Below you will find my latest Conservative Home:
The new prime minister will want to finalise plans to tackle the cost of living crisis within days of taking office.
We read that there have been preparations both in her transition team and at the Treasury under the outgoing chancellor, speeding the task of bringing together the ideas and the official appraisal of options to produce an early statement to Parliament.
The immediate task is to see off a long and deep recession by putting enough money back into the economy that sky-high energy costs will be taking out.
Some of the extra cash removed from people and companies has been lifted by the Treasury itself, a winner from all the extra VAT, energy profits taxes and other energy levies that high prices bring. Some of the extra cash is effectively a tax imposed on us all by overseas energy markets, as the UK needs to import oil, gas and sometimes electricity to get by.
We cannot get any of this back, nor can we tax it, but we do need to take it into account when deciding how much help to offer people and businesses. It is a deadweight cost to all of us and a big loss for our country’s finances.
Many people and businesses can benefit from the promised tax cuts. Where they remove taxes on energy, they also help get the inflation rate down; it is a pity Rishi Sunak did not get agreement that the £400 effective cut to all electricity bills should help lower the rate.
The Government will need to do more to help those who rely on benefits, as well as choosing tax cuts that have the best effect on tackling the squeeze brought on by the price hikes. Cutting the inflation rate by removing taxes from energy prices is particularly helpful, given the adverse impact of high inflation on public finances.
There are medium-term tasks as well if we are to chart a course out of this rolling energy crisis. It is a double problem. There is the severe jolt to the system and ratchet in prices caused by the war in Ukraine and the need for Europe to replace all its Russian gas and oil imports.
There are also the underlying issues posed by the long road to Net Zero, where we are at that point where substantial renewable power on the system is good when the wind blows and the sun shines, but causes difficulties at other times. Then we need back up power usually from fossil fuels, whilst we await commercial roll out of storage and hydrogen technologies that could underpin a further major expansion of wind turbines.
All this points to the need to develop our energy policy around three objectives: environmental sustainability, affordability, and availability. The overriding environmental objective of recent years has skimped us on the other, two leaving us too dependent on imports.
Recent events also remind us how we need an energy policy that responds to the phases of the electrical and renewable revolution at the pace it occurs. It was always going to be the case that Europe and the UK would need a lot of fossil fuel this decade. All the time most people still have gas boilers with petrol or diesel vehicles and industry runs on gas we will need plenty of gas as a transition fuel.
It was never a good idea to rely too much on imported gas. Now we know Russia will use it as a weapon that is even clearer. Imported gas means paying more than for domestic gas, if only because of the higher transport costs, and can mean desperate last minute bidding for additional supplies in a world market chronically short of offers.
If it comes as LNG rather than piped gas, it means generating a lot more CO2. Compressing and transporting the gas by sea uses a lot of extra energy. It means far fewer well paid jobs at home. It means we miss out on the often substantial tax revenue collected from those producing gas.
There are things current producers are doing and can do in the North Sea to lift output from existing fields using existing investment. Flows can sometimes be turned up, maintenance periods shortened. Specifications of gas used to supply pipes might be safely flexed.
There is then the possibility over a matter of months of adding extra wells to an existing field, tied into the present production facilities. There is the opportunity to drill the production wells in known field deposits where they can be tied into existing production facilities and pipes nearby.
Finally, there is the longer term opportunity to invest in an entirely new field with new production facilities, and to explore to find new deposits.
There is also a huge opportunity to develop onshore fields away from centres of population, with revenue or gas sharing with local residents. This would need to be done with agreement.
As we are not about to produce sufficient gas to cover all our needs, we also need to put in more storage capacity which we can fill in summer or other times of low demand as a protection against shortages in global energy markets and a way of smoothing prices.
Price controls distort and deter investment. They make the imbalance between supply and demand worse, when you need to bring the two together. Nationalisation of energy businesses would impose a huge strain on finances as current owners would need compensation. More supply is the true answer to dear prices born of shortages.
The Government needs to work as it has been doing with the nuclear industry to see if the productive lives of our current nuclear fleet can be safely extended and to see how a new fleet of smaller nuclear reactors could be commissioned at sensible prices and in a realistic time frame.
Promotion of renewables needs to continue alongside work to encourage commercial development of battery storage and the green hydrogen roll out. If we are going to have an electrical revolution we will need a great deal more generating capacity to fuel it. Government and industry in the meantime need to ensure there is enough reliable capacity to meet our power needs on days when the wind does not blow and the sun does not shine.
We are fighting inflation and recession at the same time. As energy is the single biggest contributor to the price rises, supplying more and cutting energy taxes is important. As the big loss of spending power brought on by the big energy price hikes is the single biggest cause of economic slowdown, so again improving the energy position is crucial to fighting recession.
September 6, 2022
Sir John,
LNG, liquified natural gas, is compressed and transported in huge tankers, but simple compression is not enough. To turn liquid the gas must also be cooled to a very low temperature and kept there throughout its journey from the Middle East or wherever. During that journey it is cooled by venting. I do not know how much of that venting is used in the ship’s engines and how much vented to atmosphere but both of those processes waste energy and, in the venting case, CH4, a potent greenhouse gas, is released. This must stop.
Renewable energy sounds attractive, but our energy hungry civilisation needs reliability above all – as a minor example, my bread machine is halfway through its cycle as I type and a power cut would waste the energy already used and probably the ingredients.
Unreliable renewables are worth half or less than energy from suppliers with capacity factors above 95%. They should be retrospectively taxed inverse proportionately to encourage those currently
making windfall profits hand over fist to create consortia which can cobble together a reliable energy flow.
September 6, 2022
+1
September 6, 2022
In April Boris Johnson put the kibosh on peace talks between Russia and Ukraine. It gave him an opportunity to showboat on a world stage and put h in the good books of wealthy types who could benefit him personally in future.
As a consequence, this country suffers from Russian retaliation in the form of restrictions on fuel exports to opponents. We still buy Russian fuel from the Chinese – but with massive markups from the middleman.
Meanwhile, Johnson tries to spin his term as a litany of resounding victories. We see laughable articles in the media about what a loss he will be.
September 6, 2022
An excellent post Julian. Renewables do more damage to the environment than those who plug it and gain the most from it care to admit.
September 6, 2022
+1 and do no net good either quite the reverse.
September 6, 2022
Green Hydrogen is a very expensive and energy wasteful battery system does not really make any sense at all outside a few specialist area. We have no hydrogen mines after all. Grey hydrogen converts methane to hydrogen again hugely energy wasteful and pointless in general. Why not just use the methane in the existing methane networks.
September 6, 2022
…A tax imposed by overseas energy markets.. No JR. A failure of Tory energy policy over 12 years leading to further disaster by Tory net stupid policy!
JR,
Stop blaming others and world events for your party’s resounding policy failures. We cannot have a shower or heat our homes because of your party! We cannot afford trips in our cars because of your party taxes on fuel! We have not received interest on savings because of your party. We have mass immigration, highest taxation and failing public services because of your party!
Cameron ran away, May booted out for betraying country, Johnson booted out. Do you think Truss will be booted out or run away?
September 6, 2022
All true…. but the tragedy is that the so-called Opposition would have done exactly the same thing …. or worse.
It’s the anti-British Establishment’s Uni-Party who is to blame – not just the Tories.
September 6, 2022
Cameron threw his first election by ratting on his “cast iron” Lisbon Treaty promise then he & the civil service failed to prepare for the equally likely “leave vote” outcome & then he abandoned the bridge like a petulant child. Generals have be shot for far less gross negligence. We really have had appalling MPs for most of my life – Heath, Wilson, Callaghan, Major, Blair, Brown, Cameron, May and now Boris who morphed into a green crap pushing, lockdown and diff vaccine enthusiast & a manifesto ratter/tax to death socialist. We shall shortly see what May is made of. She really much ditch net zero and the ECHR and de-rat on the manifesto ratting, and undo Sunak’s moronic vast tax grabs.
September 7, 2022
last reference to May – read Truss, and ‘she really must’ not much.
September 6, 2022
+1
September 6, 2022
Indeed a mad labour energy policy moronically continued by Cameron/Clegg, Cameron, May & Boris… Truss (?)
September 6, 2022
If Truss gets booted out it will be because the liberals in the party disapprove of her conservative policies. It will finally show us if the Conservative Party is worth voting for. Johnson’s failure to honour the manifesto on which he got into power, was despicable.
September 6, 2022
Quote of the Day
‘’I tried to follow the science, but it was simply not there – I than followed the money, that’s where I found the science’’ Dr Mike Yeadon
September 6, 2022
+100 excellent. Dr Yeadon is spot on. The Tory party/govt will not be admitting their covid catastrophe any time soon if ever.
September 6, 2022
Not so sure about this.
Coal and gas need mining and transportation, nor do they include the extra costs that come from climate change.
Renewable energy is plentiful as rain and far cheaper, and continually getting more so.
Taxing renewables is the same as subsidising fossil fuels. All it will do is delay an energy transition that is bound to take place. It also creates market distortions.
There is an issue around baseload, as you point out, but remember that energy can be transferred between Europe countries to stabilise grids, also that not a lot of baseload is required (hence why we have so few power stations nowadays). Additionally, as the Russia situation has made clear, sticking with fossil fuels has compromised our country’s energy security, which may well be the greater risk.
September 6, 2022
“Renewable energy is plentiful as rain” We have had a very dry summer. Just because more renewable energy is planted, doesn’t make it more available. Wind power has been been below 5% for days on end this year. Solar doesn’t work for much of the time in the UK, about 4% of total demand in a year, in exchange for massive subsidies and destruction of farmland.
“energy can be transferred between Europe countries to stabilise grids” They haven’t got enough for themselves. You think it’s a good idea to be dependent on Europe for our electricity?
“sticking with fossil fuels has compromised our country’s energy security” If only. We haven’t stuck with fossil fuels, only one. India and China’s fossil fuel usage is increasing, as we commit Hara Kiri.
September 7, 2022
China is becoming one big, polluted, wasteland.
Pollution affects countries directly not just indirectly affecting the rest of the world.
So if we had more green energy here, that means our cities would be much cleaner. And with electric cars, noise pollution to a minimum. There already you have two big immediate gains.
Plus there is the issue of our economy being at the mercy on rogue states and price hikes in fossil fuels.
As someone who focuses on the High Tech industry, fossil fuels will become more and more redundant just as the gas-guzzling cars of America did when people thought they’d be around forever.
September 7, 2022
And fossil fuels will become more and more like cigarettes (a bad habit).
With green energy fuelling a new, clean, quiet electric, city landscape with electricity coming off from wind and sea. And our country and economy 100% self-sufficient in energy.
The tech is not quite there yet but improving quickly all the time.
Not a question of if this will happen but when (capitalists are now jumping on board this more and more, seeing lots of money to be made from all this – following consumer demand as opposed to the dogma of political leaders), and one day the Tories are going to have to jump properly into this brave new world of renewable energy if they like it or not.
September 7, 2022
(or the dogma of greenies that capitalists also ignore. Most people aren’t greenies but are concerned about the environment. And now those in business are concerned with being dependant on fuel from places such as Russia).
September 6, 2022
You certainly live up to your name, Ignoramus. The idea that we can rely on getting energy from other European countries, which are hostile to us and will always put their own needs first (as they did with vaccines) is laughable. And the suggestion that “sticking with fossil fuels has compromised our country’s energy security” is also a LIE – what has compromised our energy security is IMPORTING fossil fuels. If we produced all our own needs we would not be in the position we are now. Supply is the key – and we need more of it domestically, both from the North Sea and from onshore fracking. And if there is not enough gas then we can revert to coal, of which we have plenty under our feet! In the long-term though nuclear is the key, and the government should be racing ahead with the RR SMRs, instead of sitting on its backside doing NOTHING, as at present.
September 7, 2022
nicely summarised, but please drop the insults in future.
September 6, 2022
You may not have noticed but Europe is going to be short of energy too because of reliance on unreliable renewables. Good luck with relying on Europe to prop us up. Norway has a shortage too.
September 6, 2022
renewables are not consistent
September 6, 2022
ignoramus
Renewable energy is plentiful as rain and far cheaper, and continually getting more so.
http://stopthesethings.com/2022/09/06/transmission-loss-billions-squandered-connecting-remote-intermittent-wind-solar/
This is what the power companies never want to talk about. It is a worldwide problem and is only getting worse.
September 6, 2022
What extra cost that come from climate change? The climate has always changed and always will. The UK’s CO2 output is almost totally irrelevant to climate – a bit warmer in the UK and a bit more plant food would be an advantage certainly in the UK.
The only extra costs come from the CO2 devil gas religion, subsidised “renewables”, expensive electric cars, EV (that actually increase CO2 anyway) and the current absurd over reaction to the climate alarmist religion.
September 6, 2022
Converting renewable natural resources into energy is neither plentiful nor cheap …almost all renewable energy requires continued subsidy and is restricted to environmental/seasonal conditions ie when its sunny
September 6, 2022
” remember that energy can be transferred between Europe countries to stabilise grids,” – ignoramous
We can’t even get the offshore cabling from the Orkney windfarms set up to use their surplus due to bureaucracy (there’s a quick win for Ms. Truss), so transfering from other countries might be a little ambitious – if they are willing to share given the Russian situation.
September 6, 2022
That anti-renewable brigade is getting as close to being dogmatic as the greeny bridage.
Rather, we need to be OBJECTIVE about the problems affecting our economy and environment but all within the context of what science can achieve and in what time-frame and cost of.
And then come up with a kind of Business Plan about how to proceed, time frame, how to finance and so on.
Both benign capitalism (strong / stable economy) and Conservatism rest on objectivity – not dogma.
September 7, 2022
But priority right now is to get the economy back on track.
September 7, 2022
I couldn’t agree more.
I find it strange that I am having an argument over an issue that is already settled.
Trying to stop the transition to renewables and green energy is like trying to stop the tide.
Just like the greenies think we should go back to living in trees, these people think we should go back to coal mills and gasometers. Very weird.
September 8, 2022
Well said.
True, benign Capitalism (focused on a strong economy with stable growth as opposed to sharp peaks and then sharp drops) and Conservatism is OBJECTIVE not dogmatic.
September 8, 2022
Being dogmatic (whether form left or right) is also a sign of insecurity not business prowess. The person who is dogmatic has to cling to some system of thought to make them feel secure. But entrepreneurs have no time for this nonsense. They’re just focused on being OBJECTIVE and in the spirit of ADVENTURE to find the next best product that consumers will need / want / love, how to create a strong brand around this, how to export abroad if they can – and the sheer THRILL of the whole enterprise (and where money is great – but the real thrill is seeing it all like a GAME – and hopefully a game carried out with principles too).
September 6, 2022
+10
September 6, 2022
Ursula von der Leyen says the EU is going to cap the price for Russian pipeline gas.
Someone should let her know that -even if the pipeline were turned back on-the Russians have just finished commissioning the Portovaya compressor-which is located on the Baltic alongside NS1.
They can now convert the gas formerly sent by pipeline to LNG for global markets.
September 7, 2022
There are regular LNG exports from the nearby Vysotsk terminal, although I think it can’t take larger ships. There seems to be a regular shuttle down to Zeebrugge, Belgium.
September 6, 2022
Which UK power stations consistently deliver a 95% load factor?
September 7, 2022
but if you had enough of them, redundancy would secure the required output.
September 8, 2022
I agree, that’s how most high availability systems work where each element is engineered below it’s maximum so that it can take on additional load form other elements that have failed. But there is more to redundant systems than simply having more than enough elements and the approach and complexity will vary depending on what service is being provided – power, telecoms, data comms etc.
I have a background in a particular kind of high availability system but I won’t pretend to know or understand how it needs to work in others
The point here is that people are spouting off technical terms and capabilities they clearly do not understand but sound good to them.
September 6, 2022
No such thing as “renewable energy” some lasts longer than others but “renewable” is B/S.
September 7, 2022
So LL, when is the Sun going to switch off, the Earth to stop turning, and the Earth’s mantle to be so cold as not be able to act as a hot source? We need to be told so that we don’t swallow B/S 🤪
September 7, 2022
There is no venting to atmosphere which would be a safety hazard. Most ship have systems to reliquefy boiloff gas not needed as fuel, with any residue being burned.
September 6, 2022
“More supply is the true answer to dear prices born of shortages.”
Then why rule out buying from Russia in the short/medium term, until we can ramp up home production and diversify the sources of our imports?
Sure Putin is using gas as a lever, but so would other suppliers if it defended their interests. Sure he is not particularly pleasant, but we’re happy to do business with many questionable regimes (China, Saudi Arabia etc).
Our foreign policy has shot us in the foot here. Time for a rethink?
September 6, 2022
Our insane net zero policy (and blowing up coal fired power stations) plus vast market rigging has shot us in the foot Putin then shot the other foot. Boris (just now) still wittering on about wind power to provide half our electricity (deliberately confusing, as usual, full power capacity with actual output (often 25% or less of this) due to the intermittency of wind and fossil fuel back up needed (which is also rather wasteful). Plus electricity is only about 20% of total energy needs anyway. Stop listening to Carrie and go back to your old climate realist self please Boris. You are surely not that thick as to believe the drivel you utter you did not used to be what happened?
September 6, 2022
Damian Green MP on Talk Radio just now “There is a net zero solution to the energy crisis” perhaps this PPE graduate could enlighten all the physicists and energy engineers as to what this magic solution is! Has he found some magical solutions experimenting in his bedroom perhaps? Does he think politicians can change the laws of physics? Certainly not an economic and realistic one in the near term Damian. Perhaps once we crack fusion but that is many years away before practical. Has this PPE man even got an A level in Physics? Perhaps he think we should all blow at the wind farms on calm days! Or get glow worms to illuminate the solar panels at night?
Meanwhile Boris compares himself to a booster rocket alas this was driven in totally the wrong direction we elected a climate realist, small government, low tax libertarian and got a lock down enthusiast, tax borrow and waste, manifesto ratter and an insane pusher of the net zero religion. Vote Boris get Carrie it seems.
September 6, 2022
Lifelogic: “Perhaps once we crack fusion but that is many years away before practical. ”
There is an alternative fission technology, based around the Throium cycle, the US had a fully working experimental reactor, in the ’60s.
Western governments didn’t develop it becase it doesn’t easily product Plutonium, can’t imagine why they’d want lots of Plutonium.
And Thorium is one of the 39th most abundant element in the earth’s crust. Coal ash is full of the stuff, but I recall rather than processing that, we tipped it into the North Sea.
September 6, 2022
You call that thinking? Good grief.
JF
September 6, 2022
Wanderer is simply recognising reality, JF. The hard thinking starts now, or should be starting, with the new PM. Are we carrying on down the road to ruin (net zero), or are we going to cancel that disastrous policy and exploit our own sources of fossil fuels? If the latter, it will take time, so we vitally need more stable energy markets in the meanwhile. Stoking up a war which is not and never was our fight, is no way to get stability back. As Peter Hitchens pointed out, most wars end with some kind of negotiated agreement. This one needs to as well, and quick, before winter is upon us.
September 6, 2022
Why would Russia want to sell gas to countries who are actively supporting the people they are fighting? Better to cause financial havoc in such countries so that the support might cease. It seems they can sell it elsewhere anyway.
September 6, 2022
All through the cold war and until recently Russia supplied rocket engines to NASA.
September 6, 2022
Like it or not, we (the “West”) are at war with Russia. It may be a proxy war for most of us but it’s very real for the Ukranians. I’m tired of hearing how NATO/EU provoked Putin etc – we are where we are.
Sir John’s post today is the beginning of the required political sea change needed to get us out of this situation. It’s hard to know exactly what is going on but I suspect that Russia has deep economic problems right now that can only escalate rapidly if Putin does cut gas completely. It’s certainly hurting Europe but with an economy so biased towards energy exports (and no quick way to replace European markets) it’s going to hurt Russia even more.
My belief is that Putin is gambling that the West will fold before he needs to – but I think he’s probably wrong in that assumption. Taking a medium view, he’s forcing his customers to look for alternative a lot quicker than they would have done. He made a very bad miscalculation with Ukraine and continues to do so.
Demand for gas is going to fall and even if Governments have to subsidise retail prices, demand destruction is already underway. I doubt it will help this winter but I’m pretty sure the outlook will be very different in Winter 2023. Hopefully, this crisis will also result in a more intelligent approach to managing carbon emmissions, rarther than the many stupid and simplistic measures adopted thus far. If we had thought sensibly about these matters, we wouldn’t be in this hole now – but we are, so best stop digging.
September 6, 2022
“When everyone is dead,the Great Game is finished.”
Rudyard Kipling
September 6, 2022
Continual references to renewables (they’re not renewable), wind and NZ ideology is evidence of a mindset that simply fails to grasp the gravity of the situation we are facing.
More State and more debt is not the answer, it is a road to bankruptcy and totalitarianism
September 6, 2022
+many
I know.
It is absolutely breath-taking.
How many years has the scientific mind had to develop wind and water and sun power?
Thousands!
They thought of it. They used it.
And when SOMETHING FAR SUPERIOR was discovered.
They used that IN PREFERENCE…and we were forced to develop our lives around it.
And then our leaders went all woo woo.
September 6, 2022
Woo woo = anti scientific…magick and all that stuff.
Turning their backs on The Age of Reason.
September 6, 2022
+1 – So few MPs understand physics, engineering, economics, climate, chaotic systems or any energy realities. Almost all are fairly innumerate, scientifically illiterate law, PPE, classics, history, sociology, politics & english graduates alas. Many purveying the evil politics of envy to win/buy votes. All but a tiny handful voted for net zero/the climate change act without even a full & proper cost benefit analysis. Governed by ignorant morons it seems.
September 6, 2022
Lifelogic
Yet again you highlight the real problem. Those in control of the situation do not have a ####ing clue never had and never will. All this fear stuff is totally unnecessary because anyone with half a brain can when with basic accountancy investigation skills confirm that the yet-to-be-announced real cost of the whole NZ project will be totally unsustainable not for just this country but the world in general
September 6, 2022
Wind and PV will always require 100% backup.
The Victorians ditched it in favour of coal but then again they believed in Britain. We currently have a government made up of arts graduates with no technical experience whatsoever.
I congratulate Liz and I pray she has a spine.
September 6, 2022
Good luck to her at least her political views have moved in the right direction. Unlike Boris who went from small government, low tax, libertarian & climate realist to a serial manifesto ratting, lockdown enthusiast and the complete reverse.
September 6, 2022
Ian Wragg
You are going to spend a lot of time on your knees
September 7, 2022
we all are…it might take divine intervention.
September 6, 2022
The last major outage, impacting London and the East, was of a fossil fuel power station.
I suggest any critical service requires backup and it would appear the population of UK power stations operate far below 100% to enable mutual backup – According to statista the average PLF of all power stations in the UK 2010 – 2021 ranged between approx 39% and 43%.
Put another way, fossil fuel power stations have always required 100% backup.
September 6, 2022
The jury is still out on Liz, especially after her saying that the ‘local people’ will have the last say about fracking for shale gas…..its not up to the local people – it’s a natural resource for the benefit of the whole country
September 6, 2022
+1
September 6, 2022
Agree – We need to realise that global warming, net-zero & climate change is a scam and therefore we need a government and leadership that will return us to the sustainable, plentiful and cheap fossil fuels, a time before Miliband, Cameron, May and Carrie
September 6, 2022
Glen.
Fossil fuels aren’t cheap.
That’s the problem.
Renewable energy is simply much cheaper than fossil fuels, which means the energy companies are understandably reluctant to bet their future on it, leading to less development.
How can fossil fuels compete when solar and wind keep getting cheaper year on year?
The question is how to make the transition, not how to stop it?
September 6, 2022
They were cheaper before ‘net-zero’
September 6, 2022
glen cullen
Its not going to happen mate. The Saving the World religous sect has taken over their minds and bodies.
History will show how right we were on so many things.
But the banks, billionaires, financial institutions and pension funds have decreed it will happen.
It will nothing can stop it
September 6, 2022
We can change it with the right political party
September 6, 2022
Are your referring to the sustainable, plentiful and cheap fossil fuels … like the diesel from Russia, oil from Nigeria and middle east, gas from Norway?
September 6, 2022
None of the above – fossil fuels from in, on, and surrounding the UK
September 7, 2022
not sustainable and not cheap otherwise why were we importing from Russia, Nigeria, USA, Norway, Middle East etc.
September 7, 2022
When did sun and wind become renewable? Features of the ‘big bang’ and a cooling planet?
September 7, 2022
I noted the appointment of a minister at BEIS with Climate responsibility, but none with specific energy responsibility. Frankly, energy needs to be a separate senior cabinet minister right now.
I also noted that Steve Baker, who might have been a good choice for Energy has taken a job at the NI office, presumably designed as a silencing measure.
September 6, 2022
One might think.
“Oh, leave it to the government to sort out …they know what they are doing”.
However, we are in this mess entirely BECAUSE of government.
So the big ideas, initiatives and promises are wearing somewhat thin.
September 6, 2022
The Boris epitaph – he got almost all the big things wrong – test and trace, HS2, net zero, the lock down, the NHS, energy, the worthless degrees, the vast tax increases, the road blocking, EVs, the energy market rigging, NI, even the vaccination programme seem to have done more harm than good looking at the stats yet sill they push them!
September 6, 2022
He might have got his Latin wrong as well. He seemed to pronounce Cincinnatus as the Americans pronounce Cincinnati, but according to my Latin dictionary the letter c is always pronounced as in car.
September 6, 2022
And yet Boris is today leaving like a King…not like someone who was booted out !
September 7, 2022
booted out? – more like ‘well old chap, it has been fun sometimes, but you really need to move over for the next one to promise and kid them along preparing for a massive confidence trick played out for a while before the next GE. Onwards and upwards as they say, on to the next jolly caper’.,
September 6, 2022
+1000
My own industry forced to choose things that would never have been chosen if free to do so.
September 6, 2022
Agree – Our energy bills go up every day and this government(s) still dithers about making a decision on whether to start fracking for shale gas
September 6, 2022
Give her a chance to get her feet under the table.
September 6, 2022
No – Liz could have called ‘fracking’ in her speech today….she didn’t !
September 7, 2022
Study the language, “energy security”.
September 6, 2022
Build Back Tory
September 6, 2022
Good morning.
The reason our energy prices are so high is because of government policy and nothing else. It was government policy to allow the BoE to keep on printing money and so devalue Sterling. It was government policy to go for so called renewables and not build traditional and reliable forms of energy generation. It was government policy to shutdown large gas storage facilities. It was government policy to entice Ukraine both into NATO and the EU, leading to a Russian reaction. It was government policy to impose sanctions on Russia forcing them to retaliate. It was government policy to allow millions of people into the UK and thereby increasing demand.
Congratulations to Liz Truss MP on getting the job she, like her predecessors, have converted for so long. I only hope that both she and ourselves do not come to regret that which the Conservative Party has bestowed on us. She has some big decisions to make. She may, as she claims, campaigned as a conservative, and she may, as she claimed, will govern as one. But given the fact that two of the last three were LibDems and the last of that three was a Raving Green I do not hold much hope.
Liz Truss MP – The UK third woman Prime Minster, and possibly the Tories last.
Good luck.
September 6, 2022
Well said. This crisis is entirely the responsibility of the anti-British Establishment and several Governments all singing from the same hymn-sheet (thereby denying us a democratic say over the Net Zero policy) of which Johnson’s was undoubtedly the worst.
September 6, 2022
Mark. I seem to remember having high open for our last female prime minister and look where that got us. Truss was a Lib dim and a remainer so are we fools to trust her? I certainly hope not.
September 6, 2022
+ many Mark B. We know who could have prevented this crisis, but instead helped to exacerbate it!
September 6, 2022
Good luck indeed she will need it. Start by ditching the ECHR and net zero. Then undo Sunak’s manifesto ratting so we can trust the next manifesto then scrap worthless degree soft loans, a bonfire or red tape, scrap HS2, cut all Sunak’s vast tax increases and the vast subsidies for the “renewables” – that should be week one!
In the Telegraph – Let the Left howl – but tax cuts are good even if the wealthy benefit
John Redwood
“I am in favor of cutting taxes under any circumstances and for any excuse, for any reason, whenever it’s possible.” Milton Friedman me too as people and businesses spent and invest it so very much better on average.
September 6, 2022
I cannot see that John Redwood DT article online, but I do see that he has written here today: “The Government will need to do more to help those who rely on benefits, as well as choosing tax cuts that have the best effect on tackling the squeeze brought on by the price hikes.” I believe the best solution, which will help EVERYONE who is working (and especiallty those on lower pay and therefore suffering most from the “squeeze”) is to INCREASE THE PERSONAL ALLOWANCE. This is currently only £12,570, but should be raised to at least £20,000. This would also SAVE the government money, from not needing to pay so much in benefits and from reduced collection costs, as lots of people will be taken out of the tax system altogether.
September 7, 2022
Surely various benefits (unearned income) are collated and taxed starting with the Personal Allowance?
Perhaps I am just naive?
September 7, 2022
I thought there might be a torrent of complaint putting me right, never mind.
Perhaps few return here to notice.
September 6, 2022
*Possibly* the last ????
September 6, 2022
I fear that half of the Tory backbenches are raving greens
September 6, 2022
glen cullen
They are and always have been. Stupidly they thought that pandering to the Green vote would keep them in a job for a long time. Sillllllllllllllllly. They deserve to be thrown out. Blame the selection process at headquarters.
Too many trying to survive outside their comfort zone and outside their limits of experience and ability
September 6, 2022
Very True
September 6, 2022
Mark,
+1 for Tory govt failures.
If rumours correct with Kwertang then she is doomed. He has a track record of failure for energy at BIES and his views for ECHR do not bode well for curtailing mass immigration! Truss might be appointing heads of state by quota for continued virtue signalling but it will not end well for 2024. How did the quota and virtue signalling appointments from Johnson work out!
Truss claims to run the country as a conservative- from a person who views conservatism as a former lib dumb!
September 6, 2022
He was just parroting the government line as he was paid to I suspect – hopefully they will have a new line on energy, the ECHR, taxation, illegal immigration, manifesto ratting, HS2, the size of government, the NHS, EVs, renewables, the many pointless duff university degrees, the road blocking, ever more red tape, the war on landlords and the self employed…
September 6, 2022
Yes, I blame the government. It didn’t have to be this way.
September 6, 2022
The Tories are good little boys and girls and do exactly what they are told by the US as do our neighbours across the Channel. It would be difficult to do otherwise of course as we all have been under the military occupation of the US since WWII. We are required by the US to do whatever it takes in the destruction of our own economy and handing all our to military equipment to the Zelensky regime to ‘weaken’ Russia and thus assist the US to become world hegemon. They might find that the Chinese are a harder nut to crack, however, especially after having been set up as patsies by the US by having one of the US’ bio-labs like those in Ukraine used for developing biological weapons such as Covid-19 in Wuhan. The Chinese will now understand that the US is a rogue state and totally untrustworthy if they hadn’t before.
It would be good if the Tories could stop pretending they formulate our foreign policy: they don’t, although it helps the US to have unpatriotic PMs s like Johnson who are evangelists for them.
September 7, 2022
I noted that Biden is reported to have taken a tough line on Northern Ireland which will not endear him to Truss. I note there was no report of any discussion of energy issues, which is another bone of contention with Biden, who needs to be encouraged to push for more drilling for oil and gas. We should be seeking to leverage support for Ukraine against these issues.
September 6, 2022
It was gov policy to hype renewables, but also to fail spectacularly in terms of scale and scope needed to replace the functional nuclear and fossil plant they closed or destroyed not mothballed for winter with stockpiled coal
The cfd contracts not being accepted or power being sold forward to no doubt offshore 3rd parties. Funny that.
This is a controlled reset.
September 6, 2022
Spot On Anon
September 7, 2022
I think you might mean ‘Controllers are for reset?’
September 6, 2022
You AWAIT commercial roll out of storage! You’ve encouraged the solar panels and wind turbines with subsidies. You’ve passed a law saying no more petrol and diesel cars. But you AWAIT storage. Like digging a well but not having a rope to lower the bucket with. Uselessness personified.
September 6, 2022
Mike Wilson
Very well said
September 6, 2022
There is no cheap, efficient and very effective way of storing substantial amounts of electrical energy cost effectively usually it is far better to generate it only when needed from Gas, Oil or a piles of coal. We clearly have damn fools in charge.
September 6, 2022
Completely Agree
September 6, 2022
+1
They might as well get down on their knees and start praying for miracles.
September 6, 2022
I bet this mess won’t appear when Boris’ legacy gets spun by his mates.
September 6, 2022
Anyone who jumped on board the electric car bandwagon is also getting a very valuable lesson.
It’s going to cost a small fortune to charge their vehicle this winter and in the coming years. I expect sales of EVs to fall off a cliff as the gullible wake up to the reality of the cost to charge their car quadrupling in the space of a year.
So Truss should admit NOW that banning the sale of new petrol/diesel vehicles in 2030 is both unachievable and undesirable.
September 6, 2022
Just the financing costs and depreciation can be £1 a mile or so. They also cause far more CO2 (in manufacture of car battery(s) and charging and than keeping a small old conventional car.
September 6, 2022
So why are the government pushing them? To price most people off the roads that they are blocking anyway I assume!
September 6, 2022
EV charging stations charge VAT at 20% so topping up other than at home could prove very expensive.
September 7, 2022
we pay VAT on liquid fuel so why not on EV fuel?
September 6, 2022
Donna
These people will never admit they are wrong. Its built-in DNA and it runs through parliaments the world over.
It’s the old old story said on here many times before. Ignorance brings incompetence which creates arrogance.
September 6, 2022
Not only that, they have passed a law that prohibits EV’s being charged when the grid is at high capacity.
It is a government website Sir John
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/regulations-electric-vehicle-smart-charge-points
September 6, 2022
I still haven’t seen a single petrol station funded by the taxpayer ? Funny that !
September 7, 2022
The law does not prohibit EVs being charged when the grid is at high load – read it.
September 7, 2022
But the EV battery outside might be an ideal warming method when our house power goes out!
Perhaps neighbours will ask if they can take up any spare seats?
September 6, 2022
It would seem that the elaphants of Net Zero and the Climate Change Act are to stay in the room!!!
September 6, 2022
You have summed up the article in one line. Well done!
September 6, 2022
Cynic
They have been in there so long now they are the building
September 6, 2022
They’re not just staying in the room…most of them are getting promoted
September 6, 2022
If Truss and this new government does not fully ditch the net zero religion then they are complete idiots!
September 6, 2022
The headline is quite correct.
However, this is a Europe-wide problem, and so at this time the closest possible co-operation is essential to its solution.
Sir John is ideologically absolutely opposed to that, and so yet another crucial opportunity will no doubt be missed by the ERG-controlled Tories, and to the severe further detriment of the people of this country.
September 6, 2022
Pardon me if I don’t get excited about the prospect of cooperation with the EU, whilst they are threatening legal action over the NI protocol. Act in our interests first, I’m sure that’s what the EU will do.
September 6, 2022
How can you claim the Conservatives are controlled by the ERG when hardly any of their policies or ideas are being implemented NHL?
September 6, 2022
Correct – the only achievement I can remember is the change of colour of the UK passport (which was meanlingless)
September 6, 2022
So you think the EU will want the closest possible co-operation (with us) which is essential (to its solution).?
They want interconnects from us to backup their shortcomings…
September 7, 2022
More rubbish from you Lad. Since when did the EU ever want to fairly negotiate with us? All they want to do us block our ports, turn off our lights or fine us. Open your eyes.
September 6, 2022
I read some numbers the other day on the cost of charging electric cars. At today’s electricity and petrol costs, it seems that a modern small petrol car that can do 60 mpg is able to compete on cost per mile with the 2 ton electric powered monstrosities.
If petrol goes back down in price from its recent all time highs, petrol will be a no brainer when choosing a new car.
Your net zero strategy is in tatters.
September 6, 2022
Does that also take into account the depreciation cost of the recharge, which recently was more than the value of the electric power supplied?
September 6, 2022
Spot On – but what can we do with half the Tory party supporting the ‘greens’ and the other half in fear of the ‘greens’
September 6, 2022
EV do not even save any CO2 after the construction of the car and battery are considered! Wind and Solar save very little after the construction and the back are considered too.
September 6, 2022
But it will not stop them. They are on a Lemming Train.
September 6, 2022
somebody said to me that using red diesel in a generator for their electricity is the cheapest currently.
September 7, 2022
What are the numbers are where did you read them?
According to the RAC today the average price of unleaded is 168p per litre, that is £7.64 per gallon.
At an average of 4 miles per kWH, 60 miles would need 15 kWH.
The current average cost of electricity is approx 27p per kWH so those 60 miles would cost 15 x 27 = £4.05.
So a small petrol car is not able to compete on cost per mile at current prices.
September 6, 2022
What about Brexit…that democratic exercise kicked into the long grass.
And the Unions..which I suspect have been behind many of the shenanigans.
It all needs sorting.
September 6, 2022
It isn’t just Putin that uses energy as a weapon, is it?
Macron, who is supposedly a friend and ally, threatened to turn off power to blackmail our country into giving more fishing licences. If ‘friends and allies’ use it as a weapon, then you really cannot point the finger at Putin. Point it to this and all preceding governments. There is no logical or economic reason for giving imports priority over self sufficiency so WHY were our governments so intent on causing unnecessary damage to the UK? Do our politicians and government have an agenda which does NOT include putting UK interests first? Is there any other logical explanation?
September 6, 2022
Macron is getting very tetchy over Erdogan’s relationship with Mr Putin(there’s a longstanding deep personal enmity between the French and Turkish leaders !) – and over who will be allowed to broker the peace when Ukraine collapses and is partitioned.
The Turkish media have been crowing in recent weeks about how western companies are lining up to use Turkey(which has refused to impose sanctions on Russia) as an intermediary to get their products back into the Russian market.BNE Intelligence report this month reports that Turkish warehouses are full of stuff destined for the Russian market.And figures released this week bear that out-Turkish exports to Russia yoy in July are up 75%.
I’m lovin’ the NATO solidarity,too!
September 7, 2022
Better to let the Turks benefit than the Chinese who are at present buying energy from the Russians and selling it at a profit to the EU.
September 7, 2022
The Chinese have contracts to buy energy and equity investments in energy production from many different places, including the US and offshore in the UK via Nexen. They are happy to increase their own use of coal to allow resale of oil and gas at very handsome profit margins.
September 6, 2022
Yes your right.
France is in a very precarious position regarding generation at the moment. We are exporting 3gw every hour to help, we are also transitting lng to top up EU storage.
We have massive leverage over the NIP and should not shy away from using it.
September 7, 2022
Our gas exports to Belgium and the Netherlands and Ireland have been running at a steady 90mcm/d, or almost 1TWh a day. I do not expect to see much of that back, to judge from recent winters.
September 6, 2022
correct.
September 6, 2022
A depressing article which fails to challenge explicitly the insane prioritisation of renewables.
September 6, 2022
Agreed.
September 6, 2022
MPC
Correct
September 6, 2022
That’s unfair, as Sir John has frequently spoken out against the prioritisation of unreliable wind turbines. I do agree, however, that he needs to push the RR SMRs much harder. In particular, he needs to urge the government to start ordering, and building, these NOW, not wait until the certification process is complete. The crucial point is that certification and construction should take place CONCURRENTLY, not consecutively. By building these NOW, so that they are ready to switch on the moment the safety certification is successfully completed (as it UNDOUBTEDLY will be, given that RR has decades of experience of building safe nuclear reactors), we will save YEARS and be energy independent much sooner than under the government’s current plans.
September 6, 2022
+1
Some B/S From BBC GCSE Bite Size:-
Renewable energy is defined as energy that is collected from resources that will never run out or which are replaced by nature in less than a human lifetime.
(all will obviously run out eventually as they come from the earth rotation (tidal), the sun’s radiated fusion or radio activity (geothermal))
Non-renewable energy is defined as energy collected from resources that cannot be replaced when they are used up, such as oil, natural gas or coal.
(Oil, natural gas and coal can all be replaced by growing them from sunlight! we burn wood or young coal at Drax) – So this is complete B/S we teach our children now as physics is it?
September 7, 2022
I think we have take into account the audience it was written for. Many Conservative Home readers are unlikely to have thought very much about the problems Sir John gently points out. Lots of them still watch the BBC and may even believe what they’re hearing. Educating that audience is a job that has to be undertaken a step at a time.
September 6, 2022
Decouple the price of electricity from the price of gas electricity generated using gas will attract a greater price which can be averaged in the market place using cheaper renewables coal and wood burning methods.
Tax any subsidy given to green electricity at 100% where the price is over the five year average by 100%. No one should be getting subsidies while price gouging.
Remove VAT and green levies from our bills – subsidise a large cut the wholesale price using the windfall tax and subsidy tax rather than price cap. Ofgem imposed profit margins will then act as a price cap This will benefit business and consumers and remove margin from the price increase.
No increase in benefits that is not at least matched by tax cuts for the people who pay for those benefits. One nation Conservatism goes both ways.
Turn down the heating in the hotels (small measure but shares the pain, let the charities that work against the UK and for these spongers give them a jumper each).
September 6, 2022
I expect it will be cheaper for many pensioners to head for a warmer climate this winter rather than pay to heat their homes. Here’s an idea, let them holiday in the Rwandan hotels that the taxpayers have paid for and are currently sitting empty. In Spain, the government subsidises pensioners to holiday in warmer coastal towns during the winter months.
It will look terrible when the number of British people dying from hypothermia this winter rises massively. If only we had an ONS system that was fit for purpose and showed the true cost of the human lives lost due to government policies. Still no investigation into the massive rise in non-covid deaths that have been happening over the last year.
September 7, 2022
Instead of providing another jab, why doesn’t the NHS give out body-warmers instead?
September 6, 2022
“Tax any subsidy given to green electricity at 100% where the price is over the five year average by 100%. No one should be getting subsidies while price gouging.” – Narrow Shoulders
Energy UK suggests moving windfarms onto CfD contracts rather than their older subsidised ones, which would save households £18Bn.
September 7, 2022
I looked at that proposal. They are getting subsidies of almost £10bn a year before we consider the fact that they pay nothing for the intermittency problems they cause on production of about 80TWh. If we look at the forward price of gas we see that it drops to about €40/MWh for 2025 onwards, implying electricity at about £70/MWh. The forward power price for next year is about £480/MWh. So they are offering to knock off maybe £100/MWh in exchange for a long term guarantee of an inflation linked base price of £380/MWh. It’s a massive con.
Beware of Greens bearing gifts.
September 6, 2022
Off topic, after years of writing studiously calm and conciliatory letters to the editors of various pro-nationalist Irish newspapers I finally lost my rag yesterday and sent this to several of them:
“Before Simon Coveney threatens us with a trade war he might like to reflect that it would hit the Irish Republic much harder than the UK – and the UK government should make sure to maximise that pain.”
I don’t expect to see it published, but then this morning I remembered that TWO BLOODY YEARS AGO I had this exchange in the letters page of the Irish Times:
September 7 2020:
https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/letters/a-brexit-no-deal-good-luck-with-that-1.4347882
“It was kind of the EU’s chief negotiator Michel Barnier to wish us Brits “good luck” if we do not agree a special trade deal with the EU (Naomi O’Leary, “Mood darkens as EU and Britain face sprint to reach last-chance deal”, September 2nd).
Perhaps there was nobody in his Irish audience who realised that they would need “good luck” more than us … ”
September 8 2020:
https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/letters/a-trade-deal-and-making-our-own-luck-1.4348904
“Responding to Michel Barnier’s kind wishes of good luck to the UK in the event that no trade deal is concluded with the EU in the next few weeks, DR Cooper (Letters, September 7th) suggests that “there was nobody in his Irish audience who realised that they would need ‘good luck’ more than us”.
These remarks, coupled with extensive quotation from economic reports about the extent of Ireland’s potential suffering in the event that there is no deal concluded, reveal an ignorance of the fact that Irish people are, in general, painfully aware of this reality … ”
And I repeat, if the Irish government wants a trade war then we should give them one, and make it a total war.
September 9, 2022
Well, it has been published in the Irish Examiner today, so that is something.
We should simply not accept any EU checks and controls on any of the goods moving between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, because it is none of the EU’s business what goods move between two parts of our country, and therefore Liz Truss should not be proposing this half measure of red and green channels.
September 6, 2022
Before we get to the longer term solutions, which in my view must take us back to being a net energy exporter as we were before 2004, there is the urgent short to medium term need to insulate retail energy consumers from the massive rises in the wholesale prices of energy, as argued here:
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2022/09/05/zimbabwe-venezuela-sri-lanka-three-poster-countries-for-price-controls/#comment-1339196
“… a temporary government intervention which arranged that the retail prices of energy would be set back to the retail prices which obtained at some selected point in time before wholesale prices started going through the roof, with the government compensating the retail energy suppliers for selling it on at a loss.”
September 7, 2022
I think there should be a social tariff element for a tranche of supply, duly subsidised, and a market rate at the margin proving some incentive to economise. Similar arrangements are necessary for industry, although there may need to be some prioritisation for essential elements and a willingness to shut down the highest consumers such as brick production.
I wait for more detail on the plans, but I am not convinced that an attempt to cap gas prices will be wholly successful. Electricity prices are being set by interconnectors. We are exporting gas fired power currently because the French will pay for it. If we make gas cheap they will continue to pay and leave us short of power in winter. This is also happening between Spain and France, because in Spain they have capped the gas price.
September 6, 2022
1,300 trillion cubic feet of natural gas in the bowland shale so it’s said. Obviously it won’t all be extracted, and it can’t all be extracted over a short period. But if it were, that’s enough for the entire world’s primary energy requirements for 2 1/2 years. So enough for the UK’s for about 200. Not just electricity, everything. Or to put it another way it’s 45x the US’s annual shale gas production. And 1/2 the CO2 emissions of coal and oil. Looks like a no-brainer to me. But to stop all the nonsense about earthquakes (the current, absurdly low, limit of 0.5 on the Richter scale would have to be 25x greater before it could be detected without a seismograph), people in the vicinity need a serious financial incentive, US-style.
Hopefully these and other relevant facts might now make it to the cabinet table uncensored and unfiltered by the green blob.
September 6, 2022
Richard1
Your last paragraph regarding direction of information travel sums it all up.
It will never ever happen.
What good is having information if you cannot understand or comprehend it.
September 6, 2022
An excellent post Richard
September 6, 2022
I live in the middle of the shale gas area and never felt one earthquake during the drilling. We had a few natural earthquakes well before fracking started. The only disruption I’ve seen is the eco-warriors constantly blocking the roads and causing massive tailbacks. Some of the sites are off small country lanes and I can understand people objecting to those.
September 6, 2022
UK Onshore Oil and Gas calculated recently that UK fracking might produce between 90 and 330 billion cubic metres (3 and 11 trillion cubic feet) of natural gas between 2020 and 2050. Using future demand figures from National Grid, they calculated that could represent between 17 and 22 per cent of projected cumulative UK consumption over that period.
September 7, 2022
Even with that pessimistic calculation that is a fantastic opportunity for us.
September 6, 2022
Start fracking for shale gas today
September 6, 2022
I hear a lot of nudging and whispers ‘ what’s the Richter scale?’
September 7, 2022
I think he played the Rachmaninov Prelude in C sharp minor brilliantly…
September 6, 2022
It has been successive Conservative Governments policy to further integrate the Blair/Brown idea of considering levies etc. as not being tax. We now have the situation that the taxpayer inflows to Government have not been this high for more than a couple of generations.
Allowing the removal of UK wealth by those that get to enjoy its benefits but never contribute on an equal basis as the indigenous people/companies, is a disingenuous premise perpetuated by successive governments. It is Government contrived poverty. i.e. imports along with foreign ownership is not always as they seem on so many levels when the playing field is tilted only in their favour
September 6, 2022
Good morning John,
Why not just come clean with the people of the UK and tell them the net zero agenda means expensive energy which many will not be able to afford? This is the cost of “saving the planet” (ignoring the pollution elephant in the room).
On another matter, I expect events will unfold quickly today. So if you are called to duty and no longer have the time to moderate this blog, I’m sure I speak for many on here in wishing you well.
September 6, 2022
The current system of government seems to place a lot of influence, and hence power, in the hands of spads and advisors.
September 6, 2022
Dave Andrews
First paragraph: that is going to hurt and that is just the supply of the energy. Wait to the real costs of decommissioning and disposal of all the blades and panels across the world start to throw up mega problems and costs. not even considered in todays climate.
Second paragraph: If it happens it will be worthy recognition for all his work over the years. For my money it should have been our host going to Balmoral today. Cannot even begin to understand why the party didnt go for safer steady hands with proven tack record on so many areas and above all well respected in most of the important circles of power. I do hope these words come back to haunt them
September 6, 2022
We are in the hands of MP’s and Civil-Servants who have had to follow instructions from The E U.
How confident are we ,that those in charge ,can put in place infrastructure to keep the lights on and industry working?
September 6, 2022
Bob Dixon
Cannot get confident over anything this lot have done. Nothing is going to change it ever does.
September 6, 2022
…at an affordable price?
September 6, 2022
One fish and chip shop in this area reports his energy charges going from £1k a month to £5k a month. A cafe’ £800 to £1600 a month. 50% of pubs will close and those that remain will be hideously expensive and most homes don’t have a solid fuel burning stove in them. Our local swimming pool will never reopen since Covid (kids being unable to learn to swim is less important than their jabs.)
You can’t do anything about this, Sir John. It’s all too late.
Oh. And your useless party lets thousands of boat blokes a day take the piss out of us.
It was galling to hear Boris’s ‘funny’ speech today – the man is a lunatic and is only good for celebrity game shows. At least he couldn’t war monger and apply self harming sanctions from Down Under.
Please start by at least acknowledging that petrol and diesel is taxed at over 100% of wholesale price and that the Treasury has been raking it in with VAT piggy backing on inflation, and that government is a huge and pointless burden on society (boat blokes, above.)
September 7, 2022
There are always tv ‘funny’ shows, pantos, newspaper columns – that book about Shakespeare?
September 7, 2022
The council implements car parking chargers in the high street and collects £50 a day in revenue, within three months all the retails shops are closing due to lack of foot fall….but the council is collecting £50 a day, which was their success criteria
Same philosophy, our government is collecting huge amounts of VAT revenue; so may it continue and two fingers to business energy costs
September 6, 2022
What’s key is the style of leadership from the new PM
Will she, as per the last three PMs go off-piste, and tear up the manifesto, be manipulated by the media and green lobby
Or listen to her members wishes, backbenches concerns and cabinet consensus while maintaining Tory principles and traditions and put the people & nation of the UK first above the EU & UN
September 6, 2022
glen cullen
It would be a first if she actually listened to the people not through the politicians but getting out there and walked the talk, but above all listen.
If MPs don’t like or understand what they hear they ignore it.
September 6, 2022
phew…thats a tough, nay impossible task.
September 6, 2022
Intermittent renewable energy is worthless because our domestic and business life cannot exist without affordable and reliable “available at the flick of a switch” power.
Renewables are only existing at present because we are still running a parallel fossil fuel system. As I write the 27 GW of installed wind turbine power is producing just 5.92GW and often it is less than 1 GW. Removing fossil fuels will cause volatile prices and rolling blackouts when the wind doesn’t blow.
Li-ion batteries for storage would cost £ trillions even if there was sufficient raw materials in existence, which BTW are controlled by China and Russia.
We will need an 8 fold increase in the installed capacity of wind turbines to produce sufficient excess energy to produce hydrogen based upon the wind turbine capacity factor of 30% and 60% for electrolysis and electricity generation.
Renewables, as well as uneconomic, provide no energy security when 90% of turbine parts and 100% of solar panels are made in China.
The national, and in particular, the local grids, are incapable of supplying the peak loads caused by the electrification of heating and transport and hence leading to further volatile pricing and rolling blackouts.
Apart from the unnecessarily expensive and technically duff Hinkley Point C all our nuclear plants will be closed by the 2035 decarbonisation date. The “one nuclear reactor per year” aim only starts in 2043.
Unless Net Zero is cancelled and we start to use our own coal, gas and oil our goose is well and truly cooked.
September 6, 2022
More for those who rely on benefits?
Politicians finally woken up to the ongoing mob riots in London?
And STILL 18th century-style terrified of them?
Build another 19th century reform style Wandsworth?
No…No…give them more benefits! Keep them calm.
We need a conservatively-empowered Police FORCE not more handouts or soppy social solutions.
Hard working tax-founders just might suspect that this chaos is what the govt actually wants!
September 6, 2022
“It was never a good idea to rely too much on imported gas. Now we know Russia will use it as a weapon that is even clearer.”
If Europe had not fallen for the communist inspired CAGW/Net Zero scam, and thus become recklessly dependent upon Russia for its energy (coal, gas and oil), Russia would never have invaded Ukraine.
September 6, 2022
Russia would still have invaded Ukraine because of NATO’s encroachments-particularly the troop build-up in the east ,”shaped” by NATO, as part of a planned campaign to recover the separatist regions of the Donbass.
September 7, 2022
Mitchel :
Russia may have wanted to invade Ukraine for the very reasons you give but it would not have done so if Net Zero had not economically weakened Europe, massively funded Russia’s military through fossil fuel sales and made Europe reliant upon Russia for its energy.
A cold winter and I can see Europe giving in to Russia.
The invasion and all the deaths in Ukraine as a result of CAGW and Net Zero taking hold in Europe.
September 6, 2022
LNG is not compressed, it’s condensed by cooling to -162 degrees C (the pressure is near atmospheric).
It’s still an expensive way to prepare a commodity for shipment across an ocean, before warming it back to a gas and using it.
September 6, 2022
Where else is the UK going to get extra supplies of gas this winter, if not from LNG tankers? The fact is that the UK has to be a higher priced bidding zone than the rest of North West Europe. That way, Norway and the UKCS players may turn their export volume to the UK, up to eleven. Even the EU may allow the two Bacton interconnectors, to export some of its expensive storage gas to the UK. Don’t bet on it. Those Q-Max gas tankers always sail to the zone with the highest prices. And, they all know the UK is heavily dependent on imports and has little storage capacity to hedge against ransom prices.
September 6, 2022
If the proposed £140 billion scheme to lower prices leads to increased profits for the energy companies, then expect a huge backlash next year.
Those profits would have been made off the back of taxpayer subsidy.
Although I’m of Conservative mindset, I’m sick and tired of these energy companies making record profits out of other peoples misfortune – those who often can’t afford it.
If they are making record profits, then there is scope on their side to lower prices and to take a temporary hit in profits to do the right thing.
September 6, 2022
Yes, of course we can lower prices. Companies must be allowed to make a profit, so that they invest in more energy production, but profit should NOT mean PROFITEERING. That is why I have suggested that the government IMPOSE, by law, a new contract on all energy companies, so that they are paid their actual costs + 7% profit margin. Offering a reasonable and GUARANTEED profit is a perfectly good and Conservative approach to the problem, and will cut inflation and also mean lower government spending. A win, win, win all round!
September 7, 2022
Guaranteeing their actual costs is a very good way of them increasing their ‘actual’ costs substantially, ie. top end salaries and other perks. They need incentives to bring costs down and pass on the savings.
September 6, 2022
@Mark J; Indeed, it’s the same old story from UK govts since 1979, privatize the profits, nationalise the losses, and as you said it is always those least afford it who end up paying. The backlash, though, won’t be until the next election – short of a Poll Tax style “Can’t pay, won’t pay” protest (not that I would condone such action)..
September 7, 2022
i’m not entirely convinced about your last point.
September 6, 2022
BLAME GOVERNMENTS NOT OIL COMPANIES. FGS. Clueless
What we see is a politically created crisis that benefits governments and weakens the civil population ie creates State dependency and encourages people to look TO the State rather than to themselves. The fact that the Tory party has embraced this form of snivelling, Socialist politics shows evidence of a unified class of politicians all now batting for the same ideology. Democracy circumvented
September 6, 2022
The energy supply companies have sold forward to offshore parties so those contracts may have to be unwound and the parties nationalized.
September 6, 2022
I’m more sick of our own government taking their cut…VAT, Green Levy, Duty & Tax
September 6, 2022
Media commentators across Europe have been making comparisons between Truss and former UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. But instead of calling her the new “Iron Lady” (Dame de fer) French newspaper Les Echos referred to Truss as the Giroutte de Fer – in other words an “Iron Weathercock”, a reference to criticism that the new PM has changed her stance on issues to suit her quest for power. She was once a member of the Liberal Democrats party before switching to the Conservatives. (Local.es) Reader question: Can I spend the winter in France to avoid huge energy bills? (Local.fr)
September 6, 2022
It is one thing being a political signpost but to still point towards the same bridge after said bridge has been swept away by events is just stupid. There are times to be a signpost, there are times when politicians need to be weathercocks, such as the ill-winds that blow.
Her future actions will be the judge of Liz Truss, not her past history, just as was the case with Winston Churchill, and indeed Margaret Thatchers time in office.
September 6, 2022
Hahaha 😂 is that the best you’ve got acorn! She was a Liberal Democrat when she was 19. All parties want the converter, isn’t that the point, that as someone grows and develops their political opinions as they get more knowledgeable. Who doesn’t think they know everything as a teenager.
Lots of my family are reds and what did that ever do for their area. A big fat nothing. They’ve got Tories now one of the red walls.
Answer: of course you can spend winter in France but don’t overstay your welcome and make sure you’ve got your own medical insurance, they’re not quite so easy going on treating the world as our NHS is.
September 7, 2022
@a-tracy; “Lots of my family are reds and what did that ever do for their area. A big fat nothing. They’ve got Tories now one of the red walls.”
Such areas have Tory MPs currently, who knows what the next election will bring, stop being so bl**dy arrogant! It will not need many of those, so called, northern red wall seats to change back, should there also be a swing against ‘blue wall’ seats in the south for the Tories to be in opposition. It has happened in the past and if anything UK politics has never been so polarized as it has become since 2016, yes Boris Johnson got Brexit done, but now Liz Truss has to make Brexit work, for both the read and blue wall seats…
September 8, 2022
Sorry being so bl**dy rude as usual Jerry.
September 7, 2022
Acorn. We can start a collection to send you to your beloved France permanently if you like.
September 7, 2022
au revoir!
September 6, 2022
CAGW/Net Zero is a communist inspired scam based upon the false idea that anthropological emissions of CO2 are causing climate breakdown, when in fact there is no evidence of increased extreme weather events, polar ice is not melting etc., and increasing CO2 boosts plant growth.
The CO2 level in the atmosphere 570m years ago, at the start of the Cambrian explosion, was at 6000 ppm. Over millions of years the CO2 level has dropped as CO2 was sequestered by plants, trees and in particular by animals producing hard shells such that today the carbon locked up in carbonaceous rocks is 100,000 times more than exists in the atmosphere.
During the last ice age, maximum 20,000 years ago, CO2 dropped to the lowest level in history at just 180 ppm. Life was close to extinction as below 150 ppm plants cannot exist. Fortunately as the planet warmed (not caused by CO2!) the oceans released some of their CO2 and the level climbed to 280 ppm, the concentration at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.
We are therefore saving the planet by burning fossil fuels and releasing CO2 back into the atmosphere from whence it came, and at the rate of 2 ppm/year we have 300 years to get to the considered optimum for plant growth of around 1000 ppm.
There is absolutely no need for the economy destroying Net Zero Strategy.
September 6, 2022
https://euobserver.com/tickers/155968
“Ukraine seeks EU weapons, offers gas”
“Ukrainian prime minister Denys Shmyhal has urged the EU to increase weapons deliveries and offered to share gas with Europe amid Russian cut-offs. “We need more modern weapons, such as air defence, missile defence and ship defence,” he said in Brussels on Monday, Reuters reports. Ukraine had 30 billion cubic metres of gas in storage tanks, he added. “We can replace to a large extent the Russian imports,” he said.”
That’s a good idea, let’s make ourselves dependent on the saintly Zelensky rather than the devilish Putin.
This war will continue for as long as we continue to supply weapons to the government in Kyiv, because with or without Putin I see no chance of Russia ever relinquishing Crimea as Saint Volodymyr demands:
https://tinyurl.com/4dw4wbeb
“Ukraine war must end with liberation of Crimea from Russia, says Zelensky”
Why should we be involved in this? Here is an article on how and why Crimea became part of Ukraine:
https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/why-did-russia-give-away-crimea-sixty-years-ago
So many disputes of this kind have arisen around the world, are we to be dragged into all of them?
September 7, 2022
Isn’t the Ukrainian gas actually Russian gas that passes through the Brotherhood pipeline?
It is western economic support that will determine Zelensky’s future-their collapsed economy is running a c$5bn per month deficit,with minimal forex reserves.
September 6, 2022
My daughter lives in UAE in Abu Dhabi. She told me that all the infrastructure from roads through to schools and housing and hospitals is assisted by Adnoc (the oil company). She knows people in Adnoc well and they do fracking every day near the city centre. No tramps on the streets. Even the local immigrants are given new blue boiler suits and water on top of accommodation and pay.
Years and years of propaganda and naivety have led to the current crisis in energy. Handing over fracking to the local nimbies is fatal. They believe that oil comes out of the kitchen taps, that there are huge earthquakes and that the earth falls into the hole.
September 6, 2022
@Mike Stallard; “Years and years of propaganda and naivety have led to the current crisis”
Cough, that’s a brave thing to say on this blog… 😮 🙂
September 6, 2022
Yes Mike Stallard. My heart sank at the words ‘local consent’.
Just damn well DO IT.
September 6, 2022
+1
September 7, 2022
@Pauline Baxter; “Just damn well DO IT.”
I assume you will not then oppose any planning application for new housing, factories, roads, power stations etc or extraction permits in your locality, never mind at the bottom of your own garden, nor will you oppose any (compulsory) purchase of yours or neighboring land for similar purposes?
The problem has never been the need to gain ‘planning approval’, the problem has become the APPEALS process.
September 6, 2022
The ‘Green Levy’ has to be removed today
The ‘Standing Charge’ needs to be removed tomorrow
The ‘VAT’ (Euro-Tax) needs to be reviewed and replaced this week
The UK single traiff for both industry & domestic supply needs to be implimented this month (differing energy traiffs are a scam)
Create a UK energy market for UK produced energy this month
September 6, 2022
Also the pricing system which requires that we pay the same for energy from a low cost nuclear plant as we do from a now very expensive gas power station has to be scrapped. The wholesale price should be the ‘average’ cost based on the supplier mix entering the grid.
This will give each supplier a normal return, the consumer will get a lower cost supply, and it will cost the taxpayer nothing.
September 6, 2022
I wonder how long it will take for politicians to grasp that storage of electrical energy is not physically possible for more than part of a day and the conversion, whether by pumping water, compressing gas, converting to hydrogen or anything tried yet, is very expensive and wasteful. All but one of our existing nuclear stations are about to close and the new one is of the same type that the Chinese have had to close down. The one that Boris has put a deposit on is also this dud French design. We are up the creek and the crew are fools.
September 6, 2022
Yes Sir John,
I second many of the posts here in the foolishness of the Net Zero religion.
September 6, 2022
I’ll just bang my drum which says we must get more of our assets from below our feet, urgently and in large quantities and storage provided. New sites must be authorised and subsidized if required. The product must be used instead of imports.
But the businesses which should get help with gas costs are those which make things and are home owned.
And my definition of making does not include sandwiches, coffee and other trivia. If they can’t pay the bills then they must close. City desk bounders will just have to make their own sandwiches and lunch drinks and take them to work from home.
We must as a country and as people become self reliant and stop imagining that the rest of the world exists to supply us with things we are too lazy to make ourselves.
September 6, 2022
Good piece as usual John. However, I am at a loss to understand why you never mention shale gas and the enormous self sufficiency that lies beneath our own land. Lets get fracking asap.
Am i missing something?
September 6, 2022
Concur with your comments
September 6, 2022
Sir John, I’m delighted to see you finally come out against the carbon taxes in your Tweet today. I just hope you will persuade Liz of this. The Emissions Trading Scheme, and all other carbon taxes, must be scrapped – or at least suspended. Is she going to appoint you to a post so that you can help her out of the hole she is in? If not, any chance she may have of success will be lost.
As to your article today, I broadly agree BUT despair at the weakness of your statement that fracking can only take place with the agreement of local residents. NO!!! I have pointed out before that local communities cannot stand in the way of the NATIONAL good. I have pointed out before that during WWII local communities did not have a veto over the building of Spitfire factories in their neighbourhoods. I have pointed out before that WE ARE IN A WAR-LIKE CRISIS and must adopt wartime measures, including IMPOSING solutions on the country.
September 6, 2022
Let’s also do as much as we can to cut consumption of gas and energy. If the unit price doubles and our consumption is halved, then we’ve cracked it. So here’s a list of some things we can do to cut down gas and energy consumption; acknowledgement to Edwina Currie for some of them.
– Impose a maximum room temperature of 17 degrees C in homes and offices
– Abolish VAT on clothing temporarily
– Wear a triple layer of thin sweaters and woollen underwear (government could issue vouchers to the poor to purchase these)
– Tin foil on the back of radiators
– Move sofas away from radiators
– Minimise use of TV and games
– Don’t boil more water in the kettle than you need
– Only put the dishwasher on when it’s full
– Strip washing preferred to showering
– Showering preferred to baths
– Prepare some cold food meals rather than hot meals
– Turn off lights when not in room
Come on everyone, Sir John included. Let’s complete this list of ideas for reducing energy consumption and send it to Liz Truss.
September 7, 2022
Lindsay – does all that apply to HM Prisons and Young Offenders units? What about hotels for illegal immigrants?
Places of work? Civil Service buildings, schools/colleges?
Good luck with that.
September 6, 2022
Off topic, reading that Liz Truss’s early appointments have included a “political director of communications” and a “director of communications” I wondered whether between them they might help her to do a bit better than her two predecessors when it comes to knocking this kind of rubbish on the head – a reader’s letter in the Irish News today, headed:
“Getting rid of protocol could lead to hard border”.
In fact doing anything at all about it would be doing infinitely better than her two predecessors, but then one of them was very happy to be provided with any false pretext to keep us the economic thumb of the EU while the other one was a charlatan who had no regard for the truth in this or any other case.
September 6, 2022
“Price controls distort and deter investment.”
That Sir John is an opinion, not a fact…
Were Energy prices not regulated post WW2 until the privatizations of the 1980s, yet the post war period saw one of the largest ever investment in to the sector, from the completion of the National Grid to the advent of nuclear power and then natural gas. True it was govt lead, taxpayer funded, but it was your beloved private sector that benefited from all the contracts.
September 6, 2022
A broad church with a diversity rainbow, and hungry for net zero, that john’s party.
September 6, 2022
We’re doomed, as it looks like Liz is going to appoint the Rt Hon Kwasi Kwarteng MP as the new Chancellor ….he couldn’t even make a decision about fracking for shale gas and still hasn’t, he’s been brainwashed by the green lobby
I tell yeah we’re doomed
September 6, 2022
“The Government will need to do more to help those who rely on benefits”
Not this again! It is almost amusing to see this kneejerk reaction by clueless vote-cadging politicians from left to right.
Have you any idea of the existing almost inexhaustive list of benefits available? All of them subsidised by workers who do not ‘rely’ on help from other taxpayers? In some cases (water and energy companies) the grants and subsidies are simply loaded onto the bills of the non-defaulters.
Pensions (plus extra benefits) are already being paid by those who earned them through personal sacrifice to those who chose not to work during their working lives. Of course there are some hardship cases, but the right of the inactive to expect the hard workers and contributors to pay them should be questioned. It’s driven a coach and hortses through moral hazard, and undermined the social work ethic.
September 7, 2022
Agreed. The pre-tax wage needed to pay the benefits received by some families is unbelievable and could never be achieved by those receiving it. Why are they allowed to receive (tax-free) more than they could possibly earn? This is why people do NOT work. They earn more by NOT working. The state would punish them financially for working.
Naturally, exceptions should be made for those who are unable to work.
September 6, 2022
Guido reporting that Truss is about to fall into an establshment trap – moving policy unit out of No10 to a unit in the Cabinet Office run by… Gordon Brown’s former speech writer – who is also Rachel Reeves’ husband.
This is not a good start 🙁
As a former head of the policy unit, hopefully JR can make a quick call…?
September 7, 2022
On the other hand, Lord Agnew said in his evidence against the Treasury that there were only two Departments which were fit for purpose – HMRC and the DWP. The DWP is run by Dr Coffey and Mr Joicey. Mr Joicey was first discovered by William Waldegrave in his very successful unsung stint as Chief Secretary. Brown only inherited him, along with the very good books Mr Waldegrave left.
It is a tricky one, this sleeping with the enemy, which seems to go on all over Westminster and Whitehall. Perhaps that is why the two main parties are so similar and no longer tribal or loyal, and why nothing, but nothing, seems to stay out of the media.
September 6, 2022
Is Truss going to take your sensible advice on the economy?
Also, what is she going to do about all Boris’s other failures?
We are not out of the EU while still in the ECHR.
Northern Ireland is still in the EU. As is our fishing industry.
Cross channel immigration has sky rocketed.
Freedom and prosperity Sir John?
While not being FREE of the EU we are definitely closer to being enslaved by Global Organisations.
And none of it has brought, or ever will bring, Prosperity.
September 6, 2022
The Tories still have a huge majority …..they could change and do whatever they wished to do ? So why isn’t it getting done ?
September 7, 2022
The answer is obvious!
September 6, 2022
Just watching this Truss circus on tv and then from my window I can see the food bank shop with the second hand store down the road a little – am sure anyone looking at it on tv for the first time might think we were still a great nation.. but then looking at the food bank shop I don’t think so.. I think the whole thing is disgusting.. everything about it
September 6, 2022
“There is also a huge opportunity to develop onshore fields away from centres of population, with revenue or gas sharing with local residents. This would need to be done with agreement.”
Fracking you mean ? Another long post where you daren’t even mention the word. You might as well say it because you will *never* get agreement from local residents to do it. NIMBYs will hold the country to ransom as effectively as Putin if you let them.
September 6, 2022
With an 80 seat majority this government could bypass ‘local residents’ and write new laws bypassing the courts or objections….re-write the planning laws….if they wanted too
September 7, 2022
Not “if they wanted to”, but if the 80 seat majority would cooperate, which it doesn’t seem to.
September 6, 2022
So one pretender is leaving office he thought he was Winston – the other is just arriving she thinks she is Mrs T – and the faithful are cheering them on – all as it should be in the final days of something.
September 6, 2022
One short comment on drilling for frackable gas, you can directionally drill for at least 10 km horrizontally so the rig and exit point does not need to be close to any nimby minded population centre. Additionally the pipe is only about 9″ in diameter. My final comment is that the Lake District and NW England are natural earthquake regions so every rumble cannot be blamed on fracking, much as many would wish.
September 6, 2022
“Twitter to roll out long awaited edit button” — Reuters, 2022-09-06
My dear Sir John,
Does your platform offer a similar facility? Whilst I realize most of those posting comments here don’t bother to read what they’ve written even before hitting the ‘post’ button (never mind having done so), for us that do it would be a useful feature!
Yours ever,
Vernon Wright
September 6, 2022
What is the hold Brandon Lewis has over PMs? Is his father a donor or something?
September 6, 2022
What is Liz doing reappointing Alok Sharma , the confirmed Green Tory, as president of Cop26….Liz should be cancelling this position, its office and any UK involvement – continued policies of Net-Zero isn’t going to win the next election
September 7, 2022
The position disappears in November with COP27 at Sharm el Sheikh. We can hope that Sharma enjoys the coral diving too much to return to blow up more power stations.
September 7, 2022
I cannot see the new Foreign Secretary making much of an impression on Brussels in negotiating over the NIP. I can only hope that Truss has decided not to negotiate at all, which would be the sensible option. Ben Habib has already pointed out that instead of pursuing the protracted slog through Commons and Lords over the Northern ireland bill, against the wets and europhiles, and then applying it measure by measure (or triggering Art. 16, a temporary stop-gap) all she has to do is withdraw government resistance to Habib’s law case, and the NIP then becomes illegal in domestic law, in which case the 1967 Vienna Treaty alows it to be simply abrogated by the government. Three-line whip: job done.
September 7, 2022
Too late for deciding not to negotiate, she has already decided to go to Dublin which will be a waste of time as they will only refer her to Brussels. Then there is the larger concern of the economy and our relations with the US – as I say all too late – and no chance to renegotiate
September 7, 2022
Conor Burns has been explaining the NIP and Belfast Agreement all through the Summer to the Biden regime and the EU. (Another member of the administration said by the lying media not to have been working.)
September 7, 2022
Rose- Yeah Burns is a complete waste of time everyone including the Biden admin know all about him.
September 7, 2022
“There are also the underlying issues posed by the long road to Net Zero”.
Why are you still pushing this net zero BS?
There has never been any scientific proof, that our emissions are causing any major problems.
I think people pushing this fiction need to be tried for treason.
Reply I am not pushing it. I have been arguing we need fossil fuels this decade to keep the lights on!
September 7, 2022
Too late for deciding not to negotiate, she has already decided to go to Dublin which will be a waste of time as they will only refer her to Brussels. Then there is the larger concern of the economy and our relations with the US – as I say all too late – and no chance to renegotiate
September 9, 2022
Whilst the discussion about solar and wind generation is understandable there surely needs to be some realism about its prospects. We can be clear that at the moment there is not a viable solution to storage. There does not seem to be any appetite for hydro, and there are supply constraints on batteries, even for the current use cases. Maybe hydrogen is possible but it is hardly efficient, it is a dangerous material to store and use, and we don’t have the infrastructure to convert it to electricity. Perhaps technological advancement may solve some of these problems, but this is jam tomorrow, not jam today.
What we do have, as you rightly point out, is vast reserves of carbon based fuels, and both the technology and infrastructure to extract it and exploit it. It is good to see government finally point this out, and I hope that the various interests ranged against it are dealt with effectively for all of our sakes.