Barry Gardiner – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Energy and Climate Change

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Gardiner on 2016-04-18.

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, whether her Department has prepared contingency plans relating to interconnection with the continental electricity grid in the event of the UK voting to leave the EU.

Amber Rudd

At the February European Council, the Government negotiated a new settlement, giving the United Kingdom a special status in a reformed European Union. The Government’s position, as set out by my rt. hon. Friend the Prime Minister to the House on 22 February, is that the UK will be stronger, safer and better off remaining in a reformed EU.

We currently expect our electricity interconnector capacity with Europe to double by the early 2020s with studies showing they could deliver benefits to British consumers of almost £12 billion over 25 years. As the White Paper that the Government published in February on the process for withdrawing from the European Union makes clear, a vote to leave the EU would lead to a prolonged period of uncertainty, including on the nature of our access to the EU’s single energy market.