Storm Arwen

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

Thursday 2nd December 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

My noble friend makes some good points, and I am obviously pleased to hear that his property was not too badly affected. As he knows, I know the area well and I am pleased that his power managed to be left in place. He makes some very good points about the totality of the damage, not just to public infrastructure and essential services, but to local authorities’ premises and the property of private businesses; it will be immense. Our priority at the moment is to get everybody restored and back on to the network, but we will need to learn the lessons and look at what we can do to help the affected communities in future.

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as chairman of the Cumbria Local Enterprise Partnership and a landowner in Cumbria who was not directly affected by the power cuts. Can the Minister confirm that the capacity of the infrastructure to respond to events like this is equivalent in the various parts of England, in particular between the north and south?