Speeches by Dixon.

“Now that you have a better sense of that, how would you target support differently in the non-domestic sector in future, particularly for those that are higher energy but perhaps more susceptible because they have not got the buying power of some of the bigger non-domestic customers to get good deals? How are you suppo…”

“I have had colleagues in the House talking about ceramics, and we have industries effectively going to the wall at the moment, largely because of high energy prices. I am just wondering what you are doing, as a Department, to build resilience in these energy-intensive sectors.”

“Okay. My final question is about those who are self-employed, where, effectively, you do not have a very good record of income. What did you do there to target support? Again, have you learned anything that is useful for the future?”

“A 10% fault rate is not ideal and has certainly undermined confidence. The main issue is to address that defective rate and ensure that the contractors under the Government scheme meet the standards.”

“To get these schemes up and running quickly, they were universal schemes rather than schemes targeted at particular households who really needed that financial support. We could argue from a value-for-money point of view that there was quite a lot of dead-weight cost in the schemes, and I think there was also some sens…”

“Good morning, witnesses. I want to raise an issue that is affecting not only my constituents but constituents quite widely, and that is retrofit schemes. Under the previous Government’s scheme there were a number of companies that went around quite aggressively selling the retrofitting of cavity wall insulation, includ…”

“Before you do, one of the reasons for universality is that targeting is simply administratively not possible. Obviously, we want to be in a position where future Ministers actually have a choice, even if on balance, and from what you have said universal is occasionally appropriate. Had we wished to target, could we hav…”

“Obviously, that sort of infrastructure will be useful not only if there is another spike, but potentially in targeting particular schemes around warm homes. We know some of the poorer homes are the worst insulated and their occupants are the most affected by fuel poverty, so they benefit the most from home insulation. …”

“And you are exploring it with the NHS to a degree.”

“But with HMRC, you feel, because of the nature of the data—”

“Thank you.”

“We talked earlier about some of the issues relating to the administrative ability to target. Looking at the impact of the programmes, my colleague Clive Betts has talked about the impact on low-income households. I would like to go a little bit further into the so-called vulnerable customers and look at how the support…”

“How many customers fall into that bracket of using traditional PPM?”

“Just to give us a sense of scale.”

“I want to make sure I have covered the prepayment meter issue. You are talking about how many vouchers were redeemed, but for this sort of scheme, these people are the most vulnerable customers and they are the hardest to reach, as you have described, particularly those on the traditional type of meter. I am keen to kn…”

“Because we keep bandying the term around, as you know from previous hearings, can you give us a sense of who you and the suppliers are defining as “vulnerable customers” for the purposes of this winter support?”

“I thank my hon. Friend for securing this debate. According to GambleAware, around one in eight people in my Shipley constituency engage in gambling behaviour that is deemed to be harmful. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West (Dr Cooper), I see gambling as an addiction and a public health issue. I therefore …”

“As the hon. Gentleman knows, he and my predecessor put the idea of a breakaway council to his own Government, who rejected it as a complete non-starter. Let us work together across Bradford for the benefit of all our constituents.”

“Will the hon. Gentleman give way?”

“Will the hon. Gentleman give way?”