Energy: Green Deal and Energy Company Obligation

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Wednesday 30th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Verma]

My Lords, this is a market-based deal. To be quite frank, it is really important that we allow consumers the choice of finding where they want to go for their finance, but this offer from the Green Deal Finance Company is available to 80% of the population. So it is a competitive rate, but if people want to source elsewhere it does not stop them from doing so. We also think that the energy company obligation with the extra £540 million attached to it will help those families who are not always able to access and source competitive rates. As for commenting on how many people have signed up, it was launched only on Monday, so it would be very predictive of me to be able to predict a figure for the noble Baroness at this stage.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

Could I first congratulate the Minister on her colour co-ordination for this Question? She will recall that the Prime Minister made a promise in the other place that everyone would be guaranteed the lowest rate for their energy supply. Does that mean the end of competition?

[Baroness Verma]

First, I congratulate the noble Lord on his observation. It was not intentional. As always, the noble Lord is resplendent in his attire, too.

The Government are very much focused on ensuring that consumers get the best possible deal that they can source out in the market. It is not the end of competition —it is actually more encouraging of competition. I hope that the noble Lord, when he accesses the Green Deal, as I very much hope that he does, will see how easy it is for consumers to be able to take control of their own destinies by being able to control how much they spend on their energy bills.