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Address in Reply to Her Majesty's Most Gracious Speech

My Lords, I cannot believe that I cannot remember the words. I just hope that Hansard will kindly correct that when it comes to be written, or I will be shot. At the moment, it seems that the Government have firmly set their course on being almost entirely dependent on imported gas from places such as Algeria and Russia. In the latter case, it will come along long pipelines that are vulnerable to terrorist sabotage. Why are the Government so bent on placing the whole future of the country into the hands of unstable regimes? Of course, that leaves us with nuclear power. In their White Paper, the Government said that they were, "keeping the nuclear option open". For how long will they keep it open, and when will they make a decision one way or the other? The noble Lord, Lord Sainsbury, has had to answer my questions, including several Written Questions, on the matter and I shall try to précis the answers. The Government admit that it would take between 10 and 15 years from a decision to build before the actual generation of electricity. They also know that only 30 per cent of our existing nuclear capacity will still be operating in 2020. The point is that, if we are to make up the deficit caused by increasing demand here at home, the cornering of supplies by China—it is now buying several oilfields around the world—and the loss of our own domestic resources, a definite solution to the looming power crisis and action by the Government are needed now. We simply cannot wait until the position is exacerbated by the decommissioning of all our old nuclear power stations. On another matter, if in accordance with the present policy of the Government we have to buy all or most of our fuel from abroad, what will that do to our balance of payments? How much weaker will the pound get as we spend more than we earn because of having to generate electricity from overseas fuel? What does the Minister have to say about all that? I would be grateful to hear. I shall make one thing clear. From this Dispatch Box, I am not advocating a new nuclear policy. That is not for me to do; it is not for my party to do either. The Government have a mandate to run the country for the next four or five years. Within that time, we will be coming to the end of the fuel sources that we have. Somewhere along the line, the Government have to make a decision about what they will do. Finally, I want briefly to mention some of the Bills in the Queen's Speech that seem to affect the DTI. We do not oppose the principle of the Equality Bill; the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas, mentioned that. However, we will have to scrutinise it very carefully in case it has the unintended consequences that I have already mentioned. The Consumer Credit Bill was also before the other place before the dissolution; we supported it then at Second Reading. I should say to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Worcester—and to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Liverpool, who said that he agreed with everything said by him—that it would be most useful to hear their views on the Bill when it comes to this House. We wish to ensure that the introduction of necessary new measures to protect debtors will also have a positive impact for business, rather than simply imposing burdens with no positive effect. The company law reform Bill has already received a broad welcome. I listened with great interest to what the noble Lord, Lord Wedderburn, said, because he often does not agree with anything that I say. I will be keenly interested to see how it implements two of the objectives in the White Paper; namely, to ensure better regulation and a "think small" approach, and to provide flexibility for the future. The parental rights Bill is already causing some alarm among small businesses. I read in the paper only twth of GDP has halved since the first quarter of 2000. I was most grateful to my noble friend Lady O'Cathain for pointing out the Government's mantra, emphasised again by the noble Lord, Lord—