Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Eric Ollerenshaw

Thursday 19th April 2012 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I understand the hon. Gentleman’s concern. He will know that we have published a draft recall of MPs Bill. In fact, this morning the Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, my hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper), gave evidence to the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee, which is doing pre-legislative scrutiny. We have said that we will consider extending recall to the devolved legislatures, including the Scottish Parliament, as part of our overall consideration of responses to the inquiry. In the first instance we want to honour our commitment to the recall of MPs, but we have not ruled out extending it to the devolved legislatures at a later stage.

[Eric Ollerenshaw (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Con)]

This week saw a report from the Department of Energy and Climate Change’s independent expert giving a green light to the resumption of fracking for shale gas in Lancashire. At the same time, my constituency has a third application before the Infrastructure Planning Commission for the storage of imported gas in excavated salt mines, Claughton moor has a second application for an onshore wind farm and, to cap it all, the National Grid now wants to build bigger and newer pylons to transmit power to newly proposed offshore wind farms. Is there any chance of having a debate on the cumulative impact of this on the people of Lancashire and their environment?

[Sir George Young]

There certainly seems to be a high concentration of energy-related projects in my hon. Friend’s constituency. On fracking, operations remain suspended. We are consulting on the Cuadrilla report and the independent expert’s recent report, but in the meantime no drilling will take place. I understand the other issues that my hon. Friend raises and the cumulative impact they have on his constituency. I cannot promise an early debate, but it sounds like a subject for a potential debate in Westminster Hall or on the Adjournment.