Net zero targets announced by 50 countries offer hope that the worst impacts of climate change can still be avoided, according to a UN report.
It said that many of the targets had yet to be translated into detailed plans to cut emissions this decade but overall they could limit global warming to 2.2C by the end of the century — close to the 2C upper limit for global warming set in the Paris agreement on climate change in 2015.
The UN Environment Programme (Unep) assessed all targets announced by countries by the end of last month and concluded that the net zero pledges “could make a big difference”.
MacAskill said that the 80m-high fibreglass blade was slippery
THE CLIMATE GAMES/PA
It said: “If fully implemented, these pledges could bring the predicted global temperature rise to 2.2C,
Rishi Sunak has claimed his budget will deliver a stronger economy "fit for a new age of optimism".
In comments released by the Treasury ahead of the chancellor's address to MPs in the Commons on Wednesday, Mr Sunak said the budget will commence the "work of preparing for a new economy post-COVID".
"An economy of higher wages, higher skills, and rising productivity. Of strong public services, vibrant communities and safer streets," he said.
Image:Critics have said the wage increases announced by the chancellor will not be enough amid a cost of living crisis
"An economy fit for a new age of optimism. That is the stronger economy of the future."
Much of the contents of the chancellor's economic set piece are already known, following a raft of announcements in recent days.
• £1.4bn to encourage foreign investment into UK businesses and attract overseas talent • £700m to be spent mainly on the new post-Brexit borders and immigration system, as well as a new maritime patrol fleet • £435m for victims services, crime prevention and the Crown Prosecution Service • £560m for adult maths coaching to help increase numeracy • A six-month extension to the COVID recovery loan scheme to June 2022
The announcements on pay, which will take effect in April, are the most high-profile so far.
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Sky's Ed Conway previews the budget
However, critics have pointed out that the end of the Universal Credit uplift, an upcoming 1.25% rise in National Insurance and continuing cost of living pressures, including rising petrol prices and soaring energy bills, will mean that many of those who see their salaries bumped up will not be much better off in real terms, if at all.
Labour's shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves said the chancellor has to "create a more resilient economy and take the pressure off working people" amid continuing cost of living pressures.
Setting out the party's approach, she continued: "Labour would grow our economy, with our plan to buy, make and sell more in Britain, and a Climate Investment Pledge to create the jobs of the future.
"With costs growing and inflation rising, Labour would ease the burden on households, cutting VAT on domestic energy bills immediately for six months.
"And we would not raise taxes on working people and British businesses, while online giants get away without paying their fair share."
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Minister: Chancellor is 'keen to give a pay rise'
Meanwhile, the Liberal Democrats said Mr Sunak was treating education as an "afterthought".
"Rishi Sunak is setting up our children to fail, while hammering families with tax hikes and a cost of living crisis," party leader Sir Ed Davey said.
"We need an emergency children's budget, with £15bn for schools catch-up funding as recommended by the government's own adviser.
"Parents and children who have sacrificed so much during the pandemic deserve a fair deal.
"Instead this budget looks set to treat education and our children's future as an afterthought.
"You can't build a strong economy without investing in younger generations and allowing them to fulfil their potential."
Ian Blackford, Westminster leader of the SNP, warned the chancellor he must not "short-change" Scotland, calling for a "multi-billion-pound Brexit Recovery Fund - to provide Scotland with compensation and to ensure proper financial support for struggling businesses and industries".
"With Brexit playing a major role in the ongoing severe staffing shortages, rotting food in the fields, empty supermarket shelves, plunge in UK exports, and rising cost of goods and services, the chancellor must wake up and smell the coffee before that also ends up running out in our stores," he said.
The series of pre-announcements ahead of the budget has angered Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle, who allowed a second urgent question in as many days on Tuesday to compel ministers to appear before MPs to answer questions on the budget.
"I was disappointed to see more stories in the media today with apparently very well-briefed information about what will be in tomorrow's budget," the speaker told the Commons.
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Speaker angry at government ignoring Commons
Accusing ministers of treating parliament in a "discourteous manner", Sir Lindsay added: "This house will not be taken for granted, it's not right for everybody to be briefed, it's not more important to go on the news in the morning, it's more important to come here.
"Let us get the message across that these elected members represent this United Kingdom. It is not done through Sky TV."
Follow budget coverage live on Sky News on Wednesday with the chancellor's announcement from 12.30pm
The government on Tuesday sought to defuse an escalating row over water companies discharging raw sewage into English rivers by ending its opposition to legislation to clamp down on the practice.
Last week, an amendment approved by the House of Lords to place a legal duty on water companies to reduce the harm caused by storm overflows was stripped out of the environment bill following a tight House of Commons vote, 268 to 204, despite its garnering widespread public support.
A revolt against Conservative MPs who voted down the non-partisan amendment was growing this week, with pressure mounting both online and in traditional media.
The initial amendment, proposed by crossbench peer Arthur Wellesley, the Duke of Wellington, called on companies to “take all reasonable steps” by law to stop raw sewage being discharged. The duke’s revised amendment, calling on companies to take action as soon as was reasonable, was not withdrawn on Tuesday night and passed in the Lords by 213 votes to 60.
Downing Street initially rejected the new amendment to the bill, which rewrites Britain’s post-Brexit ecological rules, paving the way for a further row.
Late on Tuesday afternoon, George Eustice, the environment secretary, announced a government U-turn, confirming that the bill would be strengthened with a government amendment that will see “a duty enshrined in law to ensure water companies secure a progressive reduction in the adverse impacts of discharges from storm overflows”.
In the face of growing public anger, ministers had been concerned that Tory MPs who abstained in last week’s vote might vote in favour of the new Lords amendment when it returns to the Commons.
The timing of the row was especially awkward for Boris Johnson, the prime minister, as international delegates arrive for the COP26 UN climate summit, which begins in Glasgow on Sunday
The government had previously argued that the environment bill already includes provisions to “deliver progressive reductions in the harm caused by storm overflows” and estimated the total elimination of sewage outflows could cost consumers £150bn.
Christine Colvin, director of partnerships and communications at The Rivers Trust, a charity, said: “This looks as though the intent of the Duke of Wellington’s amendment will now be met by the government.
“It is a victory for all those who have stood up for the health of our rivers including the thousands of members of the general public who have made their wishes clear.”
However singer and environmental activist Feargal Sharkey, who has been leading the campaign against sewage in rivers and seas, reacted with scepticism.
“Sending out a press release with no detail is not going to make us slow down,” he said. “The public is now demanding that it stops and stops immediately.”
The debate comes amid growing concerns over the state of waterways in England and Wales, with just 16 per cent of England’s rivers, lakes, estuaries and coastal waters meeting the minimum “good ecological status”, according to the EU water framework directive.
Water UK, which represents water companies, had called on the government to back the duke’s amendment to the environment bill. It is calling on the sector’s financial regulator, Ofwat, to allow greater investment in infrastructure in the next regulatory period starting in 2024.
“The water industry agrees that we should be ending harm from sources like storm overflows, and we have set out the framework for a comprehensive national plan to do that,” Water UK said. “This calls for government and regulators to authorise new investment.”
Announcing the concession, Eustice said: “Earlier this summer, the government published a new strategy for Ofwat mandating them to progressively reduce the discharge of sewage from storm overflows in the next pricing review.
“Following a debate in the House of Commons last week during the final stages of the environment bill, today we are announcing that we will put that commitment on a statutory footing with a new clause.”
The government said it would bring forward its own amendment in the Commons, when the bill returns to the lower chamber within the next few weeks.
The call for improvements to water infrastructure comes alongside a growing outcry over England’s privatised water companies, which have been accused of extracting excessive pay and dividends at the same time as presiding over a series of pollution and leakage failures.
England is the only country in the world to have fully privatised its water system, with ownership transferred from the state to 17 large regional monopolies in 1989.
David Hall, visiting professor at the University of Greenwich and an expert on the water industry, said that water companies had taken out tens of billions of pounds in dividends which should have been invested in infrastructure.
“We should all remember that the original justification for the privatisation of public water was that the private companies would make the investment that the public sector couldn’t make,” he said.
Earlier this year Southern Water received a record £90m fine for deliberately dumping billions of litres of untreated sewage into seas and rivers between 2010 and 2015, in a case that the judge described as showing “a shocking and wholesale disregard for the environment”.
Southern said in response to the fine that what happened was “completely unacceptable”.
The Queen will not be attending the COP26 climate change summit in Glasgow which starts this weekend, Buckingham Palace has announced.
A palace statement said: "Following advice to rest, the Queen has been undertaking light duties at Windsor Castle.
"Her Majesty has regretfully decided that she will no longer travel to Glasgow to attend the Evening Reception of COP26 on Monday, 1 November.
Image:The Queen received two ambassadors via video link from Windsor Castle on Tuesday. Pic: Instagram/theroyalfamily
"Her Majesty is disappointed not to attend the reception but will deliver an address to the assembled delegates via a recorded video message."
A palace source said the decision was taken as a "sensible precaution".
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Sky News understands that she remains in good spirits and is expecting a call with Chancellor Rishi Sunak this evening as is the norm before the budget.
Her Majesty hopes no one will use her absence as a reason not to go, according to Sky News sources.
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It is understood the Queen very much wants COP26 to be a success and result in meaningful action from the participating nations.
The monarch had been scheduled to attend events in Scotland as part of a flurry of royal COP26 engagements involving the Prince of Wales, the Duchess of Cornwall and the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge between 1 and 5 November.
Other members of the Royal Family will still be in attendance, Sky News understands.
Earlier on Tuesday, the Queen carried out her first official engagements since being told to rest by doctors and spending a night in hospital last week.
Image:Her majesty greeted the South Korean ambassador Gunn Kim, accompanied by Mrs Hee Jung Lee
Her Majesty returned to royal duties with virtual audiences at Windsor Castle.
She wore a yellow dress and her three-strand pearl necklace as she met the South Korean ambassador Gunn Kim and separately, the Swiss ambassador Markus Leitner.
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PM wishes Queen well after hospital stay
Today's engagement was the first time the 95-year-old monarch has been seen, albeit on a computer screen, since she hosted a busy evening reception for the global investment summit on 19 October.
Buckingham Palace said in a statement that the Queen held two audiences on Tuesday afternoon via videolink from Windsor Castle.
It comes after she "reluctantly" cancelled a trip to Northern Ireland last week after doctors ordered her to rest ahead of preliminary tests in hospital on Wednesday - marking her first overnight stay at a medical facility in eight years.
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Queen pulls out of Northern Ireland trip
She is currently being looked after by the medical household, her expert team of royal physicians.
Sky News' royal correspondent, Rhiannon Mills, said last week that Her Majesty's hospital admission was not related to COVID-19- and she was back at her desk doing some light work the following day.
Buckingham Palace has not yet confirmed whether the monarch has received her booster coronavirus jab.
It's not a decision that will have been taken lightly.
The Queen’s quiet influence, her decades of diplomatic experience, were going to provide the ultimate welcome for world leaders and delegates arriving for COP26.
But her doctors are clearly being cautious and decided a trip all the way from Windsor to Glasgow is just too much for the 95-year-old.
The constant questions about her health have reminded me of when Prince Philip was a similar age.
At 97 he retired from public life to stop the constant speculation whenever he had to pull out of an event.
But when you're a monarch, and so actively want to continue your constitutional duties, that simply isn't on the cards.
Last week's announcement that she'd spent the night in hospital, and the fact we'd originally been told that she was simply at Windsor, has understandably led to concern about her.
But the palace continue to insist she is in good spirits, their stock phrase for trying to reassure us that she's ok.
Her attendance at COP26 was seen as such a selling point the palace announced weeks ago that the Queen was going to host the opening reception.
As other members of the family will now step up and set that welcoming tone, the Queen will send a message via a video that'll be shown, expected to stress her hopes for meaningful actions, and on that theme I understand she now hopes that her absence won't be an excuse for others not to turn up.
Sir David Attenborough has warned world leaders must act now on climate change or "it'll be too late" for the planet.
He added it would be "really catastrophic" to ignore the issue.
His comments come ahead of the COP26 conference in Glasgow, which starts on Sunday and has been billed as the last best chance to keep global temperature rises to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius.
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Boris Johnson tells an audience of children that he has concerns about COP26
In conversation with BBC science editor David Shukman, the veteran broadcaster said: "Every month that passes, it becomes more and more incontrovertible, the changes to the planet that we are responsible for that are having these devastating effects."
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He added: "If we don't act now, it will be too late. We have to do it now."
The 95-year-old said wealthier western countries have a "moral responsibility" to help refugees displaced by climate change.
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"We caused it - our kind of industrialisation is one of the major factors in producing this change in climate. So we have a moral responsibility," he told the BBC during filming for his new series, The Green Planet, which will air on BBC1 next year.
"Even if we didn't cause it, we would have a moral responsibility to do something about thousands of men, women and children who've lost everything, everything.
"Can we just say goodbye and say this is no business of ours?"
Earlier in October, he said the possibilities of COP26 gave him "some hope".
"For the first time people around the world will hear the arguments as to what we should do, the analyses as to what the problems are and what the solutions are," he said.
"Those two things bring me some hope."
However, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said he is "very worried" the conference might not secure the agreements needed, admitting it is "touch and go".
When answering questions from school children around the world, he said: "It is going to be very, very tough this summit.
"I am very worried because it might go wrong and we might not get the agreements that we need and it is touch and go, it is very, very difficult, but I think it can be done."
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Wealthy countries not paying fair share
Watch the Daily Climate Show at 6.30pm Monday to Friday on Sky News, the Sky News website and app, on YouTube and Twitter.
The show investigates how global warming is changing our landscape and highlights solutions to the crisis.
Matthew Tulley winces as he tries to pull his face off the road (Picture: Ben Cawthra/LNP)
An eco-protester who wanted to take ‘extreme action’ to send a message admits he regrets gluing his face to the road in central London.
Matthew Tulley was one of 52 people arrested during yesterday’s Insulate Britain demonstration during rush hour.
He winced as his face was stuck to the road in the City of London, and admitted: ‘It wasn’t one of my better moves.’
The protest in the capital prompted the granting of a temporary nationwide injunction covering the ‘entire strategic road network’.
It means protesters who do continue to blockade the roads could face an unlimited fine or two years in prison for contempt of court.
Although previous High Court injunctions issued for key motorways such as the M25 have not been enough to deter all demonstrators.
Yesterday’s protest brought parts of the City of London and Canary Wharf to a standstill, as activists demanded all homes in the UK are properly insulated as a way of fighting climate change.
Police carry an Insulate Britain protesters away during yesterday’s blockade in London (Picture: Reuters)
Speaking with his face glued to the road, Tulley told the Telegraph: ‘It was to make a statement that things are fairly critical, and so I was wanting to have an extreme action to reflect the extreme nature of the emergency that we’re facing.’
People had to use scissors to cut off his hair that remained stuck to the world. The protester added: ‘It wasn’t one of my better moves’.
Asked if he was worried if he would ‘snip himself’ while being cut free, he added: ‘Well you’ll find out if there’s blood coming out.’
Tulley runs South Yorkshire-based company Solid Carbon Storage and has admitted on the company’s YouTube channel to being a fan of Insulate Britain – an offshoot of Extinction Rebellion.
Demonstrators caused chaos in the capital as they blocked vans and lorries during rush hour (Picture: Reuters)
Yesterday’s demonstration marked the 14th time that the group had caused disruption on motorways or A roads in London over the past six weeks.
Insulate Britain warned last Friday that they would resume their road blockades this week.
More than 100 protesters have already been served with court papers in relation to these injunctions, the Department for Transport said.
On Friday, National Highways made nine applications to the High Court against protesters who had breached an existing injunction by blocking the M25, suggesting the orders are not acting as much of a deterrent.
Commuters drag climate activists from the road as they try to get to work (Picture: AFP/Getty Images)
Yesterday Transport Secretary Grant Shapps tweeted: ‘Insulate Britain are back, risking lives & ruining journeys. 3 specific injunctions are already in place, but today I instructed @NationalHways to apply for an injunction covering the entire strategic road network.
‘Tonight this has been granted on a temp basis by the High Court. The long term solution lies in changes to the Police, Crime, Sentencing & Courts Bill, giving additional powers against disruptive protests which target critical national infrastructure.
‘This includes unlimited fines & prison sentences of up to 6 months for obstructing highways.’
Sir David Attenborough has warned world leaders must act now on climate change or "it'll be too late" for the planet.
He added it would be "really catastrophic" to ignore the issue.
His comments come ahead of the COP26 conference in Glasgow, which starts on Sunday and has been billed as the last best chance to keep global temperature rises to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Boris Johnson tells an audience of children that he has concerns about COP26
In conversation with BBC science editor David Shukman, the veteran broadcaster said: "Every month that passes, it becomes more and more incontrovertible, the changes to the planet that we are responsible for that are having these devastating effects."
Advertisement
He added: "If we don't act now, it will be too late. We have to do it now."
The 95-year-old said wealthier western countries have a "moral responsibility" to help refugees displaced by climate change.
More on David Attenborough
Related Topics:
"We caused it - our kind of industrialisation is one of the major factors in producing this change in climate. So we have a moral responsibility," he told the BBC during filming for his new series, The Green Planet, which will air on BBC1 next year.
"Even if we didn't cause it, we would have a moral responsibility to do something about thousands of men, women and children who've lost everything, everything.
"Can we just say goodbye and say this is no business of ours?"
Earlier in October, he said the possibilities of COP26 gave him "some hope".
"For the first time people around the world will hear the arguments as to what we should do, the analyses as to what the problems are and what the solutions are," he said.
"Those two things bring me some hope."
However, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said he is "very worried" the conference might not secure the agreements needed, admitting it is "touch and go".
When answering questions from school children around the world, he said: "It is going to be very, very tough this summit.
"I am very worried because it might go wrong and we might not get the agreements that we need and it is touch and go, it is very, very difficult, but I think it can be done."
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Wealthy countries not paying fair share
Watch the Daily Climate Show at 6.30pm Monday to Friday on Sky News, the Sky News website and app, on YouTube and Twitter.
The show investigates how global warming is changing our landscape and highlights solutions to the crisis.
