Draft Greenhouse Gas Emissions Trading Scheme (Amendment) (Extension to Maritime Activities) Order 2026

Parliament voted on 11 February 2026 to extend the UK Emissions Trading Scheme (UK ETS) to cover maritime shipping. The order, Division 426, passed by 362 votes to 107, with the government supporting the measure. It requires ferry and cargo operators to monitor their greenhouse gas emissions and purchase allowances to cover them, bringing the maritime sector within the existing cap-and-trade framework established under the Climate Change Act 2008. The practical effect is that shipping companies operating within UK waters will face a carbon cost they do not currently pay. Operators must surrender allowances for each tonne of greenhouse gas they emit, and those costs are expected to be passed on to consumers through higher fares and goods prices. Critics focused on communities where sea transport is the only option, particularly Northern Ireland, which depends on maritime routes to move goods to and from Great Britain, and the Isle of Wight, where ferries are the sole means of reaching the mainland. The Scottish islands were granted an exemption, and opponents argued that failing to extend that exemption to other island communities was inconsistent and unfair. Labour MPs voted unanimously in favour, joined by the Liberal Democrats, the Scottish National Party, Plaid Cymru, and the Greens. Conservatives voted unanimously against, as did the Democratic Unionist Party and Reform UK. The DUP and one Conservative MP, Joe Robertson (Isle of Wight), made the most pointed interventions, arguing that the measure would compound existing cost pressures on their constituents without producing meaningful emissions reductions, since no alternative to sea transport exists. The vote follows a related division on 4 February 2026, when Parliament backed a broader set of UK ETS amendments by 392 to 116, suggesting the maritime extension was always likely to pass.