Energy Bills: Self-disconnection

Debate between Stephen Doughty and Graham Stuart

Wednesday 25th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Graham Stuart]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. If she will follow that up with some details, I will happily write to her and come back on the specific points she has raised.

[Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)]

I genuinely appreciated the Minister coming to meet us yesterday to discuss these issues, but he will have seen the shock and disbelief in the room when he made his announcement, not least as he wrote to me just last week to say that the scheme would open in January, and I have been asking him about this since October on behalf of constituents in Sully who are affected. Nearly 1 million people across the country have had no form of support, in lots of different types of building, as he well knows. Can he be absolutely clear: when that portal opens on 27 February, how long will it take for those people to get the payment? Are we talking about a month, two months, or will they have to wait until the summer? What advice can he give them in the interim? Should they allow debt to build up? Should they turn off their heating? What should they actually do, and what should the management companies do, particularly in communal buildings, which potentially owe significant amounts, with residents having not paid their Bills? What is his advice to them?

[Graham Stuart]

The decision was made yesterday and I was able to brief colleagues, including the hon. Gentleman—I thank him for attending the meeting—yesterday afternoon, so I have tried to move as quickly as possible. Of course, until a decision is made, Government policy stays as it is until it is changed, and that explains the letter. I certainly hope that the hon. Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson) would accept that I was not being disingenuous. We moved to communicate as quickly as possible once the decision had been made.

The payment will go through local authorities. Much as I would love to give a define date, it depends when people apply. We will be encouraging people to apply from 27 February—if that is when the scheme launches—and then local authorities will be carrying out their verification. We will triage that first, to minimise the imposition on local authorities, but they will have to go through a process to get the payment out. That means I cannot give a definitive date, much as I would like to, and much as the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) is right to suggest that it would benefit people to know when they will get the support to which they are entitled. I hope he understands that, administratively, if I gave a date there would be a risk that I would be back before the House again to explain why, in some cases, it was not delivered. We will do it as quickly as we can but, having talked to the pilot local authorities, they feel that we are taking the most robust approach with the best chance of getting the payment out as quickly as possible.