My Lords, I do not think that this issue will take us quite as long as the previous debate. Indeed, it could be disposed of relatively straightforwardly as the Government could quite easily adopt this amendment. Frankly, they would be very wise to do so. If the Minister cannot do that, she can at least indicate that she will bring forward an equivalent but better drafted amendment at Third Reading.
This amendment concerns the issue of fuel poverty and its relativity to electricity market reform. Noble Lords will recall that when the Bill went through the House of Commons and first reached this House there was hardly any direct reference to fuel poverty in it—a glaring omission. The organisations concerned with fuel poverty and the people who suffer from it thought that was a serious omission and quite shocking in many ways. But we have moved on from that: in Clause 136, much later in the Bill, the Government have come up with a provision requiring them to provide a strategy on fuel poverty that will apply to the whole range of energy policies.
There are those who have doubts about the coalition Government’s commitment on this front. There has not been a great track record on fuel poverty so far. The hesitation and delay in bringing fuel poverty into this Bill has been worrying, as has the recent furore within the Government. As far as one can make out from the various statements by the Prime Minister and Secretary of State, there is still an argument going on in the Government. Many in the Conservative Party appear to have in their sights not only green levies in the strict sense of the word but also those levies that provide for resources to improve the energy efficiency of the homes of the fuel poor. I will be generous today and accept that the Government have agreed that a new strategy is to be provided, one which this Bill will give legislative requirement for. We can have a substantive discussion on fuel poverty at that point in the procedure of the Bill, sometime next week.
The point today is that the Government have inserted in the clause that we have just dealt with that fuel poverty is one of the matters that Ministers must have in mind when setting decarbonisation targets. In relation to the electricity market reform, there is no such reference. I suggest that reference could be made most appropriately here in Clause 5. Clause 5 stipulates the issues that have to be taken into account in electricity market reform: decarbonisation, referencing the Climate Change Act, prices for consumers both domestic and industrial, and energy security. The environmental
and economic dimensions of electricity market reform are there but the social dimension—that of fuel poverty—is omitted.
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Now that Clause 136 is part of the Bill—whether or not we improve it when we get to that point—surely we should now make sure that the Bill’s major intervention in the market, the complete reform of the electricity part of the market, is stipulated. We can obviously have the substantive arguments on Clause 136 later but that clause’s very existence and the Government’s acceptance of the need for it must mean that the social dimension of electricity market reform should be recognised and reflected at this point.
It would be sensible for the Government just to accept this amendment, although they could argue that it should be in both parts of Clause 5 rather than just one. It would be equally sensible if the Minister told me that she would come forward with a much better amendment at Third Reading. But, given the logic of what is now the Government’s point of view and for the House to recognise the importance of tackling fuel poverty as an equal part with the other strategic objective of the energy policy, we should adopt something like this amendment. I beg to move.