Energy Bill [HL]

I feel compelled to intervene because I am not quite sure whether we are going in the direction in which this Bill should be aimed. I go right back to Clause 1(2), "““An energy plan is an arrangement made by the occupier or owner of a property for a person to make energy efficiency improvements to the property””." The occupier of a property may well be the tenant. We have made a great deal of the efficiency or inefficiency of certain landlords. They do not just occur, sadly, in the private sector; there are good and bad landlords in the public sector. There are good and bad tenants in both sectors. The essence of this scheme, however, was that if the landlord did not want to do something the tenant could. I thought that the essence of the scheme was that it was voluntary but if I listened to my noble friend Lady Maddock correctly, and I am not sure that I did, she seemed to be thinking that perhaps local authorities should be in a position to compel. I am not sure I agree with that because that is not within the original purpose of the Bill. But maybe I have misunderstood the Bill or maybe I have misunderstood the noble Baroness. I am not sure which; I am becoming rather confused. That is why I am speaking. I thought that this Bill was designed to give the property occupier—if the owner happened to be there, that would be fine and good—the right to take action which is in his own interest. If that is so, it is perfectly true that he would probably have to get the consent of his landlord because almost all tenancy agreements that I have seen say that any alterations to the property must be made with the consent of the landlord. I cannot conceive, as the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Basildon, has said, that any landlord is ever going to refuse to have this sort of action taken in a property in their ownership. She is absolutely correct to say that action like this must enhance the value of the property one way or another. That is not the bit that concerns me. It is that we seem to think that we should be giving local authorities powers to compel landlords to take action, but they are landlords themselves very often. I am quite happy that they should be compelled to take action for themselves, but I thought that the essence of the Bill was that this was an arrangement essentially between the consumer of energy and the energy supplier. If that is the case, I am very concerned about these amendments because they seem to imply something else. I am anxious to see homes having their energy efficiency improved as soon and as rapidly as possible. However, it seems to me that the process suggested, and which I thought lay behind this Bill, would be likely to achieve that faster than any action implying that compulsion might come from somewhere else would be likely to do.