My Lords, I thank the Government for supporting these amendments, which reflect the substance of amendments that my noble friend Lady Hayman, I and others brought forward in Committee. That debate rehearsed the health case for action very clearly, as we have just heard, so I will not detain the House by repeating that.
However, I think the events of the last 24 hours have underlined two other reasons why these amendments are so important. In addition to the health case, there is clearly a financial case and we also now clearly see the security and humanitarian case for action. The financial case was underlined by yesterday’s IPCC report:
“The financial value of health benefits from improved air quality alone is projected to be greater than the costs of meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement.”
In respect of the security and humanitarian consequences, yesterday, the Government welcomed Shell’s decision to sever its relationship with Gazprom, yet Ministers may have seen an important story in the Health Service Journal suggesting that, over the last two years, at least 17 NHS trusts have continued to rely on gas sourced from Gazprom, which has confirmed today that it continues to get its gas supplies through Ukraine. Decarbonising the health sector will take pound notes out of the hands of dictatorial regimes that are engaged in acts of aggression. For all these reasons, the clarity that these government amendments provide, putting on a sound statutory basis the ability to take fundamental action across the NHS, is most welcome.