The Business and Trade Select Committee is a select committee of the House of Commons in the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The remit of the committee is to examine the expenditure, administration and policy of the Department for Business and Trade, and any departmental bodies.
The committee came into existence as the Business, Innovation and Skills Committee on 1 October 2009, replacing the Business and Enterprise Select Committee, which was dissolved on 30 September 2009. The House of Commons agreed to the committee's establishment on 25 June 2009,[1] following Prime Minister Gordon Brown's replacement of the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills on 5 June 2009. Following the merger of the Department of Energy and Climate Change and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills in July 2016, the name of the committee was changed to the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee in October 2016 to reflect the name of the new department.[2]
Members are as follows:[3]
The chair was elected on 6 May 2020, with the members of the committee being announced on 2 March 2020.[4] [5]
| Member | Party | Constituency | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Darren Jones MP (chair) | Labour | Bristol North West | ||
| Alan Brown MP | SNP | Kilmarnock and Loudoun | ||
| Richard Fuller MP | Conservative | North East Bedfordshire | ||
| Nus Ghani MP | Conservative | Wealden | ||
| John Howell MP | Conservative | Henley | ||
| Mark Jenkinson MP | Conservative | Workington | ||
| Peter Kyle MP | Labour | Hove | ||
| Pat McFadden MP | Labour | Wolverhampton South East | ||
| Anna McMorrin MP | Labour | Cardiff North | ||
| Mark Pawsey MP | Conservative | Rugby | ||
| Alexander Stafford MP | Conservative | Rother Valley | ||
| Date | Outgoing Member & Party | Constituency | → | New Member & Party | Constituency | Source | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 May 2020 | John Howell MP (Conservative) | Henley | → | Paul Howell MP (Conservative) | Sedgefield | Hansard | |||
| 7 April 2020 | Rachel Reeves MP (chair, Labour) | Leeds West | → | Vacant | |||||
| 6 May 2020 | Vacant | → | Darren Jones MP (chair, Labour) | Bristol North West | Hansard | ||||
| 11 May 2020 | Peter Kyle MP (Labour) | Hove | → | Judith Cummins MP (Labour) | Bradford South | Hansard | |||
| Pat McFadden MP (Labour) | Wolverhampton South East | Ruth Jones MP (Labour) | Newport West | ||||||
| Anna McMorrin MP (Labour) | Cardiff North | Charlotte Nichols MP (Labour) | Warrington North | ||||||
| 21 September 2020 | Ruth Jones MP (Labour) | Newport West | → | Zarah Sultana MP (Labour) | Coventry South | Hansard | |||
| 22 February 2021 | Zarah Sultana MP (Labour) | Coventry South | → | Sarah Owen MP (Labour) | Luton North | Hansard | |||
| 5 January 2022 | Judith Cummins MP (Labour) | Bradford South | → | Tonia Antoniazzi MP (Labour) | Gower | Hansard | |||
| Sarah Owen MP (Labour) | Luton North | Andy McDonald MP (Labour) | Middlesbrough | ||||||
| 25 October 2022 | Richard Fuller MP (Conservative) | North East Bedfordshire | → | Bim Afolami MP (Conservative) | Hitchin and Harpenden | Hansard | |||
| Nusrat Ghani MP (Conservative) | Wealden | Jonathan Djanogly MP (Conservative) | Huntingdon | ||||||
| Paul Howell MP (Conservative) | Sedgefield | Ruth Edwards MP (Conservative) | Rushcliffe | ||||||
| Mark Jenkinson MP (Conservative) | Workington | Robert Largan MP (Conservative) | High Peak | ||||||
| 1 November 2022 | Jonathan Djanogly MP (Conservative) | Huntingdon | → | Vacant | Hansard | ||||
| Robert Largan MP (Conservative) | High Peak | ||||||||
| 8 November 2022 | Vacant | → | Mark Jenkinson MP (Conservative) | Workington | Hansard | ||||
| 21 November 2022 | Vacant | → | Jane Hunt MP (Conservative) | Loughborough | Hansard | ||||
| 29 November 2022 | Tonia Antoniazzi MP (Labour) | Gower | → | Ian Lavery MP (Labour) | Wansbeck | Hansard | |||
| 12 June 2023 | Ruth Edwards MP (Conservative) | Rushcliffe | → | Jonathan Gullis MP (Conservative) | Stoke-on-Trent North | Hansard | |||
| Mark Jenkinson MP (Conservative) | Workington | Antony Higginbotham MP (Conservative) | Burnley | ||||||
| Alexander Stafford MP (Conservative) | Rother Valley | Anthony Mangnall MP (Conservative) | Totnes | ||||||
| 4 September 2023 | Darren Jones MP (chair, Labour) | Bristol North West | → | Vacant | Hansard | ||||
| 12 September 2023 | Alan Brown MP (SNP) | Kilmarnock and Loudoun | → | Douglas Chapman MP (SNP) | Dunfermline and West Fife | Hansard | |||
| 18 October 2023 | Vacant | → | Liam Byrne MP (chair, Labour) | Birmingham Hodge Hill | Hansard | ||||
| 11 December 2023 | Bim Afolami MP (Conservative) | Hitchin and Harpenden | → | Julie Marson MP (Conservative) | Hertford and Stortford | Hansard | |||
The chair was elected on 12 July 2017, with the members of the committee being announced on 11 September 2017.[6] [7]
| Member | Party | Constituency | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rachel Reeves MP (chair) | Labour | Leeds West | ||
| Drew Hendry MP | SNP | Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey | ||
| Stephen Kerr MP | Conservative | Stirling | ||
| Peter Kyle MP | Labour | Hove | ||
| Ian Liddell-Grainger MP | Conservative | Bridgwater and West Somerset | ||
| Rachel Maclean MP | Conservative | Redditch | ||
| Albert Owen MP | Labour | Ynys Môn | ||
| Mark Pawsey MP | Conservative | Rugby | ||
| Antoinette Sandbach MP | Conservative | Eddisbury | ||
| Anna Turley MP | Labour and Co-op | Redcar | ||
| Date | Outgoing Member & Party | Constituency | → | New Member & Party | Constituency | Source | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 16 October 2017 | New seat | → | Vernon Coaker MP (Labour) | Gedling | Hansard | ||||
| 18 June 2018 | Rachel Maclean MP (Conservative) | Redditch | → | Patrick McLoughlin MP (Conservative) | Derbyshire Dales | Hansard | |||
Occasionally, the House of Commons ordered changes to be made in terms of membership of the select committee, as proposed by the Committee of Selection. Such changes are shown below.
| Date | Outgoing member and party | Constituency | → | New member and party | Constituency | Source | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 November 2010 | Nicky Morgan MP (Conservative) | Loughborough | → | Simon Kirby MP (Conservative) | Brighton Kemptown | Hansard | ||
| Luciana Berger MP (Labour) | Liverpool Wavertree | → | Paul Blomfield MP (Labour) | Sheffield Central | ||||
| Jack Dromey MP (Labour) | Birmingham Erdington | Katy Clark MP (Labour) | North Ayrshire and Arran | |||||
| Chi Onwurah MP (Labour) | Newcastle upon Tyne Central | Gregg McClymont MP (Labour) | Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East | |||||
| Rachel Reeves MP (Labour) | Leeds West | Ian Murray MP (Labour) | Edinburgh South | |||||
| 21 March 2011 | Gregg McClymont MP (Labour) | Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East | → | Dan Jarvis MP (Labour) | Barnsley Central | Hansard | ||
| 24 October 2011 | Dan Jarvis MP (Labour) | Barnsley Central | → | Julie Elliott MP (Labour) | Sunderland Central | Hansard | ||
| Ian Murray MP (Labour) | Edinburgh South | Ann McKechin MP (Labour) | Glasgow North | |||||
| 16 July 2012 | David Ward MP (Liberal Democrat) | Bradford East | → | Mike Crockart MP (Liberal Democrat) | Edinburgh West | Hansard | ||
| 5 November 2012 | Margot James MP (Conservative) | Stourbridge | → | Caroline Dinenage MP (Conservative) | Gosport | Hansard | ||
| Simon Kirby MP (Conservative) | Brighton Kemptown | Robin Walker MP (Conservative) | Worcester | |||||
In July 2022, the committee published its report "Energy pricing and the future of the energy market" which examined the turmoil in retail energy arising from unusually high wholesale gas prices, leading to the collapse of several suppliers and the need for government support of Bulb Energy. The committee found that the industry regulator Ofgem had been incompetent in its supervision of the finances of supplier companies, and that the government overlooked this lack of supervision because it prioritised competition over market regulation. The report also criticised Ofgem's design of the energy price cap, recommending that the government consider introducing a social tariff; stated that the government's May 2022 support package for customers was no longer sufficient; and criticised the absence of a home insulation programme.[8] [9]
In response, Ofgem accepted that its previous financial resilience regime was not sufficiently robust, and had contributed to some of the supplier failures since August 2021.[10]