Energy Bill and green jobs

A number of people have written to ask me to support what have been called the "green jobs" amendments to the government's Energy Bill being put forward by Tim Yeo.

There has been some criticism of Tim for the fact that as well as chairing the Energy and Climate Change Committee, he has extensive business interests with renewable energy companies - which he has always declared. I am sure Tim would agree that anyone writing in support of his amendments should also be aware of those interests, so there is a link here:

I appreciate that increasing subsidies to renewable energy companies would be good for the companies in receipt of them and could enable those companies to employ more people. However, there would be a downside.

1. Energy costs would go up: Subsidies are paid for through higher gas and electricity bills. This would mean that householders already struggling to pay these bills would face further hardships. Ironically even green groups like Friends of the Earth acknowledge that fuel bills are too high and I do not want to support any policy which will further increase them.

2. Jobs will be lost: Any jobs created in renewable companies will be outnumbered by the jobs we will lose in manufacturing companies. Only a few weeks ago, Tata gave evidence to the Welsh Affairs Committee stating that high energy prices were one of the reasons why they have decided to make people redundant in the UK. Many other manufacturing companies which require a lot of energy will take their plants elsewhere if the costs of energy continue to rise.

3. There will be no impact on global emissions: Britain is only responsible for a tiny percentage of overall global emissions. If manufacturing companies decide to move out of the UK and set up elsewhere there will be no fall in global emissions but there will be a big fall in UK jobs. Supporting these amendments will make no real difference to the climate but will have a very bad impact on our economy.

4. The only form of carbon free energy which can generate electricity in large volumes on demand is nuclear. Despite being carbon free it remains controversial. If we do not build new nuclear plants or start exploiting shale gas we will almost certainly face a future in the next 10 years of much higher energy bills, power cuts and a loss of manufacturing companies. These are the things we should now be working to address. 

I believe renewable energy such as wind and solar can play a part in Britain's energy future, but unless we go over to around 80 per cent nuclear then we will continue to need carbon based energy sources until well after 2030.