The UK government’s energy strategy is only hours old, but already in complete disarray

The British people are facing rocketing energy bills, and wondering how the UK can have secure energy independence for the future.

The government has so far completely failed to tackle the cost of living crisis – for example, by refusing to implement Labour’s call for a one-off windfall tax on oil and gas producers making bumper profits from these high prices – to help save households up to £600 on their energy bills.

Today, their relaunch moment was their second chance not just to deal with the immediate cost of living crisis, but also to provide a green energy sprint to cut households bills, cut fossil fuel imports, cut emissions this decade and tackle the climate crisis.

But instead we got a strategy that has failed on all counts. Over 12 short pages, the document offers virtually nothing that will tackle the cost of living crisis people face – not just in the next year, but in the next decade. Instead, we have a series of vague targets, distant plans, and very notable omissions.

Take onshore wind and solar – the cheapest, cleanest, and quickest forms of power we have. In 2015, when David Cameron pledged to “cut the green crap”, the Tories destroyed the onshore wind industry (only 20 wind turbines built in the last five years due to their effective ban). The solar industry faced a 95 per cent drop in installations.

It would have been a no-brainer to once and for all reverse this ban, and commit to doubling the capacity of onshore wind by 2030, as Labour has called for. Doing so could power an extra 10 million homes and generate enough power to cut £200 off the average bill.

But despite earlier versions of this strategy labelling onshore wind as the “cheapest renewable”, Boris Johnson has bowed to his backbenchers – who are obsessed with fighting yesterday’s battles rather than building tomorrow’s energy system – and entirely out of touch with the mood of the country.

Rather than facing them down, Boris Johnson has caved to the entirely false suggestion that onshore wind is unpopular – when in fact all the polling says that the vast majority of the public support these projects, including those who live closest to them. It is a similar story with solar power – rather than a tripling of solar power, as Labour has called for, the strategy avoids hard targets and ducks the chance for a solar sprint.

Then there is energy efficiency – the best, quickest, most effective way to reduce energy bills, cut our demand for imported fossil fuels, and create warm homes for everyone. The Conservatives record on this is terrible – 9 million households are paying an extra £170 per year on energy bills as a result of their decision to cut retrofit schemes a decade ago.

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Ahead of next winter, it is essential that we insulate homes to bring down bills. That is why Labour has set out a 10-year national plan to insulate 19 million homes, cutting bills and delivering warmer homes for millions of pensioners and low-income households.

But the Tories have done nothing of the sort. Even the government’s own business minister Lord Callanan admitted today that the strategy did not do nearly enough on energy efficiency, whilst Eon, the UK’s second-biggest energy supplier, said today that the lack of action on energy efficiency in today’s strategy “condemns thousands” to living in cold and draughty homes.

Put this all together, and what you have is an energy relaunch that does nothing for the cost of living, and goes at a snail’s pace when what we needed was a green sprint for energy independence and lower bills.

Ed Miliband is MP for Doncaster North and shadow secretary of state for climate change and net zero

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