Speeches by Shanks.

“Thank you, Mr Efford, for chairing this debate. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester (Tom Collins) for securing it and for all his experience in this area, which is of great value to me and the Government. It is an important topic. I will speak more broadly about the issue of energy resilience, and then come…”

“My hon. Friend has been a champion of these issues for a long time, and it will not surprise him or the House to hear that I entirely agree with him; clean, cheap and secure is absolutely right. We know that because when we invited many countries around the world to the energy security summit last week, it was clear th…”

“I am not aware of the specific circumstances mentioned at the end of the right hon. Gentleman’s question, but I am happy to look into that particular case. The broader point is that we do not see licensing for new oil and gas and fracking as part of our future, and there is a presumption against fracking in other parts…”

“I am afraid that I do not accept anything that the right hon. Gentleman has just said. He said in his first breath that it was right to wait for the outcomes of an investigation and then prejudged that investigation with his own conclusions. I want to wait for some evidence from the authorities on that. The right hon. …”

“I will take that interesting point on surge protection away and speak to my colleagues in the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. On the wider point around inertia, as the system changes, there is a constant balancing job for the National Energy System Operator to make sure that we design a system th…”

“I thank the hon. Lady for that important question. I was here after Storm Éowyn, when we discussed that a number of people who no longer had a copper wire line were not able to contact emergency services. It was a really important point. There is resilience built into the mobile phone network to ensure that masts shoul…”

“Madam Deputy Speaker, I think you need to make a ruling on drawing marathon-related puns in the House to an end, but the subject is a really important one. Of course, that is why we are in this sprint towards building more network infrastructure—[Interruption.] Thank you. There are two really important things to recogn…”

“I say to the right hon. Gentleman: never say never. I am sure he has it in him. I entirely agree with the right hon. Gentleman. In the news we saw the impact on day-to-day life of what happened in Spain and Portugal, and he is absolutely right that if that was to go on for longer than a few days, there would be quite s…”

“I thank my hon. Friend for the question. He raises what we are doing to deploy technologies in the clean power system to make it more resilient, and rotating stabilisers in particular. Those technologies were introduced in some cases by the previous Government, so there was recognition of their importance and we will c…”

“I will not be drawn on an individual commercial arrangement that a project may or may not have. As I have outlined, in any investment case the Government will carry out a number of checks, one of which will always be a national security check, so these questions will be looked at. I reject the suggestion that there wou…”

“I thank my hon. Friend for that question and for drawing attention to my appalling time in the marathon. [Interruption.] That is kind of the shadow Secretary of State. My hon. Friend made an important point. The serious response to an unprecedented incident like this is to take stock of what happened, to introduce some…”

“I am happy to agree with the right hon. Member on his final point. Small modular reactors will play a really important part and are an exciting proposition that the UK can be at the forefront of. The technology competition will conclude shortly. On the broader point, we get to the heart of the contradiction. The Conser…”

“The right hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell) made a point yesterday about black start, and it is one that the Secretary of State will take away, particularly around black-start capabilities across the whole UK. On the Acorn point, we have said on a number of occasions that it is a r…”

“May I thank the hon. Gentleman, because that is a really important question and one that the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster has been wrestling with? Under all Governments there are individual Departments that take a responsibility and there are Departments that lead on parts of this, and the covid inquiry has rai…”

“The hon. Gentleman brings his customary sunny demeanour to his questions and I am grateful for that on this of all days. First, I am giving this statement because a number of hon. Members across the House asked questions of the Government on this issue, and it is right that the Government respond to such questions. In …”

“While Great Britain’s energy network is incredibly resilient and robust, there are outages for a whole range of reasons. The system continues to function, as it did entirely, without any concern at all, in the instance he raises. While it is not a regular occurrence, outages do happen in any system, particularly in the…”

“My hon. Friend always makes his point in his particular style—perhaps a more political style than I will use from this Dispatch Box, but Inspector Clouseau is a new one that I will certainly add to my list. My hon. Friend raises an important point. The broader point here is that we do not know the causes of the outages…”

“Indeed. I apologise and will prioritise it for my weekend reading. What I did see is that the Tony Blair Institute outlined very clearly its support for clean power as an important transition for this country. The shadow Minister earlier said that this was all about wind and solar, but that has never been the position …”

“My hon. Friend raises an important point. The issue of cyber-security across our critical national infrastructure becomes more and more important day by day. As our energy system becomes more complex and as smart systems become part of how we all interact with our daily lives, there are increased risks. That is why the…”

“I anticipated the right hon. Gentleman’s question after his first few words. I think the Secretary of State gave him an answer yesterday. This is a private proposal that has come to Government for consideration. It has not been driven forward by Government. We are considering it at the moment and, as I think the Secret…”