UKLabour splits deepenSigns of deep splits in the Labour party continued. In the Mail (£), Dan Hodges said that many MPs think that Ed Miliband has been given too much freedom of action. The Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, persisted with her support for Heathrow expansion, a direct challenge to the Miliband agenda. The Secretary of State doubled down. Educating EV ownersMr Miliband is reportedly considering topping up EV subsidies with a cheap loan scheme, a sure demonstration that few people want one of the pesky vehicles. Meanwhile, fire chiefs said that owners needed to be made better aware of the fire risk that EVs pose, and called for warnings to be posted at charging stations across the country. Weak public supportNew polling for Lord Ashcroft found very weak support for Net Zero policies, with majorities thinking it would make them poorer, and that it wasn’t worth doing. Miliband’s madnessEd Miliband ordered the UK’s last two shale gas sites to be sealed with concrete, an idea that might reasonably be described as lunacy, given the state of the country’s energy security. The Secretary of State’s plans for Net Zero were branded ‘fantasy’, both in print and on the broadcast media. Mr Miliband’s eccentricity – both personal and policy – seem to be getting noticed, with one broadsheet describing him as ‘a lunatic’. North Sea setbackA judge ruled that permission for the new Jackdaw and Rosebank oilfields was granted unlawfully, because of (that old canard) the right to a ‘stable climate’. Sceptics to ruleReform UK, the only decisively sceptic mainstream political party in the UK, started to show clear leads in opinion polls of voting intention. In an interview, the party’s deputy leader Richard Tice signalled that Net Zero policies would be a key battleground going forward.
|
