Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between James Gray and Justin Tomlinson

Tuesday 21st May 2024 Commons Chamber

[James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

Many unwelcome applications for large-scale solar farms, such as Lime Down in my constituency, are funded by offshore companies such as Macquarie, which is most famous for letting Thames Water fall to pieces. What meetings has the Minister had with these speculative investors to ensure that the people who build solar farms will be there in 40 years to make sure that they are removed?

[Justin Tomlinson]

My hon. Friend and constituency neighbour raises an important point about speculative development. As part of speeding up the grid queue, in which we have somewhere in the region of 700 GW of power capacity coming forward, we wish to prioritise shovel-ready schemes, not speculative schemes.