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Energy: Annual Statement

My Lords, a number of questions have been asked of these Benches about our position on nuclear power. It is clear that, as this Statement was made by my right honourable friend Chris Huhne, this reflects Liberal Democrat and coalition policy. It quite happily states the position that we have always had on nuclear power—that we would support it as long as there was no public subsidy. That was repeated in the Statement. So I do not think that any deviation can be claimed from the policy that we have had for a very long time. I have expressed that to the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, on a number of occasions. Personally, I am a nuclear sceptic, but that is a personal opinion. I welcome this Statement for a number of reasons, not least because, as chairman of the Anaerobic Digestion and Biogas Association, it leads the way to the grandfathering of double ROCs for anaerobic digestion. That will be a very helpful step in decarbonising the gas grid. I have two questions. First, in the rollout of smart meters, will the Minister consider making it a requirement to have a reprogrammable chip in the smart meter? It would be unfortunate if we put in millions of these smart meters and then decided to change their specification—if we did not put in simple technology that we understand so that it can be reprogrammed from outside rather than our having to insert a new smart meter. Secondly, the Government have talked about a consultation document on the roles of Ofgem. Could the Minister also consider a consultation on the roles of Ofwat, which has acted as a massive hindrance to the decarbonisation of the water industry, which is one of the biggest users of electricity and therefore carbon in the country? Will the Minister consider whether, if Ofgem is to be looked at, Ofwat could be not only looked at but probably abolished?