Energy Bill [HL]

Baroness Northover Excerpts

Tuesday 8th March 2011 Lords Chamber

Another aspect of the playing field—

[Baroness Northover]

Perhaps I could remind the noble Lord that, according to the Companion, he is expected to keep to 15 minutes. Given the time on the clock, he might want to draw his remarks to a close.

[Lord Lea of Crondall]

I am sorry. I have read the Companion. I am moving on amendment so the time limit is 20 minutes.

[Baroness Northover]

The important thing is for us to focus on the matter in hand; perhaps the noble Lord might bring his remarks to a sharp conclusion.

[Lord Lea of Crondall]

No, I am sorry, but I think that that is a bit rough when I planned on the basis of what I was told this afternoon was the interpretation of the Companion. Are you making a ruling?

[Baroness Northover]

I am reading what it says in the Companion. We are losing time. Whether it is 15 minutes or 20 minutes, I am sure that the noble Lord will wish to bring his remarks to a clear conclusion.

[Lord Lea of Crondall]

I will take another three minutes as a compromise, if I may, because I am not there yet.

Carbon capture and storage is another good example where lobbyists say that they need to give confidence that they can recover their up-front costs. That is in fact a demand for an open-ended subsidy. I could go on. Those are all difficult questions to put into the jigsaw puzzle that the statisticians have to put together. We cannot just have random subsidies all round.

I could mention the electricity market reform proposals, where there are four options—the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, will be pleased to know that I will not read them all out. How many people in this country —how many people in this House—know about them? If we are talking about baseload nuclear and the problems of making wind power work, we cannot shut down wind power, so will nuclear have to shut down when the range of electricity use between the summer night and the winter night is between 25 gigawatts in summer and 50 gigawatts in winter? What will the rules be about that?

I make my last point. We may think that this is complicated, but it is against the background of a spike in the world price. We must be clear which is the world price effect and which is domestic subsidies for people in the street. That is essential politically. I hope that no one thinks that I am talking in a partisan sense. It can mean less need for higher indirect taxation if people take the view that the important thing is the reduction of carbon growth, but the Treasury will not be keen on seeing that as a scope for lowering indirect taxation.

I am on my last thought. I am very pleased that the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, in our last day in Committee, said that she agreed with a few ideas in my amendment then—there were some things with which she disagreed, which I have therefore taken out. The Government are ticking the box of transparency. Secondly, they are taking the first tentative steps to what I call saleability. We still have to jump the next fence of how to get a high degree of responsibility around the country. That is the signal, which I hope can be taken on board, that there is a good deal of convergence on the view that the approach of the amendment is rational and reasonable. It is very much in the Government’s interest, as well as the wider public interest. I hope that the Minister will now, having heard about the rationale and future adjustments that can be made, give careful consideration with her colleagues before the Bill reaches the other place.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Lea of Crondall]

Before the noble Lord sits down, I have to come back and say that he is totally misinformed about how this amendment was written, when it was written, where it has been placed in the Bill, and so on. This amendment was written for debate in Committee—just like the innumerable amendments that were debated with speeches of several hours at a time by the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin. That is the first thing. The second thing is that the fact that it has been placed at the end of the Bill was not my doing. I could have had it in Clause 2, and then that argument would have fallen. Thirdly, I have made it clear that we have reached a stage where a lot of noble Lords have said that the points are interesting in terms of scrutiny. The amendment also has to go to the House of Commons. I find it amazing that that is the best argument that the noble Lord can offer regarding an amendment to which I have given a lot of study and thought. I have looked at statistics and discussed it with civil servants—

[Baroness Northover]

I remind the noble Lord that he will have the opportunity to respond to all the points made in this mini-debate at the end of the debate, after the Minister has replied.

[Lord Jenkin of Roding]

I shall finish my speech, as I gave way to the noble Lord to allow him to make his intervention.

I am not complaining that the amendment is placed at the end of the Bill. Of course the noble Lord has placed his amendment where it appears to fit. I am concerned that he is proposing a major series of changes to the whole way in which all the organs of government—the Treasury, the Office for National Statistics and all the others—should conduct themselves, and a new forum to examine the assessments. With the greatest respect, I do not think that this can be added to a Bill of the very specific nature that we have before us.