My Lords, I fully support my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe in her general statement about what needs to be done and in her specific criticisms and support for measures in this Bill. It is right that the best way out of the financial hole the Government find themselves in again is by growth. That is a cross-party idea on which we all agree.
Unfortunately, this Government have one main hope, which is that a closer relationship with the EU and taking more EU laws into our system will give them extra growth, whereas all the evidence of the past shows the opposite. Our growth rate halved when we were in the EEC compared with 20 years before we joined it, because of the damage that laws and extra taxes did to our economy after we signed up to first the customs union and then the complete single market. If we look at the leaks and possibilities around the reset, it is practically all cost and no benefit—it is Britain giving in and becoming a rule taker. The rules will be more restrictive on some of our industries that were beginning to benefit from not having to take on all the extra rules that the EU has been legislating. There will be a considerable financial bill with the extra costs of Erasmus, the administrative levies, maybe a solidarity levy and the loss of £6 billion of fish over a 12-year period. I am afraid the Government will not find growth there.
We are today focusing on this set of three limited measures. Like my noble friend, I think two of them are modestly beneficial. It seems perfectly reasonable to increase the mileage allowances given the way that costs have gone over recent years. The previous Government had not done it, and therefore it is perfectly welcome. It is also helpful to a haulage industry in great distress—because volumes are not ideal and because wage, tax and, above all, energy costs have gone up—to be given some relief, though the Government have chosen a rather modest form of relief in this VED reduction.
I have two criticisms. First, I am not sure that a year for VED relief is the right period. I do not think we can guarantee that, miraculously, in a year’s time, other costs will reduce and they will not need this help any more. It would have been wiser to keep it open-ended to see what happens, particularly to energy costs. It is also concentrated on the heavier, bigger end of the commercial fleet. There are a lot of other businesses, particularly small businesses, struggling with the cost of smaller vehicles where there is no help offered. That is a pity, and it would be good if the Government looked again at the full range of businesses and the question of duration, because it may be that this judgment, while helpful, does not go far enough and is not over the right time period.
The biggest item, which I object to quite strongly, is the generator levy. It is quite true, as the Minister pointed out, that this was first introduced by the previous Government. I liked it no more then than I like it now; I made critical remarks to Ministers and tried to get them not to do it. If you are going to impose a windfall tax, it should be a genuine windfall tax geared to a level of price or profit that you have decided to designate as windfall. What has happened is that the last Government and now this one have built this windfall tax into all their Budgets as a regular feature, regardless of what the regional price of oil and gas turns out to be in the months or years ahead. It would be much more convincing as a windfall measure if it were geared to a price target and/or a profit target, came in and was fiercer when there was genuine windfall profit and dropped out as soon as there was not. The Minister will know, observing world markets, that with the continuing uncertainty created by the Ukraine war and the war in the Middle East, we are seeing pretty big volatile swings, particularly in oil prices. That will make a huge difference to the profitability of the businesses being taxed through windfall taxes. I would like the Government to think again about the whole principle of windfall taxation. If they want a windfall tax, it should be targeted and very clearly based on genuine windfall profits.
I have one further worry about the Government’s strategy over energy, which is illustrated by the tinkering measures in this legislation. They have gone in favour of very dear energy, with very high carbon taxes, emissions trading taxes and general impositions—fuel duties and all the rest of it. They say that they have net-zero reasons for this, but I think they also have revenue-raising reasons. They see it as one of the easiest ways forward without violating the central manifesto pledges. Now they realise, correctly, that they are overdoing it. With all the tax, the cost of energy is extreme. This country has a particularly virulent case of it, which is making us uncompetitive and losing us jobs and business, and therefore other tax revenues. So now the Government are in the business of finding ways of parcelling out modest subsidies or rebates on this excessive taxation in the hope that they will see them through and enable them to keep some business going.
I fear that the Government should come to the conclusion that they are not giving enough back to enough businesses and people. If Ministers look out there in the marketplace, they will see jobs being cancelled or lost, vacancies not becoming available, turnover not growing and profits turning into losses. There are factory closures coming through in all the high energy-using areas that we have talked about before, and the closure of oil and gas is having knock-on effects for refining and petrochemicals. We are seeing an industrial collapse mainly led and generated by excessively expensive energy. Offering a few bits back will not solve the problem.
I am glad the Government have now expanded the number of businesses that will get some kind of energy rebate to 10,000, but that is by no means all the businesses out there that are suffering badly from dear energy. They are not offering enough back because they are taking lumps out. They also wish to make it worse by joining the even more expensive EU carbon trading and emissions trading schemes, and introducing the CBAM to catch anybody who dares import higher energy-using products. I ask them please to think again. I want them to succeed in creating more jobs, promoting growth and getting investment and incomes up. This will do the opposite; dear energy is a killer.
July 16, 2026
Dear energy is indeed a killer and grid instability caused by renewables will cause power cuts which will literally kill people. Energy policy has been insane from Blair through to Starmer and Ed and looks like it will get even worse under English Graduate innumerate Burnham.
Independent energy consultant Kathryn Porter (Watt-Logic) warns that Scotland’s power grid is extremely fragile and facing a potential collapse. The system relies heavily on just two conventional power stations: the Peterhead gas plant and the Torness nuclear facility.
She is right, and it is not just Scotland either.
July 16, 2026
LL.
This is why they are so keen to get us all on smart meters. It’s all about control. Do as you’re told or we’ll have you.
July 16, 2026
This is why, years ago, I decided never to have a smart meter. They can see when you use the most power and this is your ‘peak’ period and pay accordingly. State control, smartly introduced with weasel words.
July 16, 2026
Starmer pledges ‘cast-iron support’ for Ukraine on final visit as PM – Well A. starmer is thankfully almost gone now so how can he promise anything at all and B. Thanks to him the country has no money and few assets to offer anyway. He could not even stop the small boats, run a sensible defence policy or even get a single working navel ship to Cyprus. His defence secretary John Healey resigned on June 11, 2026, citing a major dispute with Prime Minister Keir Starmer over military funding. Healey stated that the government’s long-delayed defence investment plan fell well short of the resources needed to protect the nation amid rising global threats.
July 16, 2026
The government are becoming increasingly involved in business activity which it has no place to be involved.
The policy of this socialist administration is to tax everything and then use state funded employees to hand back grants to those activities it decides are worth supporting. This take and give back attitude is entirely counter to a free economy and a healthy market based trading nation.
What we are seeing is the collapse of private enterprise and the growth of state interference which does not add anything to wealth creation of to growth of anything other than borrowing to keep the whole thing going.
The fixation with international Net Zero compliance along with the view re-joining the EU will bring forth anything other than subservience and national decline is troubling to say the least.
How do we break out of this doomsday scenario being advanced by the so called progressives?
July 16, 2026
Hard to see any way out. The chance of a decent rightwing government gaining real power and delivering a sensible energy and economic policy in three years time is slim perhaps 20% at best and even then the chance of them actually delivering against the blob, devolved governments, the lefty judiciary, international bodies, the civil service, quangos, vested interests, corruption, the BBC and Channel 4 propaganda outfits… is surely very slim indeed.
Even then it will take 10+ years to turn the UK tanker round. So I may well be dead or perhaps only nearly dead.
Farewell to Sir Kier (Jacob Rees- Mogg video) is good, Mogg is too kind, understated and gentle as is his way (like JR) but still makes it very clear what an appalling, disingenuous, broken compass failure this vile, two tier PM was. Burnham will be the same or worse. The rather pathetic Reeves in tears yet again and the people who evicted Starmer all then giving him a standing ovation!
July 16, 2026
Standing ovation? I assumed they were all cheering that at last he was going.
July 16, 2026
Nearly all the markets are heavily and hugely damagingly rigged by the UK government to prevent free and fair trade between state and private suppliers:- health care, schools, universities, transport, energy, employment, tenancies, housing, planning, banking, car and vehicle sales, adverts, food, farming… it does vast damage to the country, living standards and growth.
July 16, 2026
+1
July 16, 2026
The only people who NEED dearer energy are the wasters who should be charged more to discourage them from their profligate behaviour.
July 16, 2026
Well they do pay more the more they use, and this money is used to increase energy supply albeit with Ed’s moronic, rip off, rigged market. But one scandal against the poor is a vast increase in standing charges for supplying no energy. If poor you can use less energy, sleep with a friend, bathe together once a month needed or not and wear more thermals and jumpers but standing charges cannot be avoided.
July 16, 2026
Dear energy is a killer. Got it in one. That’s the whole point of this stupid net zero
Take us back to before the industrial revolution.
July 16, 2026
So Kier Starmer claims he has left the UK in a better position than when he found it. As so often with Labour politicians you wonder if he is a deluded fool or just a blatant liar. Rachael thinks the same about her dismal performance anyone who joins or stays in the Labour Party does not understand Economics or is dishonest even if they have studied it at the LSE.
At least the Hillsborough Act is a rather better thing than Theresa May’s appalling Net Zero lunacy this just nodded through by our moronic and generally scientifically and numerically illiterate MPs not even a vote. Has Kemi removed the whip from the appalling Theresa May yet? Let us hope this act can be used to get the dreadful truth about the coerced and dangerous Covid “Vaccines” released they are still trying to hide the damning statistics.
July 16, 2026
Address this honestly I meant!
July 16, 2026
World Cup might not be ours but the Falklands definitely are, says defiant No 10 after Argentina banner row.
Alas no longer Gibralta though and perhaps not Chagos soon if Starmer, Hermer & Burnham get their way.
Plus can we ever defend them now given the dire state of our defence forces the Starmer and the 14 years of the “Conservatives” left us with.
July 16, 2026
Exactly, and this will perhaps have given the Argentinians some hope that the Falklands will be next.
No chance of us sending another task force like last time, they are all mored up in Portsmouth, seen them there physically myself only a couple of weeks ago !
July 16, 2026
As the government clearly won’t remove the oil & gas windfall taxes they should at least extend them to the green energy producers who over a year are paid billions to keep their windmills turned off.
July 16, 2026
Every once in a while JR produces a very good speech. This is one of them. Our kind host acknowledges that counter-productive carbon & windfall taxes helps to make our energy expensive – and only mentions “net zero” once
At the moment several of the larger energy suppliers (E.oN, EDF, British Gas and others) are providing free electricity windows at the weekends to soak up the free energy harvested by our solar and wind installations. It’s easy to change your tariff and take advantage. You can then do the washing, charge the EV, run the aircon etc all for free.
July 16, 2026
According to AI – tariffs that give free electricity on weekends usually charge a higher rate for standard weekday usage.
July 16, 2026
“You can then do the washing, charge the EV, run the aircon etc all for free.”
This will not last for very long as 80% or more of our local grids can only handle 1-2KW/household CONTINUOUSLY. See Stephen Broderick’s written evidence EVD0062 to the BEIS Select Committee in 2018. Upgrading the local grids to cope will cost hundreds of £billions and be enormously disruptive.
https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/82722/pdf/
July 17, 2026
PS : The CEO of E.ON UK said at an ES&NZ Select Committee meeting 15/10/2025 [3] said:
“In addition to that, if I look at the non-commodity costs—policy costs and network costs—certainly some of the modelling that we have suggests that you could get to a position by 2030 where, if the wholesale price was zero, bills would still be the same as they are today because of the increase in those non-commodity costs”.
Energy Security and Net Zero Committee Oral evidence: The cost of energy, HC 736 Wednesday 15 October 2025
https://committees.parliament.uk/oralevidence/16535/pdf/
July 16, 2026
I read your posts in the hope that every once in a while you will produce a good one.
Dum de dum…
July 16, 2026
British-made artillery barrels are being delivered to Ukraine under a £61 million contract with Sheffield Forgemasters, marking the first time forged artillery barrels have been produced in the UK for almost two decades.
The 105mm and 155mm gun barrels, 150 in total, are being manufactured at the Yorkshire firm under a contract awarded by the UK Government to BAE Systems. Announced by President Zelensky last year, the work is supporting hundreds of jobs in Sheffield, more than 60 businesses across the UK supply chain are standing to benefit. The first four barrels have been shipped as development forgings, allowing Ukraine to test its own manufacturing processes, and the Sheffield line is now turning out eight forgings a month, with the barrels forged in Yorkshire before being sent to Ukraine for finishing and integration.
Source:- ukdefencejournal.org.uk
July 16, 2026
We need to stop the windfall tax, and at the same time stop the windmill credits when they are told to switch off, for whatever reason.
What a complicated mess our successive Governments are making of everything, Tax Policies change, Goalposts are moved, Regulation is increased.
How can anyone do any longterm planning ?
Even personal finances are now going to be hit with retrospective taxes on unspent funds when Personal Pensions become liable to IHT next year, and then what is left still going to be taxed on withdrawal.
40 years of planned saving, penalised with double taxation of 40% then another 20% minimum.
If government want change the rules, then do it for new policies, not existing ones !
July 16, 2026
@Berkshire Alan
Your reply does not reflect the actual facts about wind farm “curtailment”. Last week I was reading yet another direct attack from net stupd Reform UK against wind farm electricity. This time Tice was claiming that £450m has been spent on windfarm output curtailment in H1 this year.
This figure is a gross exaggeration. Unfortunately, this is frequently the case with pro-fossil fuel propaganda. Looking at the facts is informative. The total value of the electricity produced in this country in 2023 – from all sources – was nearly £172bn. It fluctuates according to the market price of gas.
£450m is 0.26% of the total electricity output of the UK. The fossil fuel cartel likes to divert attention from the truth about their subsidies.
FACT – During the winter 2022/2023 Sunak’s government gave the fossil fuel majors operating in the UK a direct subsidy of £47bn (the £66/month winter fuel payment) This allowed Shell, BP etc to treble their dividend payouts to shareholders in 2024 at the expense of British taxpayers
July 17, 2026
We should not be paying these operators anything at all for curtailing output. If they want more deterministic payment then they should make their power delivery dispatchable.
And in this context the word “value” is meaningless. The issue is “cost” to the end user which also includes taxes as well as the £4.5b of imported electricity that year.
July 17, 2026
correction – that was £3.2b of imported electricity (World Bank data) being 33TWh accounting for 11% of the 293 TWh electricity production (Solar Power Portal). In 2023 the UK became a net importer of energy.
July 17, 2026
Strange use of statistics SG
Comparing the total value of electricity in the UK to the subsidy figure in order to get a small percentage number.
So is £450 million correct or not ?
July 16, 2026
The government’s determination to rejoin the EU may be because the Commission is becoming increasingly authoritarian and arrogant. Some Swiss citizens have been sanctioned for expressing views that the Ukraine war was caused by provoking Russia. Colonel Jacques Baud is one and he is a respected historian. His assets and bank account has been frozen and he is unable to return to his country. This is without legal authority. Perhaps this type of action would suit the Labour politicians who arrange prison sentences for opinions they disagree with.
July 16, 2026
The UK Establishment is broken, tinkering around the edges so as to be perceived to be ‘playing nice’ fixes nothing. The ideological direction of UK taxes systems has created layer upon layer of ‘fixes’ as the result of ill conceived notions in the first place.
What is the ‘extra’ cost in just the ‘administration’ forced on the Country and its People with the introduction of taxes based on political ideology. Then the net gain after allowance, subsidies etc have to be applied to achieve a sound-bite of balance?
July 16, 2026
Expensive energy is crippling this country. Everyone can see it. Some simply wish to pretend it’s not true.
All to virtue signal to the world ‘we’re going to save 0.0004% of global co2’
July 16, 2026
I fear that growth may not be an answer, even if the government introduced policies to encourage it. The fact is their approach is anti-growth and even if it happened they would just use the expansion to spend and borrow more.
The answer the government needs is to control spending, but this goes against their ideology.
More harm until the country gets an opportunity to replace the government, hopefully the electorate will have repented of their dalliance with bonkers socialism.
July 16, 2026
No Government should be able to claim a windfall tax. The government should learn to live within its means and tax people and businesses as little as possible. From Labour’s arrival in 1997, right up to today, we have had years of greedy governments.
The day of reckoning is coming!
July 16, 2026
Anybody that doubts the intentions of this and previous government as regards net-0 only has to look at the level of destruction of our industrial base.
Net-0 is but a tool, for as they talk sweet words about creating green jobs, they impose penalties on industry, and businesses to make them unprofitable, with more plans towards the ‘great reset’ than an economy that is robust and productive.
Time for the government to come clean about their intentions – do they serve the people of the UK or is their master an entrenched aim to create a country devoid of opportunity, energy and real industry.
To them it seems that net-0 is the religion that carries them forward to their socialist haven.
July 16, 2026
Off topic, since Burnham, Starmer et al were clearly intending to take some reflected glory had England won the World Cup, including the ridiculous idea of an extra bank holiday (at a cost of how many £ billions?), can we now blame them for the loss? I think we should.
July 16, 2026
So the Govt accuses companies of exploiting the public and making huge profits.
Do they return money to the exploited?
Of course not! They join in the exploitation by benefiting themselves.
Ah I can hear Hefner say – they could not invest in infrastructure an a new population without the tax ‘profit’.
Bingo!
No company can invest or survive without profit, or ‘excess’.
It’s called ‘solvency’.
July 16, 2026
Living rent-free in your head, aren’t I?
July 16, 2026
I reckon Lynn has guessed you well hefner.
It is something you would say.
Do say if it is not correct.
July 16, 2026
The acid-test on everything that our government does, should be ‘whats the benefit to the UK economy & UK people’. Business only consider the benefits to its shareholders & customers ……not the EU, not the UN, not foreign courts and not international opinion
July 16, 2026
Khan getting into the house of lords is the ultimate insult to the British population. the place has its days numbered now.
July 16, 2026
Perhaps John will be able to talk some sense into him !
I will not hold my breath, as Me Khan is another who takes no notice of any sensible comment/argument.
July 16, 2026
In other news
The government is increasing the size of the Ords by another 26 peers
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cglj25k94r9o
I recall their manifesto saying they were to reduce the size and reform it ?
July 16, 2026
“They say that they have net-zero reasons for this, but I think they also have revenue-raising reasons.”
It is both. Both high taxation and Net Zero impoverishes people. Socialism depends upon making and keeping people poor. High taxation is designed to destroy wealth and high spending is used to justify it. There is no climate crisis caused by burning fossil fuels and it would not have been invented by the Left if its “solution”, Net Zero, wasn’t sabotaging our energy and destroying our wealth, industry, economy and national security