My Lords, I will speak to the amendments in my name, but I could not begin without commenting on the three very powerful speeches which have just been made. I hope very much that the Minister is listening and will be able to give something better than a formulaic response to the pleas that have been made.
In the amendments standing in my name and the name of my noble friend Lady Parminter, there are references to two other missing links in the metrics which are in front of us via these 12 missions—missing in both the Bill, where there are no links at all, and in the White Paper that preceded it. There are 12 missions set out in the White Paper and none of them references the need for future investment to achieve net-zero emissions as the fundamental basis of levelling up. I find that, frankly, astonishing. It is all the more surprising because the White Paper itself takes space in section 1.4.1 to explain that the risks and opportunities that the transition to net zero raises are greatest in exactly those parts of the country that most seriously need levelling up.
The White Paper points out that to achieve a just transition, the most challenging area is in those places where levelling up is most needed:
“Parts of the UK that need to undergo the largest transition”
to net zero
“lie outside the South East, often in some of the least well-performing areas of the UK.”
The White Paper recognises that there is a correlation between the intensity of the impact of the intended transition to net zero and areas that need levelling up. In other words, you need more of it in the places where levelling up is needed the most. It clearly identifies that but then proposes no action to respond to that impact.
Our amendment does not propose an additional mission to remedy this oversight, because, quite apart from the spurious precision of a particular number of missions in the first place, the transition to net zero needs to be at the heart of all of the missions in the White Paper. There is a powerful read-across to living standards, transport, skills, health and well-being—to mention the scope of just five of the missions on the Minister’s list. Amendment 18 is framed in terms of requiring pervasive action within all 12 missions to enhance their success in delivering meaningful and enduring levelling up, and seeks to avoid the temptation of short-term, quick fixes that build in carbon emissions and make matters worse or undermine the UK target of net zero by 2050.
Those risks are real. For instance, for a Minister anxious to achieve a particular mission target by 2030—on, say, living standards, which is mission 1 in the White Paper—it might be very tempting to prioritise investment in an oven-ready, carbon-intensive employment prospect, rather than in a longer-term plan that would aid transition and boost jobs far more, but not until after 2030, when the Minister’s accounting period had ended.
However, an even bigger risk is emerging, which is that new green jobs are not preferentially going to those areas that need levelling up. In fact, they are not even being sprinkled equally across every part of the country. The new green jobs and investment are following the money and not the need, with London and the south-east picking up those jobs much more quickly than the north-east or north-west of England.
6.30 pm
Peers for the Planet has alerted me and other noble Lords to a most useful green jobs barometer prepared by PwC. I cannot write its map into the record, but I will give one quote from its explainer:
“It is clear that regional disparities are becoming more pronounced within the Green Jobs market. For example, the south-east has climbed four places in the regional rankings in 2022, while the north-east has fallen seven places”.
In fact, according to the barometer, the north-east scores 31 points in its assessment, but the south-east scores 15 points more, at 46 points, and London scores 62 points, exactly twice the performance of the north-east in securing jobs from green investment. The truth is that everyone is getting new green jobs—it is the fastest expanding sector of the economy—it is just that London and the south-east are getting more jobs than any other English region.
So let me join the dots for the Minister. Her own White Paper records that the need for extra green jobs is most acute in what it describes as “the least well-performing” areas, such as the north-east of England. The green jobs barometer shows that the reality is that up to now, those new green jobs are disproportionately going to much better performing areas such as the south-east of England. Yet there is no hint whatsoever that in any of the existing metrics of any of the missions will the influence of that skewed result over the review period to 2030 be taken into account. The biggest sector of future job growth is pulling levelling up in the wrong direction.
Surely the Minister can see the disconnect and the imperative for taking some action. Our Amendment 18 safeguards and embeds the achievement of a just transition within every mission metric, regardless of the number of missions and regardless of the other content of those missions at any particular moment. We believe that that is the best way forward, and I look forward to hearing a favourable response from the Minister. But if one is not forthcoming, she and her officials had better know that we will return to this again and again, because it would be a recipe for failure to rely on the existing green investment allocation mechanism to contribute in anything other than a negative way to achieving levelling up. The disparity between the regions will accelerate, not reduce, as a result of the current pattern of green investment. Surely, the missions should be challenging that and reversing it.
Our second amendment, Amendment 19, aims to fill another surprising gap in the missions published in the White Paper: the increasingly urgent need to rescue the UK’s ravaged and despoiled natural environment and rebuild a sustainable biosphere that helps local communities flourish and develop their health and well-being. The connection with the aims of the missions
as printed is clear, but the White Paper fails to recognise its vital importance in achieving them. It is one of the few areas where the White Paper has missed an obvious point. No doubt, the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett, would say that child poverty is another.
It could be said that the White Paper came along a bit too soon to capture the Environment Act 2021, but there is now no reason why that Act should not be referenced and its provisions required to be incorporated in every mission metric. Amendment 19 does exactly that, and I hope the Minister will acknowledge that the fulfilment of the missions will be much easier and more assured if the mandates relating to the natural environment are put in place as it requires.
Before finishing, I will make a general point. I understand the standard rebuttal of Ministers, and the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, supported them in this: that it would be completely wrong to include these proposed changes in the Bill, because it would be so inconvenient if an incoming Administration—or perhaps just an incoming Prime Minister; who knows these days—were faced with some metric or other which they did not like. Well, if an incoming Administration decided that they were no longer going for net zero carbon by 2050, there would be something catastrophically wrong with the direction of policy of this country. Clearly, it ought to be embedded in the metrics of the levelling-up proposition. I would say exactly the same in relation to the protection of the natural environment. One might say the same about child poverty as well.
Of course, today the Minister has to deploy the standard ministerial rebuttal. Whatever we think of it, that is what she will say. However, she is getting a steer from this House about things which should be in the metrics, and there is nothing in the metrics in the White Paper—because we have never actually voted on this at any point—that the Minister cannot change. She can go back to her colleagues and say, “They made a good point, you know. When we publish the final version, it is going to include these points”. Of course, today, she might only be able to go so far as saying she has heard what we say, but I hope she will not say that it is completely wrong to consider any change to the metrics we plucked out of the air and put in the White Paper nine months ago.
I heard the Minister, the noble Earl, Lord Howe, say in relation to a further iteration that the metrics would be revised in the light of information which came along. Well, further information is coming along about things which should in reality have been included in the first set. They do not have to wait for the second iteration to put right the things they have discovered. In fact, the essence of accountability is spotting a problem and fixing it. I put it to the Minister—I am not sure which one will respond to this group—that there is a way forward here. They can capture the high ground again by indicating that they are open to taking these debates into account before the final ministerial statement is tabled when this Bill is approved. I look forward to hearing a positive response from the Minister in due course, and to the rest of the debate.