Jeremy Lefroy
Main Page: Jeremy Lefroy (Conservative - Stafford)(12 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Chris Huhne
The hon. Lady raises an interesting point. The need for new investment is clearly factored into the price projections in the documentation. It is not just about the rise in the overall world price in gas that is driving what is happening to our bills but the need to build a quarter of the capacity that is coming offline. That is factored into the calculations.
Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)
Has my right hon. Friend had the opportunity to look at how other countries, particularly Germany, support their high intensity manufacturing users of energy to keep bills down and jobs in the country?
Chris Huhne
My hon. Friend will know that my esteemed colleague, the Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change, the hon. Member for Bexhill and Battle (Gregory Barker), was there in September. We have done considerable work to look at the experience of other countries, which is a theme that we might come back to in the debate on the solar feed-in tariff. This Government do not believe that it is sensible to sit in a room and try to develop things from scratch and a priori if other countries have already done so and we can learn the lessons from them.