work. There was a great celebration in February this year when our Prime Minister, to whom I give full credit, made a declaration jointly with Nick Clegg, the then Deputy Prime Minister and Ed Miliband the then leader of the Official Opposition. They made pledges through the Green Alliance, one of which was to accelerate the transition to a competitive energy-efficient, low-carbon economy and to end the use of unabated coal for power generation.
That was a fantastic declaration at the beginning of a general election campaign when politics was running high and competition between political parties was starting to move into a more confrontational stage. Yet three party leaders came together and said that low carbon and taking out unabated coal would be key. I see the amendment as something that could move us towards that solution in a concrete way. That is why I support it so strongly.
The Energy Act 2013 started off being about decarbonisation. It made it clear that the Secretary of State had the ability—and in parliamentary Bill language that presumed that the Secretary of State would—to declare a decarbonisation target in 2016 when the Committee on Climate Change came forward with its recommendations for the fifth carbon budget. My question to the Minister on this key area in meeting Climate Change Act obligations is whether the Secretary of State intends next year to follow that through in the carbon budget that is recommended and the one that is subsequently agreed.
The other attractive thing about this amendment is that it tries to find a least-cost way through to decarbonisation. As previous debates have shown, in this House we are united in wanting to decarbonise our economy at least cost. We all know that that is important to consumers, for fuel poverty and to the competitiveness of our economy. This amendment finds a way to do that.
I welcome the amendment and I agree entirely with what the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, has put forward. I will be interested to learn from the Minister how the Government intend to take forward the pledge the Prime Minister made in February. Will the Government move next year to a decarbonisation target for 2030 and, as part of that, will they make sure that coal really does disappear from our system as soon as that is practically possible?
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