It’s a pleasure to take part in this individual Members debate. Tim Peake the astronaut, gazing at planet Earth from outer space, marvelled at the spectacular appearance of our planet. And in a world where we talk in millions of miles, billions of kilometres and light years away, he noted the spectacular appearance of our atmosphere, which is only 16 km high—a thin, bright veneer that needs protecting, that’s so vitally important. And it hit him at that time the fragility, potentially, of our existence. It’s a 16 km depth, this atmosphere that we live and breathe, only, which is how we come to this very necessary discussion on phasing out the traditional combustion engine, for all the reasons that Jenny’s already alluded to, and introducing electric cars, hydrogen cars, driverless automated cars, vans, buses and all the rest.

Because there’s a lot of huge innovation going on. In terms of electric vehicles, which, obviously, are already on our roads, we are seeing significant strides, with some cars surpassing 300 miles in range and producing 0 to 60 mph times to rival supercars. This increase in the numbers of electric cars needs to be planned for, as well as the use of hybrid cars and those powered by hydrogen fuel cells that, again, Jenny alluded to, from William Grove’s start with hydrogen cells and photovoltaic cells invented in Swansea back in Victorian times, used by NASA before now. We need to be using them far more on the ground as well, because those don’t require mains electricity, the hybrid cars or the hydrogen fuel cars. But planning for increased electricity generation and supply needs to happen now with the predicted increase in the peak time demand for electricity of between 15 per cent and 40 per cent. We need to be developing Welsh solutions to this electricity generation challenge. And, obviously, with tidal lagoons being obvious examples, that should be supported now.

In addition, there needs to be a national network of charging points for electric cars. We need to know what Government is doing in conjunction with industry to expand this network to meet predicted demand.