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Greg Smith's Speeches In Parliament Related to Climate

We've found 55 Parliamentary debates in which Greg Smith has spoken about climate-related matters.

Here are the relevant sections of their speeches.

• 6 Jul 2026: Draft Electricity Capacity (Amendment and Transitional Provision) Regulations 2026

  18:05

  “ensure the continuation of security of supply while supporting the transition to a decarbonised energy system.”

  His Majesty’s loyal Opposition have warned countless times that forcing decarbonisation and electrification on to families and businesses at any cost would simply result in industry shutting down and livelihoods being lost. Although the Government have rejected those warnings in public, the results of that auction seem to suggest that they have privately accepted the fact that industrial energy consumption will fall thanks to their policies.

  I have no doubt at all that the Minister will seek to reassure the Committee that the Government’s mass roll-out of renewable energy and associated infrastructure will make concerns about security of supply redundant. However, what this completely fails to address is the cold, still winter nights when electricity demand is at its highest, yet generation from wind and solar is effectively nothing—precisely the scenario that the capacity market is supposed to address through securing firm power from conventional means, such as gas.

  However, by refusing to support private investment to build new gas power stations, placing more burdensome decarbonisation requirements on new and refurbished generators, as well as pushing gas to the sidelines of our electricity supply while still expecting full capacity to remain available, the Government are making continued operation for many gas power stations economically and technically unviable.

  Let us be very clear what the Government’s energy policy means: placing increasing strain on demand through legally binding electrification and decarbonisation requirements; reducing supply by failing to secure new firm power from gas; and the Government forcing families and businesses to ration electricity through consumer-led flexibility at the risk of facing blackouts. Although the Opposition do not oppose the very technical amendments made by these draft regulations, we believe that it is well past time for the Government to accept that they cannot sustain our energy system on blind faith in renewables, and that they must instead fully support new generating capacity from gas and nuclear.

  [Source]

• 24 Jun 2026: Farming Road Map and Profitability Review

  Farmers have been innovating since the dawn of time, and they really do not need a word salad document to tell them that it might be a good idea. I have listened carefully to the Secretary of State’s answers on fertiliser, both in terms of the current price shock and the impending additional shock, made by this Government, of carbon taxes on fertiliser. Surely, while there is lofty ambition for long-term innovation, there needs to be a direct answer and relief now on the shock that is going to come in January.

  [Source]

• 24 Jun 2026: Farming: Financial Sustainability

  Would my hon. Friend agree that another uncertainty is coming down the path? The Climate Change Committee is asking farmers to reduce livestock numbers by up to 40%. That would devastate and make unviable so many farms—complete madness.

  [Source]

  17:24

  Does the Minister accept that it is a choice made by this Government—maybe not by DEFRA, but by the Treasury—to bring in the carbon tax from 1 January? The Government cannot change events in the middle east, but they could choose to delay or scrap that tax.

  [Source]

• 2 Jun 2026: Household Energy Bills

  12:05

  Labour came to office with bold promises to cut energy bills, but in the real world we have seen bills go up, up and up again. In answer to the first question, the Secretary of State said that he wanted to do all he could to cut energy bills, so here are some ideas for how he could do so. He could scrap carbon taxes, he could remove VAT from energy for three years, and he could scrap legacy renewable subsidies—that would save people £200. It is called the Conservatives’ cheap energy plan and, in the national interest, we do not mind if he steals it. Will he?

  [Source]

• 21 Apr 2026: Wind Farms: Protected Peatland

  15:34

  It is always a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Alec. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) on securing this important debate. Since this Labour Government came to power, they have been recklessly zealous in their commitment to net zero targets over all else, not least their willingness to trash our countryside for wind turbines, ground-mounted solar and more, when far less land-intensive energy solutions such as small modular reactors would deliver our energy needs in a much more sympathetic way to our landscape, food security and natural environment.

  In January 2026, the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero published guidance permitting wind farm development on peatland. The national planning policy framework states that development on irreplaceable habitats, which includes a quarter of England’s peatland, should be refused, yet the Government have chosen just guidance over prohibition. It is shocking but unsurprising of this Labour Government—we find contradictions in their policymaking at every corner. Crucially, the new guidance on construction practices for wind farms on peatland has not even been published yet—the bulldozers may arrive before the policy framework lands.

  “be offset by…the green energy generated.”

  As ever, I would like to be charitable, but it is hardly surprising that the Government have been slow to draw a firm line when their approach to net zero treats all means as justified by the end.

  [Source]

  15:41

  The Conservative party has been very, very clear on that. We believe in decarbonisation, but we need to do it in a way that people can afford and that does not trash our country in the process, in the way that ground-mounted solar and these wind farms do. The points I am making in arguing that damaging untouched peatland ends up causing more environmental damage than the supposed benefits of the wind farms that those who argue for them want to put there should make every Member of the House pause. They should think whether, in getting to decarbonisation, we are not creating more problems than we are solving by simply taking the first technology off the shelf or going for the convenient bit of land that might be available to build this on. It is a totally false economy to go down the rabbit warren of saying, “It looks green, so we must do it,” rather than doing a whole-system analysis, from the manufacture of parts to the destruction of habitat, land and place across our country. That may actually reveal that the results are not as green as they look on the metaphorical packaging.

  The guidance does little to help the communities living along these landscapes, the wildlife that depends on them, or indeed the climate if carbon storing habitats are destroyed in the name of carbon reduction. In contrast to that inaction, there is a straightforward solution: prohibit wind farm development on protected peatland across our country—full stop. Despite the Secretary of State holding responsibility for both energy and net zero, it is preposterous that no such ban has been enacted. It is either that the Government do not wish to constrain their ambitions or are displaying sheer negligence towards the natural environment they claim to champion.

  [Source]

• 14 Apr 2026: Draft Energy Prices Act 2022 (Extension of Time Limit) Regulations 2026

  The huge subsidies that entitle some windfarm owners to three times the market price of the power they generate still flows to energy developers, all funded by the taxpayer. Crucially, the savings that the Labour Government have put forward do nothing to cut bills for businesses, which are seeing their network costs double thanks to the Government’s net zero policies and are getting no support from their big energy bill package.

  [Source]

• 23 Mar 2026: Draft Electricity and Gas (Energy Company Obligation) (Amendment) (Specified Period) Order 2026

  18:07

  On cost, the Chancellor was emphatic in her Budget statement last year that ECO costs households £1.7 billion a year through levies on their bills and that ending the scheme would save the average household £59 annually. She described it as a failed scheme and said that she was scrapping it. However, this nine-month extension means that the levy continues on bills for longer than households were led to expect. Ministers must set out plainly how much consumers will pay during this extended period, and whether that figure of a £59 saving remains accurate. As the shadow Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, my right hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Claire Coutinho), has rightly observed, moving costs from energy bills to general taxation is not the saving it appears on paper. Households are still paying; they are just paying from a different pocket.

  Joel Pearson of Net Zero Renewables made the same plea directly to the Chancellor. These are not abstract economic arguments; they are real firms, jobs and communities that depend on this sector continuing to function.

  [Source]

• 3 Mar 2026: Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill

  15:00

  When the Bill first came before the House, the Conservatives were clear that we support the innovation that underpins sustainable aviation fuel. Aviation matters enormously to this country: for families, for trade, for connectivity and for our standing as a global hub. The challenge has never been whether to decarbonise aviation, but how we do so without damaging competitiveness or pricing ordinary passengers out of flying.

  [Source]

  15:07

  I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, not least for his kind birthday wishes. We do support the SAF mandate. We do support the decarbonisation of air travel, as well as other means of travel, but it has to be done in a way that is economically viable not just to the industry but to all of us who ultimately pay to fly—or to go on a train or a ship, or whatever it might be—through the fares we pay. That is why the Opposition have been so laser-focused on the direct impacts on fare payers, as well as on the wider industry.

  The wider point, to return to the Lords amendments we are debating, is to ensure that the economic value of decarbonisation, which the British state is mandating through the legislation we pass in this Parliament, actually benefits British producers, British researchers, British engineers, and the incredible array of innovators and talent we have here in this country.

  [Source]

• 10 Feb 2026: Local Power Plan

  All of this points to the root problem, which is that electricity prices are already too high, and the policies pursued by this Government are only pushing them higher. Doubling down on carbon taxes and loading more expensive wind and solar on to a system that is not ready risks driving up costs for both households and industry, making British business less competitive and leaving families to pick up the bill. Families are being asked to pay more, not less. Labour promised to cut energy bills by £300; instead, bills have risen by £190 since Labour came to power. That is the reality behind its rhetoric, and that is the reality every family up and down the land understands as they open their energy bills.

  [Source]

• 4 Feb 2026: Draft Energy-Intensive Industry Electricity Support Payments and Levy (Amendment) Regulations 2026

  I am making a point about the wider context in which we have to see the statutory instrument. The most glaring omission is the oil and gas industry in the North sea. Energy-intensive industries are not just struggling; they are being driven overseas by costs that they simply cannot absorb. The very thing that the Minister said he was trying to prevent is happening. Since Labour came into government, more than 15,000 manufacturing and industrial jobs have already been lost, largely because of astronomical energy costs combined with unnecessary green levies and carbon taxes. When manufacturing moves abroad, we do not eliminate emissions; we simply offshore them, often to countries like China with weaker environmental standards and far greater geopolitical risk.

  We have also heard clear warnings from industry leaders. Sir Jim Ratcliffe has been explicit that high taxes and energy costs have left sites such as Grangemouth unable to compete with overseas rivals. These are not abstract concerns, but real decisions affecting real jobs. Against that backdrop, while the draft regulations make proportionate and technical changes, they do not address the fundamental problem. Increasing compensation within a flawed system is not the same as fixing the system itself. The best way to reduce electricity prices for energy-intensive businesses is to tackle costs at source by scrapping the energy profits levy and removing punitive carbon taxes that undermine competitiveness.

  [Source]

• 18 Nov 2025: Large-scale Solar Farms

  12:10

  I agree with the Minister that rooftops are the place to put solar. Indeed, as my right hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Claire Coutinho) made clear when she was Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, agricultural land should be protected from ground-mounted solar installations. The campaign group Stop Oversized Solar has found that operational sites and solar facilities in the planning pipeline alone are set to replace an area of farmland bigger than Merseyside, and that overall up to 5% of UK cropland is at risk from solar, so why do the Government persist with their claim that land take will be 1%? When Labour said that food security is national security, did the energy team not get the memo?

  [Source]

• 12 Nov 2025: Carbon Budget Delivery Plan

  17:35

  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir John. Since the Labour Government took office, they have pursued an ideological net zero agenda that places meeting targets above supporting our constituents and cutting bills across the country. The carbon budget delivery plan is the latest example of that: a glossy plan that completely ignores affordability and reality.

  The Secretary of State has spent much of his time in office promising that his policies will cut household energy bills by £300. That promise was made at the last election and was supported by the Prime Minister, yet that figure is not mentioned once in the flagship carbon budget delivery plan. There are sections on energy security and lower bills, but nowhere does it reference the £300 promise that the Secretary of State and others from the Labour party incessantly trumpeted across the media and from the Dispatch Box. If that pledge were real—if it were costed or credible—it would surely appear in the document that is supposedly designed to deliver it. Its absence tells us everything. The Government’s priority is not cutting bills, but chasing net zero goals regardless of the cost to hard-working taxpayers.

  At a recent Energy Security and Net Zero Committee hearing, senior executives from the country’s biggest energy suppliers warned that even if gas were free in 2030, household energy bills would still rise because of the policy costs being loaded on to bills in the relentless pursuit of net zero. I repeat: even if gas were free—even if the wholesale market delivered us a miracle—bills would go up, not down. That is a failure not of the market, but of Labour Government policy.

  Those energy companies are not hostile to decarbonisation; they are some of the loudest champions of net zero. Yet even they warn that the current approach—piling levies, subsidies and obligations on to consumers—is unsustainable and unrealistic. When those who believe in the Government’s energy objectives start doubting the approach, perhaps it is time for the Government to revisit their plans. Even Professor Sir Dieter Helm, one of the country’s most respected energy economists, has in effect described the Government’s clean power 2030 plan as economically incoherent. As he put it, we are

  It is not possible to legislate for lower bills while loading more costs on to every unit of power people use—a simple equation that the Government do not seem to have grasped, exemplified by what we have all seen in the carbon budget delivery plan. It is a classic Labour approach: a headline without a policy, a promise without a plan, a bill for everyone else to pay, and a vanity project that will simply not work. The truth is that Britain will not decarbonise by taxing, banning and bribing people into submission.

  We see the same erratic pattern in the operation of the Climate Change Act 2008, which forces Ministers to take decisions that make the British people less well off and our economy weaker, for the sake of meeting arbitrary climate targets. Take their boiler tax: it increases the cost of gas boilers to force people to adopt heat pumps, which may not work for them, to meet climate targets. We are chopping down trees in America, shipping them across the Atlantic and burning them in Yorkshire to generate electricity at three times the price of gas, because it is labelled as clean for the purpose of meeting the Government’s climate targets.

  The public understand that we must reduce emissions. They want a cleaner environment and a stable climate for their grandchildren. But they also expect honesty from the Government, and an approach that will actually work and actually decarbonise.

  [Source]

• 22 Oct 2025: Coal Tip Safety and New Extraction Licences

  It is fair to say that this country’s methods of energy production have changed dramatically since the industry peaked in the 20th century, particularly after the second world war. But what we are witnessing from this shambolic Labour Government is an accelerating obsession with shutting down productive, strategic British industries in the name of ideology. The Government seem determined to pursue a hollow version of net zero, not as a plan for environmental stewardship, but for the purpose of political point scoring and making this country economically neutered and directionless.

  As the Leader of the Opposition has rightly stated, the Conservatives remain committed to maximising the responsible extraction of our own natural resources, particularly at a time when ordinary working people are grappling with astronomical energy bills, which are now among the highest in the developed world, and our steel industry is on its knees. Yet rather than backing British industry and jobs, the Government continue their relentless campaign to strangle domestic industry in the name of tackling climate change, when they could be looking towards places such as the North sea to bring in tens of billions of pounds in tax revenue, skilled, well-paid jobs, and inward investment.

  When the Secretary of State decided not to challenge the court’s blocking of the proposed Cumbrian coking coalmine, he sabotaged an opportunity for investment and skilled employment. British Steel executives made it clear that UK-mined coal could power their blast furnaces efficiently and cleanly, cutting import costs and emissions alike. We all know where that ended. It makes no sense to make ourselves more reliant on other countries for things that we could produce ourselves here in the United Kingdom just because they do not count towards our climate targets.

  [Source]

  17:13

  The Government are just lost. To give an example, even the GMB’s general secretary, Gary Smith—no relation—rightly called this strategy “catastrophic” for not just jobs, but the environment. He warned that importing coal, gas and manufactured products from overseas is far more carbon intensive than producing them domestically. He went further, saying that the Government’s net zero drive is “bonkers”—his word—because it undermines the workers who will be essential to any genuine green transition. When even the trade unions are pleading for common sense, it is a clear sign that Labour has lost touch with not just the science, but the people they apparently represent.

  [Source]

• 15 Oct 2025: Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill

  17:06

  With that, I come to amendment 8 and the cost impact on passengers. The amendment would require the designated counterparty to report on the impact of the revenue certainty mechanism on passenger air fares. One of the most contentious areas surrounding the Bill, and indeed the Government’s whole approach to net zero, is: what does it actually cost real people? The amendment seeks to clarify that, and it gives the Government the opportunity—in theory, they should cheerfully embrace this—to lock in a claim that they profess to believe, namely that the Bill will have an impact of plus or minus £1.50 on air fares. The previous Minister repeated that statistic time and again on Second Reading and in Committee. The new Minister has the challenge today of either sticking with his predecessor’s assertion, backing the amendment and locking in protections for consumers, or admitting that this may well be more costly to air travellers.

  [Source]

• 17 Jul 2025: Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill (Third sitting)

  11:35

  Before I speak to amendment 3, a broad comment about all the amendments I will speak to today is that, fundamentally the Opposition are not a million miles from the Government on the Bill. However, as I am sure you expect us to do, Mr Western, it is our job as His Majesty’s loyal Opposition to kick the tyres and ensure that the Bill is as strong and workable as it can be. We share the ambition to decarbonise aviation and ensure that everybody still can fly for pleasure or business, and that businesses can move goods around the world using air freight.

  [Source]

  12:15

  Turning to amendment 4, then, much has been made of the cost to the end user. We had a good debate on Second Reading in which all agreed, across the House and all political parties, that the challenge, as we decarbonise and move to net zero, is that everyone must still be able to do the things that they want to do—to fly and move goods around—but in a cleaner, decarbonised, and net zero way. We have been the first in the western world to legislate for that by 2050.

  [Source]

  I understand the argument that the hon. Gentleman is making with new clause 4, but I would argue that it is unnecessary; the whole point of the Bill is to decarbonise aviation. As the Minister said himself, and as I hope the Committee will accept, the Bill was conceived and finds its origins under the last Government, and it was then carried through by this Government, so it is something that we can rightly be proud of on both sides of the House. As we are leading the world on this issue, I am not sure that new clause 4 is necessary.

  However, new clause 5 is more interesting, because it goes to the very crux of the debate we had earlier on the various technologies that can produce sustainable aviation fuel in the United Kingdom. It goes without saying that, while all forms of sustainable aviation fuel—as we know it at the moment—are greener than their fossil fuel equivalent, there is significant variation in the greenhouse gas and carbon emissions between using blends or 100% sustainable aviation fuel in an aircraft. The merits of new clause 5 go to the absolute centre of the debate on which of those technologies, or which of those great innovations, can deliver the closest to net zero over the coming years and decades, if not net zero itself.

  If new clause 5 were baked into the Bill, and ultimately the Act, it would be interesting to see how it would enable us judge among those different technologies. I have talked in the House many times about the importance of whole-system analysis, which is an analysis not just of the effect while the jet engines are turning and the planes are in the sky, but of the whole impact on greenhouse gas and carbon emissions of manufacturing the fuel and what is done with the waste product afterwards, particularly carbon. New clause 5 would go to the heart of discovering that.

  [Source]

  The central question is whether that review, when it comes, looks at the greenhouse gas savings while the aircraft is in use, or gives a whole-system analysis, from the production and use of the fuel to the benefits of using the by-products, post combustion, to make more fuel. That is an important clarification that we need.

  [Source]

• 17 Jul 2025: Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill (Fourth sitting)

  It is quite a pleasant experience to engage with a Bill in opposition when there is fundamental agreement on the direction of travel. The other Bill Committee of this Parliament on which I was shadow Minister was for the Employment Rights Bill, where we did not enjoy quite the same level of consensus, but to meet the challenges of decarbonising our aviation industry it is important that this Bill progresses rapidly.

  [Source]

• 15 Jul 2025: Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill (First sitting)

  We need to get the RCM right. The design matters to make sure that we get the most from it and deliver the most cost-competitive, efficient decarbonisation of the sector while supporting and protecting UK consumers as well as fliers. We think that we can do that with a well-designed RCM. We know that many of the design elements will come through in secondary legislation and further consultation after this point, so we do not see anything in the Bill that is particularly problematic.

  [Source]

  One thing is absolutely clear: this is very well-intentioned. We all wish to decarbonise, but I think we have to call out some fundamental flaws in the Bill. I do so with the aim of saying, “Let’s make sure that we can be really clear about what this is doing and what some of the potential unintended consequences are.”

  First, I think it is important to say—this might sound slightly controversial, but I do not wish it to be—that this is not a step that will decarbonise. It is a step that will increase the production of sustainable aviation fuel. The way you decarbonise is effectively by incentivising consumption of sustainable aviation fuel, which we already do through the SAF mandate. The SAF mandate is a reasonably well-developed tool that sets a volume threshold and a buy-out price. That is a major lever that you pull as a Government to incentivise consumption. Let us be clear that this is around incentivising production.

  [Source]

  10:12

  Jonathon Counsell: We are huge supporters of the Bill. As Luke has said, SAF is critical to decarbonising aviation. There is no silver bullet, but this gets pretty close. We think that by 2050, 70% of our fuel will be SAF.

  There are three types of SAF: first, second and third generation. Quite clearly, the first generation is all that you can buy today, and 95% of it is from hydroprocessed esters and fatty acids—used cooking oil. However, that will hit feedstock constraints in the early 2030s, so we are going to start to cap out on the amount of 1G SAF we can produce. That is why 2G and 3G are critical if we are to meet long-term decarbonisation targets. We expect that by 2050, 90% of SAF will be 2G and 3G, so it is critical that we have a policy mechanism that incentivises 2G SAF.

  [Source]

  10:15

  Lahiru Ranasinghe: From a strategic perspective, there are three things we are trying to do as an airline. We want to grow, to do so sustainably while decarbonising at the same time, and to keep fares affordable for consumers. For us to be able to do that, we need a functioning SAF market to develop over time, so that supply and demand are balanced and the market is working under its own steam. Right now, the 2G and 3G SAF technology has been developed but there is a key transition period it needs to go through, to get from technology demonstrations to commercial scale. That is where the market failure is which is being addressed by the RCM. Like my colleagues, we are supportive of the RCM. It is clear to us that the eyes of the world are on the UK to see how we make this work.

  A step down from that, there is a not quite as bad, but still bad, scenario in which the market is short on supply, so there is little incentive for suppliers to charge significantly below the buy-out price. You would end up in a situation where the cost that being passed through to airlines, and therefore to consumers, is disproportionate to the decarbonisation that happens.

  [Source]

  10:54

  However, in our case, because we are using the FT-SPK route, biogenic CO2 is produced in the process. If I capture that CO2 and connect to Net Zero Teesside, I will be able to generate more carbon certificates—actually, it is triple. For example, if I produced 100 carbon certificates without carbon capture, with carbon capture I can produce 300. By this process, we can reduce the cost of SAF to the offtaker or to the consumer, because then I will divide the capex with the overall cost; instead of dividing it by 100, I will divide it by 300. In our case and for our route, it is key to be connected to the carbon cluster in Teesside, because then I will be able to provide a lower cost for these carbon certificates, if we get the RCM potential.

  [Source]

• 15 Jul 2025: Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill (Second sitting)

  Doug McKiernan: On the first part of the question, given my knowledge of the sector as an engineer, I do not believe that there is a long-term solution other than power to liquid. At the moment, in the ASTM fuel standards, there are a lot of bio-based, sugar-based and food-waste solutions. In my view, those are not truly scalable, and their cost will only ever go up, because of the shortage of land and so on. The power-to-liquid side is truly scalable. The feedstock is air, water and renewable energy. It is extremely clean, and it gives the industry the opportunity—in, say, 10 or 15 years’ time—to move to fuels that are even more performant than current fossil-based fuels.

  [Source]

  Matt Gorman: Let me start by saying that we take this issue very seriously, for the reasons you have outlined. It is central to our business. SAF is key to delivering the industry’s net zero transition plan: it is about 40% of the solution. I do not think that anyone can forecast the future costs and prices with exact certainty, but I will say that we test all our demand forecasts for Heathrow against a range of different carbon price scenarios, from low to high—“high” being the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero’s high scenarios. We do that because it is important for us to understand and our investors to understand, and because climate disclosure legislation now requires us to share that information in our annual report. We have concluded that demand for flying from Heathrow remains robust even in high carbon price scenarios in future. We are confident about that.

  [Source]

  Matt Gorman: It is a good question. We welcome the Bill. As SAF is so important, the sector and Heathrow have advocated over a number of years both the mandate, which was passed as legislation at the beginning of the year, and the revenue certainty mechanism. It has benefits for energy security, green jobs, growth and decarbonisation. That has been one of the drivers for the sector to support it. The decarbonisation benefits are clear. On jobs and growth, earlier witnesses talked about the industry studies showing up to £10 billion of GVA and 60,000 jobs by 2050.

  [Source]

  15:35

  Q Good afternoon. Does the Bill get that balance right? Will it increase UK production of SAF to the point that we have domestic fuel security, or is there a better way of decarbonising aviation fuel?

  [Source]

  15:42

  Professor Maslin : We take the very large view that the only way to make the international aviation industry net zero is by SAFs. Electric short haul—possible in the next 20 to 30 years. Hydrogen—forget it; it is never going to work and any pilot will tell you, “Not a chance.” That is just so we have that laid out there.

  [Source]

  15:42

  Adding £1 or £2 to the price of a flight does not concern the airlines from the passenger point of view—it will not put passengers off. What will put them off is when the airlines suddenly realise that if you multiply that by 550, which is the number of people in an A380, you suddenly start to bankroll quite a lot of extra money that has to be found. I am hedging my bets, so I will not tell you that it will be higher or lower than £1.50. That is a very small amount per individual, but for the companies that are trying to make aviation work and are positive about trying to move to net zero, this is the perfect time to push, as they have suddenly woken up to the fact that they are laggards.

  [Source]

• 14 Jul 2025: Financial Assistance to Industry

  18:10

  With fleet sales removed, new EV registrations prove that this is just not a technology that people trust, desire or are willing to spend their hard-earned money on. The Conservatives previously pushed the zero-emission vehicle mandate transition date back to 2035, but this Government have brought it forward to 2030. The need for this subsidy––let us call it what it is––is a clear indication that the Government are struggling to persuade consumers to switch to electric vehicles.

  We warned the Government that that would be the outcome. However, driven by an ideological approach to net zero, they ignored those warnings. This is yet another example of how the Government’s unrealistic climate targets are contributing to the rising cost of living for ordinary British families. Many other countries have opted for a 2035 target, recognising the economic and logistical challenges of any earlier deadline. In contrast, the UK’s 2030 mandate risks placing an undue financial burden on families here, forcing them to purchase more expensive vehicles while others abroad can wait and benefit from falling prices.

  [Source]

• 17 Jun 2025: Hydrogen-powered Aviation

  10:07

  Let me be clear: hydrogen is not a hypothetical solution. It is a practical, viable and strategically critical path forward for decarbonising flight. The UK has a golden opportunity to lead the world in this technology, not just by developing aircraft but by creating the entire hydrogen aviation value chain, from production and distribution to propulsion and maintenance. When combusted purely, hydrogen emits only water vapour, unlike kerosene, obviously, which produces carbon dioxide. Moreover, unlike battery electric aircraft, hydrogen aviation scales better over distance and payload, making it suitable for not just short-term hops but future regional and potentially transcontinental routes. That is not only good for the planet, but good for Britain.

  A successful future-focused aviation sector means more than environmental progress; it means greater reliability and connectivity for passengers, and competitive ticket prices driven by fuel efficiency. For business, it means faster, lower emission logistics, better access to export markets and the growth of regional airports as hubs for commerce and investment. There is an important distinction to be made here, and one that we in this place must be honest about. While hydrogen fuel cells offer lower energy losses and may suit smaller aircraft or drones, it is pure hydrogen combustion that offers the best chance of achieving decarbonisation for medium to large aircraft, especially within the constraints of airframe weight and power density. Combustion also enables more rapid retrofit of existing aircraft designs and is more compatible with current maintenance ecosystems and airport infrastructure. Simply put, hydrogen combustion is the most practical, scalable route for commercial aviation and the UK should be focusing investment accordingly.

  [Source]

• 11 Jun 2025: Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill

  17:26

  The test that net zero must meet is that all our constituents must still be able to do everything they do today—be it fly on holiday, drive, or get a ferry or anything else that runs on a liquid hydrocarbon—and that businesses must still be able to move goods around the world and trade at the same price as today, or for an equivalent price, just greener. In that, technology is our friend, as is the innovation we see—particularly on these shores, but also innovation that is happening abroad. As my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington (Gareth Bacon), the shadow Secretary of State, said earlier in the debate, the Opposition do not seek to divide the House on Second Reading. This Bill is an extension of the previous Government’s agenda in this regard, and we fully recognise the need to replace fossil fuels over time and, in this instance, to replace aviation fuel with a cleaner, greener alternative. However, there will be key questions that the House should look at as this Bill goes through Committee and its later stages, which do need answers. We have heard some of those questions throughout this afternoon’s debate.

  The hon. Member for North Somerset (Sadik Al-Hassan) mentioned the role of hydrogen in the mix, and I look forward to debating that with him when he has a debate on this issue in Westminster Hall next week, I think. He is absolutely right that there are other technologies and other fuels out there. The hon. Member for Derby South (Baggy Shanker) correctly pointed out that there can be no net zero without many of the elements of this Bill. The hon. Member for Doncaster Central (Sally Jameson) spoke passionately about Doncaster airport and the sustainable future that the Bill will help bring about.

  [Source]

• 5 Jun 2025: Battery Energy Storage Sites: Safety Regulations

  16:01

  In my constituency of Mid Buckinghamshire, we are increasingly seeing applications for these industrial-scale storage sites in rural settings near homes, farms, schools, conservation areas, watercourses and rivers. These are often justified in the name of green energy, but residents rightly ask: green for whom and safe for whom? It is not just the risk of fire; the cumulative impact of associated infrastructure—substations, cabling, transformer enclosures —often means miles of narrow rural roads being torn up by heavy goods vehicles, with lasting safety implications. Roads that were never designed for such weight and volume are left with potholes, uneven surfaces and subsidence. For local motorists, cyclists, pedestrians and horse riders, or schoolchildren walking along rural lanes, this poses a daily and wholly unnecessary danger. I have received multiple reports from parish councils, residents and emergency services who are concerned that the access routes used for construction and maintenance of these sites are not fit for purpose. My constituents in the Claydons and in Little Missenden are at risk from convoys of lorries, with junction visibility reduced, verges destroyed and road surfaces degraded if BESS projects planned for those areas go ahead.

  [Source]

• 2 Apr 2025: Driving Licences: Zero Emission Vehicles

  I thank the Government for bringing forward sensible reforms, which will decrease the regulatory burden and provide more flexibility for category B licence holders. Many of the reforms are sensible steps that were widely supported in the consultation during the last Parliament. It is unfortunate, but unsurprising, that the Government’s so-called plan for change did not involve scrapping the limitations in this statutory instrument. Narrowing the scope of eligible vehicles from alternatively fuelled vehicles to zero emission vehicles is a mistake that cannot be ignored. As we transition to new technologies, we as a country must be less prescriptive. Too often, Governments want to tell industry and innovators what to do, and I am afraid that the restrictive nature of this measure risks hampering our country’s attempts to reduce emissions.

  Let me be clear: my concerns are not a judgment on whether the Government are right or wrong to suggest that zero emission vehicles will be most effective. The issue is rather that limiting the measure’s scope to a smaller subset of non-petrol and non-diesel fuels makes them far too narrow.

  [Source]

  There are also entirely man-made synthetic fuels that require no such feedstocks. They do not require food to be grown in order to be burned. There are innovators on that in this country and all over the world. For example, Zero Petroleum, just next door to my constituency—just over the Oxfordshire border at Bicester Heritage—has developed a fuel that works in every jet engine and every internal combustion engine that we enjoy today. It is entirely man-made; it is literally made out of air and water. It is a mixture of green hydrogen with atmospheric carbon capture. However, the ZEV mandate and the approach that the Government are taking in this statutory instrument rule that technology out of order, because there is still carbon at the tailpipe. The regulations ignore the fact that the carbon at the tailpipe is the same volume of carbon that is captured out of the atmosphere to make the next lot of fuel. In fact, a whole-system analysis shows that technology to be carbon-neutral—one volume of carbon is in a perpetual cycle. However, no matter how much Ministers and the Government claim to be technologically neutral, the test at the tailpipe, and the test in this statutory instrument, which explicitly refers to zero emission vehicles, rather than alternatively fuelled vehicles, do in fact mean that the Government pick a technological winner at every step, rather than letting our great innovators innovate.

  [Source]

• 27 Mar 2025: Aviation Sector: Support

  Significantly muddled messages are being sent to the aviation sector. On the one hand, the Climate Change Committee, upon whose altar the Government appear to worship, wants flights to fall by 2030, which is a massive blow to our aviation sector, while the Government equally say that they want growth and that they want to expand airports. Who is going to win? Will Ministers stand up to the Climate Change Committee or are we just going to end up with bigger, emptier airports?

  [Source]

• 27 Mar 2025: Scunthorpe Steelworks

  11:30

  Tariffs are but one challenge facing the industry. Alongside the jobs tax and the unemployment Bill, the steel industry is being choked by the Government’s ideological green targets. Will the Minister tell the House what concerns British Steel has expressed about those net zero targets? As I said at the beginning, this news will be deeply concerning for steelworkers in Scunthorpe. Has the Minister or the Secretary of State spoken with them about the news and, if so, what support are they being offered?

  [Source]

• 24 Feb 2025: Plant Oxford Site

  15:44

  I draw attention to my entry in the register of interests. I expected the Secretary of State to hide from talk of CVs, but it seems that also applies to EVs. This weekend we saw the disastrous consequences of Labour’s rigid approach to net zero: BMW hitting the brakes on a £600 million investment in Plant Oxford. That deal, from 2023, would have secured 4,000 high-quality jobs and was a strong vote of confidence in the UK. Like other deals, it was possible only because the previous Government were willing to be pragmatic. The Conservatives made the sensible decision to delay the ban on internal combustion engine cars, bringing the UK into line with major global economies such as France, Germany, Sweden and Canada, but Labour said it knew better, restoring the 2030 phase-out date in its manifesto.

  When the negative impacts of that approach became clear, the Government launched a fast-track consultation on the zero emission vehicle mandate, pitifully attempting to buy themselves time. Surely, no consultation is necessary. The effects of their puritanical ZEV obsession is already clear: Jaguar Land Rover says that the ZEV mandate is causing disruption to the market; Vauxhall has confirmed that it will shut down its Luton factory, citing the ZEV mandate as making the plant less economically viable; and now the future of Plant Oxford—the home of the Mini since 1959—is uncertain.

  Labour’s reckless policies have shattered industry confidence, with consumer demand for EVs dropping off a cliff and numbers only just about sustained by subsidised fleet sales. Will the Minister do the right thing: stop hiding behind consultations and acknowledge that the Government’s ideological approach to net zero will lead only to economic disaster for our automotive sector and consumers alike?

  [Source]

• 13 Feb 2025: Electric Vehicles

  09:41

  Last year, just one in 10 consumers buying a new car chose battery electric, and in 2024, the private market for battery electric was 20% lower than Government intervention had tried to manipulate it to be. Without fleet sales—which we know are warped by huge tax incentives, promoting them over practical vehicle choices—electric car demand just is not there. When will the Minister understand that people are crying out for a different way to defossilise and decarbonise their private vehicles? Battery electric just is not popular, so when will the Government stop trying to tell people what they should want? This is just a “Government knows best” attitude at its very worst, is it not?

  [Source]

  09:43

  The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders’ January report simply does not back up what the Minister has just said. I repeat that only one in 10 consumers—the people we all represent in this House—actively chose a battery electric vehicle. As the Minister knows from her time on the Transport Select Committee when we looked at the future of fuel, there are other technologies out there. The Government like to say that they are technology-neutral, but the ZEV mandate’s myopic focus on the tailpipe rather than whole system analysis effectively denies our innovators the room to defossilise and decarbonise in a manner that consumers want. Surely the Minister sees that, so instead of trying to force people to buy battery electric, will the Government just get the bureaucracy out of the way and let our innovators innovate?

  [Source]

• 3 Feb 2025: Energy Development Proposals: Mid Buckinghamshire

  21:10

  The Government seem content with ploughing on. Last week’s revelation in The Daily Telegraph of intentions to convert a tenth of our farmland to use for net zero gives a blank cheque to those intent on destroying rather than preserving our countryside. The countryside is for farming. It is not a building site for solar panels, power plants, battery storage sites or wind turbines. It is for growing food. It is for the local communities and businesses that rely on it.

  [Source]

  20:19

  My constituents are constantly being told that the projects are needed for a transition to net zero, yet the vast majority will not even be completed. That goes to show how misguided the Government’s so-called energy security policy really is: unable to deliver and throwing my constituents under the bus. It should therefore not be a surprise that the misguided and highly speculative nature of the BESS projects has led to countless rejections by local planning authorities.

  [Source]

• 30 Jan 2025: Business Confidence

  10:11

  When consumer confidence is low, business confidence is low, and nowhere is that more visible than in our automotive sector, with UK car production slumping to its lowest level since 1954. Autocar magazine warned today that the zero emission vehicle mandate

  [Source]

• 24 Jan 2025: Climate and Nature Bill

  12:10

  It is slightly worse than that. We heard the debate earlier about the word “and”. Many of these large-scale renewable energy projects such as battery storage are surrounded by such severe fencing that local nature—for example, deer runs—is severely disrupted or destroyed.

  [Source]

  To answer the hon. Gentleman’s serious point, I do not see anything in the Bill that challenges the zero emission vehicle mandate. The ZEV mandate is obsessed with testing at tailpipe rather than whole-system analysis, which gets in the way of developing synthetic fuels and greenlighting the great innovators in this country and worldwide to get on with developing that technology. If we put a synthetic fuel through an internal combustion engine, there is still carbon at tailpipe, but it is the same volume of carbon that will be recaptured through atmospheric carbon capture to make the next lot of fuel. It is carbon neutral. It is one volume of carbon in a perpetual circle, yet I see nothing in the Bill that will enable those great innovators to move ahead and get—as some of them claim they can—cost parity with the fossil fuel equivalent within a decade.

  [Source]

  I hear the point the hon. Lady makes, but I fundamentally disagree. We already have the direction—it was the last Conservative Government who were the first in the western world to legislate for net zero by 2050 and who passed the Environment Act. The answers to the challenges we face in the development of synthetics do not sit in the Bill before us today. They sit in other legislation, which I admit I voted against in the last Parliament, but it is the ZEV mandate that gets in the way, because it fails to look at whole-system analysis. Who else wants to have a go?

  [Source]

• 9 Jan 2025: Sustainable Aviation Fuels

  Estimates suggest that the SAF mandate provisions and the revenue certainty mechanism will still leave a shortfall, with a family of four facing over £300 extra to fly on holiday by 2040. That is a clear concern for consumers, as well as the airline industry. Net zero should not come at an additional cost to consumers or undermine freedoms—in this case, the freedom to fly. The test must surely be how to defossilise, decarbonise and allow people to do the same at the same cost. What steps is the Minister taking in conjunction with the Treasury to close the financial gap between incentives in the mandate and the actual increased cost of switching to SAF for the end consumer?

  [Source]

• 21 Nov 2024: Business of the House

  The Leader of the House will have surely seen the thousands of hard-working farmers who came to Whitehall on Tuesday to protest against the cruel family farm tax. While he was at COP29, the Prime Minister tried to defend his policy by quoting BBC Verify, but BBC Verify has now deleted its comment supporting the Government. Likewise, The Telegraph has reported this week that a Treasury source has told it that no impact assessment will be published on the family farm tax until just before the next Budget. Will the Leader of the House get the Chancellor to come to the Dispatch Box, so that we can have an informed debate about the actual impact the family farm tax will have on the constituents of all Members of the House, including her own Back Benchers who represent rural seats? Her colleagues can then decide whether they stand with their party or with the farmers.

  [Source]

• 11 Nov 2024: Rural Affairs

  20:17

  Of course, that was not the only threat to British farming in the Budget. There was the attack on basic equipment such as pick-up trucks, whereby farmers face paying an extra £5,000 simply for having the audacity to want back seats for their children. Then there is the carbon tax, which will see the cost of fertiliser rise by between £50 and £75 a tonne, which will have a detrimental impact on either farmers’ margins or food prices, or potentially both. Across the country, either outcome would be devastating.

  [Source]

• 4 Nov 2024: Income Tax (Charge)

  18:55

  The APR changes are not the only changes that will hammer our farming families and agricultural communities. I am sure there is a joke somewhere along the lines of “When is a pick-up truck not a pick-up truck?”, but it is no laughing matter for farmers. For them, it is just a basic bit of equipment that they need to operate, but this Government are hammering them on the cost of that equipment if it happens to have rear seats. As I raised earlier today in this House during the urgent question, the Government’s carbon tax will put up the price of fertiliser by between £50 and £75 a tonne. Either that is going to have a direct impact on the cost of food, or the Government are asking farmers—already operating on incredibly tight margins, often with no profit at all—just to swallow that extra cost. I urge them to reconsider.

  [Source]

• 4 Nov 2024: Budget: Implications for Farming Communities

  16:33

  There are already very low margins on every farm, including those in Mid Buckinghamshire. Will the addition of between £50 and £75 a tonne on the price of fertiliser, through the Government’s proposed carbon tax, increase food prices? Who will shoulder that burden? Will it be the farmer, or will it be the consumer?

  [Source]

• 29 Oct 2024: Draft Vehicle Emissions Trading Schemes (Amendment) Order 2024

  What is slightly more controversial, however, is the limit of the order and the wider questions that it poses about the Government’s approach to the ZEV mandate, our domestic automotive sector and the transition to de-fossilised and decarbonised forms of private transport. The Labour party had previously been clear that it wished to reverse the Conservative Government’s practical, pragmatic and sensible delay from 2030 to 2035 of the banning of the sale of new petrol and diesel cars, yet the draft order will do no such thing: it leaves the 2035 date intact. Can the Minister confirm whether the Government are leaving the 2035 date in place, which would be sensible, or whether we are set to see more orders coming forward? If so, will they come with a wider debate in the main Chamber?

  Can the Minister explain why the draft order does so little? It is just tinkering at the edges, with no practical steps to solve the real-world problems that we face. Can he confirm what the Government’s actual plans are to ban the sale of new petrol and diesel internal combustion engine cars? Is there even a plan? What confidence can he give to motorists and car manufacturers alike that the Government value—in a de-fossilised, decarbonised way—the freedom to drive?

  [Source]

• 22 Oct 2024: Large-scale Energy Projects and Food Security

  16:50

  This debate is about efficiency and proper land use. It is about getting to renewable energy production, but it is also about using technology that does not destroy our countryside and that does not fundamentally take away our other core source of national security, which is food production.

  [Source]

• 16 Oct 2024: Steel Industry

  10:23

  The Minister knows that Scunthorpe is now the only site in the UK with the ability to produce virgin steel. If she allows it to close on her watch, we will be left open and vulnerable to cheap imports from China, and that must not be allowed to happen. Equally, I understand that the Government are not prepared to support virgin steel manufacturing while new electric arc furnaces are being commissioned and are coming online. Is that correct? If so, how does it chime with the Secretary of State’s previous commitment that decarbonisation must not mean deindustrialisation?

  [Source]

  10:31

  What we are seeing on the ground right now is something different, however, because we have returned to the Labour party playbook: scrap jobs, scrap production and become reliant on higher-polluting countries for imports. That is not what I call decarbonisation, so I ask the Minister to come clean. What has gone wrong so early in this Government’s tenure? Why are she and the Secretary of State unable to fulfil their manifesto commitments? Can the Minister explain what will happen to those thousands of jobs in the steel sector across our country? We need the steel strategy now, not a promise of it for the future. Time is running out.

  [Source]

• 11 Sep 2024: Port Talbot Transition Project

  12:50

  It is also no surprise that, once again, Labour is presiding over the demise of our steel sector. Output fell by 47% under the last Labour Government, and 56% of jobs were lost. Today’s deal means that 100% of output will go at Port Talbot. An electric arc furnace will take five years at best to get up and running; some suggest that it will be eight to nine years before a single new job is created, if we see any new jobs at all. As the statement says, this is a transition, but it is a heartbreaking transition for thousands of people—a transition from being in work to being out of work. In his discussions with Tata, why did the Secretary of State not take steps to ensure that the blast furnace will not be closed before the new electric arc furnace opens? Is this not the New Labour playbook—scrap jobs, scrap production and become reliant on higher-polluting countries for imports? That is not what I call decarbonisation. I must say, I feel a little sorry for the Secretary of State, who has been dispatched here to announce these spending decisions just a day after Labour’s day of shame on winter fuel cuts for pensioners.

  For the benefit of new colleagues, the Government, when in opposition, were committed to £28 billion a year of borrowing to fund their decarbonisation plans—a price tag that has magically disappeared, although the target has not. The Secretary of State made promises about that to the steel industry, but where are those promises now? Where is that money? Is he still battling the Chancellor? We know that Labour’s unions are quite successful in squeezing money from the Treasury, so maybe he can send them to stand up to the Chancellor if he is having problems.

  [Source]

• 9 Sep 2024: Transport

  There is a clear and undeniable role for such fuels across all transport modes in our path to 2050. Aviation is possibly the most difficult to de-fossilise and decarbonise, but it is also ahead of the curve, because sustainable and wholly synthetic fuels are an innovation that enables everyone to continue doing what they want to do—flying off on holiday or to see family, going on a business trip or general motoring—in a cleaner and eventually de-fossilised, carbon-neutral way. We are not reinventing the wheel, but reinventing the fuel.

  The Conservative Government recognised that SAF may be more expensive than traditional jet fuel in the intermediate term. Our plan included a review mechanism to help manage prices and minimise the impact on ticket fares for passengers. My first question to the Minister is: can the Government reassure the House that the impact on passengers will be kept to a minimum, and can we ensure that they are not footing the bill? Provided that sufficient SAF is available, any increases in air fares as a result of SAF will fall well within the range of the usual fluctuations in prices that we see every year, and the previous Government had plans in place to prevent any major hikes. Can the Government confirm that they too will guarantee that there will be no major hikes in prices, so that we can transition to net zero in an affordable way, taking people along with us?

  [Source]

• 5 Sep 2024: UK Steel Manufacturing

  10:48

  But now we see, quite clearly, that Labour’s plans for decarbonisation do in fact mean de-industrialisation, and that the drive for green steel will mean fewer jobs, not more. Under the last Labour Government output fell by 47%, and, similarly, the promises that this Government made just weeks ago to steelworkers in Scunthorpe, Port Talbot and Teesside, and across the country, have been broken.

  [Source]

• 26 Jul 2024: Making Britain a Clean Energy Superpower

  11:06

  On today’s subject matter, I want to be clear from the outset that we absolutely have to decarbonise and we absolutely have to defossilise. The challenge laid down to our great innovators and scientific minds is enormous, and those great minds are rising to the challenge, from electricity generation to the fuels of the future. But that is also why I am so frustrated by an approach to cleaner energy and cleaner fuel from Government that always seems to favour the first, but not necessarily the best or most sustainable, solutions for the future.

  Let that be a warning to any community where solar is coming: it does not end with the panels. Solar has its place, but that is on our rooftops and not our fields. Research by the wonderful charity, Campaign to Protect Rural England, found that there is potential for 117 GW of renewable energy to be generated from rooftops and other existing developed spaces in England. We should be prioritising that, and not losing our agricultural land.

  [Source]

  An important point to finish on is that the carbon at tailpipe when these fuels are burned is the same volume that is then recaptured to make the next lot of fuel. They are net zero. It is one volume of carbon in a perpetual circle. I congratulate the Minister on his appointment, and ask him to take the message back to the Department that we need to embrace synthetic fuels as part of the clean energy revolution that he claims at the Dispatch Box to want to see.

  [Source]

• 18 Apr 2024: Large-scale Solar Farms

  13:35

  of renewable energy

  [Source]

• 4 Dec 2023: Land Use: Renewable Energy Generation

  12. What recent discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero on the use of land for renewable energy generation.

  [Source]

• 16 Oct 2023: Net Zero by 2050

  Further to the question from my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (John Redwood), synthetic fuels—by that, I mean genuinely synthetic fuels made from green hydrogen and atmospheric carbon capture, rather than biofuels or fuels from waste—are net zero, because the amount of carbon at the tailpipe is the same volume recaptured to make the next lot of fuel, yet the myopic zero-emission vehicle mandate prevents the UK from benefiting from synthetic fuels for our road vehicles. Will my right hon. Friend show the same welcome pragmatism she has shown to the rest of the agenda and revisit the zero-emission vehicle mandate?

  [Source]

• 12 Jul 2023: Automotive Industry

  13:24

  In embracing that innovation—this is further to my intervention on the shadow Minister—the UK is a leader in the development of the synthetic fuel sector. By that, I do not mean fuels made from feedstocks; I mean green hydrogen merged with atmospheric carbon capture, whereby what comes out of the tailpipe is the same volume of carbon that is then recaptured to make the next load of fuel. With whole system analysis, that will be shown to be net zero, but the zero tailpipe mandate gets in the way of that. Does the Minister agree that, to embrace this innovation properly and to give an eclectic future to the automotive sector, we need to embrace those innovators as well?

  [Source]

• 9 May 2023: Energy Bill [Lords]

  21:13

  Not only are these things horrendously expensive, but for many rural homes they just will not, and never will, work. The Government’s own data shows that some 20% of off-grid households simply cannot use them. Many rural or older homes, built out of stone, cob or “Whychert”, which is unique to the Vale of Aylesbury, are less energy efficient, more expensive, more difficult and, in some cases, impossible to insulate. It is essential that the Government drop ambitions to ban people from using systems that actually work for their homes. Instead, they should ensure there is the best variety of choices available to households to choose how to decarbonise in a way that will not leave them broke, indebted and cold.

  This is about developing new fuels for what we already have, not spending billions of pounds on reinventing the wheel, or at least that which makes the wheels and propellers turn. Perhaps such fuels will even be the saviour of the road car as we know it, as even the European Commission is proposing to allow e-fuels in combustion engines after its zero emission cut-off date in 2035.

  [Source]

• 23 Feb 2023: UK Food Shortages

  10:51

  The Secretary of State is absolutely right in pointing to the factors that she has in answering this urgent question. May I push her a little further on the question of energy, and urge her to work more closely with the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero to see whether we can reclassify what is energy intensive industry within our support schemes? Agriculture and horticulture are incredibly energy intensive, yet they have not had the same support as some manufacturing sectors. That could revolutionise British farming and keep businesses afloat.

  [Source]

• 20 Dec 2022: Christmas Adjournment

  East West Rail still plans to launch next year with diesel-only rolling stock. As we head to net zero, that simply cannot be right, and I urge the Government to look again at that, too.

  [Source]

• 29 Nov 2022: Topical Questions

  12:24

  T6. Does my right hon. Friend share my enthusiasm for synthetic fuels made from green hydrogen and atmospheric carbon capture as part of our route to decarbonisation? If so, what is his Department doing to support the UK pioneers in this sector, such as Zero Petroleum, to compete in what will surely be a multitrillion-pound global industry and huge export opportunity?

  [Source]

• 23 Jun 2022: Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill (Third sitting)

  12:51

  Finally, it would be good if we could boost the infrastructure levy for areas with neighbourhood plans. We are keen to work with the Government on driving greater numbers of parish and town councils to do neighbourhood plans. We share with our councils the things that have been done in so many places to tackle climate change and to promote health and wellbeing as part of the neighbourhood planning process.

  [Source]

• 16 Jun 2022: Low-carbon Off-gas Grid Heating

  13:56

  I have looked at this issue across not just the home energy sector but the transport sector, and I sincerely believe that drop-in fuels have to be part of the solution. An example is renewable liquid gas, which is a liquid fuel that resembles the same chemical and energy content as LPG but can be used as a drop-in fuel for existing infrastructure, boilers and solutions in people’s homes and businesses. However, it is produced through technology that utilises renewable feedstocks, meaning it has a low carbon content when compared with conventional LPG. Due to the drop-in nature, renewable liquid gases effectively utilise all of the existing infrastructure to deliver affordable decarbonisation solutions, particularly to the most hard-to-treat domestic and non-domestic properties that are off grid.

  However—this is the problem that I bring to the debate this afternoon—there is currently a lack of recognition, particularly for renewable liquid gas and drop-in fuels more widely, from the Government and some suppliers. The key to enabling the supply and production of renewable liquid gas is a supportive political framework orientated to the long-term benefit of many families and businesses in off-grid locations. Are we not all seeking cost-effective and convenient decarbonisation solutions? It is critical that the upcoming biomass strategy explicitly recognises renewable liquid gas to ensure continued funding and development in this area. Affordable clean energy for families and businesses is key if we are to meet the 2050 net zero ambition.

  [Source]

• 31 Mar 2022: Food Security

  15:40

  My example is solar farms. We had a good debate about large solar farms in Westminster Hall some weeks ago. There are a lot of applications for them in my constituency. The vast majority of people accept the need for the renewable energy sector to develop that technology and get us off fossil fuels. However, that cannot be at the cost of hundreds of thousands of acres of agricultural land—certainly thousands of acres of agricultural land in my own constituency. I must say that I take the planning consultants’ defence that sheep can still be grazed underneath the solar panels with a very large pinch of salt, because of course if the fields have been covered with the plastic, glass and metal that make up the solar panels, I am not sure how they expect grass to grow underneath them. I urge the Minister to work with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities in particular to work out a way to ensure that we get the solar technology that we need in this country, but on rooftops, factories and brownfield sites rather than taking away the precious agricultural land in our rural communities.

  [Source]

• 29 Mar 2022: Net Zero Targets: Synthetic Fuels

  12. What assessment he has made of the potential role of synthetic fuels in achieving net zero targets.

  [Source]

• 13 Feb 2020: February Adjournment

  14:17

  The road plus the housing development and the green-belt land that would be required would massively increase the risk of flooding, and we are already suffering considerably in Buckinghamshire from an increase in flooding as a result of over-development. It cannot be lost on the House that, at a time when we are trying to reduce carbon output and get to net zero by 2050, building a new motorway is not a sensible step to take.

  [Source]

See all Parliamentary Speeches Mentioning Climate