Climate Change Committee: Discussions

Baroness Sheehan Excerpts

Thursday 27th April 2023 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Sheehan]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what discussions they have had with the Climate Change Committee about (1) the impact newly licensed oil and gas infrastructure will have on domestic and global emissions, and (2) the design of their ‘Climate Compatibility Checkpoint’.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (Lord Callanan) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government work closely with the Climate Change Committee and are grateful for its expert independent advice. The committee provided advice on 24 February 2022 in relation to both new licensing and the climate compatibility checkpoint; the advice was published on the committee’s website. Officials also had several discussions with the committee throughout the design process for the checkpoint. Its advice was considered in the final design, which has now been published on the GOV.UK website.

[Baroness Sheehan (LD)]

My Lords, the climate compatibility checkpoint, in reference to new oil and gas fields, is, quite frankly, doublethink in Orwellian proportions. Can the Minister confirm that the IEA, the IPCC, the vast bulk of UK scientists and the Government’s own net zero tsar, Chris Skidmore, have all stated that the opening of new fields is incompatible with keeping global warming within the 1.5 degree scenario necessary to protect us and the natural world from catastrophic climate breakdown?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I do not agree with the noble Baroness. She is dead wrong about these matters. The reality is, whether the Liberal Democrats like it or not, that we get about 75% of our energy from oil and gas. That is declining, and the North Sea is a declining field. Unless she is proposing to tell voters that they should disconnect their gas boilers or not drive their cars anywhere, we have a requirement for oil and gas in the future, albeit for a declining amount. Therefore, the only question is whether we get them from our own fields and employ British workers, paying British taxes, or whether we import them from abroad, which usually has a higher carbon footprint. That is the choice that faces us.