Electricity and Gas (Carbon Emissions Reduction) (Amendment) Order 2010
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Woolmer of Leeds
Lord Woolmer of Leeds
My Lords, like the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, I have a different view of the room, but I can also see the same people and it is a great pleasure to see old friends here again. I have one simple question. In the 1960s and 1970s, I recall the piecemeal efforts made to improve old Victorian housing stock in Leeds. In the end the council adopted what eventually became a national approach, that of taking whole areas of housing, identifying it as old stock and designating “whole house improvement areas”. The council worked through the worst of the housing by taking a whole series of streets at a time. In some cases, we decided to demolish the houses because it was never going to be worth trying to keep them, but other areas were kept. This proved to be an extremely cost-effective way of dealing with improvements.
Certain areas of housing clearly need improvements in terms of energy efficiency. It seems to be common sense, and it may be that this is what is being done in some areas, that if one works through the areas most in need, that is a cost-effective approach. But instead of doing that, we are attempting to prioritise in the first instance individual properties where particular people with particular characteristics live. That is extraordinarily difficult to do, as the documents we are considering today show. In any case, people die or move on into other housing, and some individuals may therefore qualify again. My question for the Minister is this: will the Government reflect on whether the most cost-effective approach over 15 or 20 years would be by area? Clearly we would not be going into more recently built housing for a long time. This approach could be funded in the same way and suppliers could put the work out to tender by negotiation with local authorities who know the areas well and can easily identify them. This approach may already be in train, and it seems to be the most cost-effective one—not in the short run, that cannot be denied, but over a period of time it would be. Certainly it would avoid all the bureaucracy of trying to identify people in particular circumstances and with particular needs, but who are in fact moving targets. I hope that the Minister can reflect on this when he responds.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath
My Lords, I should like to welcome the Minister to the world of order-making and the familiar cast list of noble Lords present who spoke in a similar debate a year ago. The Community Energy Saving Programme is extremely important and we see this as a critical part of how we can help people to make energy savings, cut their household bills, and contribute to permanent reductions in CO2 emissions. Over the years that the schemes have been in operation, millions of households have been helped. However, as noble Lords have suggested, there is no room for complacency. That is why the previous Government consulted on the scheme a few months ago, and on the amendments to the existing framework. I am grateful to the Minister for his explanation.
I will also ask a question raised by the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin. I, too, have read the brief report of the Merits Committee, and I am grateful to the committee for its work and comments. As the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, said, the committee noted that the detailed impact assessment, which runs to 77 pages, is attached to the statutory instrument that we are debating today. The committee said that it had not had the time to make a detailed assessment of the instrument, given the speed with which the Government wish the SI to proceed. Like the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, I ask the Minister for an explanation. I am confused: surely the Merits Committee must be given enough time in which to do its job properly. I speak as the first chair of the Merits Committee, the point of which is to have time to go through statutory instruments in order to make a judgment on whether it should draw to the attention of the House that scrutiny of a statutory instrument merits special attention. If it does, it is marked with an asterisk on the Order Paper, which usually will lead to a debate in the Chamber. The Minister should explain why the Select Committee has not been given proper time to do its job. I am sure that, when the SI goes back to your Lordships' House, I will raise this matter on the Floor of the House.