Wales: Fracking

Debate between Baroness Verma and Lord Howarth of Newport

Tuesday 2nd December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Verma]

My Lords, the noble Lord raises some important points. Noise and traffic are covered in existing guidance in Minerals Planning Policy Wales. There is already quite a lot of engagement at local level. As I said in opening, we are working closely with the Welsh Assembly on these matters.

[Lord Howarth of Newport (Lab)]

My Lords, in the new spirit of promiscuous devolution of tax-raising powers, will the Welsh Government have complete freedom to levy what taxes they will on fracking in Wales, as well as to keep the proceeds and spend them as they will?

[Baroness Verma]

My Lords, businesses engaging in fracking will be working very closely with communities and are putting forward very attractive community benefits packages. As for tax-raising powers, I think that that is slightly above my pay grade.

Severn Barrage

Debate between Baroness Verma and Lord Howarth of Newport

Thursday 17th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Verma]

My noble friend raises an important point. Until we have a more detailed plan, we are unable, on the information we have at the moment, to make a complete assessment of the impact on consumers. We do know that alternative energy is providing us with good value at the moment, and offshore wind is one of those energies.

[Lord Howarth of Newport]

My Lords—

[Lord Howarth of Newport]

Developing the important questions just asked by my noble friend Lord Anderson and the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, and accepting the importance of the environmental considerations that the Minister has rightly mentioned, will she bear in mind that this project is convincingly financeable at present and prospective rates of interest? That is an important reason for a quick decision. Effectively, it would be a free gift of an enormous increase in renewable energy in Britain. It would also be of great benefit to reviving the economy and employment in south-east Wales.

[Baroness Verma]

I come back to my original point, which I have stated a number of times. I understand where the noble Lord is coming from in his commentary. However, given that the consortium will no doubt look for subsidies for the contract from energy bills for this particular energy as well, it is incumbent on the Government to make sure that they deliver best value to the British public. At this time, we are working with the consortium on a much more detailed plan. We have not ruled it out, but we want more detail about what it proposes to do. At the moment we are not satisfied on that.

Government: Procurement

Debate between Baroness Verma and Lord Howarth of Newport

Monday 25th June 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Verma]

The noble Lord is absolutely right to raise that point. As part of the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement last year government departments agreed to release a substantial package of data including material relating to many of the major departments. Most people will also be able to access data rather freely through our Open Data Institute, which we hope to have fully launched by September.

[Lord Howarth of Newport]

My Lords, what proportion of the Government’s expenditure on science and technology is accounted for by Ministry of Defence procurement? Is the Minister satisfied that that allocation of resources is well judged to encourage the most productive take-up of new technology in the United Kingdom?

[Baroness Verma]

The noble Lord raises a specific point which I think I need to take back with me as I would not want to quote a wrong figure on the Floor of the House. I will take it back and come back to him.