Brian Mathew

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Desmond. I thank the hon. Member for Waveney Valley (Adrian Ramsay) for proposing this important debate. This year, in the midst of unnatural heatwaves and wildfires, I have so far attended five screenings across my constituency of the film on the national emergency briefing. It was heartening—but, at the same time, concerning—to see so many people of all ages coming together to agree on one thing: that something needs to be done about the environment and the impending disaster we are staring down. Those honest and open conversations are partly why I am so concerned that the Government have so far refused to publish in full the national security assessment. The public and Parliament deserve to see the full picture, especially on an issue with such significant implications for national security. Over the summer I camped on the south coast, in Dorset, and it certainly felt and looked more like a scene out of Africa than the damp summer holidays I remember from my youth, but that is not something to celebrate. As the national emergency briefing makes clear, a halt to the gulf stream could lead to perishingly cold winters, as well as stifling summers. Elsewhere in the world, life itself may become intolerable, leading to many more climate refugees seeking to come to our shores. The recent tragic events in Nepal resulting from climate-driven glacial collapse emphasise the consequences of inaction. We in the north, who invented the industrial revolution, which directly led to CO₂ increases in the atmosphere, have a duty to find and implement solutions for the future of human—and, indeed, all—life on this beautiful planet Earth. Those solutions should not be seen as costs, but instead as the best investments that we and the whole world can profit from.