Solar Panels

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Wednesday 12th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

The noble Baroness raises a very important question for all the growth that we are predicting for our country. My colleagues in the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero are working very closely with the national grid to improve grid capacity; it will be essential to have that going forward. We need to make sure that that is the case, both to drive the growth that we want to see, because energy is vital to that, and to keep our energy security for the country the way we want it as we grow the economy.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, there is currently a potential conflict between the Government’s desire to ensure all rental homes have a minimum EPC energy efficiency rating of C and planning restrictions for buildings that are either listed or in a conservation zone. This is forcing many housing associations to look at selling many affected but much-needed affordable homes. What will the Government do to address this issue?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

We have had issues around energy efficiency improvements to heritage and listed buildings. It is important to get the balance here right, though. Of course, we want to drive energy efficiency and we will be working with all the conservation associations, including Historic England, to look at what more we can do to drive energy efficiency as effectively as possible while still preserving the very important heritage aspects of the buildings in this country.