While Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party have brought many improvements to party policy, much remains to be done. In particular, Corbyn has been weak on energy and climate policy. Although Labour’s election manifesto was widely interpreted to include energy nationalisation, in fact it promised no such thing. It pledged to bring the electricity […]
Posts under ‘Energy policy’
NPF Policy Responses: Environment, Energy and Transport
Apr 4th, 2017 by Chris MacMackin.The National Policy Forum has made the strange decision to group culture with the environment and energy. Meanwhile, transport is placed, not completely without justification, with local government and housing. However, as transport is a major consumer of energy and a transport policy will be essential to fighting climate change, I decided to address it […]
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What’s in the NPF draft policy statements?
Mar 24th, 2017 by David Pavett.According to the Labour Party Rulebook: “Party conference shall decide from time to time what specific proposals of legislative, financial or administrative reform shall be included in the Party programme. This shall be based on the rolling programme of work of the National Policy Forum.” (Emphasis added) The results of that “rolling programme of work” […]
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A 21st Century Energy Policy, Part 2: The Technology of the Future
Feb 20th, 2017 by Chris MacMackin.If humanity is to have any hope of avoiding catastrophic climate change, developed countries must take aggressive steps to decarbonise as quickly as possible. This will mean not only replacing existing fossil-fuel power plants, but greatly expanding electricity production to replace gas and petrol. Such a task demands not just an energy policy, but a […]
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Energy for the 21st century, part I: fossil-fuels, renewables and nuclear
Feb 13th, 2017 by Chris MacMackin.With the exception of Arthur Scargill, most on the Left agree that the days of fossil fuels must soon come to an end. We all know that it would be environmental catastrophe to revive the coal industry. We have to wean ourselves off coal and other fossil fuels but what will take their place? The […]
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A third Heathrow runway is a menu without the prices
Jul 2nd, 2015 by Michael Meacher.Business in this age of market fundamentalism is cock-a-hoop with the Davies report decision to recommend Heathrow. They would be, wouldn’t they, since the report has focused largely on the supposed economic benefits while claiming that all the toxic underside of the decision can be ‘managed’. However the feasibility of the latter needs to be […]
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Do we want predatory capitalism or an economy geared to the common good?
Mar 29th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.Despite the predictable whines of some FTSE-100 bosses reported yesterday about a post-election Labour-SNP pact, Ed M should flesh out more about his vision to replace ‘predatory capitalism’ both because that is what a majority of people want and also to put paid to the ignorant mantra that self-interested executives like to propagate that anyone […]
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Fracking in the UK is out for the foreseeable future
Mar 8th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.Listening to Osborne waxing exuberant over Britain’s energy future because of his obsession with a fracking revolution in the UK to match that in the US, you might be excused for thinking that he had a trump electoral card. Any such idea is nonsense, for several reasons. The predicted fracking deposits in this country are […]
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Cameron lets energy privateers write the rules that are supposed to regulate them
Mar 7th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.Cameron prophetically described lobbying in 2010 as “the next big scandal waiting to happen”, but by 2015 he has himself made it happen. It was already revealed some months ago that senior representatives from the Big 6 energy companies had been seconded to the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) to ‘advise’ ministers on […]
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Nothing stands between Labour and election victory except its own timidity
Jan 25th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.A sad tale of ambivalence and timidity across a range of policies This coming Monday the remaining stages of the Infrastructure Bill will be taken in Parliament, including votes on the launch of fracking in this country. Cameron and Osborne have declared they are both ‘gung-ho’ to develop this technology to the fullest degree as […]
