Oral Answers to Questions

Dominic Raab Excerpts

Thursday 31st January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)]

7. What steps he is taking to reduce consumers’ energy bills.

[Mr Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con)]

10. What steps he is taking to reduce consumers’ energy bills.

[The Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change (Mr Edward Davey)]

We have a range of initiatives to help people with their energy bills, including tariff reforms, energy saving programmes and additional help for those on the lowest incomes. From our proposals to help get consumers on to the cheapest tariffs to the green deal, and from the warm home discount to our promotion of collective switching, this Government are working hard to help people to keep their energy bills down.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Davey]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. While the carbon emissions reduction target had its successes, more than 300 million light bulbs were provided in the early years of the scheme and we estimate that approximately a third of them are still lying unused in cupboards. There was no doubt that we needed to reform the CERT. She is absolutely right to say that the ECO is a much better scheme. As the Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Gregory Barker) said, it is already under way and having a real effect in bringing help to people.

[Mr Raab]

uSwitch proposed an industry-designed web service to facilitate groups switching between energy suppliers, helping consumers get a better deal on their bills. Will the Secretary of State consider supporting incentivising companies to sign up and provide portable billing data by offering a temporary tax break to help cover the costs?

[Mr Davey]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his question and I will certainly look into that idea, but can I just tell him how many things the Government are doing to support switching, not least our support for collective switching? One of the advantages of collective switching is that it can get even better deals for people than the normal switching we have seen in the past. It can also reach out to the most vulnerable and to the people on the lowest incomes. That is why the only criterion for our competition, Cheaper Energy Together, which this year will see 94 councils involved in collective switching schemes, was that the fuel poor should be involved.