Nick Evans, a partner in the Government & Infrastructure department at Bircham Dyson Bell LLP believes that the self proclaimed 'greenest government ever' needs to get a move on in setting up a green investment bank to raise money from the private sector for new green power sources.
"It's clear that we need to take legislative steps to set up a bank and make sure that it's properly 'insulated' from the politicians in order that it can make its own decisions and act independently," explains Nick Evans.
"Speed is the name of the game; whilst there is no decision from the government to take action, companies will delay making their own investment decisions which means that the targets set for 2020 are unlikely to be met. Until the bank is set up and running, nothing else can happen."
The Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) report was clear that if the bank is 'watered down', the UK will be left short of the hundreds of billions of pounds needed to plug the UK's energy gap with renewable sources over the next few years.
"I wholeheartedly agree with the EAC's report but understand that the Treasury is concerned that if it sets up a Green Investment Bank (GIB) as part of the public sector, then all of the borrowing will end up on the government's balance sheet, something that the government wants to avoid, given how hard they are trying to reduce the deficit," said Nick Evans.
"Europe has equivalent development banks that aren't represented on their governments' bottom lines, and the rules were tweaked when Lloyds and RBS were taken over by the UK government, so one would hope that we could come up with a similar approach for the GIB. Government should be talking to the Office of National Statistics now about what is required to keep the Bank off-balance sheet, if it wants to meet its timetable.
"The Energy Bill is currently going through Parliament and could be used as a vehicle to address these issues now, rather than delaying decisions and thus investment further."
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