Communicating Climate Science

Joan Walley Excerpts

Thursday 23rd October 2014 Westminster Hall

[Joan Walley (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab)]

I intend to make only a very brief contribution to the debate on the report by the Science and Technology Committee, “Communicating climate science”, but I did feel that it was important to come along, listen and give some perspective from the point of view of the Select Committee on Environmental Audit. As hon. Members on both sides will know, that is a cross-cutting parliamentary Select Committee; it looks right across the board at different Departments.

Unsurprisingly, our Committee has spent a lot of time looking at climate science and climate change. The overarching theme that comes out of virtually all our inquiries is that looking at environmental issues, from whatever perspective, should not be a matter for just one Department, one business, one sector or one section of the media to deal with. It needs to be brought together in a cross-cutting way. It seemed to me that the conclusions of the Science and Technology Committee report were doing just that, so I felt that it was important to come along and take part in the debate.

I congratulate the Chair of the Select Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Andrew Miller), on securing the debate. It is important that we discuss work that Select Committees of the House have done. However, much as I welcome the support for and the emphasis on sound science, the integrity of science and the importance of science not being exploited for short-term political expediency, I think that what the report is really trying to say is that there must be an overall strategy from Government for communicating climate science. I believe that that is very important.

I was heartened to see that the report was unanimous; there was no minority report. Having listened to my hon. Friend the Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer), however, I wonder whether there was complete unanimity.

[Graham Stringer]

It was a remarkable work.

[Joan Walley]

It certainly was remarkable, because when I listened to my two hon. Friends, I did not get the sense that I was hearing about the same report. In fact, I looked at their body language to see whether there was any difference from what was said in the report, and I did not see that either.

Climate change is the most important issue that we face locally, nationally and internationally, so it is strategically important that we communicate the science of climate change in as robust a way as possible, having regard to the facts. After that, what matters is policy, and the support that politicians receive for those policies. If we do not have the trust of the British public for the policies that we want to implement on climate change and climate science, we will not get the policy outcomes that we so urgently require. That is why I had misgivings when I was listening to my hon. Friend the Member for Blackley and Broughton.

For me, the most important thing is that, as even the Prime Minister stated during Prime Minister’s questions on 26 February in response to questions about the winter floods,

“man-made climate change is one of the most serious threats that this country and this world face.”—[Official Report, 26 February 2014; Vol. 576, c. 255.]

He spoke about the UK’s carbon budgets and the importance of long-term investment. Hon. Members from both sides of the House know that we are at an important stage in the international negotiations that are taking place, which we hope will be completed in Paris in 2015.

This week, there are also important negotiations going on in the European Commission about the target of reducing carbon emissions by 40%. There is great concern that even if that proposal goes through, we will still be moving away from our target of keeping warming within 2° C. Negotiations are under way and huge decisions are being taken, and it will be incumbent on Ministers to return to the House and do the best that they can on those negotiations.

If Members of Parliament, let alone members of the public, have no awareness of the science of climate change, we will not have the public trust that we need to achieve the required outcomes. I do not think that future generations will forgive us if we do not achieve those outcomes, because the clock is ticking. Indeed, Lord Prescott talked about stopping the clock in the negotiations that took place in Durban. We are in an urgent situation, and I believe that the overall recommendation in the report—that the Government must communicate climate science—is exactly what is needed to bolster and support the international discussions.

For that reason, I hope that the Minister—I welcome her to her new position—will set out whether and how the Government will draw up a climate change communication strategy and ensure that it is implemented consistently across Departments. Perhaps she could give us more detail than was provided in the Government’s response to the report. As part of that work, will she have further talks with other bodies, especially the BBC? We have heard a lot about the BBC, and many Members have met and challenged the corporation about its inclination to run with controversial stories rather than taking on board existing climate science, saying that there is a problem and asking what should be done about it. That would be the proper focus for discussion.

Communication is not only about the Government’s having a communication strategy for climate science, but about campaigns to increase public awareness. I was interested in the reference in the report to the education model, because I believe that there should be a duty to promote sustainable development in the national curriculum. That is the only way to encourage youngsters to be aware of sustainable development and engage with climate science throughout primary school, secondary school, college and university, so that whatever their chosen job or career, they will be sensitive to climate science and sustainable development. That awareness will influence the work that they do, and that will contribute to the Government’s strategy for meeting the 2° C objective. We need a communication strategy, but we also need to look at what we are doing in education.

I have looked at the computer model for teaching climate science in schools, and I do not think that there is a great understanding of that model. I was speaking to somebody yesterday about the Canadian Parliament’s green citizenship programmes. I think that environmental issues are all part of the citizenship agenda, and far more can be done through the curriculum to sensitise young people to such issues, whether they go to university or train to be plumbers. At the core, it is essential to get the science right and communicate it.

We are talking about a huge subject. We have seen from situations such as the floods and the take-up of the green deal that there is insufficient public awareness and understanding to support the necessary policies. Education is key, and it is not possible without a communication strategy. Whatever the politics inside the Select Committee when this unanimous report was agreed, I hope that because of the evidence submitted to the Committee and the urgency of the need to address climate change issues, a long-term benefit of the report will be a wider response from the Government in addition to their written response.

The Environmental Audit Committee has published several reports on related issues, such as carbon budgets and energy subsidies. We also published a follow-up report on the progress made on carbon budgets. If we are to achieve the correct energy policies, which take account of security of supply, affordability and climate security, the whole country needs to have an understanding of UK policy. That relates back to the importance of understanding the science. I hope that the report will help us to fulfil the need for an overarching communication strategy based on science, rather than on the sceptical science that we occasionally hear too much about.

--- Later in debate ---

[Amber Rudd]

The hon. Gentleman, speaking from a sedentary position, is absolutely right. We have taken action as a result.

We are also setting up an expert group to advise the Government and others on communicating climate science.

[Joan Walley]

I am interested to know who is on the expert group. Will the Minister elaborate on that?

[Amber Rudd]

I am not moving on from the expert group yet. I will say a few words about that. The matter was brought up in some detail by the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston. We want to ensure that this group has an effective role and we are talking to those who are likely to be involved. We have set up the group and my Department has also set up the cross-Government climate change communications group and developed a cross-Government narrative, which climate science is part of.

The cross-Government communications group is composed of working-level officials invited from all Departments. It has met twice so far, in June and again on 15 August, and it will continue to meet for the foreseeable future. In the first meeting, 12 Departments attended, including the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Department of Energy and Climate Change. The Scottish Government are also included. We also had representatives from the Department for International Development, the Treasury, the Environment Agency and the Met Office. That is another example of action following Committee recommendations.

My Department’s new chief scientific adviser, Professor John Loughhead, whom I was delighted to meet yesterday, on his first day, will have an active role in promoting understanding in this area, following in the footsteps of his predecessor, Professor David MacKay. The Government’s chief scientific adviser, Sir Mark Walport, will of course also play an integral role. The Government will continue to work with the academies, learned societies and other experts, including the Met Office, to help ensure that authoritative scientific voices on climate science are more readily available to the general public.

However, most people do not need, or indeed want, to understand the detailed science; they want to understand what they can do. The good news is that the public in the UK understand that climate change is a serious issue. More than two thirds of people in the UK are concerned about climate change. This is a strong mandate for all political parties to take ambitious action to tackle climate change. That underpins this Government’s actions to seek an ambitious global deal in Paris next year and our policies to reduce UK emissions entrenched in the Climate Change Act, helping towards achieving our commitment of an 80% reduction of emissions by 2050.