Climate Change Bill [HL]

My Lords, I was thanking the Minister for doing it. I also thank him for being uncomfortable. And the pronunciation—if I can help him—is something like Ludwigshafen. The Minister raised two issues, the first of which was side waste. He said a later amendment is planned to clarify the position in various legislation and to put all the provisions in one place. Local authorities will welcome that, because there is a lot of argument about side waste in recycling schemes. Secondly, he suggested that the Government will come forward at some stage with an amendment in relation to certain large retailers—an interesting phrase—and single-use bags. We would very much welcome that. We will be interested to see what that amendment says whenever and wherever it appears. We welcome the Government taking the issue seriously. We raised it in Committee on this Bill. I also welcome government Amendment No. 213—which, as the Minister said, is generally the substantive amendment in this group—not least because it makes the whole presentation of the proposals much clearer and it shortens the Bill, something which is unusual for a government amendment but is to be welcomed. The amendment sets out much more clearly for anyone interested the different options for the pilots and for looking at waste reduction schemes: based on the weight of residual waste; volume—the big bins or the little bins; and type of receptacle—bins, sacks or anything else that people might invent. The question of frequency is much clearer here than it was in the original wording. The reference to types of receptacle and identification of receptacles is also much clearer. Although Amendment No. 213 does not change in any way the Government’s intentions towards the options, it is a good amendment. I understand this provision much better than the previous, rather convoluted one. Amendment No. 213A, which is in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Teverson, goes back to the issue we discussed in Committee. We gave all these charging provisions and systems a pretty good scrubbing down in Committee. The fact that we did so means that at least some of us are not revisiting those issues here. The issues will undoubtedly be considered again in the House of Commons, and we have very much helped them to do so. However, one issue that was not dealt with is advanced payments and payments on account and in instalments. Both Liberal Democrat Members and Conservative Members tabled amendments in Committee on the issue, and I remember some very useful contributions by the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, on the subject. We were not given proper answers in Committee, and I am not sure that the Minister has given us proper answers in advance today. In Committee, the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, said that, "““there must be a link between cause and effect. If people have to wait a very long time to see the cause and effect on charging, local authorities would benefit from the option of handling the charging differently””.—[Official Report, 30/1/08; col. 703.]" The problem is that if you send out estimated bills in advance and give people estimated rewards or estimated penalties in advance, how is that responding to a change in their behaviour? Surely it is clear whether people change their behaviour in a certain way or not, and they are then rewarded or penalised afterwards for doing so. It seems totally illogical to say to people: ““We are going to penalise you or reward you on the basis of your historic behaviour before the system comes in””. I do not think that the Government have faced up to that properly. Some payments in advance will take place, because if people want a big bin they will have to pay more for it, and they will get a bill for that. If there is a sack system and people have to buy the number of sacks that they require, they will pay for those in advance. That is not at issue. What is at issue is where the refuse is going to be weighed and people are then going to get rewards or penalties, and the size of their bill will depend on how much they throw away. Surely, that has to come afterwards. In Committee, the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, referred to utility companies, and the Minister has done so again today. That reference really is not the case. As I said in Committee, if you have an electricity bill or a gas bill that you think is too great, you can read the meter and ring the company to get an amended bill. There is no way that you can do that in relation to your waste; you are lumbered with the estimate, however it has been carried out. I do not know how they will possibly make these estimates in the first place. There is a real problem here in terms of advance estimates and advance payments in the weight-based type of scheme. As far as ““on account or by instalments”” is concerned, the point of my amendment on instalments is the opposite of what the Minister suggested. He suggested that it is like council tax, which you are able to pay in instalments. That is true, but it is not a requirement to pay council tax in instalments. If you are sufficiently soft in the head, as I was earlier this week, to write a cheque out for the whole of your council tax and pay it all at the beginning of the year, you are entitled to do that. Council tax becomes payable at the beginning of the year. You have a right to pay in instalments if you want to, but you pay those instalments in arrears, because the council tax is due on 1 April, and if you wish, as most people do, you pay by direct debit, cash or cheque each month subsequently over 10 months. You are doing it in arrears, though, because the council tax is due on 1 April. You have a right to pay quarterly or monthly, because a lot of people cannot afford to pay up front, or they are not daft enough to do it like I am. This is the opposite. What is being said here is that people will be forced to pay by instalments. The purpose of my amendment is to say that if they want to pay up front and get the whole thing out of the way, they should be able to. We are talking about quite a small amount of money here; £30 or £40. The idea of being forced to pay that by instalment through the year in £5 direct debits is crackers. That is the purpose of the amendment, and I hope that the Government will look again at that issue. My final amendment in this group is on revenue neutrality. I really do not understand why the Government want to put into legislation the ability to abolish the requirement for revenue neutrality when they cannot come up with any circumstances whatever in which they might do it. In Committee, the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, said that it would be an ““unforeseen event””, and that is all we got. He said: "““We want the flexibility to amend the revenue-neutrality condition. In the unforeseen event that we need to make an amendment … it would come back to Parliament””.—[Official Report, 30/1/08; col. 711.]" I accept what the Minister said this afternoon, that it would be an affirmative order, but to say that an affirmative order amounts to comprehensive parliamentary scrutiny, as he said, is pushing it a little bit. It is better than none, but it is the old take it or leave it system. It does not really provide us with the opportunity to scrutinise it as if it were primary legislation, although the system is getting better slowly, year by year. I press the Minister again on what circumstances he thinks might change what he is saying is a cast-iron guarantee of revenue neutrality—that they will not make money out of it and it is not a stealth tax or any other type of tax, except that it is a redistribution from those whose behaviour is thought to be not good to those whose behaviour is thought to be good in recycling. That is the whole principle of it: redistribution from goodies to baddies as far as recycling behaviour is concerned. Yet the Government want it in the legislation that they can change it, so that revenue neutrality can be abolished in the future and they could raise revenue. Under what possible circumstances do the Government think that they might want to do this? Until they come clean and tell us, this should not be in the legislation.