Andrew Bowie

My hon. Friend will not be at all surprised to learn that I agree with him entirely. It is purely the imposition on this country of arbitrary, needless targets, such as clean power by 2030, to generate headlines and get the Secretary of State’s name up in lights that is requiring us to become more reliant on the People’s Republic of China for the goods, technology and equipment to develop the solar farms, nearly all of which will be tainted by slave labour in some way, given the reliance on slave labour in part of that country for that infrastructure and technology. So of course I agree with him, and of course it would be much better if we were issuing new licences and continuing to support our own domestic oil and gas industry. That is something that we have debated time and again, and I am sure we will come back to this House to debate it again in the future. Great British Energy is not great, it is not British and it will not generate any energy. Public funds should not be—must not be—funding imports tainted by modern slavery and slave labour. British taxpayers deserve better: a domestic supply chain that creates jobs at home rather than funding abuses abroad. That is why we support Lords amendment 2, and I urge Labour Members to do the right thing today and vote for it as well.