Energy Bill [HL]

Baroness Northover Excerpts

Wednesday 26th January 2011 Grand Committee

[Lord Grantchester]

In moving the amendment, I shall speak also to Amendment 21E. Amendment 21D is a simple amendment for the Minister to consider. By inserting the words “or third party” we recognise that tenants may act together. The “third party” could include an agent acting for a group of tenants. We wish to clarify that that would be covered in the Bill.

In Amendment 21E, we are similarly considering appeals against sanctions. In an earlier instance relating to tenants, we on this side intimated strongly that the overuse of regulations should preclude regulations regarding appeals against sanctions. Just as we feel strongly that tenants should understand exactly what they may or may not do as a result of the Bill, we would wish landlords to understand exactly what they may or may not do if sanctions were to be levied against them. I beg to move.

[Baroness Northover]

My Lords, I am grateful to noble Lords for the amendments proposed to Clause 42. Amendment 21D is not necessary, because I can clarify that a third party—a local residents’ association or similar body, for example—would be able to support tenants and take actions on their behalf, if the tenant so wished. However, I thank the noble Lord for raising this issue; we will consider it in more detail and, if necessary, return to it in secondary legislation.

Amendment 21E would remove the power which enables any new energy efficiency regulations to set out clearly the judicial procedures to be followed when a tenant applies to a court or tribunal for a ruling against a landlord. We believe that this existing requirement is essential to provide clarity in these circumstances, and we can assure the noble Lord that this is normal practice.

Given those explanations and assurances, I hope the noble Lord will be content to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Grantchester]

I thank the noble Baroness for her clarification and I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

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[Lord O'Neill of Clackmannan]

I have a question for the Minister on the Scottish section of the Bill. It was put by the Association for the Conservation of Energy that its people in Scotland had been looking at the Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009, which was passed by the Scottish Parliament, and their feeling was that most of the provisions of this section relating to Scotland were covered by that legislation, perhaps in a more rigorous fashion. Has there been extensive consultation between officials, the Scottish Government and DECC on this issue, and are the Scottish officials on all fours with this? I am not making any point about one institution against another, but the impression conveyed to me was that it seemed that the prevailing Scottish legislation more than covered the area, and perhaps did it in a slightly better way than is suggested in the Bill. I would be interested to hear what the position is.

[Baroness Northover]

My Lords—

[Baroness Smith of Basildon]

I appreciate the clear willingness of the noble Baroness to answer quickly. I wish to raise a very similar point, about how this legislation fits in with the existing climate change legislation in Scotland. The Scottish Parliament has preceded us on some provisions. Can the noble Baroness give us some information on discussions with Scottish Ministers, and tell us what their response has been? Many of the issues that we have raised in relation to the Green Deal and other issues would apply to these provisions as well. Obviously we would not want to have the same discussions again; but if the noble Baroness can give some outline of the discussions she has had with Scottish Ministers, it would be very helpful.

[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, I was not expecting to be provoked to speak on this amendment or this clause, but I speak in my capacity as former chair of Consumer Focus. It was always a little uncertain where the boundaries between reserved legislation and responsibilities applied in this area. Fuel poverty is a devolved matter, as are most aspects of energy efficiency; but, of course, Ofgem regulation is a reserved matter. I feel that quite a number of the clauses that we are about to consider stray across both areas. I am not necessarily saying that we should hold up proceedings and delay consideration today but, before this Committee finalises its activities, it would be helpful for us—and, I think, for my colleagues in the Scottish Parliament—to have a clearer delineation of which jurisdiction applies to each area of intervention. It has caused some confusion in the past under the previous Government, and we are compounding it here if we leave these clauses precisely as they are at the end of our deliberations.

[Baroness Northover]

My Lords, I thank noble Lords for raising this matter, which gives me an opportunity to clarify things. Noble Lords can be reassured that there has been a great deal of discussion about this Bill prior to this stage, and after—as one hopes—the Bill goes through, there will continue to be discussions.

Chapter 3 deals with a policy matter which is indeed devolved to Scotland. It makes provision for Scotland which is equivalent to that made in Chapter 2 on the private rented sector for England and Wales. Similar to Clause 35, Clause 48 lays the foundations for the provisions in the private rented sector by clearly defining what we mean by “domestic” and “non-domestic” private rented properties in Scotland for the purposes of this Bill. The only substantial difference is the use of Scottish legislation to define what we mean by the domestic private rented sector in Scotland.

The domestic private rented sector in Scotland is defined as properties let under a tenancy covered by the landlord’s repairing duty in Chapter 4 of Part 1 of the Housing (Scotland) Act 2006. The intention is the same as the provisions for England and Wales. We wish to capture the widest range of private rental properties.

The definition of a non-domestic private rented property is one which is let under a tenancy and is not a dwelling. A dwelling is already defined under the Energy Performance of Buildings Regulations (Scotland) 2008, so it is logical to use this existing definition for the purposes of this chapter. I thank the noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, for raising the point on Monday of whether the amendments on Chapter 2 should be extended to Scotland.

As the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, notes, as this is largely a devolved matter, it is for Scottish Ministers to consider the amendments and decide whether they would like similar amendments to be made to those provisions which extend to Scotland. Naturally, we will make Scottish Ministers aware of the amendments which this House has been considering, so that they can consider the issues raised and decide whether they wish similar amendments to be applied to the equivalent Scottish provisions in Chapter 3. It does not override existing Scottish legislation, but it gives Scottish Ministers the option to use these powers if they so wish.

[Baroness Smith of Basildon]

I am grateful for the noble Baroness’s response, but perhaps I may ask for clarification on one point. She said that Scottish Ministers would be consulted about the amendments. I was trying to probe whether Scottish Ministers should be consulted pre-amendment. Have there been discussions about these clauses with Scottish Ministers?

[Baroness Northover]

Yes, indeed. I had hoped that I had made that clear. There are ongoing discussions and there have been a lot of discussions about the Bill, the amendments, and everything in relation to this issue. The noble Baroness can be reassured that that dialogue is very much ongoing, and we regard it as extremely important.

Clause 48 agreed.

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Amendment 29ZB not moved.

[Baroness Northover]

My Lords, this is a convenient moment for a short break, as is usual. Perhaps we can reconvene in 10 minutes.

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[Baroness Northover]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for tabling these amendments. They relate to the secondary legislation that we will be making under some of the powers that we are proposing and to whether provision made using such powers should be subject to affirmative or negative resolution procedures in the House.

This is not about the majority of the provisions which may be made under this part of the Bill, as most are clearly for the affirmative procedure. It relates to certain specific provision that we might make on more technical aspects, such as the precise qualifying actions or measures which will be eligible for inclusion within the scheme. The Government’s proposal was that issues of this sort should be set out in secondary legislation which is subject to negative procedures. The noble Lord, through his amendment, proposes that this should be affirmative.

I am delighted to say that there is a compromise position, which has the support of the Delegated Powers Committee. In its considered report on the Bill, the committee suggested that it may be appropriate for the first use of these powers to be affirmative, with subsequent uses—in effect, later amendments—being subject to negative procedures. That seems to us an excellent suggestion. It has the virtue of maintaining a very strong degree of parliamentary oversight over the essentials while leaving more flexibility for changes to be made over time. We therefore propose to come back at a later stage with an amendment in line with the Delegated Powers Committee’s suggestion, and on that basis I hope that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Jenkin of Roding]

I can only say that I am extremely grateful. However, before I withdraw the amendment, I want to raise one other brief point which was mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Oldham. It is the question of the constant amending of previous legislation. Anyone wanting to look at the current state of the Gas Act 1986 or the Electricity Act 1989—as I am certain the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, will have tried to do—will find it an extremely difficult job. There are now commercial legal publishers who will provide what they consider to be the up-to-date version as amended in perhaps four or five different Acts, as we are doing again here. There must come a time when these Acts will have to be consolidated, because it is becoming a matter of very grave difficulty not only for hapless Members of the two Houses of Parliament but for their advisers. Some of them are extremely good and know their way about. They keep their own copies very carefully annotated but most of us do not. There is therefore a case for consolidating these Acts and I hope that that message is taken back. Having said that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

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[Baroness Northover]

We fully support the underlying—

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

No, my Lords, I have asked whether the noble Baroness intends to move the adjournment of this Committee. It is 7.45 pm. I have quite a lot to say on this Committee. In fact, I could probably go on for three and a half hours and I assure the Committee that I certainly will unless the Government recognise that rules are rules. To complain about what is going on in the Chamber, which is well within the rules, and to break the rules in Committee is quite unacceptable.

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[Baroness Noakes]

The noble Lord, Lord Davies, might have forgotten that on Wednesdays the Grand Committee normally sits until 7.45 pm, not 7.30, so we are not 15 minutes but only a couple of minutes over. That is the Wednesday convention. However, I support the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Oldham, having spent many days in Grand Committee, often with him. It is customary in Grand Committee not to overrun by more than a couple of minutes and it would have been helpful not to have begun consideration of this amendment. The custom is not like that in the main Chamber, where if you start an amendment before 10 pm you finish it, but as near as possible to that time. That was the custom when I was in Opposition and the noble Lord, Lord Davies, often had to call time on behalf of the Government. I thought it was fair to say that.

[Baroness Northover]

As the inexperienced Whip on this Bill, I think I need to apologise if we have overshot. Given that we started consideration of the amendment before the finishing time, and given that it is incredibly unpredictable as to how long any amendment will take, and given that we discussed various clauses, including the one that this amendment slots into, it seemed to me—although I was clearly in error—that we could look at it quickly. That is clearly not the case, and I therefore apologise for trespassing on noble Lords’ time.

Perhaps I may respond as rapidly as I can to my noble friend. We fully support the underlying ideas in this amendment. It is essential that, when designing new energy policies, we take into account the costs and benefits of the full range of technologies available. The noble Baroness flagged up some important areas. However, I should point out that including specific measures and organisations in the Bill in this way leads potentially to the kind of problems that the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, was flagging up earlier, by potentially, if things become redundant, having the problem of needing to consolidate Bills because things have moved on and changed. Although we very much support the ideas behind the amendment, including bringing in new technologies, we encourage the noble Baroness to withdraw the amendment at this stage.

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Clause 65 agreed.

[Baroness Northover]

I think that this may be a convenient—or perhaps less inconvenient—moment for the Committee to adjourn until Monday at 3.30 pm.

Committee adjourned at 7.58 pm.