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Energy Bill

My Lords, I, too, support this group of amendments, particularly the ones that try to pin these measures down as a tariff scheme rather than something else. We have heard the saying that if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it probably is a duck. In this case, I am not sure whether ““financial incentives to encourage”” are ““payments for””. If they are, I suggest that the Government should support the attempt to make this clearer in the Bill. Amendment No. 34 would be controversial only if the Government were considering something other than a straightforward feed-in tariff. Perhaps we can press the Minister to confirm that we are talking about a straightforward feed-in tariff, as commonly understood. Now that I have pondered on Amendment No. 38, I think that it probably supersedes Amendment No. 37, also in my name. It is better because it has belt and braces: it specifies not only how a payment would be calculated but also the level. Amendments Nos. 40 and 41 are important in giving clarity to the feed-in tariff arrangements and will be particularly important when we discuss later amendments regarding the cap.