Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Ed Davey and Julie Hilling

Thursday 6th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davey]

First, may I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the work he has done on fuel poverty? It is something that is very close to my heart. We have done a huge amount in this Government. We will shortly be publishing the first fuel poverty strategy in over a decade. With regard to switching, we are seeing huge progress. I challenged the large energy companies to halve switching times by the end of this year, and that is on track. Indeed, some of the smaller companies will achieve that by the end of the year. Ofgem is currently consulting on an idea I have pushed for 24-hour switching, linked to smart meters, and we expect a decision next year.

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West)(Lab)]

19. Consumer electricity prices went up by 4.4% and gas prices went up by 3.5% between April and June this year, but the price paid by major energy firms for coal fell by 12% and for gas it fell by a massive 21% over the same period. Why does the Secretary of State not act to ensure that cuts in wholesale prices are passed on to consumers?

[Mr Davey]

I share some of the hon. Lady’s concern about that. Sustained falls in wholesale energy costs should be passed on to consumers. While we have seen some fixed-price tariffs come down, standard tariffs in the main have not, which is why I supported the regulator’s warning to suppliers this summer. When the Leader of the Opposition was doing my job, wholesale electricity prices fell by 62.5%, and what did he do? He called a summit.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Ed Davey and Julie Hilling

Thursday 4th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

7. What steps he is taking to help households with their energy bills.

[The Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change (Mr Edward Davey)]

Energy bills are a real concern for many households, so we are helping people with them by providing direct financial help, encouraging competition, and supporting energy efficiency measures. Last December, we reviewed Government policy costs and made changes to take an average of £50 a year off a household’s bill, and we are making it easier to shop around, switch, and get the best deal. We are also providing direct financial help to the most vulnerable through the warm home discount, which will take £140 directly off the energy bills of more than 2 million of the poorest households this year.

[Julie Hilling]

Gas and electricity prices are falling, but bills are not, and profits for domestic suppliers doubled in the past year. In Bolton West, more than 40,000 households would save £120 from Labour’s energy price freeze, so why will the Government not freeze their bills?

[Mr Davey]

We all know that Labour’s energy price freeze is a con. We know that the energy companies will put their prices up directly after the freeze, that it will hurt competition and push out the smaller suppliers that are giving people real choice and helping them cut their bills now, and that it will cut investment. Everyone knows that Labour’s energy bill freeze is a con and would not work.

Cost of Living: Energy and Housing

Debate between Ed Davey and Julie Hilling

Thursday 5th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davey]

I simply do not recognise those claims. We have been doing a huge amount to tackle child poverty. The increase in the child care tax credit in the very first Budget was a major help for low-income families with children, so the hon. Gentleman should take that back.

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

When the right hon. Gentleman said that some people said that they wanted to go a little bit faster in paying down the deficit, was he referring to the Chancellor, who had promised that it would be got rid of in this Parliament?

[Mr Davey]

Many commentators thought we should cut the deficit faster, but we have taken a very responsible approach, to ensure not only that interest rates were kept low—that has been so vital for many families and the hon. Lady’s constituents—but that employment has risen so well. I would have thought she would be welcoming that.

The problem is that the Opposition used to criticise the coalition on unemployment—they used to say that unemployment was going to go up—but when the facts showed they were wrong and that unemployment has gone down they have had to change their economic argument. The Opposition keep changing the economic argument because they keep losing the economic argument. Let us examine their recent economic argument on the cost of living. I presume that everyone in this House accepts that the key measure of the cost of living remains the inflation figures. So if the cost of living is the measure by which to judge this coalition, let us see what has been happening to inflation. Inflation is lower than when the previous Government left office and it is falling.

I have to confess to the House that the Bank of England’s inflation target is not being hit—inflation is lower than the target. In March, inflation had slowed to just 1.6%. Of course for our constituents it is real incomes and real wages that actually matter: what people have to spend after tax and after inflation. Looking at things in that way, it is true that after the 2008 recession many people saw living standards fall. But let us remind ourselves what happened: a huge £113 billion was wiped off our economy in the great financial crash of 2008, and there was a £3,000 cost to every household in the United Kingdom. To put that right, and to keep employment rising, it was arithmetically inevitable that living standards could not rise in the turnaround period for our economy, but now we really are in recovery. Now it is not just employment that is rising—it is living standards too. How has that happened? Of course, it has been because of the coalition’s long-term economic plan.

Key aspects of that plan are really beginning to help, above all the implementation of the Liberal Democrat manifesto policy to increase the tax-free allowance to £10,000 a year. Our record not just of implementing this fairest of tax cuts, but doing more than we promised is helping more than 26 million people. It has taken 3.2 million low paid out of income tax and it has cut the income tax bill of a double-earning couple on average earnings by £1,600 a year. This Liberal-Democrat-turned-coalition policy has cut the number of low-income people paying income tax more in five years than any other Government have achieved in the same period since records began.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Ed Davey and Julie Hilling

Thursday 6th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change (Mr Edward Davey)]

Recently published statistics show a modest fall in fuel poverty in 2011 compared with 2010, from 4.75 million UK households to 4.5 million UK households. This is welcome, but we are determined to do more. Our comprehensive policy package includes targeted energy efficiency measures under the green deal and the energy company obligation, direct bill rebates under the warm home discount and, of course, measures through the Energy Bill to back Ofgem’s proposals to simplify the market.

[Julie Hilling]

Under the previous Labour Government, the number of people in fuel poverty fell by 1.75 million. In the past two years, the number of households in fuel poverty has gone up from one in five to one in four. When next year’s figures come out, will the number of people in fuel poverty be higher or lower than when Labour left office?

[Mr Davey]

The hon. Lady will know that during the previous Parliament, when Labour was in office, fuel poverty grew in every single year and that, according to the latest figures, it has now gone down. In many ways this is a rather odd debate. The Government commissioned Professor Hills to review how we measure fuel poverty and he has come up with proposals that have gained wide-scale acceptance. We have consulted on them and will respond shortly to that consultation. We believe that the old measurements of fuel poverty, which are still in use, need radical reform so that we can better target fuel poverty policy.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Ed Davey and Julie Hilling

Thursday 8th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

T3. Does the Secretary of State support WWF’s earth hour on 31 March, when across the world, everyone will be encouraged to switch off lights for one hour to highlight the issue of climate change? What will he do to promote earth hour?

[Mr Davey]

That is a very good initiative, and I can certainly commit my Department to supporting it.