Energy Prices Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 24th October 2022 Lords Chamber

I do not think the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee or the Delegated Powers Committee have seen any evidence that their agreed recommendations are being taken on board by the Government. The House of Commons in particular needs to wake up, and fast, to what has been happening, for the sake of our democracy. I think this Bill would be a good place to start.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I apologise for not speaking at Second Reading. I did listen to the Minister’s opening speech and I had made my views clear in an earlier briefing. My views sync very closely with those of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker. Quite honestly, this Government are out of control—we have known that for months, if not years—and it is time they understood they are not acting in a democratic manner. This is a “something must be done” Bill, and I understand why something must be done. However, it has so little detail, and the Government are expecting us to take this on trust. I do not trust the Government, and so there is a big problem here for me.

There are two big issues. First, these energy price schemes will make the difference between people being able to pay their bills or not pay their bills, and whether they can feed themselves, clothe their kids and that sort of thing. We have to be sure of all this detail. The Government are proposing to fill in about 90% of the Bill’s details at a later date, and they expect us to just wave it through. We cannot know the impact of this Bill on ordinary people.

Secondly, the Government have been determined to protect the profits of oil and gas companies, which we all know is a piece of idiocy when we look at the climate emergency. That profit will probably be reinvested in creating more opportunities for the oil and gas industry. The Government take a different approach to renewables, and this will cause a long-term disruption to renewable development. I would argue that investors will be encouraged to invest more in dirty oil and gas, rather than in clean renewables. That is a huge bailout for all those stranded carbon assets, and seems to me to be a completely illogical way to move forward.

I sense that the Government might mean well—actually, I am being too generous. I understand that something must be done, but this is not it. I want the Minister to explain those two issues. Will people be able to pay their bills? Will this cause more investment in dirty oil and gas?

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 27, 31, 34 and 40. What I have to say is very much in line with the speeches that have already taken place and I will not detain the House for long, except to make this point again. We understand the urgency of the Bill, for the health of households and their heat and energy over the next winter, and that of businesses as well, but there is a lot else included in this Bill that need not be rushed through in the same way.

I turn to Amendment 27. On reading the Bill, I was quite shocked—the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, forensically went through this in principle—that it says on page 21, in Clause 22 (4)(a), that these directions “must be in writing”. These are key bits of government policy, where a Secretary of State or a person who is subject to directions under this clause—we do not even know who it might be—is able to just write what should happen. Our own amendment would substitute that with

“made by regulations subject to the affirmative procedure”.

Amendments 31 and 34, with Amendment 34 relating to Northern Ireland—it is great to see the noble Lord, Lord Rogan, here following his contribution during the Second Reading—would remove the powers of sub-delegation.

Amendment 40 is around the sunset clause, which again the Opposition has, quite rightly, majored on. Here, we have put down a two-year limit.

Clearly, the Bill goes way beyond the authority given to the Government and the Secretary of State, without reference to Parliament. Some of these amendments must be voted on for the Bill to be put right and sent back to the House of Commons.

--- Later in debate ---

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

I thank all noble Lords who spoke on this group. I understand many of the points that they made.

Let me first respond to the interesting points the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, made. I honestly do not think there has been any radical change from when he was a Minister. When he was speaking, I was racking my brains trying to remember. I have been responsible for bringing a lot of Bills to this House, taking them through, developing them in three different departments, and I honestly cannot remember ever having a direct meeting with OPC to give it the so-called instructions the noble Lord referred to. Clearly in PBL meetings, which he will be familiar with, they attend and report to PBL. However, I suspect my experience has been very similar to his experience as a Minister, in that Ministers are involved in discussing policy intent with the department, officials and department lawyers. The instructions to parliamentary counsel are given by department lawyers, obviously acting on ministerial direction and steers about what we want to achieve through certain policies. I can only speak for myself, but I think the noble Lord is saying “a conspiracy too far” here. I genuinely do not think things have changed rapidly since his time.

I will respond briefly to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, who posed me two questions. She asked, “Will this Bill will help people with their bills?” Absolutely, that is the whole purpose of it. It is to provide a subsidy to people for their bills, albeit indirectly via the suppliers, because otherwise they would be incredibly high, as the noble Baroness knows. Secondly, let me address her further conspiracy theories about this somehow being a hidden subsidy to the oil and gas companies. The noble Baroness is completely wrong. The oil and gas companies are not in scope of this Bill at all and there are no subsidies involved.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

I am so sorry to interrupt, but I would like the Minister to withdraw the word “conspiracy”. I have legitimate and reasonable fears. It is not a conspiracy; it is actual fact.

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

It is not a fact. The noble Baroness is absolutely wrong. Anyway, I am happy to take her reassurance on that. She was posing the question and I am giving her a direct answer. There are no subsidies involved for oil and gas companies in this Bill. They are not even in scope of the Bill. To answer her question directly, it is about direct support for people to help them with their electricity and gas bills.

Group 1 speaks to delegated powers in the Bill, including procedure, sun-setting use and scrutiny. I thank all those who spoke, those who tabled their thoughtful, well-intentioned amendments and the noble Lords, Lord Cunningham and Lord Rooker, who spoke on them. I also pay tribute, as the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, did, to the work of the DPRRC for its report on the Bill published last week. I have carefully considered and responded to it.

The first set of amendments would make certain regulations in the Bill subject to the affirmative procedure. I will go through all of them in turn. Amendments 1, 2, 3 and 4 relate to the energy price guarantee schemes in Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The Committee will be aware that the schemes have been operational from the first of this month. I am happy to tell the Committee that the regulations in the Bill to designate the schemes will be extremely brief and will simply identify scheme documents. They will therefore be technical in nature and I deem them perfectly appropriate to be subject to the negative procedure.