Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)

My Lords, I thank noble Lords for their valuable contributions to this debate, which reflected the relatively uncontroversial— I would have thought—nature of the regulations. As I said, these fees regulations will enable OPRED to recover its costs for the provision of regulatory services under the offshore oil and gas environmental regulatory regime, as opposed to such costs being passed on to the taxpayer. The change to the hourly rates will increase OPRED’s annual fees from £6.7 million to around £7.3 million per annum, reflecting the current cost of providing environmental regulatory activities to the offshore sector. On chargeable activities, OPRED considers the environmental implications of all offshore oil and gas operations before issuing permits and consents covering areas as diverse as seismic surveys, marine licences, oil pollution, emergency plans, chemical permits, oil discharge permits and consent to locate permission for offshore isolation. This SI is not ideologically based. In essence, it is the specialists putting up the fees by £9 and the support staff doing so by £10. The work that OPRED undertakes is very important for the rest of the industry and the North Sea. I want to answer some of the points noble Lords raised. As far as micro industries are concerned, these regulations will affect only about 100 companies working in the North Sea. As far as consultation is concerned, any further fee increases will be subject to industry consultation and strategic clarity; that is important. None of those who were consulted this time round responded, but I think that this means that people were content with the fact that they were seeing these fees go up by £9 and £10, which increased the burden on the whole of the industry by £500,000. OPRED’s costs ensure that we can continue both to provide effective environmental regulatory services and to adapt to changing requirements, such as changes to the environmental impact assessment guidance. As far as the North Sea basin is concerned, I do think that it has a future; we are going to be taking fossil fuels out of the basin for decades to come. It will also be an area where we can transform from taking fossil fuels out of the sea to wind and carbon capture, to ensure that we progress to net zero and that our energy is homegrown. As noble Lords know, gas prices are sorted out internationally, so if we have homegrown energy, we will have more control over it. That is what we want to see. With that, I hope that the Committee can agree to the fees going up by £9 and £10. I beg to move.