I am happy to address that point, because it is important. The hon. Lady needs to reflect on the motivation of anyone wanting to buy the GIB. It is a special organisation; there are other vehicles that people can buy if they simply want to invest in clean energy or strip assets. The GIB was set up for a special purpose. We put in place governance frameworks—the hon. Lady calls it the golden share; we call it the green share—that we think are robust and that Parliament approved.
Why bother if the only intention is to do easy stuff? The GIB has proven that it can do difficult stuff and make a return. We therefore come back to the motivation of a bidder, and to our doing our job in making sure that we test any proposal against the criteria we have set. One of those criteria is about not just the volume of future investment commitment to the UK, but the degree to which any buyer buys into the ethos and purpose of the organisation.
To draw things to a close, the central point is that the Government set out our case for privatisation and set out the criteria—value for money, declassification, but also a desire to see a credible commitment to the ongoing organisation and to increased levels of investment in the UK’s low carbon economy. We ran a competitive process, we received a proposal from a preferred bidder and we are now evaluating that against those criteria. No decision has yet been taken, because this is a very serious decision.
The debate, and the urgent question debate, have been very helpful—not only in sending a message about the importance of getting this right, which had already been received by Government, but, critically, in sending a message to anyone looking to buy the organisation about the importance that Members from both sides attach to getting the transaction right: it must be seen to deliver value for money, but also show a commitment to the ongoing organisation.