Business of the House

Mark Lazarowicz Excerpts

Thursday 18th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lansley]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I am sure that Graham Engineering and other firms in his constituency are appreciative of his support. That firm has put in a bid for funding under the advanced manufacturing supply chain initiative, which is one of the initiatives to which I referred earlier that support the competitiveness of industry. Those bids are being assessed. Ministers will play no direct part in that process. The independent assessment board will meet on 14 November to decide on those bids.

[Mark Lazarowicz (Edinburgh North and Leith) (Lab/Co-op)]

I strongly endorse the call from the shadow Leader of the House for a further Government statement on energy tariffs. The Leader of the House should not underestimate the degree of disarray that will be caused to the energy industry by the combination of the Prime Minister’s answer yesterday and the answer to the urgent question today. The matter needs to be cleared up now, because companies will not know what the Government expect them to do on social tariffs and fuel poverty. On all these important issues, we need answers in days, not months.

[Mr Lansley]

I do not share the hon. Gentleman’s view. The Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change, my hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr Hayes) answered the urgent question and made it clear that simplification and tariff reform will form part of the Energy Bill, enabling us to deliver precisely what he and the Prime Minister said we would do, which is to use legislation to get consumers the best possible tariff.