Recommendations & Conclusions
12 items
2
Recommendation
Forty-First Report - Achieving Net Zero…
Accepted
Significant uncertainty remains as to whether consumers will rapidly change their behaviours in line with the expectations of government’s Net Zero Strategy. For government to achieve net zero by 2050 requires extensive consumer engagement with its policies and behaviour change in line with its objectives, from installing heat pumps and …
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Significant uncertainty remains as to whether consumers will rapidly change their behaviours in line with the expectations of government’s Net Zero Strategy. For government to achieve net zero by 2050 requires extensive consumer engagement with its policies and behaviour change in line with its objectives, from installing heat pumps and better insulation to driving electric vehicles. For example, government has a target of installing 600,000 heat pumps a year by 2028, and that by 2035 all new cars and vans sold are to be zero emission. However, government has a poor track record of engaging consumers, including over-estimating buy-in to its policies. For now, the cost to consumers of these products can be high, although government is confident that this will change and the cost of, for example, a heat pump will be lower by 2035 than the cost of a gas boiler. In addition, the Department does not yet have a picture of the cumulative impacts its net zero policies are having on individuals and groups, although it is monitoring public attitudes to net zero issues on a quarterly basis. Recommendation: The Department should: • Include consumer take-up relative to expectations, and how different social groups are being impacted, in its annual progress updates. • Conduct scenario planning to prepare for and inform situations where consumer take-up falls below expectations. • Evaluate the causes of any consumer take-up shortfalls, to inform policy responses.
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Government response AI summary
The government agreed to include consumer take-up relative to expectations and how different social groups are being impacted in its annual progress updates, conduct scenario planning for consumer take-up shortfalls, and evaluate the causes of any consumer take-up shortfalls; this will be implemented by Autumn …
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HM Treasury
4
Recommendation
Forty-First Report - Achieving Net Zero…
Accepted
We are disappointed by government’s apparent lack of urgency in clarifying how it will work with local government to achieve net zero. We have previously reported that local authorities have significant scope to influence emissions in their local area, but government had not sufficiently engaged with them on their role …
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We are disappointed by government’s apparent lack of urgency in clarifying how it will work with local government to achieve net zero. We have previously reported that local authorities have significant scope to influence emissions in their local area, but government had not sufficiently engaged with them on their role in achieving net zero. The Strategy includes the Department’s new role of having overall responsibility for improving coordination with local government, and its plans to establish a Net Zero Forum to bring together senior officials from national and local government on a regular basis to discuss policy and delivery options on net zero. However, we are concerned that there is still a lack of clarity in the roles and responsibilities of local authorities in delivering net zero objectives, and a lack of capacity at the local level to carry out these activities. We are also concerned that some local authorities continue to struggle to access central government money to fund net zero activities. The Department indicated that its funding model was intended to ensure funds got to where they were most needed, for example the poorest social housing stock; however, it committed to consider how it could balance its objectives with a simpler funding system. The Department acknowledges that it has much work to do in relation to local authorities and net zero. Recommendation: The Department should urgently provide further clarity on how it intends to work with local government on achieving net zero. This should include how it will: • clarify the role it expects local authorities to play in achieving net zero; • manage risks around local government’s delivery of net zero; and • make net zero funding simpler for local government to access and utilise.
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Government response AI summary
The government states that the Net Zero Strategy already sets out how it will work with local government, by creating a Local Net Zero Forum and exploring simplifying funds for net zero initiatives at the local level.
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HM Treasury
5
Recommendation
Forty-First Report - Achieving Net Zero…
Accepted
We are concerned that neither the private sector nor the civil service yet have the necessary skills to deliver the Net Zero Strategy. The Department acknowledges that the private sector does not currently have the skills to deliver key aspects of the Strategy, such as for buildings and low-carbon heating. …
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We are concerned that neither the private sector nor the civil service yet have the necessary skills to deliver the Net Zero Strategy. The Department acknowledges that the private sector does not currently have the skills to deliver key aspects of the Strategy, such as for buildings and low-carbon heating. It is, nevertheless, confident of this capacity and capability in future. For example, it considers it will achieve its target to install 600,000 heat pumps a year by 2028 because discussions with industry have suggested that heating engineers with ‘transferable skills’ can be retrained as heat pump engineers. However, the recent failure of the Green Homes Grant Voucher Scheme was in part driven by the lack of skilled workers. The civil service will also need to ensure it has people with the requisite skills to deliver net zero. The Green Book has been updated, requiring officials to assess the carbon impacts of policies; however, the distribution of officials with these skills is not uniform across 8 Achieving Net Zero: Follow up government, with the highest concentrations in the Department, Department for Transport and Defra. The Department, working with the Government Skills and Curriculum Unit, is trying to develop the civil service’s future development pipeline, including through specialisms and the fast stream. Recommendation: The Department should: • Set out its strategy for encouraging the private sector workforce to develop the skills needed to achieve net zero, drawing on the recommendations included in the Green Jobs Taskforce. • Work with the Cabinet Office to perform a comprehensive analysis of the skills needed in the civil service to deliver net zero and fill gaps either through increased cross-departmental working, training or recruitment.
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Government response AI summary
The government agreed to set out its strategy for encouraging the private sector workforce to develop skills needed for net zero, drawing on the Green Jobs Taskforce recommendations, and work with the Cabinet Office to analyze and fill civil service skills gaps through cross-departmental working, …
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HM Treasury
6
Recommendation
Forty-First Report - Achieving Net Zero…
Accepted
Increasing focus on its domestic Net Zero Strategy should not detract government from leading global action to tackle climate change. Climate change is a global challenge which requires a global solution. Government aims to lead by example domestically to help drive action and ambition internationally. However, delays in publishing targets …
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Increasing focus on its domestic Net Zero Strategy should not detract government from leading global action to tackle climate change. Climate change is a global challenge which requires a global solution. Government aims to lead by example domestically to help drive action and ambition internationally. However, delays in publishing targets for reducing public sector emissions risk undermining its credibility nationally and internationally. There is also a risk that policies driving emissions reductions domestically increase emissions elsewhere, and the Department acknowledges that so-called ‘consumption emissions’ are harder to measure as it requires information on emissions generated by the manufacture and transport of imported goods. Although HM Treasury is considering the challenges of carbon ‘leakage’ for UK competitiveness, that is displacing emissions from one country to another, the Department recognises that international supply chain emissions, and product standards are areas where it needs to do more work. There are obvious limitations without solutions in obtaining accurate, quality data from many foreign jurisdictions. It is not easy to see how these limitations can be overcome. It plans to launch a call for evidence on demand-side low-carbon products to address issues on product standards and help consumers identify low-carbon products. Recommendation: The Department, together with Defra, should work to increase public awareness of consumption emissions (for example, the carbon footprints of products sold in the UK), so the impact of consumer decisions play a more central role in tackling climate change. Achieving Net Zero: Follow up 9 1 Reliance on future innovation and consumer behaviour
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Government response AI summary
The government plans to help empower people to make informed choices about the goods and products they buy by exploring how the government better labels these with their emission intensity and environmental impact, including work with the FCA, product labeling, and exploring environmental labeling within …
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HM Treasury
1
Recommendation
Forty-First Report - Achieving Net Zero…
Accepted
We took evidence from the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (the Department), and HM Treasury, on government’s Strategy to achieve net zero by 2050 and how it will fund the transition to a green economy.
Government response AI summary
The Treasury will continue to conduct a routine review of COVID-19 costs and provide annual public updates for the next two years, including loan costs and costs of specific public services measures.
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HM Treasury
7
Conclusion
Forty-First Report - Achieving Net Zero…
Accepted
Although the Strategy relies on private investment, government does not have a good track record of providing investor confidence in climate policy.18 For example, government set out plans for zero carbon homes in 2006, but cancelled these in 2015.19 Even today, on the back of Net Zero and COP 26 …
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Although the Strategy relies on private investment, government does not have a good track record of providing investor confidence in climate policy.18 For example, government set out plans for zero carbon homes in 2006, but cancelled these in 2015.19 Even today, on the back of Net Zero and COP 26 commitments, the UK continues to build over 200,000 new homes per year, the overwhelming majority use fossil fuel heating systems and traditional building methods with insufficient insulation. This is incoherent. The previous Committee reported in 2017 that the decision to cancel support for the construction of the UK’s first large-scale carbon capture and storage project had a negative impact on investor confidence, and this decision was at the time the latest in a series of decisions on energy 8 Department for Transport, Decarbonising Transport: A Better, Greener Britain, July 2021; Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, Industrial Decarbonisation Strategy, March 2021 9 Net Zero Strategy, Chapter 2, page 77, Figure 13; Committee on Climate Change, Sixth Carbon Budget: The UK’s path to Net Zero, December 2020 10 Net Zero Strategy, chapter 2, pages 70–73 11 Net Zero Strategy, chapter 1, page 42, paras 8–9; page 43, para 12; page 44, paras 17–18 12 Net Zero Strategy, chapter 1, page 43, para 15; page 49, paras 19, 22; chapter 3, page 143 13 Net Zero Strategy, chapter 4, page 254, para 30 14 Net Zero Strategy, page 49 para 19 15 Net Zero Strategy, page 49 para 22 16 Q 24; Net Zero Strategy, page 145 para 24 17 Q 27 18 Qq 99–101; Net Zero Strategy, page 49 para 19 19 Q 25, 100; House of Commons Library, Zero Carbon Homes, Number 6678, 27 April 2016 Achieving Net Zero: Follow up 11 policies that had potentially impacted investor confidence.20 Most recently, we reported that the Green Homes Grant Voucher Scheme damaged investor confidence by being cancelled at short notice and when it was only partially complete: government announced this Scheme in July 2020 and
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Government response AI summary
The government will develop monitoring levels of private investment attracted into Net Zero sectors, taking action to address failures, and provide certainty to investors through net zero sector roadmaps; Automotive , CCUS and Hydrogen Investor Roadmaps have been published.
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HM Treasury
8
Conclusion
Forty-First Report - Achieving Net Zero…
Accepted
Despite its track record, the Department considers that the Strategy will have greater permanence than previous climate policies that have subsequently been reduced or withdrawn.24 This is partly because the Strategy was developed in conjunction with HM Treasury’s 2021–2 to 2024–5 multi-year spending review, and partly because it contains long-term …
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Despite its track record, the Department considers that the Strategy will have greater permanence than previous climate policies that have subsequently been reduced or withdrawn.24 This is partly because the Strategy was developed in conjunction with HM Treasury’s 2021–2 to 2024–5 multi-year spending review, and partly because it contains long-term targets and trajectories which are grounded in legal commitments to carbon budgets up to 2033–7, and then ultimately net zero by 2050.25 However, it is arguable as to whether three-year departmental budgets can provide sufficient confidence to the private sector.26 HM Treasury told us that it does not want to give overconfidence or false confidence to the partners it works with in the private sector.27 Influencing consumer behaviours
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Government response AI summary
The government will develop monitoring levels of private investment attracted into Net Zero sectors, taking action to address failures, and provide certainty to investors through net zero sector roadmaps; Automotive , CCUS and Hydrogen Investor Roadmaps have been published.
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HM Treasury
12
Conclusion
Forty-First Report - Achieving Net Zero…
Accepted
We previously reported in 2021 that local authorities have a key role to play in achieving net zero as they have significant scope to influence emissions in their area, by leading decarbonisation of sectors such as housing and transport, and by influencing local businesses and residents to take climate action. …
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We previously reported in 2021 that local authorities have a key role to play in achieving net zero as they have significant scope to influence emissions in their area, by leading decarbonisation of sectors such as housing and transport, and by influencing local businesses and residents to take climate action. We also reported that although the Department had not sufficiently engaged with local authorities on their role in achieving net zero, it committed to engaging actively with local authorities on how sector strategies would be rolled out, as the strategies were published.44
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Government response AI summary
The government states that the Net Zero Strategy already sets out how it will work with local government, by creating a Local Net Zero Forum and exploring simplifying funds for net zero initiatives at the local level.
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HM Treasury
14
Recommendation
Forty-First Report - Achieving Net Zero…
Accepted
The Strategy sets out plans for how central government will work with local government in pursuit of net zero.49 The Department will take overall responsibility for improving coordination with local government and other local actors on the design and delivery of local net zero policies.50 The Department will establish a …
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The Strategy sets out plans for how central government will work with local government in pursuit of net zero.49 The Department will take overall responsibility for improving coordination with local government and other local actors on the design and delivery of local net zero policies.50 The Department will establish a Local Net Zero Forum to regularly bring together senior officials from national and local government to discuss policy and delivery options.51 However, the Department described a ‘journey’ it needs to take with local authorities, starting with the Forum.52 The Local Government Association, representing councils from England and Wales, told us it has been calling for a climate taskforce to be established, bringing together ministers and local representatives in a forum to encourage greater national-local government coordination and partnership.53 When we queried which areas the Department still felt it had work to do in despite having published its Strategy, the Department highlighted working with local authorities, and indicated that this should now progress more quickly.54 44 Committee of Public Accounts, Achieving Net Zero, Forty-Sixth Report of Session 2019–21, HC 935, 1 March 2021 45 Q 12 46 Net Zero Strategy, page 263, para 8; Local Government Association, page 1, para 2.3 47 Energy Systems Catapult, page 4 48 Core Cities UK, page 2, para 2.7 49 Q 17 50 Net Zero Strategy, page 264, para 14 51 Net Zero Strategy, page 264, para 14 52 Q 12 53 Local Government Association, paras 2.4–2.5 54 Q 82 14 Achieving Net Zero: Follow up
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Government response AI summary
The government states that the Net Zero Strategy already sets out how it will work with local government, by creating a Local Net Zero Forum and exploring simplifying funds for net zero initiatives at the local level.
Read full response →
HM Treasury
16
Recommendation
Forty-First Report - Achieving Net Zero…
Accepted
The Energy Systems Catapult highlighted the importance of expanding local authority competence and resources to ensure the capacity and capability to conduct project appraisal and to access funding to help deliver net zero.59 The Department explained that local net zero hubs exist to help local authorities secure funding, and that, …
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The Energy Systems Catapult highlighted the importance of expanding local authority competence and resources to ensure the capacity and capability to conduct project appraisal and to access funding to help deliver net zero.59 The Department explained that local net zero hubs exist to help local authorities secure funding, and that, for example, the public sector decarbonisation scheme is accompanied by the low-carbon skills fund to ensure local authorities have the capability to put together a bid of the required standard.60 In addition, the Department indicated that in future the UK Infrastructure Bank will provide support to local authorities to develop business cases for funding over £5 million.61 The Department expects the Local Net Zero Forum to provide the opportunity for central and local government to raise issues such as funding, to share information on funding available, and provide information on support mechanisms to facilitate those who wish to access it.62 Skills in the private sector and civil service
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Government response AI summary
The government agreed to create a Local Net Zero Forum by Summer 2022 to discuss local net zero issues with local government, and explore simplifying and consolidating funds for local net zero initiatives.
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HM Treasury
18
Recommendation
Forty-First Report - Achieving Net Zero…
Accepted
The civil service also needs to ensure it has people with the right skills to address net zero challenges.69 We previously reported that some departments had failed to provide detailed assessments of the climate impacts of their capital expenditure plans for spending review 2020, despite HM Treasury requesting that they …
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The civil service also needs to ensure it has people with the right skills to address net zero challenges.69 We previously reported that some departments had failed to provide detailed assessments of the climate impacts of their capital expenditure plans for spending review 2020, despite HM Treasury requesting that they do so. HM Treasury told us that the main reason for this was that the relevant capability was concentrated in the Department. HM Treasury recognised that there was more it could do to ensure departments have the necessary tools and capabilities.70 The Department told us that, in conjunction with HM Treasury, it has been providing training to other departments to help them account better for carbon in the assessments they make.71 Separately, we also previously reported that the Cabinet Office acknowledged that some skills are particularly scarce in the civil service, such as the ability to lead large projects. It planned to make upskilling the civil service a key focus of its civil service reform process.72 The Cabinet Office’s 2021 Declaration on Government Reform highlighted the need for, among others, science and project delivery skills in the civil service, albeit without referencing net zero as a unique challenge.73
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Government response AI summary
The government plans to work with industry to create the skilled workforce needed to deliver climate targets, including green apprenticeships, retraining bootcamps, setting up the Green Jobs Delivery Group with industry, and publishing a climate and sustainability strategy for education and children’s’ services, while also …
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HM Treasury
25
Conclusion
Forty-First Report - Achieving Net Zero…
Accepted
The Strategy commits government to providing an annual public update on progress made in the previous year towards net zero. This will include progress against the ‘targets and ambitions’ set out in the strategy, commentary on contextual changes that might affect the expected pathway to meeting decarbonisation commitments, and a …
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The Strategy commits government to providing an annual public update on progress made in the previous year towards net zero. This will include progress against the ‘targets and ambitions’ set out in the strategy, commentary on contextual changes that might affect the expected pathway to meeting decarbonisation commitments, and a summary of progress against the pathway, policies and proposals within the Strategy.91
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Government response AI summary
The government states that the Net Zero Strategy already commits to providing an annual public update on implementation progress, including the items the committee recommends.
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HM Treasury