• Timeline
• Votes
• Speeches
• Tweets
• Contact

Catherine West's Speeches In Parliament Related to Climate

We've found 42 Parliamentary debates in which Catherine West has spoken about climate-related matters.

Here are the relevant sections of their speeches.

• 24 Feb 2026: EU Membership Referendum: Impact on the UK

  16:59

  To realise our full potential in tackling global challenges such as climate change, the UK needs to play a fuller part in the latest iteration of the EU’s research and innovation framework programme, FP10, as we did with Horizon Europe 2024. I would welcome an update from the Minister on that point.

  [Source]

• 10 Jun 2025: USAID Funding Pause

  10:54

  Moving on to the question of climate and nature, we will tackle climate change by backing investments that help countries to grow green and resilient economies. When we consider the COP meetings abroad, we see, following disasters and emergencies, that there is so much poverty and so much aid has to be spent. We must work harder through our financial institutions to bring forward prevention schemes for very climate-affected areas. Pakistan and the speech that Sherry Rehman made at COP two years ago come to mind, as do the Pacific islands—an area that my brief covers—which are literally under threat of sinking. Those are the sorts of areas where climate interventions are crucial and where climate will continue to be a very important point.

  [Source]

• 13 May 2025: UN Ocean Conference

  The climate and ocean adaptation and sustainable transition programme is improving vulnerable coastal communities’ resilience to climate change, including: protecting and restoring coastal habitats; supporting nature-based solutions; improving small-scale fisheries management; and, the issue my hon. Friend raises, the use of bottom-towed gear over rock and reef habitats in 13 Marine Management Organisation areas.

  [Source]

• 1 Apr 2025: Topical Questions

  The Government remain strongly committed to tackling the international climate and nature crises. The UK played a key role at the COP16 biodiversity conference, and we are working closely with a wide range of partners to build global ambition on nature ahead of London Climate Action Week in June and COP30 in Brazil.

  [Source]

• 26 Mar 2025: UK-China Relations

  16:00

  The Government will always put the UK national interest first. Our approach will be consistent, long term and pragmatic. In an ever changing geopolitical context, our relations are critical in ensuring the UK’s resilient growth, maintaining our position as a responsible global actor and defending our security and values. That means co-operating where we can on issues including net zero, health and trade, competing where our interests differ and challenging where we must to protect our national security and values.

  [Source]

  17:26

  On climate, in particular, and net zero, it is also essential that we engage China on global challenges. As the world’s largest investor in sustainable energy, the largest emitter of greenhouse gases and the largest producer of coal, the choices that China makes are critical to global efforts to tackle climate change, not just in China but across the world.

  [Source]

• 28 Nov 2024: Taiwan: International Status

  14:06

  Our enhanced trade partnership that was announced last year, as my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham mentioned, will further strengthen co-operation in investment, digital trade, renewable energy and net zero. Taiwan produces the vast majority of the world’s most advanced semiconductors that drive our digital economy, and it has a critical place in the technology supply chains that underpin global markets. That is why we want our flourishing science and technology co-operation to continue.

  I am pleased to say that we hold regular expert-level talks with Taiwan on a range of other important issues. Hon. Members may have seen that our latest energy dialogue concluded just last week. We are also partners on climate action. Taiwan is a key market for the UK offshore wind sector. Our enhanced trade partnership will strengthen our co-operation on net zero technologies, which are essential for the transition to a clean energy system and for bolstering energy security.

  [Source]

• 11 Sep 2024: Democracy in Bangladesh

  19:20

  The UK’s support to Bangladesh reflects other challenges that the country faces, including the impacts of climate change and humanitarian issues. My deepest sympathy is with the people of Bangladesh, in all its regions, as the nation faces the effects of the recent devastating floods; my thoughts are with all those affected. We have responded to the recent flooding with £483,000 of humanitarian assistance. That is, of course, on top of our long-standing support under the overseas development aid projects. The UK Government are also committed to providing humanitarian support for the Rohingya refugees, and we are very aware that, at this moment of stress for Bangladesh, this is a particularly precious duty that it is carrying out on behalf of the international community. As a leading donor to the Rohingya refugee response, we are providing humanitarian aid, including food, clean water, healthcare and protection services. Over £391 million has been provided by the UK since 2017. Because the current conditions in Myanmar are not conducive to the safe return of the Rohingya refugees, we are working with the interim Government in Bangladesh on continued support to those refugees.

  [Source]

• 9 Jan 2024: Malaria and Neglected Tropical Diseases

  10:30

  Indeed, and it has been estimated that 500 million more people, rising to a billion by 2080, could become exposed to chikungunya and dengue, as these diseases spread to new geographies due to warmer climates—a point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Slough. As an example, the impact of flooding in Pakistan has also been mentioned, and in 2022 there was a 900% increase in dengue and a fivefold increase in the number of malaria cases. The Minister might be quite creative and see whether there is money in the climate funds to join up the health inequalities with the climate funding that will eventually become available through the COP28 process.

  While countries in the global south will of course carry a disproportionate burden, tropical diseases are now becoming a growing concern in non-endemic countries. Will the Minister update the House on Government efforts to mitigate the impact of climate change on malaria and NTDs, and what steps they are taking to support lower-income countries to address climate-sensitive infectious diseases? Conflict and humanitarian crises are considerable threats to progress. Many countries have seen increases in malaria cases and deaths, and a few experienced malaria epidemics. Ethiopia saw an increase of 1.3 million cases between 2021 and 2022, and political instability in Myanmar led to a surge in cases, from 78,000 in 2019 to 584,000 in 2022, with a knock-on effect in neighbouring Thailand.

  [Source]

• 14 Dec 2023: Persecution of Buddhists: Tibet

  15:55

  My hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) made an extremely important point about the climate and the vulnerable nature of Tibet. Having hot-footed her way back from COP28, she has given us her update on the environmental concerns about that fragile part of our beautiful planet, where third pole ice storage and permafrost is thawing, with dreadful consequences for the river system. We know that a lack of water can cause long-term problems, including social ones, and she has made an important point. She also highlights the potential for Indo-Chinese relations to sour, and makes the important point that when we speak to leaders from the PRC, we must consider the trade relationship, which is very important to the UK’s economy, but crucially must not leave our values at the door. Will the Minister say when she last raised the issue of freedom of religion or belief in Tibet with her counterpart in the PRC?

  [Source]

• 6 Sep 2023: Ahmadi Muslims: Pakistan

  17:29

  My right hon. Friend the Member for Warley (John Spellar) said earlier in the debate that it is right that our Government should hold Pakistan to account because we have a lot to do with Pakistan in so many areas, whether that is through the diaspora or through our strong relationships with the country. We are in a very good position when we talk about things such as climate change, poverty, women’s rights and so on with colleagues in Pakistan. Is the Minister absolutely sure that no UK aid money is being used—perhaps unwittingly—to aid or abet any persecution of the Ahmadi community? Can he say what the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office is doing to protect and promote tolerance, diversity and religious freedoms in Pakistan, specifically where we have that link-in with UK aid?

  [Source]

• 6 Jul 2023: Commonwealth Parliamentary Association

  15:52

  This debate has given us a great opportunity to praise the Commonwealth more widely as the modern institution it now is—one of which we can all be proud. As well as being visited by the Speaker from the Cypriot House of Representatives earlier in the week, just last night we heard the Climate Minister from Vanuatu, Ralph Regenvanu, speaking about the challenges surrounding climate change. Vanuatu is, of course, a very important member of the Commonwealth.

  Organisations in my constituency of Hornsey and Wood Green jumped at the chance to participate in the Queen’s Green Canopy project for Her late Majesty’s diamond jubilee, inspired by the fact that organisations throughout the Commonwealth were similarly committed to that project to increase tree cover—a vital step in tackling climate change in far-off places such as Pakistan and Bangladesh, which are so regularly subject to intense changes in climate. The current head of the Commonwealth, His Majesty the King, has dedicated his life to the issue of climate change, and I am sure he will continue to champion that.

  [Source]

• 10 May 2023: Urban Trees: Protection

  16:33

  Unfortunately, this is a particular problem in Hornsey and Wood Green, where the clay soil that most homes are built on has moved during the severe droughts and flooding we have experienced for the past few summers. With the climate crisis worsening, extreme weather events are set to become a regular feature of British summers. The law on foreseeability also means that areas such as the London Borough of Haringey, where shrinkable London clay is the underlying soil, must have proactive tree maintenance programmes for all trees whose roots may cause damage to buildings.

  Anyone can see that this needs to change. Often the finger of blame is too quickly pointed at a nearby tree, rather than investigating other causes and solutions. Mature trees help mitigate the worst impacts of climate change, but they are being cut down in the hope of fixing an immediate subsidence risk.

  [Source]

  16:44

  That is why I have called for a debate in Parliament on this issue. It is time that the Government properly recognise the critical role that trees play in improving our health and mitigating the worst effects of climate change and nature loss. The central issue here is that our current legislative protections for mature trees do not go far enough in recognising their value in making our communities healthier, happier places to live.

  [Source]

• 18 Apr 2023: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change: Sixth Assessment Report

  4. What assessment he has made of the implications for his policies of the sixth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, published on 20 March 2023.

  [Source]

  On 2 May 2019, this Parliament declared a climate emergency, yet four years on, the Government are still dragging their feet. Some 4.4 million people rent in the privately rented sector, and that number is going up due to the Government’s incompetence in building more homes. What will the Government do to bring all privately rented properties up to an A, B or C rating as soon as humanly possible?

  [Source]

• 21 Mar 2023: Net Zero

  11. What fiscal steps he is taking with Cabinet colleagues to support the economy in reaching net-zero carbon emissions.

  [Source]

  Yesterday, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change published its report on the latest data, warning that the world is fast approaching irreversible levels of global heating. Why is the Treasury still giving energy companies an easy ride through lucrative loopholes in the energy windfall tax? The Treasury should be prioritising investments in renewables so that over time, our bills can come down.

  [Source]

• 9 Nov 2022: COP27

  13:09

  Will the Prime Minister say what view he takes of the role of local authorities in the climate emergency? In 2010, there were some fantastic programmes. Had they continued to 2022, we would have a third of our homes in which people—homeowners or renters-—would be paying a third of the bills they are paying now. What view does he take of local authorities getting stuck in to retrofit, particularly in the private rented sector, which is very draughty and leaky?

  [Source]

• 6 Sep 2022: Pakistan: Flood Relief

  Catastrophic scenes of flooding in Pakistan: 1,000 lost lives, 33 million people displaced and a third of the country under water. As we have heard today, the whole House has expressed its solidarity with the community, both there and here. In advance of COP27, will the Minister undertake to produce an urgent bilateral plan with Pakistan that looks at mitigation, loss and damage, and long-term plans to avoid this sort of climate catastrophe in future?

  [Source]

• 9 Feb 2022: Edmonton EcoPark: Proposed Expansion

  16:59

  It is also a pleasure to hear from the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on air pollution, my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea West (Geraint Davies), who has talked about his outstanding work in Swansea West and beyond, responding to the challenges presented by COP26 and calling for us to be a bit more ambitious and a bit braver on incinerators. This feels like old technology, and that is why I am pleased that Haringey was the only borough that voted to pause and review when it came to the vote on the bid for the scheme.

  When the plans were first signed off, when the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) was the Mayor of London, the solution might have been okay, but that was a long time ago and things have moved on. It feels as though the project has not had the COP26 test applied to it, and now would be a good time for the Government to look again and challenge whether there is more that can be done. In particular, with the introduction of the green bonds, this might be a good time to explain exactly how they work—there does not seem to be a proper explanation of that—and to see how the project could introduce some best practice around the green agenda.

  We are in a climate emergency, and our constituents want change. They want to recycle more and they want our polluted air to be cleaner. They are anxious that the size of the incinerator will mean there is an incentive to produce more waste in order to feed the associated district energy network. They are concerned about the environmental impact of incineration and the emissions that that process creates. They want 21st-century solutions to the management of waste that do not harm the health of residents or our environment.

  [Source]

• 28 Oct 2021: Income Tax (Charge)

  16:00

  Many hon. Members have mentioned the missed opportunity on climate ahead of COP26. We could have seen much more funding for basic measures: for example, we could have asked local authorities to retrofit homes and provide state-of-the-art new boilers. That could have provided the opportunity to train up the 180,000 workers we will need to install heat pumps. Our local authorities would have been grateful for the opportunity to do their bit; instead, they are still scrimping and saving, despite the small increase in local government funding. Much more could have been done.

  [Source]

• 25 Oct 2021: Regeneration in Towns and Cities

  15:20

  With Question 16 in mind, which we may not fit in today, may I ask what urgent action the Department will take, with COP26 around the corner, to ensure that local authorities have a proper grip on flood defences and the environmental issues that councils face day by day?

  [Source]

• 14 Sep 2021: Health and Social Care Levy Bill

  16:28

  Thirdly, energy bills are about to go up. I am sure the Minister has done his own analysis of the fact that we did not have a windy summer, which meant that the renewables did not do as much as we had hoped. We will be reliant on gas and even coal, which we should not be given all our commitments in respect of COP26. For those reasons, we will see increases in our energy bills this winter.

  [Source]

• 7 Sep 2021: Net Zero Emissions and Green Investment

  6. What fiscal steps he is taking to help achieve the Government’s net zero emissions target.

  [Source]

  11:53

  The recent cuts to the international aid budget have undermined the UK’s leadership in advance of COP26, so what urgent steps will the Treasury take to develop a carbon neutral programme of international aid going forward?

  [Source]

• 20 Jul 2021: Topical Questions

  Last week, the Government finally gave the EU ambassador the legal recognition they so arrogantly denied him earlier this year, and last month we saw the Government’s needlessly antagonistic approach towards our European partners overshadow the G7 summit and consequently hamper international efforts to tackle pressing global challenges. Does the Foreign Secretary now accept that this was a mistake that has undermined our relationship with Europe, and will he commit to treating our European partners as equals to ensure that we can work together on common concerns such as security, freedom of speech, covid and climate change?

  [Source]

• 6 Jul 2021: Net Zero Emissions Target

  What steps the Government are taking to achieve the net zero emissions target.

  [Source]

• 23 Jun 2021: Deforestation in the Amazon

  15:40

  Without a doubt, the Amazon rainforest is a vital bulwark in the international fight against climate change. It is apt that we are having this debate as the Government prepare to host the critically important conference of the parties climate summit in Glasgow later this year. It is impossible to overstate the importance of the Amazon. It has long been considered a vital carbon sink, and the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Neil Parish) related that to his own experience of farming. Scientists estimate that the vegetation and trees making up the forest contain a staggering 76 billion tonnes of carbon. It is also home to a rich tapestry of wildlife and rivers. It was lovely that my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) and the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Brendan O’Hara) quoted the indigenous leaders, who have spoken with such heartfelt poignancy about their current position.

  As well as the very clear risks of climate change, we must be alive to the human dangers of ongoing and increasing deforestation. That has been so eloquently laid out by Members that I need not repeat it. In the past 18 months, we have become particularly attuned to the danger of pandemics, and there is a very real and clear risk, as my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West said, that further deforestation may cause another deadly pandemic. Biologists and epidemiologists have been ringing the alarm about that for some time. Does the Minister believe that that is an effective use of some of the global health spend in her Department, which I know she is trying hard to protect? Does she think this might be a worthy subject to fund, in terms of global health priorities? This is a moment when we are all focused on the way that coming into close contact with the animal kingdom can lead to deadly viruses such as covid-19. It is a question that desperately needs further research. We have the intellectual firepower here in the UK; I hope that the Minister, as a great champion for universities and the link between global health, universities and foreign policy, will opine on that. The Amazon is thought to be home to 10% of known species on earth, so risk of another zoological pandemic originating from the region could not be starker.

  The UK is uniquely positioned to act. Many of us mentioned the global COP summit in Glasgow. What dialogue has the Minister had directly with the ambassador regarding the deforestation question? Did he suggest, as some Brazilian MPs suggested to me, that the Amazon grows back? Could she enlighten us about how that bilateral conversation is going, saying whatever she can say in public?

  [Source]

• 12 May 2021: Better Jobs and a Fair Deal at Work

  18:02

  We all know that we have less than a decade to make the bold changes demanded by the UN’s climate body to limit temperature rises, but this Queen’s Speech is bereft of any programmes or resource allocation to implement the green jobs plan we need to meet the target. In fact, the Government completely scrapped their only green jobs scheme, the green homes grant, after it was outsourced to a private American firm which botched the roll-out. Ministers will trumpet the newly announced national infrastructure bank, for which we have been calling for a long time now, but the Office for Budget Responsibility has said that the new bank will provide less than half the funding we used to receive from the European Investment Bank and offer a fraction of the funding recommended by the National Infrastructure Commission to tackle the climate emergency.

  [Source]

• 20 Apr 2021: Topical Questions

  As we have heard this morning, this year the UK hosts the global COP summit and the G7, which give us a wonderful opportunity to lay out our leadership and ambition on a world stage. If the Government are really serious about tackling the climate emergency, where is the leadership on the deforestation question in Brazil, where, under the leadership of Jair Bolsonaro, we have seen a rise up to the highest levels of deforestation and impact on indigenous communities in more than a decade? Has the Foreign Secretary raised this directly with Jair Bolsonaro? If not, in broad terms what is he doing at an institutional level to try to address that desperate issue?

  [Source]

• 25 Nov 2020: Spending Review 2020 and OBR Forecast

  The Chancellor has spoken well today of the scars that are felt by so many in society owing to the triple whammy of covid, climate change and Brexit. Will he outline how he will manage to ring-fence money for mental health within the health spend? Mind, the charity, has said that phone calls have doubled, with many young people experiencing debilitating anxiety, depression and self-harm. Will he urgently look at mental health and ring-fence money for workforce changes, which are desperately needed, and for a decent revenue spend to bring mental health up into line with physical health?

  [Source]

• 9 Sep 2020: Protection of Jobs and Businesses

  15:40

  I think most of us agree that we are facing a triple whammy at the moment, with a public health crisis in the guise of covid, an economic crisis in which Brexit has already cost our economy billions of pounds, and climate change, which will eventually cost us a lot and is currently costing lives as well as other things that the Treasury may not be making a record of. That is certainly an expensive project as well. We are in a recession. We know that GDP fell by 20.4% in the second quarter of 2020—that is 20.4%, not 2.4%—which is the largest confirmed fall of any economy in Europe and the G7, so we are facing really tough times.

  [Source]

• 20 Jul 2020: Trade Bill

  00:00

  On environmental concerns, in leaving the European Union, we are leaving the gold standard of environmental protections, but it would be easy to write that protection in and lead on that in this Bill. Instead, the Bill is almost values free in terms of the importance of the environment. After covid, climate change and dealing with the climate emergency are probably the biggest concerns of our generation.

  [Source]

• 11 Mar 2020: Budget Resolutions

  18:44

  The third and final thing I want to talk about is the defining challenge of our time—that is what António Guterres has called the climate change challenge, and I could not agree more with the head of the UN’s description. The measures announced today do not go far enough—they are very timid—particularly when we think how frightening the climate change challenge really is.

  There are also some real mixed messages. Freezing fuel duty is a mixed message, and new roads are a mixed message, when Parliament has decided that climate change is an emergency. What is the message? Is it that this is an emergency, or is it that we can just keep building more roads and freezing fuel duty forever?

  There is a real missed opportunity in the Budget around the climate change agenda and the role of local government. If we give half of the money for the carbon capture experts to local government, they will insulate properties, prevent heat loss, ensure lower bills for millions of low-income people, introduce the proper cycle lanes the right hon. Member for Bournemouth East mentioned, and develop highly skilled green jobs in a micro way. A lot of the climate agenda and the climate challenge is very localised.

  [Source]

• 13 Jan 2020: Britain in the World

  19:32

  Increasingly, climate change also presents insecurity on a global scale. This year, the UK could become a true leader on the climate crisis, with Glasgow hosting the COP26 climate summit in November—I hope it will be more conclusive than the Madrid meeting—following closely on Labour’s push for this House to become the first Parliament in the world to declare a climate emergency. It is a real pleasure to hear Members from across the House promoting the role that the Inter-Parliamentary Union and the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association play in developing that role for parliamentarians.

  Although the UK has a good policy platform at the level of UK missions abroad—for example, promoting measures to mitigate climate change—this priority could be at risk if a free trade agreement demands some other priority.

  [Source]

• 15 Oct 2019: Britain's Place in the World

  18:32

  I would like briefly to bring out a few themes of the debate. Many Members have raised the right to go out on the streets and to have freedom of assembly. Some have mentioned the protests in Hong Kong, which we would all like to be much more peaceful, but even on our own streets, we see the protests of Extinction Rebellion because we know that climate change should be much higher up the foreign policy agenda.

  [Source]

• 14 Oct 2019: Debate on the Address

  I am very grateful that the Prime Minister has given way to a woman MP. In the Queen’s Speech there was very little information about the climate change emergency; will he give a little more detail on what the Government will do in relation to this pressing issue that is affecting so many young people and their mental health?

  [Source]

• 1 May 2019: Environment and Climate Change

  18:13

  May I first put on record the excellent work of the Hornsey and Wood Green climate emergency activists—they invited me to a meeting well in advance of Greta Thunberg’s visit and were ahead of the protesters—and the schoolchildren from schools in Hornsey and Wood Green who marched on London to demand change?

  Transport is the most emitting sector of the UK economy, responsible for 27% of greenhouse gas emissions, and the figure increases to a staggering 40% if we include our share of international shipping and aviation. That is the one we can really do something about at the three levels of government. First, the Government must fund bus services—end of—and there is an election tomorrow where that will feature in big style.

  Finally, I want to put on the record the work being done on children’s asthma and respiratory health by Ella Kissi-Debrah’s mother, a constituent of my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham East (Janet Daby). She has worked so hard to convince others of the importance of climate change and transport.

  [Source]

• 29 Jan 2019: Human Rights: Xinjiang

  15:24

  I want to mention the good things that have happened in China as a result of the convention on the rights of the child, to show that issues can be tackled. A lot of work has been done in China on human trafficking, and good results have come from that. Action to tackle climate change and air quality, and the effects on children in polluted cities, has also borne some fruit. I do not want to give a counsel of complete despair. With challenge and dialogue, we can move forward.

  [Source]

• 11 Jun 2018: Leaving the EU: Parliamentary Vote

  17:05

  Finally, on the wider geopolitical picture, this weekend Mr Trump made a number of strange statements, including a questioning of NATO. The idea that America would leave NATO is rather strange, but his speeches, if read carefully, appear to suggest that. That puts a rather different shine on our relationship with Europe and I, for one, am much more concerned to hug Europe closer because of that. Some of Mr Trump’s values regarding not wanting to be part of the climate change process—

  [Source]

  17:12

  I do not think it was Mrs May or any of us who said we did not want the US to be in NATO. Unless I am mistaken—perhaps I am reading different newspapers—it was Mr Trump who was putting into question his commitment to NATO over the weekend. It raises questions in the same way as when he wanted to walk away from the Paris climate agreement. He was able basically to decide not to be part of that when almost every scientist internationally accepts that climate change is our greatest scientific challenge. In addition, some of his statements about ethnic minorities and the Muslim community in particular are deeply worrying. I feel they add to the sense of xenophobia that we are seeing not only in this country, but internationally. Such statements corrode our sense of our values as western powers—our values of human rights and a commitment to peace, stability and doing things right.

  [Source]

• 10 Jul 2017: G20

  16:28

  What concrete steps will the Government take next to get climate change back in the discussion with the US Administration?

  [Source]

• 20 Feb 2017: President Trump: State Visit

  19:05

  I will comment briefly on the issues that we should be talking about: tackling international crime and terrorism, working together to address the mass movement of people around the globe and reinforcing international policies to combat climate change. Sadly, instead, we are falling into the trap of responding confrontationally to policy pronouncements made via Twitter. I hope we can right the ship again and get back to our more measured way of discussing, debating and taking a little more time to consider the importance of our foreign policy.

  [Source]

• 13 Jun 2016: Foreign Aid Expenditure

  17:17

  My right hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Does he agree that in the same way as Make Poverty History was a huge issue then, climate change is a huge issue now? Value-for-money programmes in Bangladesh, such as those to do with flooding, have an enormous impact. They can prevent not only flooding, but famine, helping with unwanted migration and so on—issues we need to look at. Even terrorism can be linked to the failure to address climate change.

  [Source]

• 1 Mar 2016: The FCO and the Spending Review 2015

  15:03

  At one time securing peace, strengthening human rights and protecting our citizens abroad were at the top of the FCO’s list of priorities, yet the recent state visit by China, for example, appears to illustrate the fact that the Foreign Secretary’s top priority for the FCO is mainly commercial. It was up to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition to raise specifically the problem of the tariff arrangements which put UK steel at a trade disadvantage with China, human rights in China, climate change and the need to tackle enduring poverty. In recent months, the priority of international security in relation to the South China sea has come to the fore.

  [Source]

• 2 Nov 2015: Draft Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (Immunities and Privileges) Order 2015

  The next issue is on the need for a multilateral response to climate change and environmental protection. It is welcome that clear efforts have been made to ensure environmental and social standards and the sustainability of the bank’s operation through the launch of a consultation process and the dossier subsequently produced, entitled “Environmental and Social Framework”, but concerns have been expressed that that policy-making process has occurred rapidly and narrowly. Rayyan Hassan, director of the non-governmental organisation Forum, based in Manila, commented that the bank’s environmental protection consultation wanted

  [Source]

• 21 Jul 2015: Finance Bill

  Clause 45, on the climate change levy, removes the levy exemption for renewable source electricity generated on or after 1 August 2015. Unhappily, that is an example of the Tories undermining investor confidence in renewable energy. They have already tried to halt the development of the cheapest form of clean energy, by pulling the plug on onshore wind, and that comes hot on the heels of the rather flat green deal. I am not sure whether any Members know about the green deal. It was introduced back in 2010, it was heralded and much money was spent on it. The promotion money probably helped a few public relations companies to keep going, but the number of households that took up the deal was very low.

  [Source]

  I wonder whether, as we move towards the Paris summit, we will see any improvement and any genuine debate, because this Budget fails to give any hope on the green agenda. I am pleased that Opposition colleagues have chosen the climate change levy as one of three topics to be debated in Committee in September. That is when we will all have more of a chance to debate this important deal—or lack of—and when we will table amendments.

  [Source]

See all Parliamentary Speeches Mentioning Climate