Action on Climate Change and Decarbonisation

Debate between Bim Afolami and Jamie Stone

Tuesday 5th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Bim Afolami (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)]

I rise in response to the challenge from the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone): this debate has to be of such quality as he will send a copy of the Hansard to his young constituents. That puts me under pressure—

[Jamie Stone]

But you will rise to meet it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bim Afolami]

I thank the hon. Lady for her point. The intention behind subsidies—or, to use another word, support—for energy companies is to try to achieve what we want them to achieve. The investment allowances—there are various other things—should be tweaked or changed to incentivise more directly the sort of behaviours that we are talking about. On that, I support her.

[Jamie Stone]

rose—

[Bim Afolami]

I would like to continue, as I am being nodded at by various people because of the time, so I will make a little progress if I may.

We have heard a lot today about buildings and the need for a big insulation plan, for want of a better description. I strongly support that, but micro-measures to help individuals are also important. As Ronald Reagan said, the scariest words in the English language are: “I’m from the Government, and I’m here to help.” We need big, macro ideas. We need the big plans, but at the same time we need to incentivise individuals and families who want to help with the transition, do the right thing and make their own decisions to decarbonise. We can use things such as smart household systems to allow users to manage when to charge their electric cars, optimise when their heating comes on, or when to turn their fridge up.

We could also use market reforms to allow small energy suppliers to supply local areas. When there is a proposal for something in my constituency and I say to the energy company or small supplier, “Can you do something for the local village or local community so that they can benefit from this?”—whatever the form of energy is nearby—they say, “Look, the market isn’t really structured to allow that to happen.” That is a big problem, because it means that we are not getting the support of the local community or tapping into the latent desire to decarbonise—yes, working with Government at a macro level, but also at a micro level.

[Jamie Stone]

The hon. Member need have no fears: I shall put a large red star beside his contribution when I send off the copies of Hansard. If I pick him up right, surely the point is that anyone who thinks that the Beatrice wind farm, which I mentioned in my contribution, came into being without the expertise of oil firms, which have installed mighty things in the North sea, would be very much mistaken. These same oil firms that he is referring to will be crucial if we are to establish large-scale floating offshore wind energy generation.

[Bim Afolami]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that point; I could not agree more. It is a really difficult point to make, because it seems counter-intuitive, but we will need the major energy companies to do their bit and use what they have to achieve what we all agree we need to achieve, which is faster decarbonisation. We need macro measures from Government and we need to work much harder on buildings and insulation, but we also need micro measures to help individuals and small communities invest in decarbonisation and make those decisions themselves.

I commend these estimates. I am sure the money will be spent wisely, particularly if the Government have listened to the quality of this debate.