King’s Speech

Baroness Blake of Leeds Excerpts

Monday 13th November 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Wakeham, and to welcome him back to the House.

The gracious Speech will have been followed by many to understand how the Government intend to bring much-needed relief to those struggling with the cost of living crisis and the grave reduction in our public services. Those of us focusing on energy and the delivery of net zero are, I am afraid, faced yet again with a massive missed opportunity and real disappointment at the announcements made.

I am taken back to the introduction of the Energy Bill—now Act—in July 2022. While it undoubtedly brought in improvements, the overwhelming reaction was disappointment. The measures left out would have made a real difference to people’s lives, such as the means to develop a substantial retrofitting programme, the ability to move at speed to deliver community energy schemes or the ability to move at pace to increase the introduction of onshore wind schemes. It was such a waste, with the subsequent crises in the affordability of energy prices and in energy supply, and therefore security, made so much worse by the conflict in Ukraine.

The Offshore Petroleum Licensing Bill does not provide the ambition this country needs. As the Secretary of State has admitted, it will not deliver lower energy bills for consumers—a shocking admission by any standard—so we are left asking who will benefit. Could it be those oil and gas companies already in receipt of record profits? Surely, now more than ever, the focus should be on what is right for the future prospects of this country. This is not a time to follow through on policies attempting to achieve division by political point-scoring. What message does it give to the world that the Government’s flagship policy is encouraging fossil fuel development?

The impact on the economy must be taken very seriously. We know that the damage to our international reputation as a leader in the field of climate change has consequences. The lack of a coherent plan to deliver against our climate objectives has caused consternation among our business leaders and those responsible for attracting inward investment. We have already seen the lack of interest in developing new offshore wind approvals. Now we learn that the slight encouragement given to those wishing to deliver onshore wind has failed to deliver any new investment proposals at all. The competition for investment from the United States and Europe in particular poses a real threat to our viability in these areas.

The tragedy is that there are alternatives, as outlined by my noble friend Lady Smith of Basildon in the debate responding to the gracious Speech last week. Speaking about what government can and should be doing to be a force for good, she highlighted innovation and enabling and encouraging investment. She went on to outline what Labour would do in government to achieve a successful green economy, such as establishing a national wealth fund to invest in battery gigafactories and clean steel plants and setting up a publicly owned GB energy company to improve procurement, speed up green transition and make us a global leader in clean energy. Labour’s mission is to make the UK a clean energy superpower, boosting jobs and investment for all across the UK.

We have heard much reference to the future prospects of our children and young people across our debates on the gracious Speech and to how they are being let down. An ambitious transition to clean energy would deliver thousands of skilled jobs across all our regions and nations and an ambitious nature recovery plan would offer hope for the future and help deliver our net-zero targets—missed opportunities again.

Right now, the reality is that 6 million households are heading into this winter facing fuel poverty. We have the worst-insulated housing stock in Europe and, as a consequence, an estimated 31,000 children aged four and under being admitted to hospital each year due to respiratory viruses and more. The personal cost to children is unimaginable, the loss to the economy staggering and the impact on the NHS impossible to calculate. I hope the Minister can assure us that the Government will focus on solving the problems we face, although I somehow doubt that we will receive the comfort we look for.