I congratulate the Chairman of my Select Committee, the hon. Member for South Suffolk (Mr Yeo) on his contribution. I believe that our Select Committee has been more than diligent in calling the Government to account. Unfortunately, the Government have not exactly been forthcoming in giving us the information that we require. We deliberated on the Bill some time ago and had five weeks of pre-legislative scrutiny. That is roughly seven weeks shorter than the time in which anybody else has ever been asked to do pre-legislative scrutiny. As such, it put us under a great deal of pressure.
We are told that the Government will table a number of amendments to the Bill. I appreciate that this is a very technical Bill and that the Government are not sharp enough to fill in the details. The Minister was right that the Bill was long in the making. We expected to get it some time last year for our scrutiny. The Government have had plenty of time to put together what they require, but—here we go again—they are going to table a load of amendments that Members in this Chamber will not be able to scrutinise or talk about. That is not good enough. I believe that, as the elected Chamber, we should be able to scrutinise, ask questions and get answers. I do not believe that we are getting the answers.
We have to look at the Bill in general terms. In the short time that I have, I want to talk about my pet subject: the consumer—the person who has to pay the bill—and what we are going to do to help them. I do not believe that the consumer is getting a good deal in this day and age. In fact, they are getting a deplorable deal. The Government are part of the problem because in Ofgem they do not have a body that helps them by setting out where they can call the companies to account.
Will the Secretary of State consider whether some form of windfall tax could be written into the Bill? The Labour party would be happy to table an amendment for such a tax, based on excessive profits. I believe that at a time of austerity, energy companies—particularly the big six—should not be making excessive profits or receiving billions of pounds from the Government to develop other forms of energy without providing a return for that money. The Bill should therefore include a measure that would, perhaps, allow those companies
only to make profits that are in line with inflation at this point in time. We could then look at the issue again in a few years’ time. Those companies must be held to account, and the only way to do that is by hitting them in the pocket.