SMEs: Net-zero Targets

Lord Watts Excerpts

Wednesday 7th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I agree. Carbon leakage is an important problem, and one of the reasons why a number of the larger industries are subject to international competition, as the noble Lord mentioned. We give them free permit allocations under the emissions trading system.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, are the Government looking at the efficiency of heat pumps? Have they monitored them, and will they produce a report on their cost and effectiveness?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

Indeed, we have already done so. There have been a number of reports on the efficiency of heat pumps. Efficiency varies depending on the quality of the installation. We must ensure that they are installed properly in the appropriate properties with the right number of emitters. I am happy to send copies of the reports that we have done to the noble Lord.

COP 28

Lord Watts Excerpts

Wednesday 17th May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I am not going to get into the debate about Minister Stuart. He does an excellent job and is well respected across the international community for his work, building on the work that we did at COP 26. We are committed to the Powering Past Coal Alliance. I think the noble Lord is being slightly disingenuous; he knows that the coal mine in Cumbria is nothing to do with power generation.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

Do noble Lords share my concern that the Minister has just said that what France is doing does not concern him? Does he not understand that, if we are to deal with climate change, we all need to work together?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I think I said that what negotiations go on between France and the EU are not our concern any more because we are not a member of the EU. Of course we work collaboratively with many countries across the world, not just in the EU. This is a worldwide problem and we need to negotiate on a worldwide basis, which of course we do. Carbon emissions do not respect international borders.

Climate Change: Net Zero Strategy

Lord Watts Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

Again, I am afraid I do not agree with the noble Baroness. There are some exciting prospects and we are supporting early-stage tidal projects. It depends whether she means wave-powered projects or the various barrage schemes, which are extremely expensive and have a lot of environmental implications. The approach that we take through the CfD system is to pick the most effective, cheapest means of decarbonisation, because of course it all feeds back into consumer bills. If we adopted the approach she is suggesting, these technologies are relatively unproven and would add to consumer bills.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, the Minister claims that we are making more progress than other European countries, but is it not because we started at such a low point? Let me give an example: we have the worst-insulated homes in Europe. Is it not the case that it is a very low level of improvement?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

No, it is not. The figures I quoted started from a baseline of 1990, so it actually includes some of the progress made under previous Labour Governments. There is no question that of course we have a challenge: we have the oldest housing stock in Europe, a consequence of the Industrial Revolution. Six million homes were built before the First World War, so it is a challenge, but the figures still stand: we are making faster progress than any other G7 country.

Green Investment

Lord Watts Excerpts

Tuesday 7th March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I am afraid I do not have that information to hand. I will need to write to my noble friend.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, is it not the case that the American policy is being driven by the fact that living standards in America—and in Europe and here—have been dropping? The gap between rich and poor is getting wider, and Governments have so far failed to address that problem.

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I do not agree with the noble Lord. There are reasons why the US adopted its policy —investment, which we welcome, into green renewable energy, et cetera. Of course, the US is starting from an awfully long way behind the UK. One of the reasons it has to put in such large subsidies is that it has not provided the long-term legislative certainty that we have.

Methane Emissions

Lord Watts Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I am sure that my noble friend has heard the noble Baroness’s point, and she makes a very salient contribution. It is vital that we implement food waste collection as fast as possible, and I am particularly keen to do that because we have a whole series of anaerobic digestors being rolled out across the country, generating clean green gas that can feed directly into the gas mains. We have a subsidy policy in place for that; it is an excellent scheme, and we want to expand it.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, as well as failing in most areas of public policy, the Government are failing in the insulation of homes. Would not it be good for them to actually do something about this, as it would reduce pollution and help people with their energy bills?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

It would indeed be good for the Government to do something about it—and, indeed, we are. We have an excellent insulation programme; we are spending something like £6.6 billion over this Parliament on insulation schemes. If the noble Lord would have a little patience, we will announce new schemes shortly. The Chancellor has already committed another £6 billion from 2025 for those schemes. Of course, there is always more that we can do—we have one of the biggest problems in Europe in terms of having the oldest housing stock, as many of our homes were built before the First World War. There is a lot to do, and we are doing a lot—and in essence the noble Lord is right, in that we can of course always do more on insulation, but let us not pretend that we are not doing anything at all.