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Energy: Low Carbon Transition Plan

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend on this very balanced Statement, which deals not exclusively with generation but also with the needs of our less well-off citizens and longer-term environmental issues. Perhaps I may say as chairman of the Nuclear Industry Association that, although we are grateful for the warm words, we need rather more if the new power stations are to be connected to the grid. I am not quite sure what is meant in the White Paper when it states that later this year there will be, ""a high level vision of a future smart grid"." That is an exercise in modern speak about which some of us are a bit cynical. Later this year, a statement will tell us that the national grid will be in step with the rest of the electricity industry in terms of planning for the future. I think that insufficient attention has been given to that. I am not greatly reassured by expressions such as "high level vision" because I am not sure what they mean.