Energy Bill [HL]

Perhaps I may add a word or two to the debate because I put my name on the amendment. We spent a good part of this afternoon’s proceedings all agreeing that the Government face a major challenge in seeking to extend the Green Deal or apply the Green Deal to the private rented sector; indeed many noble Lords from all parts of the Grand Committee were stressing the problems that are being faced on this. I agree with that. Although I have a lot of sympathy for those who say we have waited a long time, we must get on with this. If we try to hurry it forward and bring forward the date of the review and curtail the length of time that the review may take, it will go off at half cock. When dealing with the complexities and the challenge, which I described earlier as enormous when citing the federation, we have to be prepared to make sure that the authorities and all the people who take part in this—the property owners, landlords and tenants so far as is possible—are sufficiently aware of what is expected before one tries to rush forward. My noble friend Lord Teverson says that by 2013 we will know and have enough experience, but with the greatest respect I do not believe that for a moment. This is going to start pretty slow and the immediate reaction will be people coming along and saying ““It’s not happening””, and that we have to have compulsion and the full panoply of regulations. That would be very unwise because it might get the process off in the wrong way. The Minister has been absolutely right. The Government do not want to go down the road of compulsion through regulation, yet if one rushes the review and starts to make decisions on what is bound to be pretty imperfect and incomplete information, my guess is that is that we will be in greater difficulty than we otherwise would have been. I would therefore urge more caution on this. The date that my noble friend and I have put on this amendment and the other amendments that go with it are perfectly realistic and I would not agree with the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Oldham, that we could bring the thing forward. That would run straight into the dangers which I have been trying, in my own imperfect way, to point out. Perhaps I can say to my noble friends on the Front Bench that, if the Government are being criticised for anything, it is that on a number of issues they are moving too fast and trying to do too much at the same time. We are dealing here with a problem whose origins go back many decades. Indeed, in some cases it will be centuries. To try to rush forward and deal with it all in a relatively short time is a potential recipe for disaster. I hope that the Government will get the message that this needs a measured approach with enough time being given for people to consider and make sure that they understand the information that is to come out of the review before rushing to make regulations. That comes back to the very first point I made earlier this afternoon. If you go too fast, it will have the effect of drying up the rented sector. People will throw their hands in the air and say, ““Blow that. I am not going to let any more””. That would be a very great pity.