Energy Bill [HL]

Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 19th July 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)]

My Lords, I am delighted to follow the noble Baroness, who speaks with great knowledge and great passion. I refer to my interests on the register, in particular that I am president of National Energy Action.

I take this opportunity to welcome what is a significant Bill, about which our expectations are extremely high. We are looking to achieve security of supply with stable prices against the backdrop of the implications arising from the war in Ukraine. Clearly, the impact on households, families and businesses has been considerable, so I particularly welcome the package of measures to which my noble friend referred in introducing the Bill this afternoon.

I take this opportunity to ask my noble friend to what extent the Bill will encompass not necessarily new sources of energy but sources of energy that I believe we have not developed to the extent that we should. I am thinking in particular of energy from waste. The reason why I am firmly committed to energy from waste is that it solves two problems in one go. It not only takes waste that would otherwise go to landfill—in many instances, these sites are now full—or that cannot be reused or recycled, but it creates a new source of energy at the same time. One successful example is in North Yorkshire, in the heart of my old constituency of the Vale of York, at Flaxby. In that case, the energy that was created was fed into the national grid, which I think is a mistake. I believe that it should be fed to the local community, to enable it to feel the benefits from this locally sourced energy.

I believe that, as others have suggested this afternoon, we should learn from other countries. I am particularly pleased that just this week the EU has signed a memorandum of understanding with Azerbaijan, securing a more stable gas supply than from other unreliable and less dependable sources—let us face it, that means Russia. Gas imports from Azerbaijan will be doubled to 20 billion cubic metres by 2027. That has to be extremely welcome.

Others have referred to Denmark—and, being half Danish, it would be remiss of me not to refer to Denmark too. Denmark was completely caught out in 1973, in the original oil crisis. It did not have natural sources of oil or gas to the extent that Norway and other states did, but it turned that around in a short period and now relies almost totally on renewables, including distance warming and energy from waste. In Denmark, the local community benefits from the reduced cost of heating, energy and hot water in their homes. I believe that that immediately makes the community accept what in this country there can be huge resistance to, such as a chimney being part of a facility, as I found out to my cost.

I would like to take this opportunity to ask my noble friend the Minister a number of questions that arise from a first reading—on this occasion, a Second Reading—of the Bill, if I may. He referred to the part of the Bill that talks about offshore wind. What research has been done on the impact of offshore wind farms on marine mammals and wildlife? In its latter days, the Energy and Environment Sub-Committee took evidence in which we heard various academics state that they estimated the damage to marine mammals and wildlife to be considerable. I suggest that, before we consider having any further offshore wind farms, we consider what research lends itself to the damage that can be done.

I take issue with what the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, said with regard to onshore wind farms. One of the dangers of both offshore and onshore wind farms that we are not necessarily told about when planning permission is first sought—I hope that, on a different occasion, there will be an opportunity to amend this in the levelling-up Bill—is that, once an offshore farm reaches shore and when an onshore farm is onshore, each relies on ghastly overhead wires and pylons to transmit the electricity to the national grid or, in the case of North Yorkshire, to some distant southern part. We must accept that 30% of the electricity is lost in transmission; it is utterly wasted. We have to look carefully at why we still rely on the overhead transmission of electricity. I remind your Lordships of the damage caused by Storm Arwen, when thousands of houses lost their electricity—for six days in some cases—last autumn. To a large extent, that was because we in the north are completely dependent on transmission via overheard wires.

On the role of Ofgem, my noble friend the Minister referred to it being appointed to regulate the heat networks. For what reason does the Bill not give heat network customers equal market protections as would apply to gas and electricity customers? For example, the Bill should include a price cap and rules to regulate customers fairly to ensure that debt is collected at a rate that is affordable to customers. If it is in the Bill and I have missed it, perhaps my noble friend could explain to me where it is.

As I am sure all noble Lords have, I have received a number of helpful briefings for this afternoon. I refer to one of them, from the Association of Convenience Stores. It points to the part of the Bill—Part 10, I think—on fuel retailers without a wetstock management system. Can my noble friend the Minister confirm that they will be requested to provide information on their fuel stock levels only in emergency circumstances? I remind him that the association includes more than 7,000 convenience stores that trade from fuel sites, which provide 88,000 jobs across the UK.

I also want to look at how the Bill seeks to empower the raising of new levies on customer bills, in particular the new levy on gas bills to fund hydrogen. Will my noble friend give the House an assurance today that these new costs will not be put on the standing charge? As he will recall from the statutory instrument that we debated in Grand Committee last week, I believe that standing charges have already been increased by too high a level and that any further increase should be seriously considered before being imposed on a standing charge.

I am delighted to see that Ofgem has raised an investigation into potentially unjustified increases in the direct debits of households by six energy companies. I am struggling to think which the other companies are—I thought we were down to about six major energy companies—so I look forward to the outcome of that investigation with great interest. With those few remarks and those few questions, I give the Bill, for the most part, a very warm welcome this afternoon.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott. I agree with everything she said. My noble friend Lady Bennett of Manor Castle suggested that I would sum up other people, but she has done a better job of it than I could, so I am just going to rant about the Bill.

The Minister said in his opening remarks something about the weather. Of course, this is an extraordinary day for us to be debating this Energy Bill. The temperature when I came into the Chamber was 40.2 degrees at Heathrow, and it is quite possibly higher now. It is highest UK temperature ever recorded, and possibly not the highest this year or in many years to come. The roads are melting, outdoor workers cannot do their jobs and London is on fire. I do not know whether the Minister has seen pictures of the fires in London that the fire brigade is tackling at the moment.

Then there are the buses that our Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, put on the roads, which I said at the time were inadequate. They have terrible ventilation, and now they are stifling ovens. I invite noble Lords opposite to go and test one today and see what they think about them. They will find them extremely unpleasant.

Yesterday, the High Court ruled that, as many of us have said for so long, the Government’s climate plans are barely worth the paper they are written on. The High Court ruled that the strategy was “inadequate and unlawful”. That is quite strong language. What were the Tory leadership hopefuls promising until Alok Sharma, bless him, forced them to acknowledge previous government commitments? They were promising to rip up our net-zero targets so that we can cut taxes for the rich. It is incredible that they think that that will win them the general election at some point.

Clearly, the 2050 net-zero target is too little too late to keep the 1.5 degrees centigrade goal alive, and even then, the Government look set to miss it. The Bill could have been an opportunity to correct course and get the country on track to meet the targets, but the Government miss the mark again and again. We must limit our greenhouse gas emissions to no more than the UK’s proportionate share of the global carbon budget. This emissions reduction has to be done as rapidly as possible. Yes, there are costs, but they are nothing compared to the costs of inaction and delay.

This transition must include an end to exploration, extraction and the trade in fossil fuels. As other noble Lords have mentioned, the Government talk of gas as a transition fuel. Although I reject this argument, if the Government truly believe it, they should put this transition status in the Bill, with a legally binding pathway to phase out gas entirely. However, they have plans for new UK oil, gas and even coal extraction. None of this is sustainable; none of it is transitionary. It is all damaging, destructive, and dooms any hope of keeping 1.5 alive.

Then there is the other energy source that is described as a panacea, as the future: nuclear. We hear of small nuclear reactors, thorium reactors, nuclear fusion; a never-ending wish list of science-fiction solutions to the very real crises that we face. I call it science fiction; my noble friend called it magical maths—I think I prefer that. Magical maths: that is what the Government keep trying to do. Of course, as with magic, it is not real—let us face it. Today we heard about “jet zero”. I give it 10 out of 10 for the label, but minus 10 out of 10 for the concept of making aviation net zero.

The noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, mentioned energy from waste. I am sympathetic to that, but we have found that when we have incinerators, recycling rates go down. The councils have a commitment to deliver a certain amount of waste to the incinerator companies, but they cannot supply all that waste because people are reducing—

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)]

My Lords—

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

I will not take any interventions. I am so sorry; we are all tired and we want to get going, but I am happy to chat to the noble Baroness outside.

Perhaps the most objectionable part of the Bill is the Government’s quiet plan to bury nuclear waste under the sea—it is not quiet any more, of course. It is yet another example of passing on the burden of our terrible decisions to future generations. We will not solve the climate crisis by passing on a nuclear waste crisis instead.

As other noble Lords have said, insulation and energy efficiency are key to solving the crisis by significantly reducing our energy usage, but what does the Bill provide? A new energy performance certificate and a power—not even a duty—to make regulations about the energy efficiency of new buildings. It is inexcusable that new buildings are not meeting the very highest standards of energy efficiency.

One of this Government’s worst legacies will be the hundreds of thousands of leaky new-build homes that were built in the years since they scrapped the zero-carbon homes policy in 2015. Since then, we have had five years of inadequate homes being built, almost all of which will require expensive retrofitting as a result of this Government’s short-sightedness. This legislation should fix that mess, ensure that all new-build homes are zero carbon and set out a workable plan for deep retrofit of the entire UK housing stock, beginning with the communities that are struggling most in this cost-of-living crisis.

The Bill also misses the crucial role that local authorities and community energy must play in reaching net zero. Local government can be unleashed with new powers, new duties and the corresponding funding and fundraising ability to deliver. When the Minister comes back at Committee, will he table an amendment on community energy schemes? We can actually encourage people to go from “not in my backyard” to “let’s have it in our area”. That is a direct request to the Minister. It would be a real gesture of understanding what we need for the future.

The Bill has also missed the opportunity to align the UK’s emissions reductions target and strategy to the all-important 1.5 degrees centigrade threshold. Also, as others have mentioned, there is another catastrophic legacy from David Cameron’s tenure as Prime Minister: the whole issue of onshore wind. Perhaps the Minister could also table an amendment on that as a gesture towards all those in this House who care so much about that issue.

Of course, the Energy Bill should also ensure that any proposed solutions to the climate crisis as far as possible minimise damage to ecosystems, food and water availability and human health. I do not believe for one minute that this Government can rise to that challenge—but I live in hope—and nor, it seems, does the High Court.

Your Lordships’ House will work diligently, spending countless hours through countless days improving this legislation; then the Government will take it down the Corridor, as they always do, to undo all our hard work, whipping their MPs to do the wrong thing, no matter how obviously wrong it is. It is deeply disheartening and I can only plead to your Lordships that we put our collective foot down and insist on a realistic pathway to achieve that net-zero climate target.

However, luckily for the Government, who seem short of ideas at the moment, there are two Private Members’ Bills going through Parliament at this very moment that will fix their problem and fix it for the rest of us. They supply all the ideas necessary to actually get towards a carbon-neutral future. There is the Climate and Ecology Bill, which would make up for the gaps in the Energy Bill and ensure that the UK plays its full role in the global effort towards achieving 1.5 degrees centigrade, with its science-led target that we emit no more than our fair share of the remaining global carbon budget. It addresses the full extent of the climate and nature crisis, in line with the most up-to-date science. It will ensure a comprehensive and joined up approach. The Bill was written by scientists, experts and campaigners, was first introduced in Parliament by Caroline Lucas MP in September 2020 and has just been introduced in this House by the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, who is not in his place.