Speech by Joan Ruddock MP to the Environment Agency Spring Conference on Adaptation to Climate Change - London, Monday 31 March 2008
Thank you for inviting me to speak today, and to set out the government’s adaptation plans. I know that Barbara Young and Steven Haddrill will have underlined the significance of the title of this event, that it really is time for action.
The range of issues already covered I think will show that what we need from government is a response from all departments.
The Stern Report set out a strong economic case for a planned response to climate change, to reduce costs and maximise the benefits. The Report stated that “The Government has a role to play in making adaptation happen, starting now”.
I agree, and I see the Government as having a role in three key areas:
- First, providing information
- Second, putting in place a framework for action
- And third, leading through example and taking action ourselves.
Let me start with our role in providing information. Ten years ago the Government set up the UK Climate Impacts Programme, and continues to fund it today. I’m sure that you’re all familiar with this excellent, world leading resource. It provides information and tools which can help to identify the risks and opportunities offered by a changing climate. This information is free and available to all.
In November we are due to launch the UK 21st Century Climate Change Scenarios, or UKCIP08.
This will be the most comprehensive package of future climate information ever made available for this country.
UKCIP08 will give projections, including probabilities, of climate change over both land and sea up to 2099. The data will go down to 25 km grid squares. It will also contain sub-surface marine data.
This data will be available through a number of web-based and written products, offering different levels of information, depending on the needs of the user.
This will ensure that UKCIP08 is applicable to a wide range of organisations. Some of course may only want the headline messages. Some might use detailed data to help plan multi-million pound projects. And in order to assist with the whole process, UKCIP have also developed a range of tools to assist in planning adaptation strategies.
So, Government has taken the lead in ensuring that information and tools that can help organisations across the public and private sector are in place.
And we use this information ourselves of course. Our ground breaking climate change bill, currently making its way through Parliament. We will use the UKCIP08 information to undertake the National Risk Assessment required by the bill.
This assessment will look at the risks from the different impacts of climate change: flooding, heat waves, sea-level rise and so on. It will consider how these impacts will affect the UK – its infrastructure, its natural and built environment, and its businesses. This will be done for different periods of time – for short, medium and long-term.
Plans for the Risk Assessment are already in hand, so that work can start this year, and there will be a tender exercise to identify the best experts to carry out the work.
This process will be managed by a steering group which will include key stakeholders, such as the Environment Agency and Natural England.
To complement the risk assessment, the Government is also planning to undertake a detailed cost-benefit analysis of adaptation. This will help us to target adaptation strategies to where they can deliver the highest net benefits to society. And while much of our debate is focussing on risks and costs it is important to remember that there may be some benefits in certain sectors as climate change proceeds.
The climate change bill requires the Government to undertake the national Risk Assessment on a regular basis with the first being undertaken within three years of the Bill receiving Royal Assent.
This leads me to the second role for Government. The need to put in place a framework for action.
The climate change bill contains a statutory duty for the Government to set up a programme to address adaptation, taking account of the risk assessment.
There will be also be new powers in the Bill that will allow the Government to request other public authorities to assess the risks of climate change and, where necessary, to take action. We are committed to producing a report on how we intend to use this new power within a year of Royal Assent.
To produce this report, we will need to supplement our existing knowledge with a survey of our current capability in dealing with climate impacts. We will look at the mechanisms that already exist to ensure key organisations consider and manage their risks. This will include, for example, the new local authority performance indicator on adaptation.
In addition, Statutory Guidance will be provided to help public authorities understand how to undertake their risk assessment and planning exercises and we will be consulting on this guidance later in the year. So I hope very much this audience will look out for, and participate in that consultation.
As well as legislative framework, we have to make sure that the right policy framework is in place.
Later this year, when the legislative framework is confirmed – and we hope that will be this summer - we will publish an Adaptation Policy Framework Document.
This document will consider the role Government has to play in helping us all to adapt. It will consider when the Government needs to intervene, and why. This is a deceptively simple question. To answer it we need to discuss some challenging questions, and we may not always like the answers.
There will be occasions when we can reduce a negative impact of climate change by increasing our resilience to it. Sometimes our changing climate, as I’ve indicated, will offer opportunities.
But sometimes, we may need to accept a risk, or a loss. When will we do that? When can we justify significant intervention to protect ourselves from change? When will the market deliver the change that we need? How can we make sure that the most vulnerable in our society are not disproportionately affected?
The Adaptation Policy Framework will consider these questions and set out our plans on moving forward. These will include a road map for how we will deliver the statutory requirements under the Climate Change Bill.
But the title of this conference is: time for action. Implementing the framework that I’ve outlined is a complex task. To get a Risk Assessment and a cost-benefit analysis right will take time – so that is real action. But you also want to know, I think, what’s happening right now.
This brings me to the third area where there is a clear role for Government and that is leading by example.
Defra and our delivery partners have a particular leadership role to play, in making sure that we all move forward in an integrated, joined-up and effective way.
Following a Defra presentation about adaptation to all Permanent Secretaries, it was agreed that we should establish a cross-Government Board, to further develop and manage our work on adaptation together.
As a result the Secretary of State has asked each Department to identify their top priorities for adaptation in their areas of responsibility. I am following this up with a series of bilaterals with the lead Ministers on adaptation in each Department.
I had the first of my meetings with Jim Fitzpatrick at the Department for Transport last week. Barbara probably mentioned the potentially severe and extensive impacts that climate change could have for our critical infrastructure, and we’ve already seen many examples of what that means for the Department for Transport.
When 2 to 3 months worth of rain fell in 30 minutes in August 2002, 17 London Underground stations and 5 mainline London stations were flooded.
On one day in July 2003, 4,000 passengers were trapped on London Underground in broken down trains for at least 90 minutes, and subjected to combined temperatures and humidity approaching 40°C.
That year road surfaces melted and rails buckled. So action is being taken across a number of fronts, including specifying that future rolling stock suppliers will be required to take account of climate adaptation.
With BERR I expect to have a detailed discussion on the potential impacts on business and the critical infrastructure that it relies upon. BERR has already asked the Electricity Network Association to further review risks from flooding in light of the 2007 floods.
One of the issues that the Home Office is considering is the range of new challenges that climate change might pose for our police services. An increase in the frequency and severity of flooding could place significant demands on that resource.
The Department for Children, Young People and Families is looking at the impacts of climate change on our schools. Hard lessons were learned in the 2003 heatwave when schools – including the newest ones – had to be closed to prevent children suffering heat exhaustion.
Redhill School in Worcestershire shows what can be done. It is one of the first in England to have a climate change impact assessment carried out from the start of the design process. As a consequence the new school includes:
- a rainwater harvesting scheme which uses rainwater to flush toilets, and,
- overhanging eves to protect classrooms from intense summer sun
The result was that the urban drainage system in the school resulted in no rainwater being diverted to sewers during the 2007 floods.
The Department for Health, in collaboration with the Health Protection Agency, recently published a report on the ‘Health Effects of Climate Change in the UK, 2008’. They identify a huge range of issues: heatwaves, risks of increased exposure to UV light, the potential for the spread of vectorborne diseases such as Lyme Disease from ticks, and increased exposure to allergens.
And of course Defra itself is very much engaged in the need for biodiversity to adapt to the changing climate. Hilary Benn and Phil Woolas have also been leading work on flooding and water scarcity.
So we face a multitude of risks and although we can point to a few good examples of adaptation, it is clear that we are only on the first step of the journey.
Government has a clear role to play. We need to provide information. We need to make sure that a clear framework for action is in place and we need to lead by example.
But I believe that these three roles, these challenges, apply equally to all of your organisations and sectors. In your organisations you need to ensure clear information is available to all who need it about what adapting to climate change means. Have you set a clear framework that enables people to take the right action? Can your organisation be seen to be leading by example?
As the Minister leading on climate change adaptation, I am only too aware of the daunting nature of the task we face. It is not surprising that most people think our country is unprepared for adaptation. Understandably the international debate has focussed on mitigation to avert dangerous climate change. But, as I hope I’ve described, the government has not been idle and the climate change bill makes it clear – this is not a choice between mitigation and adaptation. We have to do both. And we have to act now.
I look forward very much to hearing more about your experiences, and how you have begun to address these challenges.
Thank you.
Page published: 31 March 2008