March 2026

Families will be deeply concerned about the impacts they are facing as a result of the Iran conflict. This Government are determined to fight the people’s corner. As a result of actions in the Budget, the energy bill price cap will fall from next week and is guaranteed till the end of June. We have already provided £50 million of immediate support for vulnerable customers who use heating oil and will act to prevent unfair practices like price gouging. Above all, we will work to end this conflict

My hon. Friend is absolutely right about that. It is an important reassurance for understandably worried families that, from 1 April, the energy price cap will fall by £117 thanks to this Government’s actions. That happened not automatically, but because the Chancellor made decisions in the Budget to raise taxes on the wealthiest, which was opposed by the Conservative party. That decision is making possible that relief for families, including those in her constituency.

The hon. Member is right about this country’s exposure to fossil fuels, and that is the legacy of the previous Government. I am incredibly proud to say that, as a result of our two record-breaking renewables auctions, we will power the equivalent of 23 million homes. She is also right to say that the decoupling of gas and electricity prices is an important issue, on which we are working intensively.

The hon. Gentleman asks an important question. The reason why we decided to put the money into the crisis and resilience fund three weeks after this crisis began was to get the money out the door quickly. During the previous crisis, that took 200 days. He asks an important question about local authorities’ provision of support and also what happens if they do not have the funds. That is something on which we are working intensively, and we are keeping closely in touch with local authorities. We

We published the levelised cost analysis, which showed that new renewables were much cheaper to build and operate. As gas prices are soaring across the world and hitting us here at home, the idea that the Conservative party still opposes our renewables auction, which gives us clean home-grown power on which we can rely, is absolutely nonsensical.

Families in the right hon. Lady’s constituency will see savings on their bills from next week thanks to the actions of this Government. She is wrong on her facts, because, if we look across 2025, we will see that bills were lower in real terms than in 2024. We remain absolutely committed to our manifesto commitment to cut bills by up to £300 by 2030.

Public services across the country, including schools and hospitals—I hope this will come to the hon. Member’s constituency—are seeing reductions in their bills, and money is being transferred to the frontline. We on the Government Benches support those proposals. We support lower bills. As I said to the right hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Wendy Morton), he can look forward to his constituents having lower bills as a result of this Government’s actions.

My hon. Friend makes the really important, and relatively basic, point that gas is priced and sold on the international market. Whether it comes from the North sea or is imported, it is charged at the same price. And do not just take my word for it; when the shadow Energy Secretary was in post she said that more drilling would not necessarily lead to lower energy bills.

My hon. Friend raises a really important point, and no doubt the Chancellor will cover this in her statement shortly. It is incredibly important that we protect the most vulnerable, particularly at this time. I am proud of the action we have taken to nearly double the number of people getting the warm home discount to 6 million people. This very important action will take another £150 off people’s bills, so in a sense, we have a form of a social tariff, but I assure my hon. Friend that we will k

First, let me congratulate my hon. Friend’s council on its great work. The Government are putting hundreds of millions more this coming year into warm homes as part of our record-breaking investment. I hope we can agree across the House that investing in home upgrades is a way to not just have more energy efficiency but cut people’s bills. We are committed to going as far and as fast as we can.

My hon. Friend makes a really important point. The Conservatives come here month after month making the same argument about something that will not reduce bills by a single penny. It was they who said that during the last crisis and when they were in government. This Labour Government are about reducing people’s energy bills, which is the priority of the British people.

The Conservatives’ plan is totally incredible, and the shadow Secretary of State knows it. Their plan on renewables is just to tear up the contracts. They had 14 years to do it, and they did not do it. Why? Because they know that they cannot. I have to say, it is quite extraordinary that her position is now to abolish the windfall tax, which has raised £12 billion since it was introduced in 2022. The difference between us and them is that we are willing to tax the oil and gas companies to help o

We are driving forward with contracts for difference, and we are looking at that proposal. On the hon. Gentleman’s more general point, though, he is absolutely right that rolling out renewables at speed—solar, wind, all types of renewables—is the best way to insulate ourselves from global economic shocks. That is a point that we have consistently made, which sadly is being borne out by the events we see around the world.

First, I accept the hon. Member’s congratulations on our announcement of the future homes standards today, which are a really important measure—they should never have been abolished by the last Conservative Government. On warehouses and car parks—particularly on the warehouse question—we are looking at how we can roll that out more swiftly. There is so much unused space that could be used to help cut bills right across the country.

The UK benefits from a strong and diverse energy supply, with only 1% of our crude oil and gas coming from the Gulf, but the essential lesson of this conflict is that while we are dependent on fossil fuel markets, we are exposed as a country, because prices for oil and gas, wherever it comes from, are set on the international market, affecting families and businesses. For our energy security, the answer must be to go further and faster towards home-grown clean power that we control.

The North sea will continue to play an important role in our energy mix for decades to come, which is why we said in our manifesto that we will keep existing oil and gas fields open for their lifetime, including, as we announced last autumn, the use of so-called tiebacks. My hon. Friend is absolutely right in the wider point he makes. That is why we have the largest nuclear building programme in half a century, it is why we have had two record-breaking renewables auctions, and it is why we recen

I disagree with the right hon. Lady on that one. As I said in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh East and Musselburgh (Chris Murray), we are going to use existing North sea oil and gas fields for their lifetime. I think the right hon. Lady is referring to the question of exploration licences. What everybody says is that exploration licences make no material difference to production levels. On the tax question, I hope she will carry on supporting the windfall tax and will tell her

My hon. Friend is right. Those people offer no short-term or long-term solution to the problems of energy security, and they want to fly in the face of all the evidence. As I have said before, it was the last Government who said that more UK production of North sea oil and gas would make no difference to the global price of gas, and it is important that the House understands that.

No, it is not. The hon. Gentleman is entitled to his own opinions, but he is not entitled to alternative facts. What the last Government said, what this Government said and what every sensible economist says about more production is that his idea of more drilling—“drill every last drop,” or “drill, baby, drill”— would be precisely the wrong thing for our country because it will make no difference to the price. The answer is home-grown clean renewables that we control.

This party and this Government are taking a pragmatic approach to these issues. We are using existing oil and gas fields for their lifetime, including with tiebacks, which is welcomed by industry, but we are not going to fly in the face of the evidence. The answer to a fossil fuels crisis is not to double down on fossil fuels, but to double down on clean home-grown power that we control. The Conservatives used to believe that, before they jumped on another bandwagon.