My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Forsyth for moving the amendment on behalf of my noble friend Lord Marlesford and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chester. I sympathise with the aims behind this amendment. Consumers have a right to know what they are paying for, particularly when it is a basic essential, such as energy. The Government recognise the importance of providing clear and consistent information about the content of bills. Every year my department publishes a breakdown of costs that make up an energy bill along with a detailed assessment of the impacts of our policies. We feel strongly that suppliers should be open and honest about the costs that they incur, and noble Lords will have heard my colleagues in the other place repeating this call in recent weeks.
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Our priority is to make bills as useful as possible for consumers and to ensure that they have the clearest information possible to help them engage in the market. We want to see key information presented clearly and simply, including information on the cheapest tariffs available to them. We want the information that suppliers provide on bills to prompt consumers to consider whether they are getting the best deal that they can and to empower them to shop around. Ofgem’s retail market review proposals are designed to do just that, and have required suppliers to make a major overhaul of their bill design in order to comply with the new requirements.
I do not want to pre-empt the work that is going to be done by the Cabinet Office as laid out by the Prime Minister in the context of the competition test. My noble friend is aware that I am sympathetic to the idea of ensuring that consumers know exactly what they are paying for.
I have listened very carefully to arguments from across the House. Given the strength of feeling shown in today’s debate, I would like to take away the arguments that have been made and perhaps follow through with noble Lords who are happy to discuss with me how to better look at this amendment. In the mean time, my noble friend needs to recognise that I and the Government have a commitment to transparency and clarity on bills. While I undertake to take my noble friend’s amendment away, I reassure noble Lords that it is not about not wanting clarity and greater transparency; it is also about ensuring that consumers do not get an overload of information on their bills that will make it even harder for them to disaggregate what they are actually paying for. With that undertaking to take this away and to work with noble Lords, I hope that my noble friend will withdraw his amendment.