May mixes Business with Energy as DECC scrapped in reshuffle
The Department of Energy & Climate Change (DECC) is to be abolished in a rearrangement of government departments as Theresa May prepares her government for Brexit.
The changes will also affect the Department for Business, Innovation & Skills (BIS), as the creation of two departments to deal with Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union draws some responsibilities from the department.
Stripped of its remit for international trade, which has been taken up by one of the new departments, as well as responsibility for higher education, which has returned to the Department for Education, BIS will now become the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), subsuming the work of DECC.
This means that action against climate change will not be a nominal part of any department, though it has been confirmed that the new business and energy department will retain responsibility for it.
Communities Secretary Greg Clark, who served as Shadow Energy Secretary between 2008 and 2010, will take up the position as Secretary of State for the new department (still referred to as Business Secretary), while the previous head of BIS, Sajid Javid, has switched places and will lead the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG).
Speaking in the House of Commons this morning (14 July) before the extent of the reshuffle was revealed, then-Energy Minister Andrea Leadsom, filling in for then-Energy Secretary and new Home Secretary Amber Rudd, did not deny that DECC would be closed in the reshuffle. When asked about the department’s future, Leadsome said: “You will have to wait and see.”
She continued: “But what I can tell you is the commitment to our energy trilemma… to all of our policies will remain as strong as ever.”
Leadsom has subsequently been named as Environment Secretary, taking over from Liz Truss, who, like Rudd, has been promoted into one of the top cabinet roles, stepping into the position of Justice Secretary.
Prior to the EU referendum, green groups and Parliament’s Environmental Audit Committee warned that the EU had played a crucial role in shaping the UK’s environmental policy and that leaving the union would put much of the investment and protection in environmentally-friendly practices at risk. Reports now suggest that the building vacated by DECC will now be used to house the newly-formed department responsible for negotiating Brexit.
Former Labour Leader Ed Miliband, who was the inaugural Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change after the department’s formation in 2008, has expressed his dismay at the scrapping of DECC, tweeting:
DECC abolition just plain stupid. Climate not even mentioned in new dept. title. Matters because depts shape priorities shape outcomes.
— Ed Miliband (@Ed_Miliband) July 14, 2016
New Chancellor has history of backing green growth
Good news for the renewable energy sector might come from new Chancellor of the Exchequer Phillip Hammond, who has previously emphasised the potential of the green economy and climate mitigation to economic growth.
Speaking to the American Enterprise Institute in Washington DC last year in his then-guise as Foreign Secretary, Hammond said: “The global low-carbon economy is already worth US$6 trillion (£4.5 trillion), and is growing four to five per cent a year. In 2013, additions to the world’s renewable energy generating capacity exceeded those to the fossil-fuelled capacity for the first time ever.
‘Rationalisation should bring long-term policy guidance’
Commenting on the extensive reshuffle, David Palmer-Jones, CEO for the recycling and recovery division of SUEZ in the UK, said: “As a long-term investor in UK energy and recycling infrastructure SUEZ welcomes any rationalisation of government departments to ensure the creation of more joined-up, long-term strategic policy planning at a national level to help us build the power stations, produce the resources and create opportunities for a skilled labour force the country needs.
“Businesses like ours need clear long-term policy guidance from Whitehall so we can continue to plan and invest in infrastructure to help address the country's rapidly impending energy supply gap as we wean ourselves off fossil fuels.
“All of the UK's devolved administrations will be looking for clarity and certainty of process over the UK’s negotiations with Europe over its long-term relationship with the EU and during that period of transition the waste and resources sector continues to seek vision and leadership from Whitehall as well as the industry getting its due.
“National policymakers should take note that only this April MPs endorsed SUEZ’s view that UK membership of the EU has underpinned the pace of environmental action – this is good for the environment and the country’s appreciation of water and waste as resources to support jobs and investment and we – the whole of the UK – remain a member of the EU until Article 50 negotiations have concluded.”
