The Government’s ambitions for the COP 26 climate summit need to
be clearer, says the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy
(BEIS) Committee in an interim report on Net Zero and
COP26published today.
The Committee notes that no details have yet been provided by
Government on how success will be measured against each of its
headline ambitions. The report recommends the Government set out
a clear list of COP26 ambitions, with a set of accompanying
measures of success.
, Chair of the Business, Energy and
Industrial Strategy (BEIS) Committee said: “COP26
this November must conclude with countries around the world
setting out their road maps to delivering on the Paris Agreement
targets set five years ago. The British Government must put
sufficient resource behind these global negotiations to ensure
that agreements are reached at COP26 which both commit and help
each country to make the required changes.
“We have concluded that the current ‘themes’-based approach
to COP26 is too broad, without clear measures for success, and
that more focus needs to be given to the overriding necessity to
agree deliverable policies that keep global temperature rises to
as close to 1.5oC since 1990 as possible.”
The report notes that the success of COP26 will be dependent on
effective diplomacy but that it remains unclear whether the COP26
Unit has been assigned a dedicated diplomatic team or the extent
to which the diplomatic network is engaged in helping to achieve
summit objectives.
The Committee’s interim report also makes recommendations, in the
wake of Covid-19 and issues around differing vaccination
roll-outs, to help ensure all countries, including those from
developing countries, are able to fully participate at COP26 in
November.
The report emphasises the need for the Government to show global
leadership by taking decisive action on the UK's domestic
ambitions and recommends the Government accept in full the
Climate Change Committee (CCC) sixth carbon budget advice
(covering the period 2033–2037) and bring in the necessary
secondary legislation as early as possible.
The BEIS Committee’s report follows up on key commitments made in
the Committee’s evidence sessions (including with , COP President, and Claire O’Neill, former COP
President) and, in particular the COP26 President's plans to
engage with Parliament over the next nine months. The interim
report also follows up on ongoing discussions around the UK
delegation to COP26, Covid-19 contingency measures and digital
access to the summit, and on the UK Government's intentions in
relation to the sixth carbon budget.
