Schedule 21 - First-year allowances for expenditure wholly for a ring fence trade
Finance Bill
5:30 pm
Mr Howard Flight (Arundel and South Downs, Conservative)
I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Fylde for his intervention. The Financial Secretary is being cavalier, and I shall repeat the commonsense point to which she has not responded. Shutting down a field means that there is no chance of recovery. Mothballing is done deliberately in order to leave scope for further recovery when oil prices rise. There is an obvious inconsistency in shutting-down expenditure qualifying while mothballing expenditure does not. The policy is irrational.
My right hon. Friend did not ask for the exact figure today, which would be unreasonable. There is, however, a difference between £10 million and £90 million. My understanding is that, relative to the total picture, the materiality would not be that great. Rather than suggesting that closing down should not get the allowance and all mothballing should get it, it is easier simply to say that all mothballing should get it.
This is not a huge point, but the Government would be wise to keep their mind open and look at the measure's effect. If the result of not extending the allowance were to be that many marginal fields were closed down rather than mothballed, yet again the Government would have shot themselves through the foot. There is little point in pressing the amendment to a vote, but the Government should take a more in-depth approach to the matter. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Schedule 21, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 63 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Schedule 22 agreed to.