Annual Energy Statement
Debate between Damian Hinds and Ed Davey
Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)
There are 10,000 off-grid homes in my constituency. What more can be done to help my constituents to access good deals, including the ability to buy at times of year when the kerosene price is at least a bit lower?
Mr Davey
There are two things that can help my hon. Friend’s constituents and others like them; first, collective purchase. There are heating oil clubs where people come together to get better deals, and that is helping some people. Secondly, I hope that he is aware of the campaign being pushed by the Minister of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks, to get people to buy early. If people buy early, they can get heating oil much cheaper than if they buy it later, in the winter months.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Damian Hinds and Ed Davey
Mr Davey
It is already a good deal. I understand the issue in the cavity wall insulation market, but the hon. Lady will understand that there are very few cavity walls left to fill. The real issue in the building fabric of the nation is solid walls. There are 7 million solid walls that are yet to be treated for energy efficiency. The last Government did almost nothing to tackle that. The green deal and ECO will do something about it. That is where the biggest wins are available and we are proud of what we are doing.
Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)
14. What recent progress he has made on the roll-out of the green deal.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Damian Hinds and Ed Davey
Mr Davey
The right hon. Lady will know that I have already acted on this issue. Two months into office, I negotiated a voluntary agreement with the big six so that they would provide details of the best available tariff on people’s bills already—so I am afraid that she is behind the times again. I note that she has not commented on Ofgem’s proposals, not least because she wants to abolish Ofgem. That would be very damaging to the interests of energy consumers, both households and businesses. So I have to say to her that she needs to engage with the real debate, which is Ofgem’s proposals and our thinking.
Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that although having multiple price points for exactly the same product can be good for consumers, that stops being true when the poorest and most vulnerable are less able to access them and when the sheer volume, complexity and rate of change of those tariffs makes it almost impossible to make meaningful comparisons and keep up?
Mr Davey
My hon. Friend is right. Under the previous Government we had a multitude of tariffs, which became confusing and complex, but that Government failed to take action. It is good to know that Ofgem, with our support, has brought forward proposals after careful study, and we will act on them. Although it is possible to have too much simplification, which puts us in danger of reducing choice and competition, Ofgem is trying to strike the right balance and that is why we are studying its proposals so closely rather than dismissing them.
Pub Companies
Debate between Damian Hinds and Ed Davey(12 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Damian Hinds
The motion does in fact specify a “free-of-tie option”. Many pub-owning companies would say that some sites are appropriate for leases—where the partner can build the value of the lease by building up the food business, for example—whereas others are more appropriate for a traditional tenancy-type business. The motion as stated would conflict with that approach.
In addition to that false implicit impression, there is a confusing conflation of tenants and lessees. On the one hand, we seem to be saying that this is only about very large pub companies that run leases; yet a number of those who have spoken in favour of that proposition have referred to the people in question as tenants. I am not entirely sure where the cut-off point of 500 sites comes from. It is possibly intended to target just a couple of companies, but frankly, coming up with a regulatory package for the whole industry is probably not the best way to do that. I fear that that would pull in a couple of other companies it is perhaps not intended to target.
Most importantly, there is little evidence that I know of that traditional, smaller, integrated brewers have any difficulty with the tie, which suggests to me that there is no problem with the tie per se.
Mr Davey
My hon. Friend is right, and that is one reason why the Government response made a big distinction between the tied tenancy model and the leasehold model of full repairing and insuring leases, with which most, if not all, of the real detriment and problems have occurred.
Damian Hinds
The Minister is correct, and that is indeed in the Government response. Unfortunately, the BIS Committee report, which is a fantastic report and to which we are to some extent referring, does not make that distinction quite so clearly.
What should we do if the tie is not the answer? Let me start with what we should not do. The Government response puts it rather well:
“Government should not intervene in setting the terms of commercial contractual relationships”
where, according to the OFT, there are no competition issues that significantly affect consumers; and
“whether or not a lease or tenancy includes a tie is a commercial decision on the part of both parties.”
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Damian Hinds and Ed Davey(14 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Davey
We looked in some detail at the case for a state-backed Post Office bank. The cost of a banking licence would have been in the realms of the amount of money we are putting into the post office network to modernise it and to prevent a closure programme. I am sure that the hon. Lady welcomes the £1.34 billion of investment in the post office network. That, along with the policies we set out in our policy statement to get more Government revenue through the post office network, and to tie up arrangements with banks such as RBS and the post office network, is the surest way to ensure that the post offices in the villages she talked about have a long-term viable future.
Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)
The Government are keen to promote closer working between post offices and credit unions. Will the Minister seek ways to facilitate robust back-office arrangements between the two, which would be a good and cost-effective way of improving financial inclusion?
Mr Davey
I think the hon. Gentleman is quite right to point to the important role that credit unions can play and the potential for work between them and the post office network. As we said in our statement, there are already initiatives and pilots to see whether there is room for expanding the role of partnership work between the post office network and credit unions. I look forward to seeing the results of those pilots. The points made about a longer-term relationship are well made, and we are certainly looking at that.