Oral Answers to Questions

Claire Coutinho Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Secretary of State.

[Claire Coutinho (East Surrey) (Con)]

I have a very simple question. Everybody in this House knows we will need gas for decades to come, so for once, can the Minister give a straight answer? Which is better for the environment: going to a country 1,000 miles away, fracking the gas, freezing the gas, shipping it and reheating it, or just piping it in straight from the North sea?

[Michael Shanks]

The very simple answer is that we are continuing to use the North sea—no one is switching off what we are producing in the North sea—but the amount that we are able to extract from the North sea has been in long-term decline. The right hon. Lady knows that because she was the Secretary of State who talked a lot about the need for a transition in the North sea—she recognised then that the North sea has been in decline. We have been a net importer for more than 20 years, so this is not a short-term position. The shadow Minister, the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Andrew Bowie), gave the game away a few minutes ago: the answer to this is how we build the industries that come in the future, alongside retaining oil and gas for many decades to come.

--- Later in debate ---

[Claire Coutinho (East Surrey) (Con)]

I would like to offer my condolences to the Secretary of State on the death of his mother. It is clear that she was a remarkable woman, clearly much loved by her family.

I have a yes-or-no question for the Secretary of State: can he guarantee that not a single solar panel put on a British primary school by his Government has been produced by Chinese slave labour?

[Ed Miliband]

First, I thank the shadow Secretary of State for her kind words about my mum. If you will allow me to say so, Mr Speaker, I feel incredibly sad to have lost her, but very lucky to have had 56 years with an amazing mum, who taught me values of kindness, warmth, love and justice. It is a reminder to me of what really matters most in our lives. I sincerely thank the shadow Secretary of State for the message she sent me.

On the question about the use of forced labour, we take this incredibly seriously. We inherited a regime from the last Government, which we applied in the early stages of what GB Energy was doing, but the shadow Secretary of State will know that, through the passage of the Great British Energy Bill, we have strengthened GB Energy’s commitment to this. Frances O’Grady is now the champion of dealing with slave labour. I can absolutely assure the shadow Secretary of State that we will do everything we can to prevent the use of forced labour.

[Claire Coutinho]

Well, there were words there, but there was no guarantee, so let me just remind the House that the Secretary of State has sold his entire agenda as being one of providing moral leadership to the rest of the world, but there is no moral leadership in sending British children to schools powered by Chinese slaves.

On 2 May, our electricity grid almost breached its frequency limit. That has the potential to cause nationwide blackouts. The Secretary of State’s plans are making it harder and harder to balance the grid—there is no denying that—so can he confirm who is legally accountable if we have a blackout, thanks to grid instability, and what repercussions would that person face?

[Ed Miliband]

I am afraid that the shadow Secretary of State is indulging in the worst sort of scaremongering to justify her anti-clean-energy agenda. It is incredibly sad what has happened to her. She used to believe in clean energy. Today, a report comes out from CBI Economics, showing 1 million jobs in net zero, and what does she do? She starts quibbling about the small print, and saying that the report does not represent the views of CBI, when the CBI chief economist is actually advocating for clean energy.