Climate Change Bill [HL]

I am extremely grateful to the Minister for that long explanation. This is one of those occasions when we have to say, quite genuinely, that we will read it in Hansard, try to understand what it means and consider our position further. I have one or two further comments on the whole question of charging and these amendments. The Minister appeared to say that there could be instances where people were due rebates for the period when they were living in a property, behaving themselves, not putting much stuff out and therefore getting all their brownie points, but if they moved away they did not have to be paid, even if the authority knew where they were. That does not seem to be equitable. If people have earned a bonus of, for example, £20 or £30, why should they not be paid it along with everybody else? I think there are limits on how far flexibility can be taken in this when people will believe that they are owed that money. That leads to my second question on whether people who move away can be chased for any money that they owe. From reading the documents that the Government have produced I understand that the amounts that people could get from this in benefit, or in bounties, or which they owe because they have not been recycling properly, might be quite low. I assume that there will be a de minimis so that people will not be sent bills for £1, but where is a sensible level? If the level that is being talked about is under £100 per year—it might be £20, £30 or £40—what are the administrative costs for an authority of chasing people for that money? It seems that the difference between that and utility bills is that utility bills are usually higher than £20, £30 or £40 and often a great deal higher nowadays. That is the case with council tax generally. One of the problems underlying the proposals is that the amounts of money being talked about are not high. Administrative costs in relation to them might be a serious problem. Finally, the Minister said that potential cases in extreme would not be expected to be seen in the pilots. That goes back to one of our fears that the pilots will be in easy areas and the difficult problems that we all know are going to be there. If the pilots are going to be worthwhile we have to tackle some of the difficult problems. Perhaps not the most extreme ones, but if it does not tackle difficult inner city areas, difficult council estates, other difficult areas or far-flung rural areas it is not going to be of any value, but that goes back to the point that we made earlier. As I said, I will read carefully what the Minister said. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. [Amendment No. 183P not moved.]