Energy Bill [HL]

My Lords, I am not against relying on statutory instruments to clarify the policy as we go down the line. All Ministers find that it takes time to work out the details, but at this stage we need to put down some markers and to have an idea of the general direction in which the Government are going. I agree with a lot of what my noble friend Lord O’Neill said on the ECO and fuel poverty. If the Government are effectively putting all their eggs in the fuel poverty basket through the ECO replacing all other forms of intervention, as my noble friend Lady Smith said, however good the scheme which emerges under the ECO is, it will be undermined if the payment for it is on a quasi-poll tax basis. You will take away with one hand what you have given with the other. I urge the Government to think clearly about what they are doing on both sides of that equation. However, my main point is on Ofgem. I understand that a review of its role is still ongoing. As the Minister will know, there are widely different views, not necessarily on a party basis, on what Ofgem should and should not be doing. Ofgem itself tends to change its mind on what it should be doing. Clause 67 implies that we are taking something away from Ofgem. I should like to know from the Minister whether this is part of the review of Ofgem, which I understand will end in March, when there will be a report. Ofgem is also covered by the Public Bodies Bill, as my noble friend said, and there are uncertainties relating to what will emerge as a regulator in that regard. It is important that the totality of what Ofgem is responsible for is defined before we provide measures which could, piecemeal, carve off bits of Ofgem’s role or add bits to it. Before we finish the Bill, we need to hear the result of that review and what the Government propose in total.