Speeches by Miliband.

“There is a broader point here that I want to touch on, which is that, in general, the grid delays we have are enormous. That is because we had a first come, first served system and we have ended up with more than 700 GW of capacity queuing up in the system, and lots of capacity that is not needed for 2030. It is import…”

“We have moved to a much more intentional approach. Some people will therefore have to wait their turn. I am afraid that is tough because we have a national interest here.”

“I do not believe that is what is going to happen. I know you had Fintan Slye before the Committee on this. There were some concerns in the solar industry. Reassurance has been provided about grandfathering. We could decide not to reorder the queue—I know you are not suggesting this, but we could just leave this in plac…”

“Let me go to the bigger picture and then I will come to your question, because if I am frank with you, Chair, I think there has been quite a lot of nonsense talked about last week and quite a lot of scaremongering. I do want to deal with it directly. First, I want to quote the NESO. They said at no point were electrici…”

“Just explain your question, if you would, Chair.”

“I think it goes to the overall picture of bills and so on. I have read some of the testimony on this in the evidence to you. The key thing about this is that, as we said in our manifesto, a clean power system—this is the definition of the CCC and others—always has a strategic reserve of gas on the system. The key quest…”

“That is not the way we are thinking about the role of GB Energy at the moment. We have the capacity market to provide the dispatchable power that we need and GB Energy—maybe we will come on to this—has lots of other priorities. For the present time, we think the capacity market with privately owned gas-fired power stat…”

“Overall, what I pick up from the sector—this is not meant to sound complacent or self-congratulatory—is that they want a sense of direction and we are giving them a sense of direction. Going back to the conversation we had earlier, setting out the ranges of different technologies that we want builds confidence. Consent…”

“The first thing to say is that long-duration storage has an important role to play in our mission. It enables the electricity system to store wind and solar power when it is plentiful and when it is most needed. It is also important to say that no long-duration storage capacity has been built in a number of decades. Th…”

“Why don’t we write to you with a more detailed answer on that issue?”

“It is interesting that you ask this question. We have a tendency to think that the future is going to look like the past. I think that batteries, long-duration storage and consumer-led flexibility will play a much bigger role in the energy system than maybe some people anticipate. There is real potential in these areas…”

“I know you had Fintan Slye before you. I think the NESO report reached an important conclusion, which is that even though there are significant costs to building a clean power system—and this is the central insight of our work—the cheaper wholesale costs you get from a clean power system mean there is scope for lower b…”

“Let me deal with that directly. The British people choose the Government here and the American people choose the American President. It is important for our country, whoever the President is, to work with them and find common ground. No doubt there will be areas of disagreement with the incoming President Trump. He wil…”

“I will just say, on the Aberdeen chamber of commerce, that I do not include them in this. It is important for us to work with our North sea communities, including the Aberdeen chamber of commerce, OEUK and others. We may have slightly divergent perspectives on certain issues but we share a lot of common ground as well.…”

“This is the right question, and this is something that we are determined to work on with industry, trade unions and workers. We will be consulting soon on our licensing policy, but it is going to be much more than that. It is going to be about how we build this future. You mentioned the skills passport, which has been …”

“I cannot guarantee you of that, but I have read your questions about this community share issue, which is interesting. Our GB Energy local power plan is absolutely about that idea. If you talk to RWE, for example, they say, “As a matter of course in other countries such as Germany, we might be building significant onsh…”

“I think the reality is that the concentration in supply chains has been built up over a long period. I am afraid it is because the last Government did not take the view that we needed to build in Britain, at least not sufficiently. I have a different view, which is that it really matters that we build our own supply ch…”

“I said to Torcuil that our dialogue with Aberdeen chamber of commerce, OEUK and others is important, and it is partly that dialogue—obviously I do not determine tax policy, and I should be very careful not to suggest that I do—that led to some changes to capital allowances that the Chancellor announced in the Budget. T…”

“We could have gone on for hours.”

“Of course.”