Richard Graham – 2022 Speech on Government Support for Marine Renewables

The speech made by Richard Graham, the Conservative MP for Gloucester, in Westminster Hall, the House of Commons, on 7 December 2022.

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) on securing this timely debate, and for his continued, strong advocacy for both marine energy in his constituency and the great work done by EMEC—which he has referred to—and, more widely, for the cause of marine energy across the United Kingdom. It is interesting that, in this small but passionate debate, we have representatives from constituencies across all parts of the United Kingdom; this is a sector that, in geographical terms, wonderfully complements the work that is being done on offshore wind on the east coasts of both England and Scotland.

I pay tribute—unusually, perhaps, in such a debate—to the Department. BEIS has played a huge role in recognising the value of tides and waves, and the cause of marine energy, to renewable energy made in the UK: it contributes to the energy baseload, domestic energy security, community sustainability—that is an aspect that should not be overlooked—and the creation of green jobs around the northern, western and southern coasts of our island. The work of the Department includes both officials, who have worked hard on the detail, and the commitment of Ministers. The right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland may have referred to this, but that was epitomised by the visit of the previous energy Minister but two, my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Anne-Marie Trevelyan), to EMEC in summer 2021, and by the commitment of the Secretary of State at the time—the former Chancellor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Spelthorne (Kwasi Kwarteng)—who was absolutely committed to the business of recognising that support for marine energy would be one of the best long-term investments that this country could make. Of course, the truth is that, in adding a separate pot in allocation round 4, the Department effectively moved from philosophical understanding of the issue to practical assistance in a way that had never been done before and, for those not yet convinced about marine energy, not a penny of taxpayer funds is due until the energy is generated.

So far, so good—but what next? Without repeating too much of what the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland said, I will highlight four quick things. First, we must keep going; we need a continued pipeline of opportunities to stimulate manufacturing scale and innovation research. The work done on FastBlade by Babcock and the University of Edinburgh partnership at Rosyth, which I saw in the summer, is a model of its kind; it will help to both improve the technology and reduce costs. Secondly, we must reduce the hidden cost of process—that has been referred to in terms of some of the detail around marine licences and the section 36 consent. We can probably all agree that the process, as it is, is both opaque and slow, and could be made much less opaque and much faster. I propose the production of a combined paper on its details from the Marine Energy Council—the chair of which is well known to the Department—which the all-party parliamentary group on marine energy will give to the Minister by the end of January for discussion, consideration and, I hope, implementation as quickly as possible. The Minister has been a great supporter of green energy, work on climate change and the environment in general. I hope that, as soon as possible after he has seen the paper, he will happily come and discuss its implications and what might be done with the all-party group.

Thirdly, and curiously in this context, let us not forget England. One of the problems at the moment is that the strong support, particularly from the Scottish Government, but also from the Welsh Government, means that English bids for the CfD project are rather disadvantaged by not having the same amount of local financial support. A very good project from the Isle of Wight has been put forward. I encourage the Minister to look at that; it needs help to make sure that that area, too, can be levelled up and be competitive in this space. Some approvals are already in place, so it is a case of putting them into action.

The fourth point is to not forget tidal lagoons. I know the Department has a lasting bruise from the saga over the Swansea tidal lagoon project, in which I had a strong interest, because the business behind it was headquartered in Gloucester. Ultimately, that project fell partly on confidence in the management to deliver it, and partly on an assumption that the project was far too expensive. As the then Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), recognises, it now looks pretty good value and—guess what?—it would have been up and running any moment now, had it been approved. There will be new and alternative ideas on tidal lagoons, which the Department should look at.

David Duguid

The hon. Gentleman is making an excellent speech. I hate to interrupt him, but I could tell he wanted a quick sip of water there; I was also going to ask whether he would agree that marine energy in general, and tidal stream energy in particular, has the opportunity to be an exportable commodity to the rest of the world, not only for Orkney and the rest of Scotland, but for the whole of the UK. Tidal stream for the UK could be what offshore wind has been for Denmark.

Richard Graham

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, both for the marine energy that I was able to take, and for his thoughts on exports. The Minister will know that the parts of the world that I am most interested in exporting to are in south-east Asia. By happy coincidence, huge opportunities for tidal stream energy have already been identified in Indonesia in more than one place, and potentially also in the north of the Philippines. There will be other places, but those two stand out at this time.

It would not be easy, but if we wanted to add a fifth point to my thoughts for the Minister to consider, that might be looking closely at how we can help exports of tidal stream capability and technology be part of a strategy to deliver more than just a huge contribution to domestic UK security. That would help to make sure that the manufacturing benefits stay within the UK, we keep Nova based here and we are able to export successfully both the skills and the manufacturing equipment that goes with them around the world.

There are huge opportunities here. The Government have been very supportive. It is a niche interest at the moment, but colleagues in Scotland, Northern Ireland—let us not forget Strangford Lough; I am sure someone will remind us of that—and Wales have all got an interest. It is a wonderful UK project, which, with the support of the Government, can become something to be very proud of.