Energy Bill [HL]

Baroness Hayman Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 5th September 2022 Lords Chamber

I am sceptical about whether this Bill will even get through. It could easily be overturned—it might not even get past this week, of course—but we must seize the opportunity to fix a broken system. We are living through a market failure. It will destroy the lives of millions of people, push more people into poverty and make life harder. If the Government cannot get a grip of the issue, they will deserve to be out of power for a generation.

[Baroness Hayman (CB)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as co-chair of Peers for the Planet. I will speak very briefly to the amendments. I have amendments of my own later in the Bill on energy demand reduction and the regulator’s responsibilities.

I support the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale. It is important that this Bill is specific about the implementation of the aspirations that we hear from government. We have not had enough detail about the plans to implement the strategies, and we have not had enough detail in the strategy. For that reason, I have some sympathy with the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Moylan. He raises important issues about putting flesh on the bones of the aspirations, but I disagree with him about changing the timetable. I also disagree with the noble Viscount, Lord Trenchard, on the question of whether, because our contribution to global emissions is low, we should go ahead with the contribution we can make in innovation and leadership, which completely ratchets up the effect of this country’s own policies on a global scale.

One serious point I want to make about the noble Lord’s amendment is that I am extremely worried about the suggestion that the Secretary of State should commission and publish “an independent assessment” of the costs, the implementation dates and the risks of the net zero strategy. We have the Climate Change Committee, which is admired for its work throughout the world. It is an important and respected body and it is independent of government. It would be ridiculous to try to get different independent advice: if we go down that road, we are in “anyone’s view is the best view” territory. We have an independent adviser for government. We have the Office for Budget Responsibility; we have lots of people who can comment on the advice it gives, but it would be quite wrong to put in this legislation anything that undermined its position.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Lord Callanan) (Con)]

Let me say first what a pleasure it is to open for the Government in today’s discussions: I am sure we will have lots more as we go through the Bill. I thank the noble Lords, Lord Lennie, Lord Ravensdale and Lord West, the noble Baronesses, Lady Blake and Lady Worthington, and my noble friends Lord Frost, Lord Moylan and Lady McIntosh, for their amendments, which seek to address the purpose and strategic aims of the Bill and of course the Government’s energy policy more generally. That allowed us to have a debate with more of the flavour of a Second Reading debate, rather than addressing the specifics of the Bill, but that is understandable given the nature of the amendments.

I turn first to Amendments 1, 6 and 7 from the noble Lords, Lord Lennie and Lord Ravensdale, the noble Baronesses, Lady Blake and Lady Worthington, and my noble friend Lady McIntosh. These amendments all seek to address the fundamental purpose of the Bill. While they are well-intentioned, it is my strong contention that these amendments are not necessary as the Bill already has a clear purpose. Provisions in the Bill as drafted not only have regard to the outcomes those noble Lords seek, but they are actually designed with those outcomes in mind. For example, a number of measures in the Bill will contribute to the resilience of the UK’s energy system—most obviously, those powers related to the ensuring the security of the core fuel sector. I am happy to give the assurance that my noble friend Lady McIntosh sought today: that energy security is of paramount importance to this Government.

Amendment 245 would give effect to Clause 1 once the Act is passed and, for the reasons I described, I do not believe that it is necessary. On Amendment 5, from my noble friends Lord Moylan and Lord Frost, and the noble Lord, Lord West of Spithead, relating to energy strategy statements, I reassure them that the Energy Bill is to a significant extent an expression of the Government’s strategic intent as set out in the 10-point plan, the energy White Paper, the net-zero strategy and the various sector-specific policy papers we have published. Furthermore, government policy evolves over time and strategies do not always neatly replace others. Some aspects may remain government policy, and some are updated in response to a changing landscape—of course, we have seen that very recently with the Ukrainian invasion. I submit that, rather than prescribing policy intent in primary legislation, it makes more sense to allow Ministers to exercise discretion in these matters and respond to a changing policy environment and international environment.

I move on to the requirement to publish a strategy

“for managing intermittency of electricity supply”.

Intermittency is an important issue, but the National Grid Electricity System Operator is responsible for balancing electricity supply and demand, because while production is intermittent, so is demand. The Government remain confident that they have all the tools needed to operate the electricity system reliably. We can call on a wide range of technology types to do this, some of which were mentioned in the debate today, including emergency gas-fired generation, interconnectors and, crucially, demand-side responses such as insulation, retrofit measures, et cetera.

The capacity market is the Government’s main mechanism for ensuring the security of electricity supply. It has done a great job and we have already secured the majority of Great Britain’s capacity needs to meet future peak electricity demand out to 2025-26. The Government have also committed to ensuring a flexible system which involves the use of a wide range of technologies—again, a number of them were mentioned in the debate today—including battery storage and pumped storage, which I was really interested to hear my noble friend Lord Howell talk about. In my electrical engineering degree many years ago, we studied that particular development; for those who have not been able to see it, it is an incredible feat of engineering.

This amendment also has a requirement to commission assessments of the 10-point plan and of the costs of achieving net zero. My noble friend Lord Moylan raised concerns that progressing towards net zero is a “constraint” to achieving affordable and abundant energy in the UK. I reassure him that, as we transform the energy system, the Government are committed to pursuing the most cost-effective solutions, which, at the moment, are offshore and onshore wind. Ensuring security of supply and decarbonisation, and affordability to the consumer and the Exchequer, are of critical importance. While there will be costs, the costs of inaction in this sector, as we have seen through the invasion of Ukraine, are much greater. Had we not acted over the last decade or so to secure the second-largest supply of offshore wind in the world, the costs we would be facing now would be much greater and our security of supply would be at much greater peril.

As set out in the Net Zero Strategy, we estimate that the net cost to achieving net zero, excluding air quality and emissions-savings benefits, will be the equivalent of 1% to 2% of GDP in 2050. That strategy was informed by the Treasury’s 2021 Net Zero Review, which looked at the potential costs and benefits to businesses and consumers of the transition to a net-zero economy.

Furthermore, several mechanisms already exist to analyse the path towards net zero, as mentioned by my noble friend. For example, the Government’s approach to net zero is already subject to independent scrutiny by the Climate Change Committee, whose 2022 progress report included an analysis of the economic impact of decarbonisation. Much of this work already takes place.

I turn to Amendments 2, 3 and 4, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Blake, and the noble Lord, Lord Lennie. The Energy Act 2013 introduced the power for the designation of a strategy and policy statement that sets out the Government’s strategic priorities for energy policy, the roles and responsibilities of those implementing such a policy and the policy outcomes to be achieved. The Government have committed to laying a strategy and policy statement for energy policy later this year and a statement at the earliest appropriate time. Designation of a strategy and policy statement will ultimately be a decision for Parliament, not the Secretary of State. Therefore, I submit that these amendments are duplicative and unnecessary.

I thank my noble friend Lord Moylan for submitting Amendment 231. He raises an important point; splitting the wholesale market into two—namely, creating one market for variable renewables and another for firm generation—is already being considered as part of the review of electricity market arrangements, or REMA. An initial consultation, which included exactly this proposal, was published in July. Splitting the market is one of many options being considered within REMA. My department is currently assessing the viability of implementing a split market and the potential costs and benefits associated with doing so.

Based on stakeholder responses to the consultation and based on further policy developments, we will publish a second consultation in 2023 to set out any feasible options in more detail. Legislative proposals on how to implement recommended reforms will then follow. Adding a clause into the Bill that commits the Secretary of State to publishing legislative proposals on splitting the market by a specific point in time would, I submit, prejudge the outcomes of both the consultation and the review.