Energy Bill

Earl Cathcart Excerpts

Tuesday 9th July 2013 Grand Committee

[Baroness Worthington]

I have spoken on this theme before so what I say will come as no surprise. I consider this Bill to have wide enabling powers, with potentially dramatic consequences for the electricity market, but it is not matched with sufficient responsibilities on government to keep us informed of progress. This amendment would require that the reporting of the current annual energy statement, issued as part of a coalition agreement, become a legal requirement. If I am wrong and this Bill has some tough provisions for the Government to report on progress, I apologise and look forward to hearing that reassurance. However, in my reading of it, there are a lot of provisions to set strategy and forward plans, but little in the way of coming back to Parliament and reporting on progress.

The annual energy statement was a welcome document. It is not simply an electricity or gas report, but seeks to cover all energy including infrastructure and fuels, as we have just discussed. I do not see why the producing of such a statement should not be a requirement on government. It is not a lengthy document and I hope that it will not cost us too much argument. It is very important, we take this Bill forward with all the powers that it contains, that there is proper accountability to Parliament and the wider public. An annual energy statement, like the one that we have now had produced, is the bare minimum that we would expect to see in terms of reporting back on progress against the objectives set out in the Bill. I beg to move.

[Earl Cathcart]

My Lords, I want to say something about policy here. At Second Reading, I had three points. One was on the 4.5 million households in fuel poverty. The Minister has written to us today, saying that the Government will now amend this definition of fuel poverty; instead of having 4.5 million in fuel poverty, we have only 2.5 million, so that is all right then. The second thing was the price of fuel having doubled in the past seven or eight years and the prospects of it doubling again in the near future. The third thing was whether there was going to be a sufficient supply of power and what the Government’s current policy was to ensure that there would be.

Sorry, before I start, I was going to say this to the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Judd, but I did not want to steal his thunder. I apologise to the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, for coming in during her amendment.

The Government’s current policy is nuclear and wind, with imported gas as backup. However, why are we importing gas when we have our own shale gas, which we seem reluctant to exploit? Surely this is a gift horse that we must exploit. And why are we persisting with wind power when it is inadequate, intermittent and becoming increasingly expensive as we have to go more and more offshore into more expensive sites to build on them?

On the question of nuclear, we have yet to do a deal with EDF, which is, worryingly, the only player at the table. Even if we do a deal, any plant will take 10 years to build. We are told that energy supplies for Britain will be tight in the year 2016—there are scare stories of rationing and the lights going out. One would think that the Government’s policy would want us to generate ample power until the replacement sources were in place to ensure that rationing did not have to take place. However, what are the Government doing? They are closing down and taxing our coal-fired power stations just when coal is relatively cheap, just when Germany is proposing to build 20 more coal-fired power stations—are the Germans going to tax those out of existence? No—and just when China and India are about to built 800 more coal-fired power stations.

This seems to be a policy of closing down power stations before you have anything nuclear in place or any contract at the table. It is just like being in a job that one hates and wanting to move to another job: you do not give notice to your existing job until you have secured the new one. However, that is exactly what we are doing in Britain; we have given notice to coal before we have any nuclear in place. I just do not see the logic of that, and I hope that the Minister can explain finally what the Government’s logic here is.

[Lord Oxburgh]

Returning to the amendment, the message here for the Government is that with this Bill they are taking quite extraordinary powers, and those powers are going to have to be exercised to a degree that was probably not anticipated when the Bill was originally drafted, simply because we have run out of time to do things in a more orderly way. Whether or not we need annual reports, the important message for the Government to get is that, given that these extraordinary powers are there and will be required, that also imposes on the Government a requirement for an extraordinary and conscientious degree of reporting over that period.

--- Later in debate ---

[Earl Cathcart]

My Lords, I think that my noble friend Lord Whitty and I have spoken about fuel poverty on all three Energy Bills produced by this Government. We both feel the same: the Government need to do something to address this. Unfortunately, the Government just put it in the “too difficult” file and nothing has been done about it up to now. If fuel poverty has doubled over the past seven or eight years and the prospect is that it will double again over the next few years, it really is time that we did something to address it. We cannot just leave the increasing number of people in fuel poverty to stew in their own juice. I see that there are amendments on fuel poverty later. I hope that they will help address the situation. Unfortunately, I do not think I will be here for that debate but I will certainly read it with great interest.