I do agree. Let us look at what has just happened in America with the advent of shale gas and the development of non-conventional gas and oil exploration in the US. That has essentially destroyed the notion that the world has already hit peak oil or peak gas. If we compare projected gas prices—the Minister mentioned this—with what is happening in markets where unconventional gas is being developed quickly,
we see that new developments could come forward if allowed in the future. I fear that we are picking winners on that basis. I know that all Members are concerned about greenhouse emissions and the like. The development of shale gas in the United States has reduced America’s greenhouse emissions. Therefore, there is an interesting benefit from doing these things.
To deliver the Government’s plans in the Bill will be hugely challenging, but they are even more challenging because there is a whole host of factors. If renewable technologies were easy to deploy at the utility scale, the Bill might be helpful, but they are not. If renewable technologies were economic to deploy, the Bill would be very helpful, but as of yet they are not. If nuclear power stations could be built quickly and economically, the Bill would help, but in the UK we struggle with building quickly and economically on that sort of scale. It may have been done overseas, such as in Finland, but, realistically, we cannot do that. If the public were willing to pay any price in their bills to fund this policy—this is my major concern, hence my amendment 169—the Bill might be helpful, but they are not willing to pay huge extra sums. These provisions are placing a huge extra regular contribution on bills, up to an estimated £600 each year by 2020 at the very least.