Mr.
Hurd: I have no doubt about the Minister’s
sincerity on this issue, as I have heard her talk about it before, but
let me put it to her that as far as this is concerned, her advice is
duff. Clause 11 says quite categorically that we put, as a society, a
value on material prosperity and the economy because we have to take
into account economic circumstances and the impact on the economy.
However, when we are being presented with an opportunity to send a
strong signal that we put a value on the natural resources on which
that economy depends, we duck
it.
Joan
Ruddock: On the contrary. The case that I make is that the
phrase that we have in the Bill about science entirely covers those
points. All the science acknowledges these points. I have to return the
hon. Gentleman to the nature of the amendments—this is a
technical point—which are specifically asking us when setting
budgets, which are just numbers, to take account of the effect that
that might have on the world’s biodiversity and the
world’s temperature rises. Clearly, I am sorry to say, I could
use the same word—“duff”—about the
amendments, but I shall say that they at least do not
work.
4
pm
David
Maclean: I am grateful to the hon. Lady for the kind and
courteous way in which she is dealing with my amendments. While I
accept that they might legally and technically be duff, given that in
the places I have tried to insert the phrases
“biodiversity” and “rain forest”, they may
not actually work, will she accept the vision thing? She kindly said
that in my speech I was making “a vision thing”. Does she
not accept that somewhere in the Bill, with the Government’s
excellent lawyers and civil service, they could put a bit of the vision
thing in, using appropriate phraseology and at the appropriate place,
to highlight the importance of rain forests and
biodiversity?
Joan
Ruddock: I think the right hon. Gentleman has enough
parliamentary experience to know that we do not put such visions into
Bills. We debated a preamble in a previous sitting. When great speeches
come to be made, as they will as a consequence of the Bill becoming an
Act of Parliament and all that will flow from that, including the
reports that come in to Parliament, people will undoubtedly surround
whatever they have to say of a technical nature with that vision,
because nobody can doubt that that vision is why we are doing this. Why
have the Government brought a Bill of this nature to Parliament?
Because we understand that our whole planet is in great danger and we
must make our contribution to dealing with it. However, as my hon.
Friend the Minister for the Environment has had to say on several
occasions, we deal with only what we have the possibility to control,
and that is our own carbon emissions and the way in which we decide on
them and report on
them. I
shall dealing now with the new reporting requirement that the right
hon. Member for Penrith and The Border would like to place upon us. We
are in the business of reporting on UK biodiversity and I assure the
Committee that there are regular reports. If hon. Members have not seen
them, they should look for them, because they are comprehensive. The
hon. Member for Cheltenham congratulated us on our UK biodiversity
action plan. That is entirely transparent and a way in which people can
follow the efforts that are being made to conserve UK
biodiversity. Regular
reporting occurs and, in particular, DEFRA leads on the natural
environment public service agreement, which includes targets for the
Government’s approach to action on biodiversity. Progress
against the PSA is, of course, published annually in the departmental
annual report to Parliament. I suggest that any additional reporting
requirement would be unnecessary in any case, but clearly would not
work for this
Bill. To
summarise, the Government’s view of the group of amendments is
that scientific knowledge about climate change is wide enough to ensure
that the matters raised by the right hon. Member for Penrith and The
Border are taken into account in relation to carbon budgets, in so far
as that is possible. The Government are deeply committed to promoting
biodiversity in the UK and overseas. I meant to mention, but forgot,
that the right hon. Member for Suffolk, Coastal referred to the need to
link indigenous lifestyles with the conservation of biodiversity. I
refer him to the Darwin initiative, for which he can take some credit,
which has funded hundreds of projects in developing countries where we
are doing
precisely that. I am glad to say that I recently launched a new round of
funding for that so that we can help developing countries with our
scientific expertise, particularly on climate change and the way in
which lifestyles need not threaten biodiversity and we can all work
together. I
do not believe that the amendments would add value to the
Government’s existing reporting to Parliament on biodiversity
and I do not believe there is a meaningful causal relationship between
the UK’s carbon budgets, or our policies to meet them, and the
level of global temperatures and loss of international biodiversity. I
tell the right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border that I therefore
cannot accept the
amendment.
David
Maclean: I am grateful to the Minister for her kind and
courteous reply. She said at a couple of points in her response that of
course it is implicit in considering “scientific
knowledge” that loss of biodiversity, the rain forest and other
matters will be taken into account. She said that it would be
inconceivable to consider new scientific knowledge without considering
those matters. I accept that, but she said towards the end that, as far
as was possible, the Government would take loss of biodiversity into
account. She says, and I accept, that the Government would not wish to
set a target for the United Kingdom based on what was happening in the
Amazonian rain forest or in Papua New
Guinea. I
had no intention of seeking to tie British policy to things of which
the Government are not in charge. It would be utterly wrong to attempt
in any way to tie the Government’s hands by including a legal
obligation in respect of rain forests and biodiversity, and therefore
requiring a carbon target to be set for the United Kingdom on matters
that are way outside the Government’s control. I was seeking to
incorporate a little bit of vision in the Bill because I think that it
lacks
it. One
of the reasons why we are here is because people have a vision of the
disastrous consequences of climate change if it goes unchecked. I was
merely seeking—in a technically inadequate way, I know—to
introduce some concepts that the Minister says are already implicit in
the reporting mechanism. I would merely wish the Minister and her civil
servants to think again. Are there ways to flag up the two phrases,
perhaps in a reporting mechanism—possibly not a reporting
mechanism on
carbon budgets, but elsewhere in the Bill—in addition to all the
current reporting that the Government may do, and in addition to any
other report laid before Parliament? Is it possible to include
somewhere in this Bill—the most important one for a
generation—on climate change and saving the planet phrases about
the loss of biodiversity and rain forests, or preservation of
biodiversity and rain
forests? The
Minister is right. No doubt when politicians make great speeches in the
future, they will talk about biodiversity and rain forests, not just 60
and 80 per cent. targets. However, I am afraid that when my hon. Friend
the Member for Bexhill and Battle is sitting in the Department as the
Minister of State, possibly in a couple of years’ time, and he
goes off to make a major speech, he will want to talk about
biodiversity and rain forests but his officials will say, “No,
Minister. You must stick to the terms of the Bill, which is all about
climate change. We have a very exciting speech here for the UN about 20
per cent. targets,” or 80 or 60 per cent. targets. That might be
fanciful and it might not happen—it is fanciful that my hon.
Friend would accept the advice, because I am sure that he would
not. The
Minister and hon. Members sitting with her can tell from what I have
been saying that I have no intention of putting wrecking provisions
into the Bill, or of including provisions that are impossible to
achieve, or meaningless legally or technically. I do not wish to press
the amendment to a Division because that would be against the spirit of
consensus—we are almost in agreement on this—but I hope
that the Minister will think again and try to find a way of coming back
on Report with a proposal to include in the Bill an obligation to talk
about the things that she says are implicit in
it. I
am sorry if my colleagues are disappointed that I will not press the
amendment to a Division, but I suspect that I would not win and I would
not win for the wrong reasons. I might anger the Minister such that she
does not come back on another occasion with an amendment that is not
duff, so I beg to ask leave to withdraw the
amendment. Amendment,
by leave,
withdrawn. Clause
11 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Further
consideration adjourned.—[Siobhain
McDonagh.] Adjourned
accordingly at nine minutes past Four o’clock till Tuesday 1
July at half-past Ten
o’clock.
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