My Lords, I am most grateful to my noble friend and to colleagues around the House who have spoken in support of this amendment. It is a remarkable thing to have an amendment that
unites the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, with the noble Lord, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, and I do not think that even the speeches from the Front Benches could quite bring themselves to oppose it.
I am grateful to the Minister for agreeing to take this away, think about it again and talk to people about it. Of course, the very last thing that I want is to create a Division and thereby put my noble friend Lord Teverson, not to mention many of his colleagues on those Benches, in a position where they might have to vote against something that they thought was the right thing to do.
Rather wisely, my noble friend Lord Lawson pointed out that this matter has considerable strength of feeling in the country behind it, and it would be a pity if this cause were taken up by a tabloid newspaper, for example. It would be an even greater source of concern to me if that proved to be more influential than the combined voices around this Chamber. If it were taken up by a tabloid newspaper, judging by the brief that the Minister has been given by her department, I would not want to be the press officer responding to the inquiries because the Government have nothing to say on this.
This is not an issue about whether we are for or against decarbonisation or whether we are sceptics or enthusiasts—it is an issue of trust and transparency. I welcome the Minister’s comments that she is sympathetic, that she believes in transparency and that she would like to get there, but she is sounding a touch like St Augustine. Still, I take her commitment seriously, even though it is a commitment that she made earlier, in Committee. Therefore, while giving notice that we will return to this at a later stage in the Bill if no beef is produced following what has been a widespread consensus position in the debate, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.