An energy manifesto for national decline

The Conservatives’ energy manifesto is not as daft as the LibDems’ effort, which I looked at yesterday, but it’s not exactly streets ahead.

In fact there is very little of any interest at all – the main message seems to be ‘keep calm and carry on’. There are a couple of statements of note though. Such as this:

“Ensuring that green levies on household bills are lower. The cost of renewables such as wind and solar has fallen dramatically. We will ensure the annual policy costs and levies on household energy bills are lower in each year of the next Parliament than they were in 2023.”

The bit about the cost of renewables falling is obviously not true. As we have said ad infinitum at NZW, such claims are refuted by the financial accounts of windfarms, and by Claire Coutinho’s decision to award them huge price increases. It is also worth noting that the OBR thinks that the burden of green levies will continue to increase for a few years.

Intriguingly, there is a call to reform the Climate Change Committee:

… giving it an explicit mandate to consider cost to households and UK energy security in its future climate advice.

But that may well mean nothing.

And that’s about it. There are lots of micro-measures, but essentially this is a recipe for energy prices to continue rising, industrial output to decline and society to deteriorate further.

It seems that the Conservatives have learned nothing.