Matt Rodda
Main Page: Matt Rodda (Labour - Reading Central)Department Debates - View all Matt Rodda's debates with the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero
(1 day, 5 hours ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
Order. Before Matt Rodda makes his intervention, I want to be clear that the language we use also means that we do not accuse each other of falsehoods.
Matt Rodda (Reading Central) (Lab)
I commend the Minister for his speech; I hope my words will reflect the seriousness of the issue in front of us.
Does the Minister agree that, sadly, the last Government fell woefully short on building new solar in particular? I think the statistics are very much along the lines of more solar being approved in the first few weeks of the new Labour Government than was approved in the whole term of the last Conservative Government. Will the Minister update me on those figures and provide a little more light and less heat in this debate?
Martin McCluskey
I think I am right in saying that the projects that we have consented since last July would power 7.5 million homes through solar. The work being undertaken by the Secretary of State on the solar sprint will see us go even further on solar.
Let me make some progress. A year and a half ago, fed up with the status quo that I was talking about a moment ago, the British people voted for change. From the moment when this Government came into power, we have been laser-focused on our mission to make the UK a clean-energy superpower; that is the only way to strengthen our energy security, to bring bills down, to create a whole new generation of good jobs in the energy industries of the future, and to build a more secure, prosperous Britain for generations to come.