Clause 2 - Objectives and activities

Part of UK Infrastructure Bank Bill [Lords] – in a Public Bill Committee at 9:25 am on 22 November 2022.

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Photo of Abena Oppong-Asare Abena Oppong-Asare Shadow Exchequer Secretary (Treasury) 9:25, 22 November 2022

I thank the hon. Member for South Ribble for her comments, but I do not fully agree with her, because I feel that the Government have not done enough. There has also been a cancellation of Northern Powerhouse Rail and a dismal failure to invest properly in renewable energy and to take decisions on nuclear; there has been a lack of strategy and planning. That has happened under this Tory Government in the last 12 years.

The Government’s track record does not provide much confidence. The Government set up the Green Investment Bank 10 years ago and sold it to a private equity group five years ago, with the Public Accounts Committee concluding that the Government had focused on

“how much money could be gained from the sale over the continued delivery of GIB’s green objective.”

We would not want to encourage a similar short-lived path—