Climate Change Bill
Tim believes that climate change is one of the greatest challenges facing our world today. The Conservatives are leading Parliamentary efforts to ensure that Britain's response to this crisis is both ambitious and effective and Tim welcomes the inclusion of a full Climate Change Bill in the Queen's Speech.
A Draft Climate Change Bill was published in March 2007. The key aspects of the Draft Bill were:
- to set statutory targets of a 60 per cent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 2050 using five year carbon budgets;
- to create a Committee on Climate Change to advise the government; and
- to require annual Government reporting to Parliament on progress towards meeting the carbon budget.
The Secretary of State for DEFRA, Hilary Benn MP, recently announced new measures to be included in the full version of the Bill in response to the consultation on the Draft Bill. These new measures included:
- asking the independent Committee on Climate Change to consider whether the government's 2050 emissions reduction target should be increased beyond 60%; and
- asking the Committee to consider the introduction of aviation and shipping.
As the Climate Change Bill progresses through Parliament, Tim will be pushing to strengthen the Bill and ensure the inclusion of measures designed to ensure global warming stays within 2 degrees Celsius.
We will keep you up to date with the progress of the Bill here.
