A new regulator will hold the UK Government to account on its green targets, Environment Secretary Theresa Villiers has told MPs.
The Government’s new Environment Bill, which will go before the Commons next Wednesday, will include plans to set up a new Office for Environmental Protection.
During a debate on the Queen’s Speech, Ms Villiers said the Bill also aims to cut down on single-use plastics and increase recycling in the UK.
She added: “Our Environment Bill will mandate the setting of ambitious targets and these targets will be rooted in science.
“And a powerful new independent watchdog will be created to hold the Government to account on meeting the targets that we set.
“From a free-to-use complaints system, to the authority to instigate and undertake investigations, to the power to take the Government to court if necessary.”
Green Party MP Caroline Lucas said that there was a “major loophole” in the Bill however, as it gave the Government “nearly two decades to meet” legally-binding environmental targets.
She said: “It’s all very well to set them by 2022, but to have 15 years before you have to meet them seems to be absurd.”
Ms Villiers replied: “I can provide reassurance by drawing your attention to Clause 10 which provides for interim targets, and also it is the case that the OEP will have the authority to hold the Government to account over its progress towards meeting long-term targets.”
Later in the debate Inverness MP Drew Hendry called on the Government to invest in carbon capture.
He said: “Instead of wasting billions of pounds of the public’s money on new nuclear, the Government should be investing in projects like St Fergus, which in a very few years could be storing at least 5.7 gigatonnes of carbon, or 150 times Scotland’s 2016 emissions”.
