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9.53 am
Mrs. Teresa Gorman (Billericay): I congratulate the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, North (Ms Walley) on securing a debate on such an important matter. Perhaps we should discuss environmental issues more than we do. In fact, this is not just a question of the environment; it is a question of the economy, the politics of the country and our attitude to various of our industries, including important industries such as the car industry and the fossil fuel industry.
Let me put my cards on the table. I drive a car, and Ford UK is in my constituency. That company is an important employer, but, like the rest of the car industry in the west nowadays, it is also extremely responsible in regard to emissions. Over the past few years, it has reduced the particulates--the bits and pieces that come out of exhaust pipes--to practically nil.
We are not talking about the kind of pollution that we associate with the old-fashioned smogs. We are talking in particular about Kyoto, which is intended to deal with
the level of carbon dioxide emissions in our atmosphere. We must discover where those emissions come from. In fact, the great majority do not come from motor cars: only about 20 per cent. of the alleged carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere--by which I assume people mean emissions other than the natural carbon dioxide emissions from decaying vegetable matter--come from cars.
I should say in passing that I have been a scientist for the past 35 years, and I therefore know something about the detail of the subject. Facts and figures sometimes drive people nuts and do not get to the point, but the point is that the motor car is not the villain that it is sometimes portrayed as being. The vast majority of carbon dioxide emissions probably come from house dwellers--from the fuel they burn or from the fuel they waste. Housing should be better insulated, because it can have a detrimental effect on the air that we all breathe.
Of course we are all keen to improve the environment, but the atmosphere and its effect on our climate have little to do with anything we do on this earth. Most climate changes are due either to the sun, which influences our climate enormously, or to our planet's orbit around it. That orbit varies, as was demonstrated recently. Those who were awake and looking at the sky one night in September will have seen a remarkable eclipse of the moon, which, for a short period, appeared much larger than usual. That was because of one of the wobbles in the earth's orbit.
The climate is also strongly influenced by ocean currents, as we saw recently. El Nino has had a massive effect on the climate. It causes huge changes, producing violent rain storms and other destructive weather, for which some people immediately blame motor car pollution.
Another massive cause of climate change is volcanic activity. People seem to think, from what they read in the papers, that a volcano pops off occasionally--that it is a one-off event that occurs every few years, and is not significant. That is not true. In the Antarctic region, close to the area where the measurement of ozone holes is carried out, there is a very active volcano, Mount Erebus, which produces in a year more chlorine gases--which contribute to the chlorofluorocarbons in the upper atmosphere--than the whole of industrial production since the beginning of the industrial revolution. Those are the three massive forces over which human beings have little control.
Another significant climatic element is the fact that the Earth is basically a water planet, 75 per cent. of whose surface is covered by water. Only 15 per cent. of the remaining part--the land mass--is habitable: most of it consists of mountain ranges, ice plains and deserts.
The inhabited part of the earth's surface is very small, and only a tiny portion of that is industrialised; most of it is agricultural land. It is important to keep the facts and figures in proportion. Only a small part of the Earth's surface is involved in industrial activities that contribute CO 2 to the atmosphere. There is a tendency to think that industrial activity is extremely dangerous for our atmosphere and climate, and that the problem can be dealt with by punishing the motorist and cutting down on the use of the motor car. At that point, the argument comes down to politics.
I see from the attendance in the Chamber for this debate that a number of hon. Members are concerned about this matter. If they want to hear the other side of the story,
I advise them to read documents produced by NASA. Its upper atmosphere research programme puts out extremely informative documents about changes in the atmosphere and about the amount of gases, including greenhouse gases. It insists that the hysteria that is generated by this subject, particularly on climate effects, is unwarranted, but that is not a particularly popular view. An enormous number of institutions, such as Globe, genuinely believe that there is a serious problem that industrialised western countries can deal with.
I should love better quality air. Everyone wants that; it is like motherhood and apple pie. I deplore the fact that, when I was in Egypt recently, I could see across the Nile at 7 am, but not at 10 am, because pollution levels from the old rust buckets that roam the streets were such that the atmosphere was very unpleasant. That applies in other parts of the world, such as China, although I have never been there. I know Mexico City very well, and it has a dreadful pollution problem, but that is partly due to the fact that the city is surrounded by mountainous regions.
There is an alternative point of view, and it is well received in the United States. It brings me to the attitude of President Clinton to the Kyoto conference. Without the agreement of the Americans to the proposed 20 per cent. reduction in emissions, nothing much will happen. President Clinton has laid his cards on the table. We should not assume that his is just the voice of a careless and vote-happy President who wants to preserve his industries against the better interests of mankind. The Americans are as pollution-conscious and as concerned about global warming as we are.
In science, one has to deal with the facts and consider both sides of the story. The amount of investment in our industrial society, the jobs it provides and its importance to the standard of living of the people we represent are serious considerations. We should not go to the Kyoto conference calling for global figures, such as a 20 per cent. reduction of CO 2 in the atmosphere, just because that is a nice target at which to aim.
Rev. Martin Smyth (Belfast, South):
I appreciate the hon. Lady's argument, because I recognise that other factors are at work, but we should take the right remedy. The car industry produced the catalytic converter, but it is not much use in industrial cities and is a waste of money. Does the hon. Lady accept that the argument coming out of the United States is that the Americans do not want their industries to be injured further while other countries are polluting more than they are? The argument is not just about the scientific fact that nature produces its own pollution: it is about the Americans looking after the mighty buck.
Mrs. Gorman:
I take the hon. Gentleman's point. I put it to him that it is the duty of any Government to ensure that industries, which are the backbone of communities, are properly looked after and protected. I hope that every hon. Member has the same attitude.
Is President Clinton being selfish or is he being responsible in saying that emissions produced by motor cars in the United States are relatively small, given the improvements that have been made, especially with
regard to particulates as opposed to the CO 2 element? How important are CO 2 emissions from the motor car compared with other forms of adding CO 2 to the atmosphere? I repeat that less than 20 per cent. of CO 2 >emissions into the atmosphere come from the car, so it is an easy target. Insulation of properties is less easy, because everyone could do something about that, as opposed to leaving an individual industry to do it.
Other parts of the globe, such as China, the countries of the former Soviet Union and Mexico, are not able to make those improvements, especially given the low level of wealth of their citizens. The way to help those countries is to improve their economies overall. I am sure that the Egyptians who were driving rust buckets around Cairo would love to have a nice car with controlled emissions and catalytic convertors, whether or not they work.
My argument is about the importance of the motor car. This debate and the discussions at Kyoto are an attack on the industrialised west, its alleged greedy consumption of fossil fuels such as coal and its selfish use of raw materials in the production of motor cars.
Mr. Cynog Dafis (Ceredigion):
It is important to note that objective scientific work has been done on this subject. The energy technology support unit has produced an account of how it believes the United Kingdom proposal of a 20 per cent. reduction could be achieved by 2010. It has produced figures for different sectors: industry and services could reduce by 9.6 million tonnes of carbon; the domestic sector by 7.6 million tonnes; transport by 14.9 million tonnes, so that is an important component; and renewable energy could make a contribution of 2.7 million tonnes. Those figures show a 40 million tonne carbon reduction. That is not a random attack on any particular sector, certainly not on the transport sector. However, the reality is that transport can and will have to make its contribution.
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