The SAF Podcast
Welcome to The SAF Podcast, the only podcast on the internet that exclusively covers sustainable aviation fuel (SAF). So if you want to find out the real issues and challenges are for commercialising and scaling SAF production, look no further.
Every week we will be hearing from senior industry leaders who are actively shaping the future of SAF and aviation.
Hosted by Oscar Henderson and brought to you by the team at SAF Investor. Connect with us at www.safinvestor.com
The SAF Podcast
The SAF Podcast with Robert Courts: Pulling back the curtain on UK policy development
In this episode of The SAF Podcast, we go behind the curtain of UK sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) policy with former Aviation Minister and former Member of Parliament for the UK Robert Courts.
Listeners will gain a rare glimpse into the complexities of government policymaking—from managing cross-departmental collaboration and limited civil service bandwidth to ensuring stakeholder engagement and long-term adaptability.
Courts candidly addresses industry concerns about implementation timelines, revealing the unavoidable bandwidth limitations within government and the necessity of thorough consultation. He takes us through the formation of the Jet Zero Council (now Task Force), explaining how it transformed the government-industry relationship from policy being "done to" industry to being developed "with" industry. We also discuss the Green Fuels Green Skies competition which paved the way for the Advanced Fuel Fund which has given grants to numerous leading SAF production technology developers in the UK.
This collaborative approach has survived changes in government precisely because sustainable aviation enjoys broad cross-party support.
You can also find out about the process of developing policy, exemplified by the development of the Revenue Certainty Mechanism. We look at the pros and cons of this long process and actually discuss why these processes are in place.
We finish by looking at the big challenges in developing the infrastructure for domestic SAF production as well as what policy makers wish industry understood more about the policy making process.
Make sure you check this episode out to get behind the process of policy development and why policy takes the shape it does.
Find out previous episode where we looked at the investment landscape in the UK and where investment is going here: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2202964/episodes/16944093
Hello and welcome to another episode of the SAF podcast. This week we're doing something slightly different from what we normally do. I'm delighted to be joined by Robert Courts, who was a former Member of Parliament here in the UK for Whitney, who had various roles throughout his governmental career, but probably the one that's most pertinent to this podcast is his time as the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State in the Department of Transport. Try saying that quickly, or after a beer or two, that's a bit of a mouthful. So, robert, thanks so much for joining us. How are you?
Speaker 2:I'm very well. Thanks, it's great to be here. Thanks very much for having me. It's a topic that's really close to my heart, so it's great to discuss about the things I was involved in and where things are going in the future.
Speaker 1:But I think it's easiest just to say former aviation minister, everyone knows what that means and it's better than the full title of parliamentary undersecretary et cetera. But the full title is very British and just overly grand and aggrandizing. So you know it's got that going for it.
Speaker 2:It has a. It certainly does. It's got a certain ring. The full title was parliamentary undersecretary of state in the department of transport, with the responsibility for aviation, maritime security and civil contingencies.
Speaker 1:That's the full lot and he said that with no notes. I want to point out as well no notes. Um, so before I think I don't want to get overly political, but I think it's interesting, why, first of all, why did you get into sort of politics? And then, what sort of within politics led you to go down this route with the sort of Department for Transport, aviation and Marine?
Speaker 2:Absolutely yeah. So I mean, the good thing about this area is that, you know, looking at the politics side of it, a lot of the things we'll be talking about today, I've got broad cross-party support, you know. You've got, uh, there is not a lot that will separate, uh, really, any of the parties here, and that made it something that was a great bit of policy work to be involved with, because you could, uh, you know, talk to people from whatever political party, political um standpoint they came from, and we could work through things together. You could take everybody's ideas on board. There's an awful lot of that goes on in Parliament, actually, believe it or not, it's not all. It's not all, like you see on prime minister's questions, of everybody trying to score points off each other. That's that's not. That is a bit of the theatre, but it's not the whole thing.
Speaker 2:And so, from my perspective, I am just a lifelong aviation enthusiast. I love air travel in terms of, you know, I love the machines, I love the technology that's behind it. I think the people who've been involved in it over the years are some of the most extraordinary people that mankind has ever invented or created, and I love what air travel does it, the way it broadens the mind, the way that the world is made smaller, the way that we can trade with people, no matter where they happen to be in the world, the way in which we can understand other cultures in a way that just wouldn't have been possible before the invention of air travel, in particular, air travel that was available to the vast you know, to a vast, broad range of people, and I want to see a world in which that remains the case for everybody, and I want to see more people flying. I want to see more people get the benefits that I was able to get. I'm one of that generation. Oscar, you'll probably feel much the same. You know we were able to benefit from the budget carriers who were able to get us around Europe and over to the States at a cost that wasn't prohibitive, and we have to find a way to do that. But equally, you know, whilst I was growing up and again from a generational perspective, you know an increasing awareness of the planet that we live in and of the environment that we inhabit, and that the growth of aviation has to go hand in hand with that.
Speaker 2:So for me, being aviation minister was really just a it was to say it was a labor of love and understatement it was. It was a dream job. It was something that I would uh, you know was was delighted to do and woke up every day full of enthusiasm and excitement for what I did. And we went ahead and I started during the pandemic.
Speaker 2:So my immediate issue was dealing with Covid and the response of it, which, of course, was the greatest challenge in the aviation sector's history. But then, as we started looking for what government calls business as usual, we started looking what the wider policy things were that we wanted, and the the sustainable flight part of it was the biggest thing that we did from business as usual perspective. Saf was a key part of that. Zero emissions flight was a massive part of that, but also some of the non CO2 aspects. So all this incredibly complicated stuff that personally I love because I'm a lawyer by background and an aviation guy by instinct. So the complicated things around airspace modernisation, for example, that is a big part of this picture too.
Speaker 1:So, when you were in government, what were your you know know involvements when it comes to sustainable aviation fuel, and where did you sit in terms of the development of the current policy that we we currently have here in the UK?
Speaker 2:So I played different roles over the years. I mean, I was there for the best part of 10 years and I came at it from the point of view, initially, of someone who just wanted to do what what he could to to help move the policy background along. So I was part of the all-party parliamentary group for aviation and was involved in that and set up some work on historic aviation. Initially, that was my first toe being dipped in the water and I was then what's called the parliamentary, the parliamentary private secretary uh, the pps for the department for transport, and that's what the press somewhat unkindly called the bag carrier for the ministers. You're essentially a bridge between the minister, who are in the department the whole time, and the back benches, who tend to be in parliament, and you. They have to have a means of communicating and someone to talk to and you know, take, take your concerns forward. So I was that for the department of transport and then I I came into. I was lucky enough to be appointed aviation minister in september 2020 and that was, you know, in large, in part at least, or certainly I'd like to think so, because I've expressed the enthusiasm about aviation for so long in public and in private that I was a fairly obvious pick to put in there. So, whilst I was at the department for transport, the biggest thing that we did was the jet zero council, which continues to this day, albeit rebranded as the jet zero task force and with a slightly different scope and emphasis as well, and that was was the flagship product, and that was something that sat on top of the jet zero strategy, and the strategy and the council together outlined the government's approach to decarbonizing aviation, and there are probably two things that were really keen on this, and from people, from someone who you know is an aviation enthusiast and you know 100, supported and encouraged and helped by my boss, grant Shapps, who's who's equally an aviation guy.
Speaker 2:We wanted to do two things with this policy. The first was to decarbonize, but to decarbonize in a way that used the benefits of technology, so that all of the people are coming up with brilliant ideas around how to make aviation cleaner, greener, more efficient, were helped and not hindered by what government was doing, and that we didn't look at any crude but ineffective policy levers like increased taxation. That just wouldn't help with what we were ultimately trying to do. And the second bit, which sounds simple but is really important is that it was intended to be done in partnership and cooperation with industry. So often industry, in whatever department you're talking about about, in whatever bit of policy you're talking about, feels that policy is something that is done to it, not done with it, and I and we were absolutely determined that on this that would not be the case.
Speaker 2:So the jet zero council that we set up and it continues to this day, under a different government and a different, uh flavor of politics, but, as I said at the beginning, a lot this is by beginning. This is in large part cross-party work. I know we'll come on to perhaps some of the politics a bit later on, but this was supported by all of us and it was intended to bring together the relevant bits of government which is not just aviation, not just the Department for Transport and the key industry players, so that at all times what government was doing was informed and guided by what industry needed, as opposed to industry trying to cope with what government had already done to it, but government as a whole, with the trade, the business department held as well, because they have the what's called the. You know, they hold the pen, they have the responsibility for aerospace. So there are different governmental responsibilities in different departments. We wanted those all brought together and we wanted industry along, for along with us and how did you manage the industry?
Speaker 1:sort of buy-in was there. You know, were they skeptical at first, where they sort of understood what was going on, what we were trying to do, and were sort of very eager to buy in. And for those that may be not in the UK, who were the sort of the big drivers from industry who were really willing to get involved, yeah, I mean that's a really key point.
Speaker 2:So industry wasn't sceptical, industry was very enthusiastic. This was a big, high-prof profile uh event uh the first and it had priority from the very top and, for example, we'll probably talk about the greenfields, green skies, competition. Well, that was part of a 10-point plan on on environmental matters that was put forward by the then prime minister, boris johnson. Uh, he was hugely supportive of aviation and hugely supportive of decarbonisation as a concept and that was part of a big prime ministerial drive on this topic and GFGS was a part of that and Jet Zero Council was a part of that overall government drive anyway. So industry was very supportive because it was a big deal you know to be. It showed that the aviation sector was part of government's priority and it showed that industry was meant to be a part of it as well, both the operators and the manufacturers of aircraft.
Speaker 2:But our focus was on UK and so the intention was to bring the UK sector in first and foremost and that wasn't really. That was largely because of reasons of efficiency, and probably the biggest challenge was the fact that the Jet Zero Council could only have a certain number of members, whilst everybody would want to be a part of it because it was a big ticket item and it was important policy development. There's always a challenge when you're sitting there in a governmental perspective either a minister or a civil servant that you need to talk to as many people as possible, but you can't talk to so many people that you never get anything done, because then it simply becomes a talking shop. So there is always a tension between keeping it small enough to be actually delivering things and we were determined this was going to be a delivery body that made a difference, but not at the same time keeping it so narrow that you were you're excluding voices that's a very fine barrier, fine line to walk, because everyone that's not involved goes, oh, they don't have the right people involved.
Speaker 1:And people will equally say there's not enough perspectives in there to have some, some productive conversation with all stakeholders. Because there are numerous stakeholders in aviation. It's not a very neat value chain. So that's not a very easy balance to find. I think even under the current guise of the Jet Zero Council it's still something that sort of comes up today, even with its current formulation.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, that's absolutely right. I mean, and you're right, it is not an easy thing to do, but then nothing in government is easy and if you're looking for an easy day at work, it's not the place to be, to be honest. So, yes, that is absolutely right, but the point I would make to people at the time and I would still encourage anyone listening to to bear in mind is that membership of the task force as it now is, or the council as it was, isn't the only way to get your voice heard. Your voice can be heard and your feed in will. I can absolutely promise you from somebody sat on the other side of the of the chair, from a ministerial perspective and from a civil servant perspective, I can absolutely promise you that your expertise is absolutely wanted and valued.
Speaker 2:There is a skill for industry in making sure that your expertise is put across in a way that is easily understood this is complicated policy and in a way that aligns with what government is trying to do. So there's a skill there from an industry perspective, but it is absolutely welcomed. And even if you're not on the Jets Aerotask Force now, I know that the department will be very keen to hear what you have to say. So there's a bit of reassurance there.
Speaker 2:But you're absolutely right, oscar, it's not easy. It's not easy particularly with a sector that's so diverse, because when you look at the difference between the scheduled carriers, the charter carriers, special operations, business jets, general aviation, when you look at all of the different sectors, all of which have equally valid, equally important viewpoints, it's not straightforward. But you always have to think at the end of the day, where do I want to be when I finish this process? Do I want to have delivered something that's made a difference to aviation for the good or not? And if you do well, then you've got to make sure it's efficient and you've got to make sure it delivers things.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and you mentioned the Green Fuels Green Skies competition that was run whilst you were there. Do you just want to explain or remind people what that was, what the sort of aim behind it was, and you know what sort of it entailed and ended up resulting in, because it had a quite a quite a profound end result. In the end, that was quite a big moment for not just UK aviation but global sustainable aviation yeah, I mean we.
Speaker 2:One of the key things to remember is that you get iterations of policy that you often will deal with something now because that is a deliverable at the moment. So the gfgs green fuels, green skies uh competition was something that came off of that prime ministerial 10 point uh plan, competition, and it's a 50 million pound program which has had a certain period, but then after that the government moved on to doing similar things under the advanced fuels fund. So similar aims but done slightly differently. And that's really just about spending review periods, you know, and when government there are very few programs that run on forever in government. They I don't know how long the spending review period is and this was just an early part of them relatively small, but it was intended to be seed corn funding, intending to lay the groundwork for the development of the UK sustainable aviation fuel industry and it was very much focused around waste and so it gave relatively in the scheme of things, in the scheme of government spending, relatively small amounts of money.
Speaker 2:I appreciate very large amounts of money to individuals, but from the hundreds of thousands up to the low millions To a number of people who had ideas.
Speaker 2:Some of those are big, well-known companies like Landerjet now, or some of them are relatively small, but all of them had had an innovative idea. Some of that would be cooking oils. Those tend to be the things that catch the headlines, not least because you see trucks driving around saying you know, our cooking oil has been turned into fuel, but then through to things like industrial waste and even sewage, but then through to things like industrial waste and even sewage. So a wide, a really wide range of different ideas people have had, looking to see which ones were likely to be possible to sustain and develop on a commercial basis. And then, once that had happened, then later variations of the fund came along and we'll talk, I'm sure, about the mandate, uh, and the revenue certainty mechanism in due course, which we're all part of this too I think one of the great things about the gfgs and then the advanced fuel fund that came afterwards is the breadth of technologies that are acknowledged within it, the fact that you mentioned.
Speaker 1:There's sewage, there's lands jet doing our culture jet. There's people working on heifer plants, there's um people doing tires in sort of um the northeast. There's all sorts of different feedstocks, different production pathways and it's really acknowledging the full breadth that staff production can entail and how it can benefit the UK, across the UK, because it's geographically spread as well as pathway spread as well.
Speaker 2:That's right pathway diverse and geographically diverse as well, and this, in you know, in my view, is what government should be doing, which is and there's a bit of a philosophical, political, you know, political preference here. Some people prefer a greater level of government control, some people prefer less. I would be one of those who prefers less government control, because I don't think government tends to run things well when it gets involved in the day-to-day itself, but what it can do is spark stuff off, particularly in an area like this, and so that was a great competition to be a part of, because it simply was. It gave if someone had an idea and they could make it stack up on a business case basis and could show that they were, you know, able to, uh, to deliver what was needed within the government criteria that there always are, because it's public money and you've got to have some criteria. Uh, then it was able.
Speaker 1:It then gave them the ability to develop their idea and look towards getting it commercializable so, moving on to the mandate, it's come up a couple of times. It's probably the most well-known bit of uk policy. We were speaking before we started recording that you were involved in this more as a backbencher, with um sort of in very early days of the mandate being discussed. So you've kind of seen it sort of from the front line all the way through to where it is now and across the whole sort of life cycle of what the mandate is currently now. So what you know, what's the story about? You know how it got set. What were the sort of of? What were people calling for? Was there an element of compromise into how it got set? Now, because lots of people talk about there being similarities with the european mandate and then there being some fundamental differences. So how did they align together? Was that sort of happy accident? Was there sort of discussions around that sort of? You know, how did the mandate come to have the guise that it currently has?
Speaker 2:yeah, I mean, this is a is a really quite innovative bit of, uh, you know, a bit of policy and and just to, as I know, I'm speaking to an expert audience, so I expect everyone knows this, but it's well worth just revisiting, uh, the policy background that sits behind this, because we're doing something quite unusual in in decarbonizing aviation, and many of the same points incidentally refer to, you know, apply to maritime road transport and so forth as well, and that is, we are trying to force the pace of a fuel change. And if we think about the last time that happened, you have to look to maritime really for that, because of course, aviation didn't exist a couple of hundred years ago. But from a maritime perspective, there was a major change from sail through to coal fired, through to oil, but in each of those cases it was allowed to take place at a speed at which the market dictated. So coal fired ships came on stream originally they were co-powering sail vessels at the same time, ships like hms warrior, a good example of that and then, as time went by, sale was simply phased out. Although in some ways, coming back, it's another whole interesting conversation I won't segue into now, but there wasn't a deliberate phase by saying you must stop using sale by a certain period, and that is really different from what we're doing here. So you know, sail vessels continue being used to a certain extent, you know, right up until the middle of the 20th century.
Speaker 2:It's just, if that's what you wanted to do, then fine, that's different here, because here we are seeking to get to a world in which we get to a net zero world by the middle of the century. So that is forced by policy. It's a time scale that is, there's not just working at whatever the market gets around to it, but a bigger overarching policy environment that they're looking to do. So the big question is how you do that. And the question that you have to do is is to and your industry was supportive and remained supportive of, of a mandate, ie thata certain percentage of SAF has to be mixed into uh, the uh into the fuel mix by a certain date and then increasing over time uh, that means that the airlines have to buy it, which means that somebody has to produce it, and that is all intended to build that domestic, sustainable aviation fuel industry. And there has to be a domestic one, because it makes no sense from a carbon reduction perspective to make it abroad and then ship it here to you. So that simply is making yourself yourself. You're putting yourself in a position where you can say you're doing the right things. But are you, are you really so the real?
Speaker 2:Uh, the policy challenge was how we managed to do that also artificially forced time scale, if that makes sense, and the mandate was, was the big part of that. And then you get to the issue of the cost of it, which is that it is approximately, speaking, twice as expensive as fossil fuels, meaning that airlines can't voluntarily use it. No airline CFO can sanction using fuel that's twice the price of his or her competitor, and so you have to get to a position where that comes down. So you have to have sufficient produced, and that's where the revenue certainty mechanism comes in, because it seeks to de-risk, from an investor perspective, the amount of fuel that's going in there. So there's lots covered there almost really complicated policy area.
Speaker 2:The other question you just asked me was about the EU side of things, and there's always informal discussion going on so that you know what the other side is doing, and there are contacts, usually at the civil service level, that have those detailed policy conversations, so you're aware of what the others are doing. But of course we've got to do what's right for ourselves and it's a UK industry we're looking to build. So the thrust of them is similar, but there are some subtle differences in the way that the mandate is carried out and, of course, the proportion at certain times, which is different as well.
Speaker 1:The other sort of side of the policy coin, as it were, is the US model of incentives, tax credits. They've got a totally different form of government, obviously, than we do. I'm guessing there was never really an option to look at a model like that, just because of the nature of government, the nature of public finances and the realistic benefit that that could bring versus other policy levers like a mandate and the revenue certainty mechanism can bring yeah, I mean you have, for a start, that it was one of the challenges of aviation.
Speaker 2:That is, by its nature, a globalized industry and you'll have many carriers who are having to, and producers you know, manufacturers or operating on both sides of the atlantic and have a different world.
Speaker 2:But the united states is a very different world in both the responsibilities of government the federal versus the state power and the traditions of what they're expected to do and, quite frankly, the money available. They are all quantitatively different. So, whilst you can learn some lessons, we chose to do it in a way that both tended to be closer largely closer to what had been done before, and one of the guiding principles was the contracts for difference scheme that was used when we fostered and brought into being the offshore wind industry in the UK. That was seen to be successful. It was seen to be something that industry was happy with and comfortable with, and from the point of view of the governmental system as well. When a part of government has done something successfully, there's no point in reinventing the wheel unless you really need to by doing it in a completely different way. So, whilst there were other models that could have been adopted, the one that seemed to be the most effective was the one that industry was comfortable with and the government had some historic practice of doing already.
Speaker 1:And with regard to mandate and you rightfully pointed out that making SAF domestically makes the most environmental sense and there's other economic benefits associated with doing that currently, to fulfill the mandate as of 2025, the UK is the net importer of SAF in order to meet the quota of the mandate, so I'm guessing that's an unintended consequence whilst projects come online and start commercially producing. But was there ever a sort of worry about you know how long that could go on, for I'm guessing people you were aware of, or the powers and government were aware that it was a distinct possibility that this could be the case, because obviously there's lots of production in rotterdam and mainland europe. But it's making sure that that's not the ongoing model that the mandate ends up influencing rather than encouraging that domestic production.
Speaker 2:Yes, exactly, and that's why you have different levers which are intended to do different things. So the mandate is just intended to encourage the uptake of SAF, which it helps with the supply and demand equation that you have to you have to deal with. And then you have the revenue certainty mechanism, which helps from a governmental perspective to encourage, establish and help to thrive a UK domestic industry which, as you rightly say, has the principle for huge amounts of jobs in new tech industries to be created in all different parts of the UK. So the economic potential for this is significant as well.
Speaker 2:Yes, you're always aware with those things. Whenever you design any kind of policy, you always think through what the unintended consequences might be, uh, but at the end of the day, you've got to do something. And when you've got a fairly clear steer from your political uh intent and also from the public because we're all trying to do what the public would like us to do, or trying to, you know, respond to what our constituents are saying when you have those two clear imperatives there, you need to take the white stage. One step first of all, which is get the SAF being used, and then, following on from that, is the next stage, which is how you do it here.
Speaker 1:So you mentioned the revenue certainty mechanism and I want to touch on that now because it's this other sort of lever, that sort of counterbalances, the mandate for domestic production. But I think one of the biggest points of consternation when you talk to producers is that you've got a mandate that came into place in 2025, yet this revenue certainty mechanism only comes in in 2026. So there's quite a big time gap there and not necessarily as aligned as one would ideally want. So do you explain sort of how that came about, the potential reasons behind that, just so people can understand that it's not always clean sailing. Things aren't always fitting neatly in a jigsaw puzzle.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely, and you're right to point out that you've got two parts of the policy equation here and they are complementary really policies that are driving both the uptake and the UK production. On the other hand and there's a number of reasons past that as to why that is firstly, you've got to get, you've got to, you've got to kick off the demand before you can start creating the supply, otherwise you're just creating something that people aren't buying, so so I think that has to come slightly first. There is always, however, a just the sheer reality that this is complicated work. It's not straightforward. You are seeking to force the pace of change in industry and to force the market's hand for wider policy reasons, which is the desire to cut down on our carbon dioxide emissions, and the government has a number of steps it has to go through, and the consultation process is key. Amongst them and I referred at the beginning about how you know government was very keen, certainly in my day, and I have no reason to think it's changed at all in this sphere is to understand what sector thinks. And you know, if you charge ahead and you roll out policy that is ill thought out, that the sector doesn't support, you're only going to have to undo it again later and you incur a lot of disquiet and unhappiness amongst the people you're trying to help in the meantime. So this just does take time, and there's also no getting away from the fact, bluntly, that there's only so much bandwidth in government, although I know from the outside it's the government seen as this massive monolithic organization. There's only a certain number of people within government who have this level of detailed policy input and they have other things to be doing.
Speaker 2:At the same time, events happen that you have to you have to deal with, and so the the process of talking to the industry, properly consulting, really understanding what it is that you're proposing to do, is vital. I mean, it's vital for legal reasons as well, frankly, because if you get it wrong, you'll just be judicially reviewed. So you you've got to get it right from the from the point of view of protecting yourself against unnecessary legal challenge, but there's also just the sheer moral and professional diligence of wanting to make sure that what you're doing is right. Um, the the worst thing to do is to is to rush through with something, then have the sector say well, hang on, you've done a. You've done a whole bunch of things here which are unintended consequences, and if only you'd ask, we could have pointed out what those were in advance. So much as I. I totally hear and accept and understand those concerns. Um, what government is trying to do is to go through the process that it has to do to get things right.
Speaker 1:I think the idea of industry consultation, this consultation period, it's really nice for engagement, for those that that are listening abroad and aren't necessarily familiar. A policy is developed. There's sort of certainly in this case the revenue certainty mechanism. The different options in terms of form that this will take are sort of laid out. It goes out to industry, industry have the chance to respond, add comments, make suggestions, and then the government can acknowledge those requests, requests, make comments in response to that as well and then use that to formulate what the best policy approach in that consultation is. So it's a very sort of nice thing in theory, but it does take time. These consultation periods are over sort of months and you know the machine, the cogs of government are turned slowly at times. They're not necessarily the the fastest moving things, but it is. It's important to be able to to get that sort of interaction as, as we said earlier, for people that aren't necessarily on the jet zero council or task force as it is now, it's another way that they can get engaged that's exactly right.
Speaker 2:It's, uh, you know, check zero task forces. It now is is the is the key steering body which is seeking to drive and has the major players on board, but there are others who need to be heard as well. Uh, and there are some areas I mean there there's a wider, bigger political governance issue that lies underneath this around consultation and the speed at which government does things, and in some areas of policy, there is an argument for amending some of the regulations that require a lot of this because it has time and it has a financial consequence, therefore, as well. But when you're dealing with what is fundamentally technical, uh and and highly, uh, highly detailed policy, this is tricky stuff. I do think you've got to take the time to get it right, and that means talking to industry and thinking about what they say and listening and amending your policy and then coming out with something that has broad support and that has been stress tested. Nothing wrong with rushing out something that hasn't been stress tested.
Speaker 1:And sort of. The other side of this is that you set this policy in place and hope it sort of has the desired results. Obviously we'll see when it does come into place whether it actually fulfils the purpose that it's designed to or whether you know it needs further tweaking and whether you know actually this isn't quite right. It doesn't work. In reality the markets change. The whole aviation sort of SAP ecosystem could move in a year in a direction that isn't necessarily foreseen. So what are your thoughts on the adaptability of policy once it's been set out? Because obviously the policy, when it's made, goes through this long process if it needs to be adapted, and adapted quickly. Does do governments and I'm talking sort of more generally, obviously, with your experience in the uk government are they able to sort of tweak things at a speed that that could be required later down the line?
Speaker 2:Yeah, very much depends on the action that you've taken. If you have taken action that requires primary legislation, which is an Act of Parliament, then that is harder to amend than a regulation which is secondary legislation that sits underneath it. And that's why you will usually see that an Act of Parliament is written in relatively broad terms. It lays out the overarching policy objective that you're seeking to do. It then lays out the regulatory framework under which the law is amended. So regulations are relatively relatively speaking easy to change, relatively easy, and I'm speaking very much in a relative term.
Speaker 2:So it's important not to put too much detail into that, into that act of parliament. And that that of itself leads to frustration sometimes because people will say you know you're consulting on a potential bit of primary legislation, but you haven't covered xyz questions that are really important, to which the answer is they will be considered but they have to go in secondary legislation, not least because you need to be able to change them. You don't want to change them all the time. The use in secondary legislation, not least because you need to be able to change them you don't want to change them all the time the use of secondary legislation has increased vastly over the course of recent decades. There are various reasons for that. It's partly because of european union membership, which govern through secondary instruments.
Speaker 1:It's a large part but it's also because of the sheer complexity of government.
Speaker 2:It's trying to do so many things now so quickly that that secondary legislation use has increased. You've got to be careful about how you use them because they are subject to far, far, far less democratic and parliamentary scrutiny than the big, big ticket items which are the acts of parliament. So the answer to the question slightly long windedly, and I apologize it depends exactly what you've done. If it's an act of parliament, then that's harder to change it's not impossible, but it's harder because of parliamentary time. If it's a secondary instrument, then that is easier not straightforward, but easier. But in terms of policy that's underneath it, before the law gets made, that's being reviewed all the time, nearly always when any policy is brought out. If it's a, if there's a regulation, there'll be a review mechanism built into it, and if it's simply a policy that's intended to drive things without rule making, then that is subject to uh, to an ongoing scrutiny on a regular basis.
Speaker 2:And indeed the examples of this are the jet zero council and jet zero task force, which aren't regular, aren't statutory level bodies, but they have been refreshed, reviewed, renewed and relaunched with a slightly different focus, and the classic example here is the Jet Zero Council was intended in very in high level, political support for decarbonisation of industry and bringing people together, getting them used to working together. But now that we're at the stage where there's a broad plan, there's a mandate and they're consulting on their own new circuity mechanism which is where they are at the moment you are now moving more to a delivery and implementation phase, which is why you see the task force redesigned in the way that it starts to become much more about infrastructure, about systems, about the other parts of government and some of the non-fuel related things coming in together. So it does, I can assure you. There's an ongoing process of review and the flexibility depends upon what it is that you need to do.
Speaker 1:Presumably with sort of cross party, sort of both parties, major parties, acknowledging the importance of this and broad support for this would suggest there's a more. They'd sort of be using secondary instruments rather than big acts of parliament, or does that not necessarily follow?
Speaker 2:follow, no, it doesn't it doesn't as much follow like that. It depends on what it is you're trying to do. Um, if you're trying to set up a major, uh, overarching power to do something, then you have to use an act of parliament. If you're looking to establish the means by which you do it ie how you do it that tends to be done in secondary legislation. So you might set up a body to do something in an act of parliament and the body then is given powers under the secondary legislation to do those things and you then let it crack on with it and then you review what it is it's looking to do. So it's not really about cross party support or lack thereof. It's more about the mechanisms of rulemaking.
Speaker 1:Sure, I think, at risk of getting slightly political now. What are your thoughts on the sustainability agenda more broadly and its ability to remain a top priority, and whether it can potentially be at risk of being knocked down the priority list as other things emerge, because obviously governments are working across monumental challenges that are constantly arriving, and so there's always a priority list that is constantly changing. Do you think sustainability net zero is something that is more likely to be bumped down than anything else other than other things, or I?
Speaker 2:I don't. I don't think it is, because you often get large policy priorities where something explodes into the public consciousness and it's the big story for a period of time, but then it starts bedding into everything that you're doing and and I think, with broader sustainability, that's where we are now, that people will naturally look at whatever the policy happens to be. We're talking about aviation today, but it could be anything and you start thinking about the sustainability aspects of that. Now there is a challenge therein, which is that if you get the processes wrong, then that simply becomes an extra cost, and that's when it becomes unpopular.
Speaker 2:And you know we are in challenging economic times, for reasons that we are all well aware of, and there are productivity challenges facing the country. There are challenges about the way it is governed and how quickly decisions are made We've touched on some of them already and how efficient the country is being in doing what it wants to do and, in blunt terms, how it creates enough to pay for the things that we need it to do. And that's in a time of economic challenge, alongside security challenges as well. So you and so what you have to do at all times is to have an eye to the economic realities of the action that you're proposing to take, because if if you don't do that, then you risk undermining the thing you're trying to do. So when we look at the green agenda and sustainable flying, it has to be done in a way that protects the industry and that enables people still to get the benefits of flying, because if you don't do those two things, you damage the country economically and you simply undermine the support for what it is you're trying to do, uh, and so you have to make sure that you bed everything this into every area of policy.
Speaker 2:So, from my perspective, as I started off our conversation by saying what the jet zero council was intended to do in the jet zero strategy, that um that came underneath it, was to harness the benefits of technology and to harness the benefits of the economics, so that you were delivering on what people rightly expect to see, which is the ability to travel and to see the world, but you do so in a way that increases jobs, that doesn't downgrade your competitiveness internationally and therefore maintains the support of what you're trying to do. Because ultimately, you know, you can, we are, are in a global world and we have to remain competitive, and if you don't, you won't, you won't be able to continue doing any of the things that you want to do if you're in a position where you're not competitive on the international stage.
Speaker 1:Having been in the early stages of developing and formulating UK policy and, you know, having left politics and have seen it sort of implemented and and other bits continue to be reviewed what are your sort of concerns about UK, the UK's position in global staff development in the world, and where do you think what sort of is the exciting bit for you when you look at staff in the uk? The?
Speaker 2:exciting bit in is unquestionably the amount of companies, be they startups or established companies, who are truly innovating. That is incredibly exciting because there are so many brilliant ideas out there. We referred to some of them already. But when you're looking at, you know industrial waste sewage, a whale on top of things like cooking oil. I mean, if we can you know the waste products that we have those things can start going into aviation fuel. That is extraordinary. We've been just very quickly talking about esaf as well.
Speaker 2:You know that's clearly another part of the issue, that where the feedstock point uh is moot, if you're taking carbons out of the atmosphere and breaking them down, putting them back in the fuel, it's, it's an emitting uh, but it's not a uh but, but it's a net zero type of fuel. Um, I appreciate not relevant to saf, but you know the, the net zero uh, sorry, the um, the zero emissions part of flight is truly exciting too. So from a technology and innovation perspective, the country is an absolute world leader. The challenge is just getting it's, getting the flywheel turning. It's getting the point at which there is enough fuel being produced that it goes down in cost and the people buy it, and then it becomes the natural choice for airlines to say we will buy saff, not just because we want to, because it's the right thing to do, but because it's equally economically competitive, or perhaps even better, uh, and so you get.
Speaker 2:You know, I mean, there was the point that I'm sure you've noticed.
Speaker 2:I mean nest day's 2024 figures quite good case in point here because nest day, uh, we're saying there's too much saff around, it's not being bought, uh, and iata, of course, saying there's too little.
Speaker 2:Well, of course they're really talking past each other, they're not, they're not really making the same point. Uh, you know, because, in essence, it, because it's too expensive at the moment it's not all being sold, um, but it would be cheaper and therefore bought if there's more of it. And this is the the point I've been making throughout our conversation that is, getting the flywheel turning such that there's, there are domestic industries which are able to produce, able to produce at a uh, at a value that makes them the logical, obvious choice. And this is hard because we can't allow the market to do it over the course of decades, which is the natural thing to do, because we want it done by a certain period of time 2050. Or, in some cases, of course, you know we're forcing the pace even faster than that. So that is, that's the challenge, but it has an enormous, enormously exciting potential from the point of view of economics, industry, jobs, as well as sustainability.
Speaker 1:And ultimately, if we don't do it, others are going to be doing it and it would be silly for us to miss out on that opportunity you mentioned asap there, which comes up in the conversation all the time across the world as sort of heralded as the the holy grail of saff production, um, and obviously there's sub mandates, um in the uk and in Europe associated with it come 2030.
Speaker 1:When you're sort of looking at, one of the big sort of issues around it is getting access to renewable feedstocks or getting enough renewable energy in the grid so that they can get access to it to.
Speaker 1:You know, get that into their projects so that they can develop this SAF and same with pipe gym and etc. But the big challenge of getting access to the grid because the uk grid is um, well, I don't know how to put this delicately it's not in the best, it's not in the best shape. It's arguably losing its ability to fulfill its purpose. It's constantly like ram, there's no space, you can't get any energy for sort of years down the line if you wanted to integrate into it. Is those the sorts of things that you thought about when you're, when people that government are thinking about trying to work on, because obviously this goes cross-departmental, as we said earlier, that is a fundamental sort of challenge to getting that commercially developed because, as you said, there's so many great companies developing this that at small scale, looking to sort of develop production further yeah, you've put your finger on a couple of really critical points there.
Speaker 2:The first of those is that the power demand for any sustainable fuel solution, whatever it is that the power demand for any sustainable fuel solution, whatever it is it be it esaf, be it saf, be it hydrogen, whatever it is the power demand is enormous and, of course, aviation isn't the only one looking at it.
Speaker 2:Aviation is not the only one that's trying to get access to it, so precisely, uh, there that there there are vast areas of society which are looking to do this. When you start looking at road transport, uh, or you start looking at, um, you know, at a heavy industry, you know you're you're any kind of manufacturing industry, you realize that the more that you decarbonize, you're really using electricity on one way or another. And that may be a clean fuel at the point of expenditure, but it isn't necessarily clean at the point of creation and there's simply no point creating something the dirty way, simply to say look at me, you know, aren't I being environmentally friendly because I'm using electricity? And just to give you the sort of the scale of it, I mean, if a major airport is, it has a power draw the size of a city. A cruise ship docked up alongside might be able to use shore power, but that's like docking another city alongside the existing city that surrounds the port and you have to have a holistic, cross-government solution to all of this. And this work does go on.
Speaker 2:So where you're sitting in the, in the seat that I was in as aviation and maritime minister, that was my job was to deal with aviation and maritime, but the wider power draw sits within the energy department and, to a certain extent, cross-government, coordinated by cabinet office and organizations like the jet zero council.
Speaker 2:That's why we were very keen to bring everyone together so that everybody's voice was getting in there. And this is going to require some real, real conversations for people to have, because we need to start thinking about, you know, nuclear, for example. You know what do you do if you're going to need a lot of uh power created, which we're going to, and it needs to be, uh, green, well, there's a place for nuclear, isn't there? Uh, what about, uh? You know, wind farms, be those onshore or offshore, uh or solar panels, you know, all of which you know are, in some circumstances, popular but in some certain circumstances, deeply unpopular. There has to be a wide understanding of the power draw that is needed for net zero and the consequences that that has, which are very much a part of this. So you're absolutely right, it's got to be cross party and the power sorry, cross government and the power requirement is very significant indeed one final question.
Speaker 1:I know we brought up a lot of things about the inner workings of government and it's been fascinating to hear about the details and get a glimpse behind sort of the closed doors. What's one reality of developing policy in government that you think that you would love for people in industry and just people in general to sort of have a bit more understanding of? That will hopefully sort of enable things to move a bit smoother?
Speaker 2:yeah, it's a really good question. Uh, that and one I could. I could probably give you a number of different answers, but I think probably the most simple thing is to understand. This is very complicated policy and there is limited bandwidth within the people who do the nuts and bolts of the work within the civil service, simply because there's only a certain number of people and there are only so many hours in the day, and there are only so many hours in the day, and that they are. So there's a real skill in putting your case in a way that can be clearly understood and which aligns with government priorities. So in that way, industry can help government to help industry.
Speaker 2:The sheer human realities of limited bandwidth and this is complicated policy and make yourself as useful as possible by putting your case clearly and persuasively and aligning it with what government's trying to do, is extremely helpful indeed. But secondly is also just to understand that the government is constrained by legal, fiscal, cross-departmental realities, to say nothing of the political realities which govern the world in which you operate, whether you like it or not. Uh, so it's simply about understanding, putting yourself in the shoes of those, and when I'm talking about government, I'm not talking about politicians, incidentally. I'm talking about the civil service as well, that whole system that is working together to run the country, both the sector experts, the technical detail experts in the civil service and their partners in industry, and the politicians who are sitting there. Bringing the top together and giving it its democratic legitimacy. Understanding the constraints within which they work both human constraints, uh policy constraints and political constraints and then working within those is a way that we can all help each other.
Speaker 1:Help all of us can help uh ourselves, help each other which of the financial, political, judicial um challenges are the most frustrating, or are they all as equally as frustrating, or does it depend on which day of the week it is?
Speaker 2:yeah, I mean, you just get different challenges on different days. In reality, uh, I don't think any particular. They're all just parts of the system that you have to learn to navigate. Uh, which is a key thing to remember you, you don't get things done in government just by saying I want them to be done. You have to understand the policy constraints within which everyone works. So learning to navigate departments and to navigate whitehall is an essential part of being an effective minister and an effective civil servant, for that matter as well. It's important to remember that it's not just about knowing what you want to be done. It's about knowing how to deliver it, and so being effective in government is not just about politics, but also about administration as well, and the two things are separate.
Speaker 1:Robert, thank you so much. That was a fascinating glimpse into the inner workings of government. I'm sure everyone listening will appreciate just how complicated developing policy is, if they weren't already aware of it. So thanks so much for giving up your time to to shed some light on it.
Speaker 2:It's my pleasure. It's been great. I really enjoyed the conversation and, I hope, a helpful glimpse for people, but to everyone in the sector. Thank you for everything you're doing and because you really are leading the way in in terms of innovation, in terms of economics in the future for aviation and it's great to see. Keep up the good work.