Martin Horwood (Shadow Minister (Environment), Environment, Food & Rural Affairs; Cheltenham, Liberal Democrat)

I hesitate to follow the hon. Gentleman, who clearly speaks from a very expert and knowledgeable perspective. However, I too, was intrigued to know how on earth this could literally be done. We have talked about the powers of the Secretary of State being very wide, but the power to give a direction in respect of a “relevant stratum” of a geological storage area, seems an extraordinarily technical power to give to a Secretary of State. I would be interested to know in respect of subsection (3)—I am not sure that the Minister quite explained this and I am not familiar with the Petroleum Act—[Interruption.] perhaps my researcher is not familiar with it. What exactly is the significance of being regarded or not being regarded as

“ resulting in the boring for or getting of petroleum”

for these purposes? What is the practical relevance of that? If the extraction of oil from a geological area of this type constituted boring for petroleum, what would that mean in practical terms for the operation of this facility?

That reflects an underlying worry that this is an example of gold-plating—that there is a rather extreme level of detail in the provision that might be better dealt with in more flexible regulation. The worry is that we run the risk that if, for instance, enhanced oil recovery becomes viable unexpectedly in the course of the operation of one of these facilities, the Secretary of State will have almost boxed themselves into a situation in which a particular regime applies to that and there is not sufficient flexibility to allow it to take place on a viable or commercial basis. I would therefore welcome clarification if possible of exactly what the implications are of this near overlap with the petroleum licensing requirements.

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