Tory ‘Tea Party tendency’ putting green energy jobs at risk, warns Ed Davey
Liberal Democrat energy secretary fears rightwingers are putting billions of pounds of investment in jeopardy by creating uncertainty about government policy
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- The Observer, Sunday 23 September 2012
Ed Davey fears that the influence of an anti-green faction is sweeping the Tory party. Photograph: Richard Saker For The Observer/Richard Saker
Tens of billions of pounds of investment in low-carbon, job-creating energy infrastructure projects that are “ready to go” could be lost to Britain because of an anti-green movement that is sweeping through the Tory party, the Liberal Democrat energy secretary warns today.
In an interview with the Observer, Ed Davey describes a “Tea Party tendency” among Conservative MPs who question climate change and green investment as “perverse”, and says it is creating deep uncertainty for an industry that could do much to help lift the country out of the economic doldrums.
Davey is careful not to take aim at George Osborne, who is increasingly sceptical about the green agenda, but makes it clear that the “noise” created by some of the chancellor’s “friends” on the anti-green Tory right risks putting off investors for good. “Noises off at the margins are undermining investors’ confidence and that is undermining green growth, and that is undermining the central purpose of the government, which is deficit reduction,” Davey says.
He says he has confidence in Osborne to continue backing the green agenda, even if some of those around him are urging him to take a different course: “Of course some of these people are his [Osborne’s] friends – some of these people on the margins – but he is going to be judged by growth. The Conservative party is going to be judged by growth. The Liberal Democrats are going to be judged by growth.”
Over recent months the Tory party, including David Cameron and Osborne, has appeared to dilute its enthusiasm for green policies that defined its supposed “modernisation” drive in the runup to the 2010 general election. Osborne is said to have formed the view that green policies such as investment in windfarms and solar power are too costly at a time of recession. He is understood to have been swayed by arguments put forward by the former Tory chancellor Lord Lawson, a climate change sceptic.
Davey says, however, that there are huge opportunities for the British economy from investment in low-carbon energy infrastructure projects, including wind and solar energy, carbon capture storage and new nuclear power, all of which make up a large part of projected spending of £118bn in the sector over the next decade. Last year alone £12.7bn was invested in this country by the renewable energy industry, creating 20,000 jobs.
Davey says he fears these opportunities will be lost if the pre-election consensus on climate change and green policies continues to be questioned. “If there is not seen to be that consensus investors are going to balk. When you hear all that noise on the right of politics that worries investors. They think, ‘Well if I am going to put all this money in – it is a 30-year investment – I need to know that if the government changes we are not going to have some rightwing Tea Party tendency taking over.’ “
Last week the head of the Swedish firm Vattenfall, which opened its third British offshore windfarm on Wednesday, said the UK would fail to tempt wind turbine manufacturers to set up in the country because of the uncertainties about future government policy. “If you look at the UK, not one supplier has established itself yet because of uncertainty in the future,” said Oystein Loseth.
Describing the arguments of the Tory right as perverse, Davey said he could not believe so many Conservatives failed to see the economic benefits of investment in green infrastructure, much of which would be from the private sector and so off the government’s books. “Energy infrastructure is going to drive growth and what is even more significant is that a lot of the energy projects are shovel-ready – they are ready go tomorrow.”
He went on: “We have to win this argument for the future: it is almost like we have to re-win it. I am confident that if I was the chancellor I would want growth.”
As the Lib Dem conference opened in Brighton, Tory hostility to the green agenda was top of the agenda. Among those taking on Osborne will be his deputy Danny Alexander, chief secretary to the Treasury, who has proposed a motion condemning “the refusal of the Conservatives to acknowledge that investing in carbon-reducing technologies has the potential to make an important contribution to long-term growth”.
Davey also made it clear that he was in favour of introducing a legal goal to decarbonise the power sector by 2030 – something also opposed by Osborne – although he said he believed this could be done through secondary legislation and with less stringent conditions than were being proposed by many of the green groups.
He described the former Tory energy minister Charles Hendry, who was enthusiastic about renewable energy but sacked in the recent reshuffle, as a “brilliant minister” and said he had no idea why he had been dismissed from the post. “I genuinely don’t know [why he was sacked] because I have not had a conversation with the prime minister. I do know that Charles Hendry was a brilliant minister,” said Davey.
While Osborne is known to be enthusiastic about a new “dash for gas” – which he sees as crucial to the country’s future energy needs – Davey was sceptical about over-reliance on gas. In particular he questioned whether exploration of shale gas in the UK would change the need for a balanced energy policy. “As far as the British shale gas story is concerned I don’t think it is a game changer at all, as we would still be dependent on imports.”
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