Energy and climate change secretary Ed Miliband has agreed to include emissions from aviation and shipping in the new Climate Change Bill, which is due to become law next month. Having already taken the important step of upping Britain's commitment to curb its carbon footprint from 60 per cent to 80 per cent by 2050 during his first week in office, he's now accepted an ammendment to the bill proposed by rebel Labour MPs to include the carbon footprint of the aviation and shipping industries.
Together aviation and shipping account for 7.5 per cent (and rising) of the UK's carbon output, so any plan to cut emissions which did not include them wouldn't really be worth the (hopefully recycled) paper it's written on. By agreeing to include them, Ed Miliband has plugged a gaping hole in the Bill and indicated that he intends to make the new legislation as strong as possible. Which, given that the powerful lobbies of the two industries have been trying to keep them out of the equation, is a demonstration of commitment that we should all applaud.
In a separate announcement on emissions, transport secretary Geoff Hoon is to allocate £100 million of new money to promote the use of electric cars across the country. Again, a positive move, although given that £100 million is the same amount that the government spends on widening a mile and a half of the M1, perhaps not quite so generous as it might appear at first glance. But to give credit where it's due, electrifying our transport network is a vital step in the fight against climate change and will be key to reducing our dependence on foreign oil, so it’s very encouraging that the government has recognised this.
But if the Prime Minister is truly committed to the wider development of electric cars, he'll need to go a lot further and introduce incentives like free parking and cheaper road tax for people who decide to go electric, closed-loop battery recycling (where manufacturers are obliged to recycle batteries which have reached the end of their life) and a renewed focus on improving public transport. There is a real opportunity here for Mr Brown and co, because if ministers can get this right then Britain’s ailing car industry could become a trailblazer in emerging electric technologies, creating thousands of green collar jobs and exporting zero emission cars to developing countries around the world. Let's hope that they're willing and able to take it.
