Claire Coutinho
MP for East Surrey · Conservative · United Kingdom
“Control room operators at the National Energy System Operator have the life-or-death job of balancing our electricity supply and demand. If they do not get it right, we will have blackouts, and in blackouts, people die; it is that serious. That makes what I am about to say all the more extraordinary.”
“It will not look into whether the grid is being run securely, or whether there was a breach of security standards on 23 June. It does not grant anonymity to any control room operator who wants to come forward. Those who are not selected by NESO management will have to ask those managers if they can participate, if they have concerns.”
“I first raised questions on 2 June. Since then, we have had three public electricity margin notices—warnings to the market that we may be short on supply. I cannot stress enough that this is completely unprecedented. Multiple whistleblowers have now come forward. This, too, is unprecedented. I have raised this matter twice in the House.”
“Last month, I asked the Secretary of State about the risk of blackouts from the increasing instability of our electricity grid, and he accused me of scaremongering. Since then, I can inform the House that I have been contacted by a whistleblower at the heart of our grid operator, the National Energy System Operator.”
“Let us look at the facts: bills went down £500 under me, but they have gone up £300 under him. The Secretary of State said that he has raked in investment, but that is because he has promised that consumers will pay sky-high prices to wind developers for decades to come. He is decimating British industry.”
“According to the press, the Secretary of State is applying for a new job, which means that he must be in need of references. Who will he ask first: the trade unions, who are calling for him to be sacked; the public, who have faced a £300 rise in their energy bills on his watch; or the oil and gas workers, who roundly rejected him at the r…”
The complete record
Every one of 600 lines we hold for Claire Coutinho, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 2 of 12.
“We are set to have yet another Labour Government who fail to start a single new large-scale nuclear power plant, and now we hear that Natural England is adding yet more delays to Hinkley Point C for little environmental gain. Is he fighting that? No. He is defending the status quo. By the end of this Parliament we will still be waiting for a decision as to whether small modular reactors will go ahead, by 2030 there will be less nuclear online than there is now, and in 2035, which is 10 years away, the Government still will not have started any new large-scale nuclear power plants in this country. That is the same old stop-start approach that killed the industry to begin with. If that is what the Secretary of State calls being ambitious for nuclear, he needs to give his head a wobble.”
“He used up his chance; he should have asked a better question. There are some parts of this work that I welcome. The Fingleton review is impressive. I thank those involved and, as I have made clear before, we will support that work going forward. Nuclear is the only form of energy that can provide round-the-clock, totally clean power, and I will always support policies that make it as easy as possible to build. There is a catch, however. The Secretary of State says he wants to ease nuclear regulations while, at the very same time, he has cancelled the project that they would be used on. By cancelling the third large-scale nuclear power station that I signed off, he has killed the nuclear pipeline. He is repeating his own mistakes.”
“Meanwhile, today the Secretary of State is asking his Back Benchers to vote to shut down the North sea. This is the single greatest act of industrial self-harm we have seen in a generation. Only a complete wacko would respond to a supply shortage by shutting down their own oil and gas industry. We are in the absurd position of the Labour Chancellor thanking Canada and Norway for increasing their oil and gas production while her own Government are shutting down British production. And why? It is so we can be more reliant on higher-emission gas from Qatar or the US and so we can send billions of pounds to Norway to import gas from the very same basin that we could be drilling ourselves. The Government are calling this energy independence. Have they lost their mind?”
“Let me tell the hon. Lady. Under the last Labour Government, which the Energy Secretary was part of— [ Interruption. ] Let me explain. Not a single new nuclear power plant was started. When we came into power in 2015 and got control of the energy brief, there was one nuclear welder left in the country. It is the stop-start approach that kills the nuclear industry. Here is the problem: the Government have killed the pipeline again. These are the same old mistakes, and I am raising them because we are getting into the same trouble again— [ Interruption. ] The Ministers say that those were not mistakes and that it was not a mistake not to start a single new nuclear power plant. That is what they think, on the record. On to the North Sea. Andy Burnham, who is hoping to be Labour leader, talked yesterday about reindustrialisation.”
“What he is saying is that he is willing to turn his back on British industry, even though we will not need any less energy. We will rely on higher-emission imports from abroad because he cares more about the climate bureaucrats than about the jobs of British workers. That is what climate leadership means to him. Where exactly is this meant to be leading us—bankruptcy? Where does it end—cheering as the lights go out as the last factory in Britain closes? That is what the Secretary of State’s North sea and carbon tax policies are doing. They are simply offshoring British emissions to the coal-powered refineries of India, the diesel tankers bringing us gas from the US and Qatar, and the factories in Trinidad from where we are now getting our ammonia. That does not help the climate and it does not help British workers.”
“People change their minds when they look at facts— [ Interruption. ] I am not hiding from this. I think the hon. Gentleman needs to look at the overall record of the things I said in government. The first thing I said when I went into position was that we cannot impoverish ourselves in the name of net zero. I started a true costing of renewables in the Department, because we did not have a proper costing of energy. Who cancelled that work? It was the Secretary of State. I backed the North sea; I signed off Rosebank; I legislated to protect those North sea licences. Who is turning all of that around? The Secretary of State. We all know the real reason that he is doing it. He is shutting down British oil and gas to show climate leadership. He put that in the King’s Speech. Let us be crystal clear, though.”
“The North sea is a vital part of our industry. It provides us not only with the gas that we need for energy security but with the feedstock that feeds into our chemicals and plastics industries. There is a whole supply chain of other industries that rely on the North sea and on our having a successful industrial base. If we lose just one of those foundational industries, it is like dominoes: the rest will go. If we keep offshoring British emissions, it will not help the climate and it will not help British workers. Do the Government understand how bad it looks when they make speeches patting themselves on the back here in Westminster while hard-working Brits out there lose their jobs so that we can import more goods with higher emissions from abroad? That is why the vote on the North sea today should be a litmus test for them.”
“It is an energy dependence Bill that makes Britain beholden to Marine Le Pen for our electricity, to Xi Jinping for our solar panels and to Donald Trump for our gas. The Government’s plan is for energy scarcity, but what we need is energy abundance. That is why our plan would be to double down on nuclear, to axe the carbon tax to save British industry, to get Britain drilling and to make electricity cheap.”
“I will just make a bit of progress. Now let us talk about electricity. A key part of the Secretary of State’s plan is to make us more reliant on electricity imports. He does not like to talk about it, but at the height of winter, when we need it most, we will be importing twice as much electricity by 2030 as we did when this Government came into office. What does that mean? It means relying on the goodwill of France and Norway to keep the lights on in Britain. I remind the House that we are now in a situation where France is on the edge of a debt crisis, with the National Rally topping the polls. Does the House really think it prudent to hand over the keys to our electricity security to Marine Le Pen? Let us be honest, that is the Secretary of State’s plan. Whichever way we look at it, this is not an energy independence Bill.”
“I know that the hon. Gentleman’s party has changed position on this recently, and I welcome that change. As I have said, the North sea is a foundational industry. It is not just about the oil and gas it provides. It is not just about the tax revenues. It is not just about the jobs that exist within that industry. It is about all those other industries it supports, including the chemicals and plastics industries. By the way, even the renewables industry supports more drilling in the North sea, because it needs the specialist rigs, the undersea technologies and the exact same workers. There are so many industries and wider economies that the Government are killing just because of the ideological bent of this Secretary of State.”
“When he talks about reindustrialisation, they should ask him whether he supports the Secretary of State’s plans to shut down the oil and gas industry—the biggest act of industrial self-harm committed in generations. If Andy Burnham wants more powers at a local level, amen to that—I could not agree more—but Labour Members should ask him how he can argue for economic freedom in one breath, while in another dictating to people what tumble dryers or cars they have to buy. If Labour Members really cared about growth and reindustrialisation, they would axe carbon taxes, get Britain drilling, double down on nuclear and make electricity cheap. In short, they would put the national interest ahead of the Secretary of State’s ideology and vote with us tonight.”
“Andy is like the fun uncle who sits on the sidelines saying whatever he wants without anybody holding him accountable: “Let’s have ice cream for dinner! Let’s go to the zoo next week! Let’s nationalise everything! Who cares about the bond markets? Let’s rejoin the EU!” He has said whatever he liked because he has never had to pick up the bill. Now that he is actually looking at being in charge, he is having to go back on all those promises. Members should ask him this: how is he going to fund his nationalisation plans? He wants to stick to the fiscal rules. Is he really saying that he is going back to taxpayers, who already face the highest tax burden in history?”
“Families are working harder and harder and getting less and less at the end of the month. And if people want full-fat socialism, why would they choose Labour when they have the boob whisperer offering them bigger and better? Our whole system is flooded with caution. Nobody is incentivised to take any risks. That is what is making us poorer. The truth is that the personalities in the Labour leadership race do not matter. Unless we get cheap, abundant energy, remove the legal straitjackets and onerous taxes, and fix the broken regulators and the sluggish machine of government to set the economy free, nothing is going to change. If Labour Members think that Andy Burnham has the answers, let me tell them this.”
“The EU leaders themselves rail against their own energy policy. Reindustrialisation is just a meaningless slogan unless we back the North sea, axe the carbon taxes that are killing British industry and cut the cost of energy. If none of Labour’s contenders has the courage to say anything about these issues, nothing will change. Alongside cheap, abundant energy, the most important ingredient for growth is economic freedom, but the Labour party openly stands for more state control, more tax and spend, more red tape on employing people, more expensive energy, less AI, fewer profits and more subsidies. It has been on this path for two years now, and what do we have to show for it? Higher inflation, weaker growth and soaring unemployment. Why would anyone want more of this?”
“I will make a bit more progress. Here is the fundamental bind that the Labour party is in. It does not matter who its next leader is—they will all fail. Its supposedly popular leadership contenders will become unpopular very quickly when they cannot keep their promises. It happened to us in government. It is happening to Labour now. It is happening to Reform at council level. It will happen to whoever is in government next unless they face up to the trade-offs that get us better growth. Growth is the antidote to so many of our problems, but to deliver it, we need two things: cheap, abundant energy and economic freedom. By shutting down the North sea, cancelling nuclear projects and keeping a distorted electricity market in place, the Government are making energy scarce and expensive. Being part of the EU does not solve that problem.”
“I will very happily ask the Secretary of State the question— [ Interruption. ] Well, he said he would happily give way; he does not look so happy now. In government, I started work on the true costing of renewables, because the Department does not have an accurate costing of energy—it does not have an accurate costing of clean power 2030. Why has he not published one?”
“Nurses have been hounded and harassed by the NHS simply for stating that biological sex is real. The Minister met some of them at my request, and I am grateful for that, but that was months ago. What has happened since? Has she got an answer from the Nursing and Midwifery Council about how many more nurses face such witch hunts? Has she got a date from the Health Secretary for when the NHS will ensure single-sex changing rooms for staff? In short, what can she say to those hard-working nurses whose lives have been ruined by senior people in the NHS?”
“I thank the Minister, but this is the classic problem. She is not on top of her brief. She is absolutely allowed to write to regulators and ask whether they are breaking the law. Let me try another question. The Muslim Vote campaign is telling people how to vote, depending on what God they pray to. This is divisive, sectarian and has no place in Britain. The last time I asked the Minister to condemn that, she said that she was not aware of what I was describing, but in these local elections, the Muslim Vote has once again endorsed the Green party and Plaid Cymru. I will give her another chance: will she condemn this group and the divisive sectarian role it is playing in British politics?”
“It is utterly disgraceful that she had to be shamed into finally agreeing to meet with For Women Scotland a year after the ruling. We are suffering from a hierarchy of diversity where unaccountable diversity policy officers get to pick which ethnic, religious or minority groups are more worthy and deserving of special privileges. We just heard a speech that was completely devoid of any trade-offs to understand how the women on the other side of those policies would be impacted. That is not equality; it is deeply destructive and divisive. No matter which way it is cut, it always manages to leave women and girls at the bottom of the pile.”
“Without their strength and determination we would not be in the position that we are in today. I thank Trina, Marion and Susan, as well as the hon. Member for Canterbury (Rosie Duffield), for their tireless work because, Lord knows, they have all suffered for it. The Supreme Court ruling is crystal clear. In the Equality Act 2010, “man” means man, “woman” means woman, and “sex” means sex—no more legal fiction, just simple biological fact. Women and girls breathed a sigh of relief when we saw that ruling, but what have we seen from the Government since? A first-rate lesson in dither and delay and a determined effort to avoid doing their job. This is one of the most important issues on the Secretary of State’s desk.”
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I thank the hon. Member for Upper Bann (Carla Lockhart) for securing this important debate, and for her work to support single-sex spaces and nurses such as Jennifer Melle and the Darlington nurses who have been hounded and harassed for asserting that biological sex is real. On a personal point, in my interactions with the Nursing and Midwifery Council and the NHS trusts, I have had complete disinterest from people in positions of power, and an arrogance that they were right when, actually, the Supreme Court ruling showed that they were in the wrong and that those nurses—those employees who were not in positions of power—were correct. I also pay tribute to the incredible women of For Women Scotland.”
“Why did it take months for the Government to submit a “narrow set of comments” on the draft code of practice to the EHRC, and what exactly were those comments? Did the Secretary of State, as reported in The Times , instruct the EHRC to tone down the draft guidance? Will the Minister take personal responsibility for ensuring that all Government Departments are finally compliant with the Supreme Court ruling? What additional resources are the Government providing to the EHRC to help it to enforce the Supreme Court ruling and the new code of practice? Will the Minister finally name the specific day when the Secretary of State will actually lay the draft code—no more excuses, no more misdirection, no more passing the buck?”
“Frankly, women deserve better than seven months of misdirection about over-egged requirements for consultations, impact assessments and purdah for devolved elections—God help us! They deserve better than a Secretary of State refusing to withdraw the outdated and unlawful 2011 code. They deserve better than a year of Government Departments and quangos telling us that they are reviewing policies, with no end in sight. They deserve better than a Government crippled by fear, inaction, obfuscation and delay. All the while, women and girls across this country are put at risk and denied their legal rights. Hopefully, the Minister will take this opportunity to answer a few questions that might put our minds at rest.”
“It is women such as Sandie Peggie, Jennifer Melle, and the hard-working Darlington nurses who have been put through the wringer by the NHS simply for stating that biological sex is real. It is the women who have been raped and find themselves face to face with a man at a rape crisis centre, and the female prisoners who are forced to share their spaces with biologically male inmates. Countless organisations are failing to comply with the law, with absolutely no consequences. Women and girls are being denied their legal rights on a daily basis. The former chair of the EHRC, Baroness Falkner, was absolutely right; this is cowardice from a set of Ministers who are entirely captured. To quote her directly: “You have a Government led by a lawyer…yet he’s unable to uphold it in its most visible form”.”
“Before the Minister tries to fob us off with a can of red herrings about purdah and prorogation, let me say this: the Government made an announcement on potholes yesterday, but they cannot make an announcement on the importance of women’s rights. Women have waited long enough. There is no legitimate reason to delay publishing the code because of the devolved elections. They could have done the work ahead of the elections if that is what they wanted. The Equality Act is a reserved matter and the code is not specific to Scotland or Wales. The Government have made plenty of announcements; this is just another excuse for inaction. We know why they have been stalling: Labour Ministers are too scared of upsetting the gender activists on their own Back Benches to ensure that women’s rights are protected. While they stall for time, who suffers?”
“The law is clear: biological sex is real and this madness has to stop now. When it comes to the Supreme Court ruling, Ministers’ adherence to this hierarchy of diversity has left them paralysed, pulled one way by their public statements and another by their own beliefs. A whole year on from the Supreme Court ruling, the Government are still unwilling and unable to do their job and take the action needed to enforce the Equality Act. Despite the empty words of a written statement conveniently timed to pre-empt this debate, the Secretary of State has still not laid the code of practice before Parliament. Having already waited seven months, we are now sat in publication purgatory: action promised but still not delivered. All the while, out there in the real world, women and girls are paying the price.”
“If anyone complains or argues that women’s rights are important and that women have the right to safety, dignity and privacy in a compassionate society, they are labelled as bigoted. It is not bigoted to have these debates and speak up for the rights of women and girls, or to point out that this religion of diversity is now putting them in harm’s way. That culture has real, harmful consequences: women have lost their jobs; they have been hounded out of public life. Tragically, we are missing chances to stop men from killing women and girls. It is the same ideological approach that allowed biological men to force their way into female spaces, sports events and even places on public boards. The women who spoke up for their rights were treated brutally, including within the Labour party. Enough is enough.”
“I completely agree with the hon. Gentleman. The fact that a meeting with the people who brought the court case was not prioritised shows how far down the list of priorities this has been. Just this week, the teacher of the Southport killer admitted that she was silenced for raising concerns about his behaviour, after she was accused of stereotyping him as “a black boy with a knife”. The result was that he went on to kill three young girls. MI6 ran an internship that would hand a place to a private school black boy but turn away a white working-class girl who had grown up in poverty. To this day, health professionals in this country are excusing harmful cultural practices that affect women and girls, such as female genital mutilation or cousin marriage, in the name of diversity.”
“I am very grateful to Minister for giving up a moment of time. If she expects people to follow the law, can she confirm that all Government Departments are doing so?”
“This Government are taxing people up the wazoo and piling cost after cost on to their energy bills. People on £30,000 or £40,000 a year, who are not well off, are being hammered to pay for welfare when they are already working all hours to support their own families. Now we hear that the Government are about to go back to the taxpayer again to subsidise those on welfare, but their first port of call should be to adopt our cheap power plan. It would cut electricity bills by 20% for everybody by cutting green taxes and levies, and it would not cost the taxpayer a penny. Why will they not do that?”
“Will the Secretary of State be honest and tell the country why he is ideologically obsessed with shutting down the North sea? Is it because he does not think we need the £25 billion of tax revenue it would generate? Is it because he prefers to import gas with higher emissions, or is it because he has never bothered to speak to the thousands of workers who are losing their jobs right now because of his policies?”
“RenewableUK, the unions, Tony Blair and the Secretary of State’s own handpicked chair of Great British Energy—the biggest advocates for an energy transition—have said that he has got this wrong. Is his ideology so rigid that he is incapable of admitting when he has got things wrong and that he will put us on a pathway to higher emissions and fewer British jobs? Let us try again. Can the Secretary of State be clear with the House? He knows that we will need gas for decades to come, so why does he prefer to import dirtier gas from abroad than to use the gas that we have in the North sea?”
“Producing our own oil and gas has no connection with our consumption of oil and gas. The biggest barrier to electrification is not our oil and gas industry; it is the Labour party, making electricity more and more expensive by piling levies and taxes on to people’s bills. Using electricity to heat our homes or drive our cars can help make us resilient during a price spike, but the problem is that our electricity is too expensive. The Secretary of State, by piling cost after cost on to people’s electricity bills, is making the problem worse.”
“We use all the gas that we drill in the North sea. It makes up about half our supply. If we do not use our own North sea gas, by 2035, we will be three times more reliant on foreign imports of liquefied natural gas. That is much dirtier foreign gas. Why would we use that when we could use our own? The argument that it does not affect our energy security is pure misinformation from the Secretary of State, and MPs in the House today would be unwise to repeat it. Even the Climate Change Committee acknowledges that we will still need oil and gas for decades to come. If we are going to need them, we should get as much as possible from Britain. That is just common sense. Secondly, Labour says that maximising our own resources in the North sea makes us more reliant on fossil fuels. That is total rubbish.”
“What do RenewableUK, Scottish Renewables, Greg Jackson from Octopus, the chair of Great British Energy, the unions and the Tony Blair Institute all have in common? They all think that the Labour party has got this wrong; they all think that we should make the most of our oil and gas in the North sea. They are some of the most powerful advocates for clean energy in this country, they are the great and the good of the Labour left, and they all get that shutting down the North sea is an act of economic self-harm—an unforgivable own goal when it comes to Britain’s energy security. The question is: why does the Labour party not get that? Let us go through the arguments, one by one. First, the Secretary of State has argued that the North sea does not help our energy security because all the oil and gas gets sold abroad. That is rubbish.”
“I beg to move, That this House calls on the Government to remove the Energy Profits Levy, end the ban on new oil and gas licences and approve the Rosebank and Jackdaw fields to increase secure domestic energy supply; recognises that the North Sea provides half of the UK’s gas supply, supports 200,000 skilled jobs across the UK and generates billions of pounds in tax revenue; further recognises that three quarters of the UK’s energy needs are met by oil and gas, that the UK will continue to use oil and gas for decades, and that the North Sea is the UK’s most secure and lowest-carbon source of oil and gas; notes that without action to make the sector more investable, the UK risks importing 82% of its gas by 2035 at higher cost and with higher emissions; and further notes that independent analysis by Stifel shows that the Energy Profits Levy will cost the Treasury more than it raises and that reforming it would generate an additional £25 billion in tax revenues within 10 years.”
“Let us hear none of that argument today. Thirdly, the Government say that drilling will not help reduce costs for ordinary people. That is economically illiterate rubbish. We are paying tens of billions of pounds to import oil and gas from Norway from the exact same basin we could be drilling ourselves. Destroying our oil and gas industry means some £25 billion in lost tax revenue for the public finances over the next decade. The Government say they are taxing the wealthy. Are they in the real world? They are taxing anybody with a pulse: pensioners, middle earners, small businesses, farmers, drivers—if they breathe, the Government are taxing them, and people are suffering. The Government could instead be getting that tax revenue from a thriving industry.”
“We do need to take some of the green taxes and levies off electricity bills. The problem is that if the Government keep making electricity more expensive, no one will want to use it. That is why our policy is the opposite of theirs. We believe that we should make electricity cheap by taking off green taxes and levies, and that has nothing to do with the North sea. Drilling in the North sea does not stop anyone buying an electric car. It does not stop us building nuclear, of which I am a strong advocate, and nor does it stop us building wind or solar for that matter. The Government say that drilling in the North sea leaves us tied to fossil fuels, but why? They need only look to Norway to see that that is not true. It makes the most of its own oil and gas resources, but lots of people drive electric vehicles there.”
“The Labour party says that it cares about that and that climate change is the biggest threat to our national security—its words, not mine—but it has a choice today: we can be three times more reliant on that dirtier LNG shipped across the Atlantic or shipped in from the middle east, or we could use our own gas with four times fewer emissions. Do the Government prefer virtue signalling and higher emissions under the Secretary of State, or more jobs and lower emissions under our plans to back the North sea?”
“Fourthly, on climate, Labour will say that drilling our own oil and gas in the North sea is “climate vandalism”—I am quoting the Secretary of State—but that is patent rubbish. Every drop of gas that we do not drill ourselves, we import from abroad instead. The liquified natural gas that we import has four times the emissions of gas that we could get from the North sea. LNG, for those who do not know, has to be frozen to minus 150ºC, shipped in diesel-chugging tankers, then heated up here. That is why it has much higher emissions overall.”
“The hon. Lady might like to know that oil and gas jobs have been stable for the past six years, but we are losing 1,000 jobs a month because of the Government’s policies. I know that because I have been to Aberdeen; perhaps she would like to do the same. We also saw yesterday that the markets are charging us 5% for our borrowing. That is because they think we borrow too much and earn too little. There is an easy way for the country to earn some more money: we can make the most of our own resources and back the North sea, which would drive down costs for everyone. It is unfashionable at the moment to talk about balance of payments, but if we keep sending billions of pounds abroad and rack up the credit card bill, that causes costs for everybody.”
“We are in an energy crisis, and he could speed things up if he chose to do so. Jackdaw alone could produce enough gas to heat more than 1.5 million homes. Labour’s Chancellor commended Norway and Canada for drilling more— [ Interruption. ] That is what she said last week. She said that “every country has got to play their part” by generating more oil and gas. Government Members should ask themselves why their party position seems to be to support the oil and gas industry anywhere but Britain.”
“The two Ministers are Scottish MPs. They have been to industry, and they know what people in those areas are saying. They know the jobs that are being lost. It is so blindingly obvious that we should use things that we make in this country, rather than using dirtier imports from abroad. The question they need to ask themselves is, why is it that their Secretary of State cannot see the truth? Fifthly, the Government say that new fields will take too long to get up and running. That is dangerous, short-termist rubbish. Jackdaw and Rosebank could be up and running by Christmas. They have been sat on the Secretary of State’s desk gathering dust. The Government are hiding behind the process. I was part of the process, and it is in the Secretary of State’s gift—it is up to him to make the assessment.”
“The idea that one should ban industry if it does not change prices in this country is, let us be clear, an argument to shut down all business in this country. There are benefits to making things in Britain: jobs, tax revenue and self-reliance. The Labour party used to understand that.”
“The question that the Government need to answer is this: what reason do RenewableUK or their very own chair of Great British Energy have to back the North sea if it does not give us those very things? Maybe—just maybe—it is time for the Government to admit that their Secretary of State has approached his role with a dangerous, blinkered ideology, rather than being interested in the national interest. Perhaps even they realise that they are once more being marched up the hill on the wrong side of history and on the wrong side of public opinion, when we all know that there will be an inevitable U-turn from the Prime Minister and the Chancellor in a few weeks’ time. It is mad at the best of times not to want to make the most of our own resources.”
“I would thank the hon. Lady, but I do not think it takes much effort to read out a Whip’s question. The question she needs to answer is why she is supporting a policy that will increase British emissions. She is supporting a policy that means we are importing goods with higher emissions. I have laid out five bad arguments that have been thoroughly disproved by people outside this Chamber whom the Government supposedly respect. Those five bad arguments spun by the Secretary of State should be consigned to history. What the North sea can give us is what it has been doing all along: stronger energy security, a stronger environment and a stronger economy. Are those not things that we want the next generation to have?”
“My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. In the trade wars that we saw last year, China limited the export of several rare earth minerals that are critical components in the renewable supply chain. An energy system that is dominated by renewables is one that is completely reliant on China, and that is why we think it is the wrong approach. It is mad at the best of times not to want to make the most of our own resources, but in the middle of a supply crisis, it is completely unforgivable. Yet that is exactly what Labour MPs will vote for today. They are on the wrong side of history on this one. They should put their disastrous Secretary of State’s zealotry to one side, fast-track Rosebank and Jackdaw, reverse their disastrous bans and taxes, and put our energy resilience over their narrow political interests by backing the North sea.”
“I think those are the strongest words I have heard from the hon. Member in my entire time in Parliament, and the Government would be wise to heed them. At the moment, we share the same basin with Norway. Last year, Norway drilled 46 new wells and made 21 new discoveries, while we drilled zero wells for the first time since 1964. This is exactly the same basin. There is not a geological difference; it is a political line drawn down the middle. It is quite clear that it is the approach of Labour and the Secretary of State that is driving the industry into the ground.”
“I know that the right hon. Gentleman’s party has a chequered past in backing the North sea, but I would be happy to work with anyone to look at how we can support the industry. My position is clear. At the moment, we are taxing companies at a marginal rate of 100%, we are banning new licences—the only country in the world to do so—and we are making ourselves more reliant on dirtier gas from abroad, when we could be using our own resources and taking in £25 billion of tax receipts. That is why I urge the Labour party—the party that used to be the party of workers, the party of industry and the party that understood aspiration in this country—to put itself on the right side of history and vote for the motion today.”
“Can the hon. Lady explain why the production of oil and gas makes us more reliant on the consumption of oil and gas? Will she consider the example of Norway, which, despite exporting oil and gas, and getting tax revenue from it, has high electric vehicle penetration? Why does she conflate these issues?”