Enterprise Bill [ Lords ] (Fifth sitting)

Catherine McKinnell Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd February 2016 Public Bill Committees

[Caroline Flint (Don Valley) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield on tabling the amendment and thank her for asking me to put my name to it. I also congratulate my hon. Friend on becoming Chair of the Environmental Audit Committee. I know that she will use all her talents and her tenacious approach to delving into the detail of policy areas to ensure that the Government are held to account by her colleagues from all parties on the Committee.

As my hon. Friend said, it is interesting that the Green Investment Bank drew cross-party support when it was established. It is important to understand the context. We are in the process of an energy industrial revolution in terms of technology for reducing the amount of energy we use and the different ways we can create energy in future. Not only can we make our planet safer but we can be imaginative and creative about the job prospects that the sector can bring for those in work today and for our children in the future. Something like 60% of the infrastructure projects that the Government are looking to support are energy-related, which gives a sense of the enormity of the process.

Why was the Green Investment Bank so important? As my hon. Friend said, it was an acknowledgement that sometimes the market does not deliver what we want and that, although not choosing winners, Governments can play a role in encouraging innovation. Take the defence sector, pharmaceuticals or academic research—there have been countless examples over many years and under many different types of Government of where the public sector, by which I mean the Government, has, by putting some resource into innovation and by understanding some of the related risk, led the way to some profound things that today we take for granted. For example, if it was not for the Apollo space missions way back then, we would not have Teflon in everyday use. I am not saying that we were behind all that, but it is an example of where creativity made a difference. Sometimes it is only Governments and Administrations that can get behind those sorts of projects.

The Green Investment Bank was set up to acknowledge the fact that, although there already has been innovation in the wider marketplace—for example, nuclear and other forms of technology—in a number of other areas it has been difficult to get the finance and to get people to take on the risk involved in looking at some of the more novel projects.

[Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)]

My right hon. Friend is making a powerful speech. We should always bear in mind the fact that the Government have the ability to make an impact not only in supporting innovative technologies that perhaps would not get off the ground otherwise but in supporting regions and regional economies that would not otherwise be able to take advantage of certain opportunities. I will of course always mention my region, the north-east, which has led on some innovations in the low-carbon technology sector. It probably would not have been as successful as it has been without support such as that offered by the Green Investment Bank.

[Caroline Flint]

I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. Having spent the past five years as a shadow Energy and Climate Change Minister, I find it most encouraging that, when we look at the investment going into these projects we can see that, despite the recession and the economic problems we have had for a number of years, green energy is one of the few sectors that has bucked the trend. More pertinently, when we look at the spread of investment, the research that goes into some of these projects and the jobs coming out of them, it is one of the few sectors where we can really talk about a one nation policy. Opportunities in the sector are far more open to all regions and countries of the UK than some other sectors such as finance, which is why it is such an interesting area to think about today and for the future. How do we protect those jobs for the future?

The Labour party has been at the fore, as the last Labour Government passed the Climate Change Act 2008 with all-party support. I think that only five Members of Parliament voted against it. I am not sure, Sir David, how you voted on that one. [Laughter.] Actually, I cannot quite remember whether you voted against it or not. Anyway, although there have been a number of wobbles in the past five years on a number of different aspects of green technology such as onshore wind farms and what have you, this country is lucky, compared to other countries, that there is political consensus on this important issue.

This is about saving the planet, but I am a bit of a meat and potatoes sort of person and this is also about creating the jobs and skills of the future. In that way, the issue is much bigger than for Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace. It becomes an everyday issue for everyday communities. In my part of the country in Yorkshire, I see what is happening on the east coast in Hull and in Grimsby, in my own area, and over in Sheffield regarding nuclear development, I can see how this picture comes together. The Government are yet to promote the story in the way that it deserves.

What is important about the Green Investment Bank and accountability is that, although it was recognised that investment came in from different sources and that the sector bucked the investment trend as the recession hit, it was also accepted that sometimes more novel and complex projects need a little bit of a push. That is why the Green Investment Bank was there—to focus on more novel and complex projects that struggle to find funding and involve a bit of risk. Sometimes Governments are a little too risk averse on different public policy fronts, and there is a balance to be struck.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield said, to date just about £2.3 billion of public money has gone into 60 projects with a total value of more than £10 billion. The Green Investment Bank has done really well. I will not make partisan points about it just because it was set up under the previous Government. However, the concern has been that, in a move to privatisation, its focus on the more novel, innovative areas will actually decline and it will just become a run-of-the-mill funding organisation for projects that, to be honest, are easier and less complex and for which funding can be sought in other areas of the marketplace. It will then be focused on issues that maximise shareholder return. Maybe in five or 10 years’ time, we could have had this discussion but, given the infancy of this project and, despite its youth, the good work that it has been doing, it is a shame that the Government have taken this route.

There has already been a discussion in the other place about how the green elements should be privatised. I am afraid that I am old enough to remember the privatisation of things such as our rail and energy services. As I used to say when I was doing the shadow job, if only Margaret Thatcher could have seen how some of these energy companies have behaved towards their customers in the past few years. I do not think that that was her vision when she set out to privatise the energy sector. In transport, energy and water the financial payback packages for those at the top of organisations seem over the top given the public service performances of some of those companies. These areas are of huge importance to the public, which is why I support the amendment. As my hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield said, everything that we are asking for in this amendment is currently covered in the annual reports of the Green Investment Bank remuneration committee.

As the UK Government would for now remain a shareholder, they would have influence over the policy of this privatised bank. The Government have already conceded that they do have a role to play in protecting the greener aspects of this bank and supporting innovation in this sector. It would be in the public interest and would aid transparency to continue the reports on how people are paid—whether the chair, the non-executive directors or the executive team—so that we can set how they perform against how they are rewarded. That is a safeguard and it is in the public interest. I cannot for the life of me see why anyone would object to this, and I therefore support this amendment.