Energy Bill [HL]

My Lords, this is a fairly straightforward amendment; I like to be straightforward to help the Ministers. I declare an interest as a current vice-president of the Local Government Association; therefore I have some concerns and an understanding of the impact of additional burdens on local government. I am helped by the Minister’s response to my last question. Whatever the purpose of the review—which I understood was to seek a review to maximise the uptake of the Green Deal, or, as the Minister said, to safeguard against regulation—we need to ensure that any new duty that is placed on local authorities can be properly scoped and evaluated to get a full assessment of the impact that will have. My sense is that local authorities recognise the importance of the Green Deal, they want it to work and they want to be involved. They are aware of the duties being placed on them by this Bill. However, Clause 37 outlines some of the regulations that were brought in by the Secretary of State that will impact and place duties on local government. Therefore, it is sensible that these be included as part of the review so that they can be properly understood in terms of what it will cost local government, the implications on local government budgets, the implications on the time that will have to be spent by the officers who undertake it, the implications on their skills, and what additional information local government will need. It is a very straightforward provision to ensure, as we proceed and progress on this, that we can be confident that local government will be in the right place to undertake its responsibilities under the terms of the Bill. It is seeking to ensure in a new provision under subsection (5) that we make a proper assessment of the impact on local authorities.