Charles Kennedy put pressure on the Prime Minister at PMQs to re-consider the proposed amnesty of 'on the run' Northern Irish terrorists, as it was a matter of "principled judicial process."

6.06.12pm GMT Wed 23rd Nov 2005

John Hemming MP secured a small victory in the battle for the government to face up to the consequences of an unsuccessful energy policy this afternoon in securing a debate on the matter in the House of Commons. In the debate, granted by the Speaker as an urgent issue, John Hemming asked the Energy Minister when he would worry about the removal of gas from storage.

A lively and full House heard the Energy Minister, Malcolm Wicks MP, pass the buck onto Europe's Energy Markets and fail to recognise that the lack of government leadership in efficiency measures and alternative energies.

JOHN HEMMING MP says "Britain is importing at roughly the expected rate from the continent: Europe is not the problem. We have less gas available than we thought we would because the government has under-estimated the productivity of Britain's gas fields. Hence we are currently living off reserves that will be needed later in the winter"

"It is very disappointing that the government cannot accept responsibility for this mess. The liberalised energy market in the UK has been very successful, but there has been insufficient scrutiny of optimistic assumptions. That is not industry's fault, but the government's."

"If we take slight demand-reduction measures now it will mean we don't have to make more drastic demand-reduction decisions later in the winter."

"A further 528 GWh (around 49 mcm) was taken from storage on Tuesday. Using the 4 day rolling average from Saturday to Tuesday that gives 49 days before safety monitors are breached. Ofgem did say to me that no gas had been taken from storage today, but today's gas day does not end until 5.59am tomorrow morning."

NOTES:

Data released by the National Grid shows that the interconnector, the link between the gas markets of Britain and the Continent, is running at around 38 million cubic metres of natural gas a day (mcm/d), only 4 mcm/d less than the National Grid's own predictions made in the summer. The real problem is falling output from the UK continental shelf (UKCS).

The government's prediction that 303 mcm/d will go into Britain's gas network from the UKCS over the course of the winter looks increasingly inaccurate. Since the start of the cold spell UKCS has in fact provided considerably less, with the shortfall having to be made up by gas from storage:

Daily Flow: Beach and IOG

Daily Flow: Interconnector

Daily Flow: From Storage

mcm

mcm

mcm

Sunday 6th

257

5

0

Monday 7th

264

7

6

Tuesday 8th

265

11

4

Wednesday 9th

268

22

5

Thursday 10th

266

16

1

Friday 11th

256

18

1

Saturday 12th

253

27

0

Sunday 13th

249

29

1

Monday 14th

273

27

20

Tuesday 15th

270

27

13

Wednesday 16th

281

37

9

Thursday 17th

289

40

34

Friday 18th

292

39

46

Saturday 19th

283

29

46

Sunday 20th

275

32

56

Monday 21st

276

38

68

Britain has 40,000 Gwh of Gas in storage (about 3650 mcm). At the current rate of extraction this will last under two months. If the government implements demand reduction techniques now the situation we are likely to face come February could be considerably improved. Some demand reduction comes about with the higher prices, but during the winter a supply of gas is such an important part of everyone's life that the market is likely to be rather inelastic.

All 'government predictions' are taken from the National Grid's Winter Outlook Report 2005/06 (http://www.ofgem.gov.uk/temp/ofgem/cache/cmsattach/12493_214_05.pdf?wtfrom=/ofgem/work/index.jsp&section=/areasofwork/securityofsupply) and all data regarding the gas market is taken from the National Grid's website (http://www.nationalgridcom/).