Proceeding contribution from Eric Forth (Conservative) in the House of Commons on Friday, 17 March 2006. It occurred during Debate on bill on Climate Change and Sustainable Energy Bill 2005-06.
As amended in the Standing Committee, further considered.
I am most grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I shall accept his explanation and move on as a small reward for his participating in the debate. I hope that we will hear a lot more from him as time goes on. That brings us on to the string of amendments that the Minister sought to dismiss as somehow trivial or technical—Nos. 40, 42, 43, 44, 45 and 46—in which we are beginning to tackle, really for the first time, the definition of microgeneration and the relationship between the Energy Act 2004 and the Bill. This was touched on at col. 1088 of the Official Report for 10 March 2006, when there was an interesting exchange between my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr. Chope) and the Minister. We—that is the House, because I do not think we were being properly guided on that occasion—got a little confused about whether we were talking about microgeneration being solely concerned with renewables or whether it went beyond that. That subject will come up in a moment when we look at the relationship between the Energy Act and the Bill, but at that stage we were talking about targets and the Minister was helping to clarify matters. He said:"““The target of 10 per cent. is for renewables . . . . It is not a target for microgeneration””—[Official Report, 10 March 2006; Vol. 443, c. 1088.]" That set the scene for what I want to explore in some of these amendments, which is how far microgeneration, as we now want to define it, is involved with renewables only or whether it can involve any other source of energy. The Energy Act, to which the clause refers, comprehensively sets out an approach to microgeneration. That is one of the reasons why I have hesitated so far to give my wholehearted support to the Bill. Section 82 of the Act, to which the amendments refer, places a duty on the Secretary of State"““to prepare a strategy for the promotion of microgeneration in Great Britain””." It goes on to state that he"““must publish the strategy within 18 months after the commencement””." We should have had sight of that strategy by now. Perhaps when the Minister responds on this group, which he airily dismissed as being merely technical, he will tell us where we stand on that.
Secondary information
- Type
- Proceeding contribution
- Reference
- 443 c1711-2
- Session
- 2005-06
- Chamber / Committee
- House of Commons chamber
- Subjects
- Combined heat and power Climate change Environment protection Energy Electricity generation Ofgem Planning Scotland Wind power Carbon emissions Fuel cells
- Legislation
- Climate Change and Sustainable Energy Bill 2005-06
- Link
- View this Proceeding contribution on www.publications.parliament.uk
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- 2024-04-21 23:52:44 +0100
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