Smart Meters Bill

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Monday 5th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

My comments will be brief.

The Opposition do not oppose the Bill, and will support its Third Reading. However, there are still a number of outstanding issues, two of which have come to the fore since the Committee stage. First, there is the alarming fact that Capita, which wholly owns the Data Communications Company, has issued a profit warning, and company shares, as of last Thursday, have fallen to a 20-year low. All the communications and infrastructure for the operation of smart meters have been outsourced to Capita, and, in turn, Capita has engaged partners in the DCC to operate aspects of its overall function. As a result of the Bill, a special administration regime will hopefully mitigate the impact on smart metering should Capita’s fortunes worsen, but I reiterate the Opposition’s concern that if the DCC goes into administration, consumers will pay the price through this administration regime. Why should they pay the price for yet another failed outsourcing? I wonder what the Secretary of State’s rationale was for forcing them to pay for such failure.

In the case of the DCC, there will be some protection should Capita fail, but what about the detail, and what about contingency plans in relation to Capita’s other ventures? Indeed, what immediate measures are the Government putting in place for any potential collapse of Capita? Capita is a major outsourcing firm which last year alone was awarded 154 Government contracts. My colleague the shadow Cabinet Office Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Hemsworth (Jon Trickett), last week said

“that the Government’s behaviour in response…has been marked by indifference to corporate mismanagement, incompetence in office and complacency in the face of a crisis.”—[Official Report, 1 February 2018; Vol. 635, c. 980.]

We need assurances that any contingency plans will protect services and information, guarantee jobs for current employees, and protect the pensions of those employees and the pensions of the public sector workers that the company is managing. Will the Secretary of State in time provide those much needed assurances?

The second development is that the National Audit Office has announced it will be investigating the economic case for the roll-out of smart meters and looking at whether the Government are on track to achieve their target to roll out meters by 2020. The report is expected in the summer of this year. I would not want to pre-empt the National Audit Office, but it would seem that it is not only Opposition Members who are concerned that the Government are on track to miss their target at consumers’ expense. Indeed, it seems extremely likely they will miss this target, given that 40,000 gas and electricity meters would need to be installed per day even on present projections; that is no mean feat and perhaps why the language has changed to state that consumers will be offered smart meters rather than there will be installation per se. It seems irresponsible of the Government to have rejected Labour’s new clause 4, which would require the Secretary of State to publish a report and a cost-benefit analysis relating to the smart meter implementation programme and lay a copy of the report before Parliament within three months of the Act coming into force.

I referred to the energy price cap on Second Reading and I do so again now as it has been three months since then and still no action has been taken. It is estimated that customers are to pay somewhere between £130 and £200 on their bills to recover the costs of the installation of a smart meter on their property. This is in addition to the price increases inflicted by energy providers. The Government have promised a price cap and we have had sight of legislation to implement it, but we are still a long way off an energy price cap having any real impact on household bills. I would like to take this opportunity to say to the Secretary of State that although the days are starting to get longer and the weather milder—although this week is a slight exception to that—we on this side of the House have not forgotten the Conservatives’ promise of an energy price cap, and specifically to knock at least £100 from 17 million household bills.

I join the Secretary of State in thanking all those who have spoken throughout the passage of this Bill and all Committee members who have worked so diligently. I thank the Front-Bench teams for the good nature of the debates we have had on this issue, and especially my Labour colleague, my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test (Dr Whitehead), an expert who revels in the detail and minutiae of smart meters and has seen not one but two Bills through the House over the last two months—and who could forget his jovial use of the props Gaz and Leccy on Second Reading? [Interruption.] Google it; it is not to be missed. I also thank the Public Bill Office and the Clerks of the House for all their assistance on this Bill.