Net Zero Watch launches campaign to scrap renewables expansion and cut energy bills
Today, Net Zero Watch - which campaigns for cheaper energy - has launched a new national campaign calling on MPs to stop the expansion of renewables and put affordable energy first. Households can now use a simple online tool to contact their MP directly and demand action.
Labour won the election on a clear promise to tackle the “underlying causes” of the cost-of-living crisis and bring energy bills down. Clean Power 2030 (CP30) - Ed Miliband’s mission to decarbonise the electricity grid over the next five years - was sold as the policy to deliver those savings, with repeated claims it would cut costs by £300 and “lower bills for good”.
Yet evidence since the election shows the opposite is happening - with prices rising by £150.
According to the International Energy Agency, the UK now has the highest industrial electricity prices in the developed world, and energy industry leaders have told Parliament that even if gas were free by 2030, electricity bills would still remain high due to the soaring costs of the system itself.
The Tony Blair Institute has called on ministers to “recalibrate” the CP30 mission. Oxford University's Professor Sir Dieter Helm, the respected energy economist who in 2017 led an independent review on behalf of the govenrment into the cost of energy, has said the UK’s current trajectory “poses serious risks to the UK economy” and will “lock in permanently high costs for British energy”. The economist behind Ed Miliband’s pledge to cut bills by £300 has cast doubt on whether any savings can now be delivered.
Rather than address the root causes, as promised in their manifesto, Ministers are reportedly considering shifting billions of pounds in policy and system costs into general taxation - hiding the bill rather than reducing it. Families would still pay, just through higher taxes and more borrowing. This is not what voters endorsed.
Central to Miliband delivering CP30 is the upcoming subsidy auction known as “Allocation Round 7” (AR7). If successful, economists have warned it will lock in high electricity prices for a generation. As such, Net Zero Watch is asking all MPs to hold the Government to its mandate and:
Cancel the AR7 auction
Put affordability first by prioritising denser and more reliable forms of power generation
Cut the structural drivers of high electricity bills
Drop attempts to shift costs into general taxation and be fully transparent about what people are paying for
Maurice Cousins, Campaign Director at Net Zero Watch, said:
“Labour promised to cut energy bills and voters took them at their word. AR7 risks making electricity permanently expensive. MPs must act now to stop this damaging policy before it breaks the country and further harms the credibility of Westminster's ability to deal with the cost of living crisis.”
ENDS