Climate Change Act 2008 (2020 Target, Credit Limit and Definitions) Order 2009

My Lords, there is an issue of the Government against the real world and I certainly would not wish to get up and defend the Government on this or any other issue in broad principle, given their incompetence in action. However, the world is not standing still. We keep hearing about this enormous sum of money that may have to be spent, but that seems to be said without any regard to the huge sums of money that are being spent by every country in the world at present to maintain their energy supplies. A few years ahead is something that is constantly referred to as peak oil. What we are really talking about—whether or not we are ever going to get agreement on global warming—is the security of future energy supplies. I say to my noble friend Lord Marlesford that I tend not to be too concerned about whether nuclear energy is renewable or not, as it is emissions free. That is the energy distinction that we need to make. We will have to spend increasing sums of money even if we do not change the technology, in order to supply this country with energy. There is a net amount to come off the huge sums that are talked about in respect of the costs mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Stern. I say to my noble friend Lord Fairhead—I beg his pardon, as I should have said Lord Leach of Fairford; I am getting muddled up with some relatives of mine—that there is a distinction between the scientists whom he mentions, who are all apparently not prepared to come out in public, and the scientists who have been doing all the work on global warming and who are all well known and out in public. That may or may not be an argument but, if I understood my noble friend Lord Leach, he said that many people disagree with what is going on but are not prepared to come out in public about it.