Mr.
Woolas: That is a good question. The hon. Gentleman has
said that we want 100 per cent., but we do not—we want
flexibility for 100 per cent. We will have this debate later, but, in
practice, one has to achieve a balance between UK domestic emissions
capping
and what is available for offsetting overseas. I do
not want him to leave this debate thinking that we want 100 per cent.,
as we do not. We want to get the balance right. The simple point in
what I have just said, which I want to emphasise, is that we want
flexibility. I believe that the hon. Gentleman agrees with
me—Members of his party in the other place
did. I
believe that the amendment helps to provide the clarity for which
business and others have been calling. Incidentally, for maximum
transparency, the report in clause 14 to which the hon. Gentleman has
referred must be laid before Parliament at the same time as each budget
is set, which is a point that we probed during consideration of an
earlier
amendment.
Gregory
Barker: We have not reached the vitally important issue of
using overseas carbon credits in Committee, but I have no doubt that it
will be an extremely important and engaging discussion when we do. My
party is strongly of the opinion that if we are to secure first-mover
advantage in the new low-carbon economy, it is vital that the UK
focuses its investment here in Britain, facilitating dynamic industrial
change in our economy, rather than through a trading system that would
involve the majority of the money going overseas. We certainly need to
do that if we are to develop the skills, jobs and technologies to make
Britain a truly green economy, but I shall save that debate for another
sitting. We
will support Government amendment No. 8. Whatever their designs may be
towards the distribution of domestic versus international carbon
reductions—we all have different views on the exact
distribution—it is certainly in the best interests of all
concerned and of the Bill that the implications of carbon trading are
examined and included in the strategy
report. Amendment
agreed to.
Amendment
made: No. 5, in clause 14, page 7, line 33, leave out ‘Prime
Minister’ and insert ‘Secretary of
State’.—[Mr.
Woolas.] Clause
14, as amended, ordered to stand part of the
Bill.
Clause
15Annual
statement of UK
emissions
Mr.
Woolas: I beg to move amendment No. 6, in clause 15, page
8, line 14, leave out ‘passenger travel and imports or exports
of goods’ and insert ‘aviation or international
shipping’.
The
Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss the
following: Government amendment No. 7, in
clause 30, page 15, line 36, leave
out subsections (1) to (5) and
insert— ‘(1) Emissions of
greenhouse gases from international aviation or international shipping
do not count as emissions from sources in the United Kingdom for the
purposes of this Part, except as provided by regulations made by the
Secretary of State. (2) The
Secretary of State may by order define what is to be regarded for this
purpose as international aviation or international
shipping. Any such order is
subject to affirmative resolution procedure.
(3) The Secretary of State must, before the end of
the period of five years beginning with the passing of this
Act— (a) make provision
by regulations as to the circumstances in which, and the extent to
which, emissions from international aviation or international shipping
are to be regarded for the purposes of this Part as emissions from
sources in the United Kingdom,
or (b) lay before Parliament a
report explaining why regulations making such provision have not been
made. (4) The expiry of the
period mentioned in subsection (3) does not affect the power of the
Secretary of State to make regulations under this
section. (5) Regulations under
this section— (a) may
make provision only in relation to emissions of a targeted greenhouse
gas; (b) may, in particular,
provide for such emissions to be regarded as emissions from sources in
the United Kingdom if they relate to the transport of passengers or
goods to or from the United
Kingdom.’. Amendment
(a) to Government amendment No. 7, in line 13, leave out from
‘Kingdom’ to end of line
15. Amendment
(b) to Government amendment No. 7, in line 13, leave out
from ‘Kingdom’ to end of line
17. Amendment
No. 81, in
clause 30, page 16, line 9, leave
out from ‘passed’ to end of line
11. Amendment
No. 82, in
clause 30, page 16, line 11, at
end insert— ‘(5A)
Regulations under this section must provide for emissions arising from
the transport of goods to the United Kingdom to take account of all
stages of the journey of those goods to the United Kingdom from their
point of origin, where any part of that journey has been by sea or
through the Channel
Tunnel.’. New
clause 1—Emissions from international aviation or
international shipping ‘(1)
Emissions of greenhouse gases from international aviation and shipping
shall count as emissions from sources in the United Kingdom for the
purposes of this Part from 1st January 2013, as provided by regulations
under this section. (2) The
Secretary of State may by order define what is to be regarded for this
purpose as international aviation or international
shipping. (3) An order made
under subsection (2) is subject to affirmative resolution
procedure. (4) The Secretary of
State may make provision by regulation as to the circumstances in
which, and the extent to which, emissions from international aviation
or international shipping are to be regarded for the purposes of this
Part as emissions from sources in the United
Kingdom. (5) Such provision may
be made only in relation to emissions of a targeted greenhouse gas and
in making such provision the Secretary of State shall have regard to
international carbon reporting
practice. (6) Regulations under
this section may make
provision— (a) as to the
period or periods (whether past or future) in which emissions of the
targeted greenhouse gas are to be taken into account as UK emissions of
that gas, and (b) as to the
manner in which such emissions are to be taken into account in
determining the 1990 baseline in relation to those
periods. (7) They may, in
particular— (a)
designate a different base year,
or (b) designate a number of
base years, and to provide for the emissions in that year, or the
average amount of emissions in those years, to be taken into account as
if part of the 1990 baseline.
(8) Regulations under this section are subject to
affirmative resolution
procedure.’. Amendment
(a) to new clause 1, in line 14, at end
insert— ‘(5A) Regulations
under this section must provide for emissions arising from the
transport of goods to the United Kingdom to take account of all stages
of the journey of those goods to the United Kingdom from their point of
origin, where any part of that journey has been by sea or through the
Channel
Tunnel.’.
Mr.
Woolas: We come to the detail of the Bill, and I suspect
that there will be a robust debate.
Mr.
Woolas: Robust, not long, Mr. Cook. There is no
reason why the debate cannot be short. The arguments have been
rehearsed in the other place and during pre-legislative scrutiny. The
Liberal Democrats have long campaigned for the existence of
pre-legislative scrutiny. I have never seen a correlation between the
amount of time spent on such scrutiny and the amount of time spent in
Public Bill Committee, but I live in
hope. Government
amendments Nos. 6 and 7 aim to clarify the Bill’s language,
while also working, of course, within the spirit and the intent of the
amendments made in the other place. They
replace “international
passenger travel and imports or exports of
goods” with “international
aviation or international shipping”.
Let me explain
why.
As amendment
No. 82 recognises, one possible way of defining these emissions is by
reference to “the transport of passengers or goods”.
However, there are, of course, other ways—I argue better
ways—to define those emissions, which we do not want to rule out
inadvertently. That is why I want to revert to the broader language
of “international
aviation or international
shipping”, which
is established terminology within the United Nations and the European
Union, as the right hon. Members for Suffolk, Coastal and for Penrith
and The Border will, I hope,
recognise. Furthermore,
the proposed clause 30(2) gives the Secretary of State the power
to: “define
what is to be regarded...as international aviation or
international
shipping.” This
power was originally part of the Bill, but it was removed in the other
place. It is a useful supplementary part of the Bill’s
framework. It allows us to clarify what we are talking about when we
refer
to: “international
aviation or international shipping”
emissions, and to
update that definition as necessary. For instance, and this is a very
important point, the definition would be updated if there were—I
hope and expect that there will be—an international agreement on
how to allocate emissions to individual countries.
Finally, the
other place set a deadline of within five years of Royal Assent for the
Secretary of State either to include international aviation and
shipping emissions in the UK’s targets under the Bill or to
explain to Parliament why that has not been done; it was an opt-out
rather than an opt-in, if I can put it that way.
Given the importance of securing international agreement on those
issues, we remain concerned that setting an arbitrary deadline risks
being perceived negatively by our international partners.
However—I look to my hon. Friend the Member for Bury, North at
this point—given the strength of feeling in the other place and
elsewhere on this issue, the Government are prepared to accept the duty
to act within five years, either by including those emissions in our
targets or by reporting to Parliament to explain why that was not
possible—in other words, the opt-out rather than the
opt-in. If I may, let
me briefly set out what clause 30(4) does, as amendment No. 81 would
remove it. We believe that it is necessary, because it clarifies that
the Secretary of State’s ability to make or amend regulations on
this issue does not end once the five-year period from Royal Assent has
elapsed. It ensures that the Secretary of State can still make
regulations or amend regulations that have already been
made. If
after, say, eight years, there was international agreement on a
different way of allocating emissions between countries, which does not
preclude an international agreement before that time, clause 30(4)
would allow us to amend our regulations to reflect that agreement, but
only after an affirmative vote in both Houses. Alternatively, if we
wanted to make some minor and technical changes to our existing
regulations, as is bound to happen at some point between 2013 and 2050,
clause 30(4) clarifies that that is possible.
Let me also
briefly set out the three key reasons why the Government feel that we
cannot set a date for including those emissions. First and most
importantly, we all agree that these are global issues and that a
global solution would be the best way forward. Let me reassure the
Committee that the United Kingdom is at the forefront of international
discussions and proposals to address that point. We are also starting
to see progress with both the International Civil Aviation Organisation
and the International Maritime Organisation in the United Nations
talks. Indeed, it was my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State who
successfully proposed at European Union level that aviation and
shipping be included within the targets. If we are to succeed, we will
need to persuade other countries that there is no hidden agenda and
that we are not trying to force something on them now for narrow
economic or political reasons. What we are trying to do is forge a
global solution in the best interests of the international community as
a whole, recognising that we are talking about global emissions that
affect our domestic circumstances and not the other way around. That
will be made much more difficult if we have a domestic deadline for
deciding what the UK’s fair share
is. As
hon. Members know, there are several possible ways of splitting
emissions between countries. For some countries, the methods provide
radically different answers. Independent analysis carried out for the
Government that examined different methods found, for instance, that
one of the models gave Belgium, a distinctly trading nation, more than
29 times as many emissions as under the other model. Denmark got more
than five times as many, while Sweden got less than half. Such
differences carry huge potential economic
implications. It
is not simply a case of picking the right methodology. Suppose in 2011
or 2012 we were nearing international agreement, with the UK playing a
leading role in the
discussions. Then, for entirely domestic reasons, we were forced to
choose a particular methodology for calculating the UK’s
emissions for “international aviation and shipping”. How
would that go down with our partners? Would that not give ammunition to
those states—there are many—that do not want to see
progress on the issue. They could say that we, the UK, were driven not
by genuine desire for global agreement but by domestic
concerns. Secondly,
it is not impossible that we could reach international agreement
through the United Nations framework convention on climate change, the
IMO or the ICAO. The best way to deal with international aviation or
shipping emissions is through a sectoral approach—my personal
view is that that is the most likely outcome—rather than
allocating emissions to individual countries. In fact, that is one of
the proposals that we are already discussing. We are already starting
to see it at the European Union level, where it is likely that under
the ETS aviation emissions will be allocated to airlines rather than to
individual member states. Once in the EU ETS, aviation emissions will
be capped, and any increase will have to be met by reductions
elsewhere. Any reduction in aviation emissions would simply lead to
emissions going up somewhere else, which is how emissions trading
works. Martin
Horwood (Cheltenham) (LD): What is the most optimistic
assessment for when such a sectoral international agreement might be
implemented?
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