My Lords, Amendment 55ALE would implement the recommendations of your Lordships’ Delegated Powers Committee. Noble Lords will forgive the slight sense of déjà vu with which we return to this subject but, as the Delegated Powers Committee highlighted, the scale and nature of the extensive powers this Bill affords to the Secretary of State are vast. That these powers are subject to annulment only and could require no parliamentary approval seems completely inappropriate in the most part. This amendment also extends the provision for parliamentary approval to the CFD counterparty as well as enforcement provisions and the oversight of consultations. When commenting on this section of the Bill, the Delegated Powers Committee notes that much of the provision for investment contracts mirror those that will implement the CFDs in Schedule 2. Therefore its recommendation is the same.
Paragraph 14 of the sixth report states:
“We re-iterate in the context of Schedule 2 the view we expressed in the final two sentences of paragraph 4 above about the importance of draft regulations being made available to the House in sufficient time before it embarks on the report stage of the Bill”.
Paragraph 15 states:
“We also consider that any regulations made under Part 2 of Schedule 2 should require the affirmative procedure, with the exception of those which make provision falling within paragraph 10 or 11, which should require the affirmative procedure on first exercise”.
Without repeating remarks made in Committee previously, it is clear that this is not an appropriate way to legislate. We are now on the final day in Committee on this Bill, which has already been passed in another place, and we still lack most of the detail to enable us to understand how the new landscape will work in practice. Parliament is being asked to approve little more than a framework for legislation that should guide investment in the energy market for many decades to come. I sense that the Government are keen to heed
the advice of the Committee, and therefore ask the Minister to ensure that draft regulations, in particular for Part 2, are published in good time for this House to analyse them ahead of Report when we return after the Recess. I beg to move.