>Five ex-ministers are among those who have written to the Sunday Telegraph arguing for a cut in environmental levies and the removal of energy taxes.
>
>Their call follows big increases in wholesale gas prices. Experts say average bills could hit £2,000 in 2022.
>
>The government says it is meeting suppliers and the regulator regularly to work out how to help consumers.
>
>The letter to the Telegraph has been organised by the Net Zero Scrutiny Group of Conservatives, which keeps an eye on the potential consequences of the government’s environmental commitments.
>
>The group’s chairman Craig Mackinlay is one of the letter’s signatories, along with former Work and Pensions Secretary Esther McVey and senior MPs Robert Halfon and Steve Baker.
>
>”We hardly need to point out that high energy prices, whether for domestic heating or for domestic transport, are felt most painfully by the lowest paid,” the letter states.
>
>It argues that by scrapping the 5% VAT rate on energy bills and suspending environmental levies which fund renewable energy schemes, the average household could save £200 on their energy bill.
>
>Labour has also called for the lifting of VAT on fuel bills for the winter to help households, while Ovo Energy firm boss Stephen Fitzpatrick last week suggested that some “environmental social policy costs” should be removed by the government.
“Net Zero Scrutiny Group of Conservatives”. Tory MPs spouting utter shite as per usual pushing the same old failed austerity agenda of cutting taxes and not investing in the country. Cutting taxes and removing funding for renewable energy schemes will just leave us dependent on gas for longer. Makes you wonder how many of these Tory MPs are taking backhanders from Russian and Qatari shell companies. The current spike in gas prices is just the first of many more in the coming decades. The only way we can build up resilience to wild fluctuations in gas prices is by doing the hard work now and weaning ourselves off it. That means an aggressive program to properly insulate and glaze Britain’s draughty freezing cold homes, big investments in adding additional wind and solar, big investments to add storage to the grid be it battery or pumped hydro, getting on with adding new nuclear generation and telling the swivel-eyed false environmentalist types who object to it to get in the sea, etc.
“Net Zero Scrutiny Group of Conservatives” more like group for dilly dallying and sitting around with our fingers up our bumholes whilst praying to the god of the private sector and accepting backhanders.
He’s far too busy.
Probably got to get some money off a bloke to redecorate a bedroom or admire the crown emblem on a pint glass somewhere.
Priorities vs plebs. We loose.
For as long as the government is taking advice from power companies prices will always rise and infastructure won’t be changed. Yes they need to be involved, but not as the ones GIVING ideas, they should just be allowed to agree or disagree on proposed ideas.
It’ll get to April and they’ll act like no one warned them of this. After a week of outcry they’ll introduce some arbitrary figure that sounds like a lot but just plucked from thin air based on nothing (like a billion £) to help people, then tell those people to contact their local council to access the scheme. The council will then say they either don’t have the money or you don’t qualify.
In a “liberal” economy not much they can do to seriously fix the problem. But temporary solutions such as prices caps or more companies taxes or subsidizing (vouchers, cash) the poorest households do exist
It’s quite telling how threads like this get very few comments, yet the thread about school kids wearing a mask already has 100+ comments after only a couple of hours.
The primary interest of the government is to ensure that the utilities remain solvent and don’t incur any major losses. The well being of the British public is something they will waffle about at election time but otherwise is of no concern.
What can they even do that’ll have a quick effect other than getting rid of the 5% tax?
Any acceleration in building new energy plants would still take a few years to notice at all. If Putin wants to sell expensive gas then that’s what we have to pay for now I guess.
Would be nice if the government fully or largely funded new energy plants and got an equivalent share of it though, so that they could take no profit on their bit. Instead of funding them a bit in return for 0 ownership and high energy prices.
I am trying to change supplier atm not even for the price but because I hate the one I am with but I literally can’t find one that is accepting new customers lol
40 years too late for this sort of discussion, long term planning is absent in this country
Gas prices up 20x from last year is a direct consequence of green energy –
When the wind doesn’t blow every country needs to use gas.
If environmentalists cared they would be building nuclear power plants. But they are shutting them down.
Go Green, Go Broke! This is what the the consequences are for relying on other countries energy.
More like these MPs and Peers realise they’ll have to pay shitloads more themselves so want the government to act.
14 comments
>Five ex-ministers are among those who have written to the Sunday Telegraph arguing for a cut in environmental levies and the removal of energy taxes.
>
>Their call follows big increases in wholesale gas prices. Experts say average bills could hit £2,000 in 2022.
>
>The government says it is meeting suppliers and the regulator regularly to work out how to help consumers.
>
>The letter to the Telegraph has been organised by the Net Zero Scrutiny Group of Conservatives, which keeps an eye on the potential consequences of the government’s environmental commitments.
>
>The group’s chairman Craig Mackinlay is one of the letter’s signatories, along with former Work and Pensions Secretary Esther McVey and senior MPs Robert Halfon and Steve Baker.
>
>”We hardly need to point out that high energy prices, whether for domestic heating or for domestic transport, are felt most painfully by the lowest paid,” the letter states.
>
>It argues that by scrapping the 5% VAT rate on energy bills and suspending environmental levies which fund renewable energy schemes, the average household could save £200 on their energy bill.
>
>Labour has also called for the lifting of VAT on fuel bills for the winter to help households, while Ovo Energy firm boss Stephen Fitzpatrick last week suggested that some “environmental social policy costs” should be removed by the government.
“Net Zero Scrutiny Group of Conservatives”. Tory MPs spouting utter shite as per usual pushing the same old failed austerity agenda of cutting taxes and not investing in the country. Cutting taxes and removing funding for renewable energy schemes will just leave us dependent on gas for longer. Makes you wonder how many of these Tory MPs are taking backhanders from Russian and Qatari shell companies. The current spike in gas prices is just the first of many more in the coming decades. The only way we can build up resilience to wild fluctuations in gas prices is by doing the hard work now and weaning ourselves off it. That means an aggressive program to properly insulate and glaze Britain’s draughty freezing cold homes, big investments in adding additional wind and solar, big investments to add storage to the grid be it battery or pumped hydro, getting on with adding new nuclear generation and telling the swivel-eyed false environmentalist types who object to it to get in the sea, etc.
“Net Zero Scrutiny Group of Conservatives” more like group for dilly dallying and sitting around with our fingers up our bumholes whilst praying to the god of the private sector and accepting backhanders.
He’s far too busy.
Probably got to get some money off a bloke to redecorate a bedroom or admire the crown emblem on a pint glass somewhere.
Priorities vs plebs. We loose.
For as long as the government is taking advice from power companies prices will always rise and infastructure won’t be changed. Yes they need to be involved, but not as the ones GIVING ideas, they should just be allowed to agree or disagree on proposed ideas.
It’ll get to April and they’ll act like no one warned them of this. After a week of outcry they’ll introduce some arbitrary figure that sounds like a lot but just plucked from thin air based on nothing (like a billion £) to help people, then tell those people to contact their local council to access the scheme. The council will then say they either don’t have the money or you don’t qualify.
In a “liberal” economy not much they can do to seriously fix the problem. But temporary solutions such as prices caps or more companies taxes or subsidizing (vouchers, cash) the poorest households do exist
It’s quite telling how threads like this get very few comments, yet the thread about school kids wearing a mask already has 100+ comments after only a couple of hours.
The primary interest of the government is to ensure that the utilities remain solvent and don’t incur any major losses. The well being of the British public is something they will waffle about at election time but otherwise is of no concern.
What can they even do that’ll have a quick effect other than getting rid of the 5% tax?
Any acceleration in building new energy plants would still take a few years to notice at all. If Putin wants to sell expensive gas then that’s what we have to pay for now I guess.
Would be nice if the government fully or largely funded new energy plants and got an equivalent share of it though, so that they could take no profit on their bit. Instead of funding them a bit in return for 0 ownership and high energy prices.
I am trying to change supplier atm not even for the price but because I hate the one I am with but I literally can’t find one that is accepting new customers lol
40 years too late for this sort of discussion, long term planning is absent in this country
Gas prices up 20x from last year is a direct consequence of green energy –
When the wind doesn’t blow every country needs to use gas.
If environmentalists cared they would be building nuclear power plants. But they are shutting them down.
Go Green, Go Broke! This is what the the consequences are for relying on other countries energy.
More like these MPs and Peers realise they’ll have to pay shitloads more themselves so want the government to act.