Ed Miliband

I will not, for a few minutes. The result is new jobs building wind turbines at Siemens Gamesa in Hull, new jobs making transformers in Stafford, new jobs making heat pumps in Derby, and new jobs at Sumitomo’s new factory at the Port of Nigg—some of the 400,000 additional clean energy jobs that we expect our mission to support by 2030. That is the difference. What is the Conservatives’ policy? They want to rip up the Climate Change Act 2008 and abandon net zero by 2050, which was their legacy. As a result, they have been roundly condemned by British business. Energy UK says that abandoning that target will scare off investors. The Confederation of British Industry says that it is a “backwards step”, because the Climate Change Act is “the bedrock for investment flowing into the UK”. Baroness May—they do not like to talk about her—called it a “catastrophic mistake”. And get this: even Boris Johnson —rarely have I quoted Boris Johnson—says that “in my party, it’s all about bashing the green agenda, and personally I don’t think we’ll get elected on…saying what rubbish net zero is.” Normally—I have experience of this—Oppositions stick by what they did right in government, and trash what they did wrong. The right hon. Member for East Surrey (Claire Coutinho) is pursuing a novel approach to opposition: trash anything that they did right, and double down on everything that they did wrong. Nowhere is that more true than in our dependence on fossil fuels. At this point, I express my sincere thanks to the right hon. Lady’s colleague on the Front Bench, the hon. Member for South Suffolk (James Cartlidge), who sadly is not here. Last week, I was talking about the causes of the energy bills crisis of 2021. He shouted out—I checked Hansard—“Because Putin invaded Ukraine!”. Obviously, he is one of the finest minds on the Opposition Front Bench, and he is right about that, but he has given the game away. This relates to affordability and this Budget debate. The lesson from the worst cost of living crisis in generations is this: it came about because Putin invaded Ukraine. What was the cause of higher bills? Why were we worse hit than many others? Because we were so exposed to fossil fuels. It was not the price of renewables that soared; it was the price of gas, including from the North sea, priced and sold on the international market. That is what happens when we do not have clean, home-grown power, and when we are at the mercy of petro states and dictators. What is the strategy of right hon. Member for East Surrey now? To double down on the Conservatives’ failure. She literally says that we should cancel the allocation round 7 auction.