Speeches by Billington.

“Current global instability, from Ukraine to Venezuela, has shown the vital importance of having domestic energy security. Does the Secretary of State agree that investing in renewables will help with both security and cost, particularly because they are cheaper to build and operate, as well as providing us with vital e…”

“19. Whether he has made an estimate of the cost of building new gas-fired power stations.”

“Does the hon. Member agree with the principle that just because he does not like something, that does not mean it should not be produced? There is a wide variety of BBC productions that we may not watch, but that does not mean that we do not think they should exist.”

“I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. When talking about increasing the opportunities for young people in my constituency, I find it frustrating when people say that young people need more aspiration. I remind them that, frankly, young people need a bus service that gets them to where they can fulfil the aspirati…”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Mundell. London’s Freedom Pass model is the envy of older residents across England, and it has become embedded in the expectations of many that free public transport is one of the benefits of living in our capital city. However, free travel for older residents is not t…”

“My hon. Friend is being very generous with his time. Not only do seven of the 10 most deprived areas appear to be in Blackpool, but all 10 of the top 10 are in coastal communities, as are 50% of the top 50. We who represent coastal communities do not want to indulge in any kind of deprivation bingo. Instead, we want th…”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Efford. I rise to speak in this debate simply because I love Jane Austen and all her works. We commemorate her in this debate, as we did on the 250th anniversary of her birth on Tuesday. Today, there has been a statement in the House on the Government’s launch of their…”

“Does my right hon. Friend share my concern that, in the run-up to Christmas, NHS staff will be having to change their Christmas plans to cover emergency shifts as a result of this ridiculous strike, and patients will have emergency operations, and indeed scheduled operations, cancelled?”

“Thirty-five years. In the intervening 35 years we have built up a carbuncled system that is teetering like—I am going to mix my metaphors—something that is about to fall over if we say, “Actually we need to change that”. Each time, rather than change it or take it off we add something else and then wonder why it is tee…”

“How many years?”

“Is that because there was a clear strategic direction that the markets were going to deliver, and over the intervening—how many years is it since we privatised the energy system?”

“If it is abated, that does not make the same economic sense, does it?”

“I am just going to ask one more question because I know I am being annoying, sorry. In that circumstance is there a risk that if you are paying for the cost of investment and not the amount of energy that you use that the bill disincentivises energy efficiency?”

“Do you have a proposal for what we should do as an alternative to that outcome?”

“Okay. When you are talking about the investment cost—and it is the chunk of money that is on your bill to reflect the cost of investment—how different would that be from basically a big chunk of money to make the system work? It would still feel like a big chunk of money that you spend.”

“Forgive me, Professor, I know I do not know very much about this in comparison to you, but when I look at my energy bill and when we have been talking about network costs and policy costs and people’s usage, that is how it feels. It feels like I am paying that amount of money. If I spend any time thinking about it at a…”

“Is that not what we effectively have with the network costs chunk plus your use on top of that?”

“Apologies for being late. Professor Grubb, I am interested in your idea about consumers having access for the cost of investment on bills. What would that look like?”

“I am just going to ask one more question because I know I am being annoying, sorry. In that circumstance is there a risk that if you are paying for the cost of investment and not the amount of energy that you use that the bill disincentivises energy efficiency?”

“Is this too counter to the way we currently run our system for it to be a natural step in part of our transition?”