Energy Bill

Debate between David Mowat and Mark Reckless

Wednesday 4th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[David Mowat]

I will not take the intervention, as I want to finish as quickly as I can to allow time for the other speaker.

We have a security of supply issue. To be clear, the debate is not about pollution, nitrous oxide or sulphur dioxide control, or even about the long-term plan to phase out coal. We intend to be at 3% by 2030. Our European partners, by contrast, do not have such an ambition. The debate is not about the Kyoto targets, which we have not met, but about the need to replace a vast amount of capacity, and to accelerate such replacement. We are unique in that our nuclear stations and our coal are so old. We also intend to use more electricity as we decarbonise the transport sector. If we are to meet the climate change budget targets, it will be about not just electricity generation but transportation. We are talking about more electric cars, which means yet more electricity. The task is absolutely enormous, and we are currently sitting here with a capacity surplus of around 4% or 5%. To accelerate that further would be folly.

Members have mentioned that we are talking about replacing possibly one of the cheapest methods of energy generation—the relatively old stations that are depreciated, and all that goes with that—with some other technology. In relation to today’s infrastructure plan statement, offshore wind, even with the new CFD numbers, is about three times the cost of those coal stations that are currently burning.

If we are seriously thinking of replacing about 15 GW of capacity with offshore wind and even gas, which is more expensive, it is hard to see how that would not put up energy prices. Of course it would put up energy prices both for our energy-intensive users and our consumers. Those Members who think that fuel poverty matters should give some thought about how they will vote this afternoon.

Finally, let us look at how we are dealing with the issue compared with many other countries. I have one statistic to put to the House. Renewables went up a great deal last year. Across the world, they went up by about 30 million barrels of oil equivalent, which is a high percentage. The use of coal across the world went up by three times as much to 100 million barrels of oil equivalent. Such increases are not just happening in Asia and China. Germany and Holland are moving ahead with brand new unabated coal power stations that will run for 20 or 30 years. In this country, we already have among the lowest carbon emissions per head and per unit of GDP of any EU country. The only major country that performs better is France, which has so much nuclear power, although our green lobby thinks that that is wrong as well.

I have not covered in any detail the havoc that would be wrought on what is left of the UK coal industry. The fact that Members are justifying voting for the amendment because it will bring forward investment in CCS, which is still unproven at the scale that would be needed to work in this country, is, frankly, almost vandalism.

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South (David Mowat). I was very impressed with his speech and with what he said about the growing disconnect on this issue between this country and most other countries in the world. With the exception of him and my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood), there seems to be an enormous disconnect between what Members of this House think and what our constituents want. Our constituents want cheap, reliable energy.

On Monday, we saw the Government trying to find ways to reduce by £50 the rise in electricity bills. For the Opposition, too, the debate is purportedly about trying to cut or at least to hold down bills. They say that for 20 months, from May 2015, they will fix prices. The reality is that the Opposition are co-operating with the Government Front Bench and the Liberal Democrats to fix prices for 20 or 30 years across vast swathes of our electricity generation capacity, and to fix prices at two or three times the current market price. That will drive costs through the roof for our constituents, who will be forced to pay such prices for decades to come, and yet the coalition and the Opposition purport to be having a debate about holding down prices, when the reality is the reverse. We see that again today in this rather surreal debate about whether we should force some of the cheap generation to close, as the Government support, or even more of it to close, as the Opposition want.

Energy Bill

Debate between David Mowat and Mark Reckless

Wednesday 19th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mark Reckless]

A lot of it is connected with EU regulation, but many of the costs of EU regulation are outside and in addition to it. It does not include the EU’s emissions trading scheme. It does not include our own carbon tax, which will rise from £16 to £70 a tonne. It does not include what is happening with the national grid: just two days ago it was announced that that would add a further £15 to each household’s bill, and £8.50 of it will kick in next year—on top of the £53 that the national grid is already adding to bills.

The depreciated investment shown on National Grid’s balance sheet is only £20 billion, yet over the next eight years £38 billion more will have been invested. I fear that much of the investment that has taken place is merely to link wind turbines and other renewables from remote parts of the country with major population centres in order to make the grid less unstable than it would otherwise be. Because of what we are doing with these technologies, all of which are subsidised and costing our constituents large amounts of money, my constituents will have to choose between heating their homes and buying Christmas presents. I fear we have got ourselves into a Westminster bubble.

The only thing that I can say for the Bill is that it is not quite as bad as it would have been if the other lot were in charge. Debating how many hundreds of pounds we should be adding to electricity bills when 6 million, 7 million or 9 million households are in fuel poverty, with more than 10% of their spending going on electricity, is simply wrong. Sooner or later the electorate will prick that Westminster bubble, and many of us will be faced with the reality that very few of our constituents think it acceptable for politicians to load hundreds of pounds on to their electricity bills for the purpose of what is essentially a political conceit.

We hear it said that because so many other power stations are shutting down, we have to replace all the coal. No, we do not have to replace all the coal. The reason we are replacing the coal is the EU’s large combustion plant directive. It is shutting Kingsnorth power station in my constituency, with the result that 300 workers are losing their jobs, and we are losing £7 million in business rates because of the rateable value of the station. It could perfectly well go on producing electricity. It emits sulphur dioxide, which if anything is a cooling rather than a warming agent. However, it cannot be replaced with a more efficient coal-fired station that emits much less CO₂ because of the emission performance standard that we are introducing, which basically bans any new coal-fired power even if it is much cleaner and emits much less CO₂ than what it would replace.

[David Mowat]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Mark Reckless]

I will, for the last time.

[David Mowat]

My hon. Friend may know that Germany is about to build 23 unabated coal-fired stations. Perhaps those 300 people from Kingsnorth could find work over there.

[Mark Reckless]

My constituents work for E.ON, which is a German company, but I am not sure that they would want to move to Germany even if jobs were available. However, I understand what my hon. Friend is saying. We do not see the Germans, let alone the Chinese—or the Americans: we have just heard about the gas price there—applying legislation like the legislation that we are applying to ourselves. Although the Bill will constrict our industry and impose vast additional costs on consumers—on our constituents—we are going to vote it through tonight. I think that we need to care much more about the family budget, and minimise the costs that we, as politicians, are imposing on our constituents.