Contribution
I thank the hon. Member for Cheltenham (Max Wilkinson) for introducing the Bill. I will try not to cloud the Chamber too much with puns; I will leave it to other hon. Members to shower the room with them. [Laughter.] It’s so painful.
I am glad that the Bill has been brought forward. There are so many good things in it, and I want to ensure that the country as a whole can embrace the future of solar power generation where people live, right in the heart of communities and on their homes. I have moved in the past year or so to ground level, as many people in my constituency know and frequently comment about on Facebook. I have lived most of my adult life in tower blocks, and one of the great things about 1960s council tower blocks is that there are fantastic views over everybody’s roofs. In all the decades I lived in those tower blocks, it was apparent that we are missing out in this country. So much acreage on rooftops is empty and devoid of power generation, while other countries have leapt ahead and taken advantage.
At the same time, I have seen where this has not quite worked. I watched a new council housing block being built right next to the previous place I lived in. Over its rooftops, I saw the solar panels go in and then saw what the problems were, where the management company and the local council were not quite able to make it work and to generate power for people there. The solar panels were for a long time unused and not functioning. That is the sign of a technology that was not quite mature, and it is only in the past five years that that has happened.
When, like me, Members go around their constituencies, they will see lots of solar panels on houses and have lots of conversations with people in pubs who have installed them on their houses. Some people will have had a great experience and will talk at length about how it has reduced their bills, and unfortunately others tell of the problems and challenges of getting connected to the grid and making it work. That is not a reason not to do it, but it is a reason to have a clear eye as we go forward on this change. Hopefully, the Minister will talk about how we can ensure that this policy is successful in future.
There are loads of opportunities, but we should not lose sight of other opportunities as well. One of the most impressive things I have seen in my constituency from an industrial side is the cluster of factories around Kemsley paper mill from DS Smith. A third of the cardboard produced in the UK is recycled in that one location. It is part of a set of factories that use their waste products and heat to generate power themselves in a circular carbon economy. A key part is more traditional forms of power production. For instance, all the cardboard that is not used in those factories and that cannot be recycled is turned into electricity, and carbon capture is used. The carbon capture process is then used to support work in other factories, such as the production of plasterboard, and the waste heat is used.
The factories are already doing great work, and they want to expand further with solar power, particularly on an old landfill site, which is perfectly placed. That is a great opportunity, but there are also the factory roofs. Not all the buildings are suitable, but as we build on that cluster and can generate power locally, and as we build more homes around them and in that area to provide power, solar power has an important part to play. I very much want to see that we are able to change our building regulations and to ensure they meet the needs and opportunities from factories, but, at the same time, we must not close our eyes to the fact that there are many other ways of ensuring that we reach a zero-carbon future.
Fixing the housing crisis is absolutely not mutually exclusive with fixing the climate crisis. The hon. Member rightly identified the cost of living crisis and the climate crisis. I would add in the housing crisis as a third part of that, and I can see he does not disagree.