Energy Bill

My Lords, as the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, pointed out, I raised inter alia whether or not statutory instruments in draft would be available at Second Reading. Answer came there none from my Front Bench. In fact, my noble friend Lord Marland said—as if it was a badge of honour—that this is a framework Bill. The noble Baroness, Lady Smith, has translated that badge of honour into her Amendment 38 and, apparently, has also made it a good part of the Bill. I had not anticipated that we would be debating this point today. I have today tabled amendments—we will not see them on the list until tomorrow—that will tease out this point. The Constitution Committee is clear that a framework Bill is on a par with a Henry VIII clause; that is to say, they are fundamentally unconstitutional. In particular—this is the point made by the noble Lord, Lord O’Neill—it sucks out the ability of this House, as a revising Chamber, to make any significant impact on the genuine content of what will be the result of the legislation. As a matter of principle—and the committee reiterated this as recently as the Public Bodies Bill—it does not believe that framework Bills are a good thing. I therefore oppose the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, because putting ““framework”” in makes it sound as if it is okay. I believe that this House ought to hold out against excessive use of Henry VIII powers and the excessive use of framework legislation where there is no good reason for it and where the amount of information that will be made available to noble Lords during the passage of a Bill will not enable them to exercise their crucial function as a revising Chamber. I will make these points again when I come to my amendments which are on the way to being tabled in respect of Chapter 4 of Part 1, which is the point that I specifically raised on Second Reading in regard to this very inchoate legislation. I had not intended to raise this point on the Green Deal, but I fully support what the noble Lord, Lord O’Neill, has said.