Nia Griffith
Main Page: Nia Griffith (Labour - Llanelli)(12 years, 6 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
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Gregory Barker
No, I am afraid that that would deliver the most terrible uncertainty to business. It has to be clear that there is a cut-off date. We mean what we say, I am afraid.
Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)
The Minister is right that we cannot consider the matter in isolation. In the light of his Government’s decision to betray the good faith of all those who have invested in the solar panel industry on the basis of feed-in tariffs, how will the Government now convince any potential investors in UK manufacturing that the Government can be trusted to stick to policies that encourage manufacturing, to avoid the immeasurable damage that the lack of that investment would cause?
Gregory Barker
That sort of hysterical response does very little to help the industry. The fact is that the feed-in tariff scheme was set up to provide a return in the region of 5%. Now, 18 months on, we are recalibrating the scheme to provide a return in the same region. Everything else is a bubble. The hon. Lady’s constituents’ energy bills pay for the scheme, and we cannot simply waste energy bill payers’ money.