Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what assessment he has made of the impact of rising energy prices on energy intensive industries.

The Government remains determined to secure a competitive future for our energy intensive industries (EIIs), providing them with extensive support, including over £2 billion to help with the costs of energy and to protect jobs. As part of our British Energy Security Strategy we recently announced an extension of the EII Compensation Scheme for a further three years and its budget will be more than doubled.

The Government announced a new six-month scheme – the Energy Price Guarantee for Businesses (EPGB) – to protect all businesses and other non-domestic energy users from soaring energy costs. It will offer comparable support to that being provided for consumers and we expect the scheme to be available in the autumn. After this initial six-month scheme the Government will provide focused support for vulnerable sectors, targeted to make sure those most in need get support.