The Minister of State, Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (Graham Stuart)

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Once again, may I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox) for introducing this important legislation? I am afraid that I am not the historian of legislation that I ought to be, so I have no idea whether any Member in history has ever managed to get two private Members’ Bills in a row put into law, but my right hon. Friend is a remarkable man, and he has shown that once again by successfully steering this Bill through. The machine, as ever, always responds by trying to kill it, but such is his dexterity, insight and flexibility that no attempt to kill it is successful, and he finds a way through to deliver something that will be good for everyone. I am pleased that all the amendments were accepted in Committee on 25 January, and I am delighted to offer my support for the Bill as the Minister of State in the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero.

Although the name of my Department may have changed, the position of the Government has not, and I can confirm that the Government are fully supportive of the Bill. One key priority of the new Department is ensuring that the UK is on track to meet its legally binding net zero commitment and support economic growth by significantly speeding up delivery of electricity network infrastructure and domestic electricity generation.

The nation will have been grateful for the speech made by the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra), but it seemed clear from its tone that the Labour party prefers appropriation to the reasonable treatment of people in delivering this. Of course, failing to engage properly with communities will slow down the transformation we need. People thinking they can ride roughshod over communities because they scream, “Climate emergency and urgency” is not the way to do it; we have to go with the grain of communities. We have to explain the narrative. What is our narrative? As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has set out, we have a vision of delivering the most competitive, lowest-cost clean energy in Europe by 2035. That will have a transformative effect, not only in terms of our leading the world in reducing emissions, as we have done to date under this Government, but in enabling the re-industrialisation of the north, Scotland and Wales, with all the economic benefits that come with that. It is this Government, not the Labour party, who have delivered. When Labour left power in 2010 only 7% of our electricity came from renewables, but now it is nearly half. We are going further and faster, but making sure we do it in a way that works with the grain of communities, because if we ride roughshod over them, they will come back and will slow us down. To answer the hon. Lady’s point, this Bill will not slow down what we are doing; it will enable us to move at the speed required and make sure that we do so in a way that retains community support.

The Bill is about the building of network infrastructure, and the planning and consenting process. I thought it would be helpful to set out the Government’s commitments in this area and the work that is already under way. It currently takes about 12 to 14 years to build or reinforce new onshore electricity transmission network infrastructure, from the initial planning to the final completion and commissioning. The development of new transmission infrastructure is often on the critical path for the connection of new generation. The wonderful and extraordinary new generation that we have helped bring about, and are going to bring about in the future, is of no use if we do not have the infrastructure to get the electrons to where they need to go. The current position offers an unacceptable timeline when the electricity network is a critical enabler of our domestic energy production targets and our decarbonisation targets. We committed in the British energy security strategy to significantly reduce the timelines by about three years for delivering onshore transmission network infrastructure. We aspire to halve this end-to-end process by the mid-2020s. So we are working with developers and supply chains to increase pipeline visibility and certainty, to help accelerate the procurement.

Work is already under way to improve the strategic planning of network infrastructure, including the holistic network design. We are also improving the planning and consenting process. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities published its nationally significant infrastructure project reform action plan just yesterday, and our consultation on the revised energy national policy statements is imminent. Additionally, work is ongoing to improve work with communities and to expedite Ofgem’s regulatory approval process, but we recognise that more needs to be done. That is why in July last year my Department appointed Nick Winser CBE to the role of electricity networks commissioner. He is advising Government on how the development process for transmission infrastructure can be accelerated. He has extensive experience in electricity networks and is currently chair of the Energy Systems Catapult, which provides technical, commercial and policy expertise to drive innovation across the whole energy system. The commissioner is tasked with looking at where further improvements can be made beyond what is already in train across Government and will be looking at providing recommendations on crucial issues such as strategic network planning, planning consent and regulatory approvals. His work commenced in September and he continues to work intensively with stakeholders across the development process, within Government and across industry so that his work can deliver a valuable contribution to my Department’s aims. He hopes to submit his final recommendations to the Government for review in June. The commissioner is working in collaboration with the offshore wind champion, Tim Pick, and the offshore wind acceleration taskforce, given the importance of electricity networks to the offshore wind deployment we need. We are also working with Ofgem to speed up its regulatory approvals process. So in December, Ofgem published its decision on accelerating strategic transmission investment, which includes exempting certain strategic projects from being subject to competition. That provided greater clarity and certainty to industry on which projects should be progressed, and by whom.

Communities that host network infrastructure are playing a vital role in ensuring a cheaper, cleaner and self-sufficient energy supply in Britain. It is therefore only right that they benefit from developments in their area. Although benefits to communities are already offered by industry, now is the right time, given the scale and rate of change to which hon. Members have referred, to review how community benefits are delivered. We intend to explore whether there should be a more standardised approach, or whether providing a framework or benchmark offers more flexibility that would be of benefit to the distinct needs of individual communities and projects. We will consult in the coming weeks on options for community benefits regarding onshore network infrastructure.

The Government announced a review of the energy national policy statements to ensure that they reflect the policies set out in the energy White Paper net zero strategy and the British energy security strategy, and that we continue to have a planning policy framework that can deliver the investment required to build the infrastructure needed to ensure an independent, secure energy supply as we transition to net zero. The draft energy national policy statements were subject to parliamentary scrutiny, including by the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, which published its report and recommendations on 25 February. When analysing the responses to that consultation, we will take account of those and of any other resolutions as we go forward.

Let me talk now about the Bill. I have set out what we are doing to accelerate the build of network infrastructure, but as I have said, new network infrastructure must be built in a way that protects the rights of local landowners and communities. That is why the Bill has the Government’s support. We believe that it can be a bulwark for the vital transformation that is needed for our electricity network.

Transmission owners need access to private land when installing network infrastructure, and in that situation, the landowner is entitled to compensation. We recognise that in cases in which the landowner and the transmission owner cannot agree on compensation, challenging through the upper tribunal can be expensive for landowners. The Bill presents an opportunity to address that by ensuring access to alternative dispute resolution processes, which can play such a crucial role in offering a quicker and cheaper route to resolving disputes.

We need the right expertise and the right balance of views to develop proposals, as my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset said. That is why we will establish an alternative dispute resolution taskforce to take the work forward. I have been asked repeatedly and quite rightly about timelines, and that taskforce will be taken forward this year. Its work will complement the ongoing work within my Department. We are already reviewing the land rights and consents processes for network infrastructure. We published a call for evidence in 2022 and we are reviewing the responses.

To answer my right hon. Friend’s question on whether the scope of the proposals will extend to the distribution network and to the refurbishment of existing infrastructure, the Bill sets out only which cases must be in scope of the proposals. The Secretary of State can decide whether to extend the scope to other electricity network-related cases, including the distribution network and, indeed, refurbishment where a DCO is not in place. We envisage that the taskforce will make a recommendation on scope to the Secretary of State.

Amendments have been made to the Bill since Second Reading. I will now—briefly, I hope—explain the amendments and their purpose. Amendment 1 removed clause 1, which was replaced with new clause 1. The new clause focuses the proposals on electricity-related cases rather than gas-related cases. The new clause also moves away from proposals to establish a new mechanism to proposals to encourage use of alternative dispute resolution processes. That means that we can consider existing practices and whether they can be strengthened to meet the aims of the Bill, as well as whether new mechanisms are required. The new clause retains the key factors that the proposals must consider: that decisions are enforceable and that the process is affordable and accessible, as my right hon. Friend so fluently laid out.

Amendment 2 simply replaced “applies” with “extends” for the subsection dealing with territorial extent in clause 2 —a minor technical amendment to reflect more appropriate terminology. Amendment 3 changed commencement to two months after Royal Assent, bringing the Bill in line with standard commencement procedure for primary legislation. In line with the focus on electricity transmission infrastructure, amendment 4 removed “gas” from the Bill’s short title in clause 2. Finally, amendment 5 edited the Bill’s long title to reflect its contents in clause 1.

I thank all hon. Members who have participated at the various stages of this Bill’s progress through this place. Supporting this Bill is in line with our ongoing objective of ensuring that landowners have access to a clear, fair, affordable and enforceable system for dispute resolution. I am so grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset for introducing the Bill and for working so constructively with the Government to ensure that were able to deliver on this important issue. I hope all Members will agree that the |Bill should now move to the other place, where I hope it will gain the support of peers as it has gained the cross-party support of Members here.

My hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Rob Butler) talked about David and Goliath and about the need to ensure that we have a system of infrastructure that works fairly and equally for people, and reflected on his experience in his own constituency. My hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Greg Smith)—there is something of a Buckinghamshire massive here today— talked about solar farms and the need for infrastructure reinforcement, and pressed me on the timeline. I hope I gave a suitable answer.

I am grateful to my officials, those in the Box and those outside: Daniel Boorman, Charles Grant, Alex Chittenden, Louise Sun and Susanna Isola from my private office. I look forward to working with my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset to support the passage of the Bill, which I am confident will not only introduce a fairer system but aid rather than break the fast change that we need to deliver in order to have the most competitive energy system in Europe in the 2030s, which I think will underpin the return of the UK—quite properly—to its position as the premier economic power in Europe. I believe that energy is often the foundation and the secret of economic success.