Lord Whitehead (Lab)

I thank noble Lords for their important contributions to this debate. I did not hear any particular dissent from the idea that this is a good thing that will help British supply chains in offshore wind and, we hope, onshore wind, to develop significantly in the future. That will be done through a process whereby, in future rounds, those bidding for services will put in, as a pre-bid to the AR7, AR8 or AR9 bid itself, a notice of intent about what they will do as far as British supply chains are concerned and how they will source from them. When they get the additional CfD arrangement for doing that, the money will be released only when those commitments have been met. It is not a “money for pie in the sky” arrangement; it is very much a “money for pie firmly affixed to the ground” arrangement for the future. Of course, one can never be sure exactly what commitments will be made by people putting forward their proposals to get into a particular realm but, certainly in AR7, they have covered all sorts of aspects of the supply chain, including port infrastructure, et cetera. The noble Earl raised the question of port development. A lot of investment is going into ports in general at the moment, and into the ability of ports to provide the sites for fabrication, et cetera, for offshore wind, as well as making sure that the ports are as well equipped as possible for Sea Jack-type erection vessels and so on. The idea is to thoroughly uprate investment in ports to support the offshore wind energy industry of the future. The noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, was concerned about the fair work charter. I just looked it up: it appears on the government website and seems, pretty substantially, to be a final document. I am sorry not to have got my speech finished before the Division.