Here are the climate-related sections of speeches by MPs during the Commons debate Planning and Infrastructure Bill.
Judith Cummins (Labour)
(b) the mitigation of, and adaptation to, climate change.”
This amendment would ensure the Secretary of State must publish a report into the success of development corporations in achieving their duty to have regard for sustainable development and climate change.
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David Smith (Labour)
Too often the debate has been about nature versus development. I note, for example, that amendment 151 assumes that development corporations will come into conflict with the need to tackle climate change. I believe that the Bill will be good for our natural world in so far as it unlocks the “little and often” developments that will help Northumbrians to revitalise their rural communities and protect natural landscapes. As the MP for a constituency with a natural landscape, including a dozen sites of special scientific interest and half a national park, I cannot help but be awed by that beauty.
As amendment 151 acknowledges, our natural world faces an uncertain future, with climate change and other pressures. Organisations such as the Northumberland National Park Authority and the Northumberland Wildlife Trust do excellent work in stewarding Northumberland’s unique ecological inheritance. I encourage the Government to continue having a genuine dialogue with environmental groups as the Bill progresses and is implemented in due course. Our language and approach must honour our commitment to environmental stewardship, and we need to thread the needle of sustainable development together.
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15:59 Gideon Amos (Liberal Democrat)
Wary of your strictures to stay on topic, Madam Deputy Speaker, I hope you will briefly allow me to add my welcome to that of my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Max Wilkinson) of the fact that, following the introduction of his private Member’s Bill, the Government, to their credit, have agreed that all new homes will be fitted with solar panels as standard—his sunshine Bill really is “winning here”—bringing zero emissions a step closer, after all the hard work of Liberal Democrat and Labour Ministers on zero-carbon homes, before the Conservatives cancelled the programme in 2015.
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11:30 John Lamont (Conservative)
Before I talk about the detail of my concerns about compulsory purchase powers, I want to set out a little of the context, and say why the issue is exercising so many of my constituents. I am privileged to represent the Scottish Borders—the place I call home. It is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful parts of the United Kingdom, but it is under attack. The net-zero-at-all-costs agenda of this UK Labour Government, backed by the SNP in Edinburgh, is causing huge concern to my constituents. Massive pylons, solar farms, wind farms and battery storage units are ruining the Scottish Borders as we know them, and compulsory purchase powers are a key part of delivering many of those projects.
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16:40 Steff Aquarone (Liberal Democrat)
Good design will also support the second key aim that amendment 151 seeks to have the Government report on, which is tackling the climate emergency. It is simple: a development that means fewer fossil fuel-powered cars are required to be on the roads will be better for the planet than one that does not.
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16:47 Manuela Perteghella (Liberal Democrat)
We also need serious, measurable action on climate. Development corporations are being handed significant powers, yet the Bill fails to guarantee that they are delivering in line with the UK’s climate targets. That is why amendment 151 is so important. It would ensure that the Secretary of State publishes a report on whether development corporations are meeting their legal duties on sustainable development and climate change. With so much at stake, we need transparency and accountability built into the system.
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16:49 Matthew Pennycook (Labour)
New clause 114 in the name of the hon. Member for Taunton and Wellington would ensure that development corporations include provision for green spaces in new developments. The Government absolutely agree that delivery of large-scale development and regeneration projects must include the provision and stewardship of green space, which has a wide range of benefits, including supporting health and wellbeing, climate mitigation and adaptation, and biodiversity and wildlife.
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