New PM to stop energy increase??

[Jobotheclown]

Bear with me...

I've seen more and more Twitter threads (and TikToks) that are starting to think that the lack of any Tory MPs stepping out of line on the energy crisis is a sign that something might actually be planned for when the leadership contest is over. Going further than Truss with her tax cuts, and Sunak, but that they might actually freeze energy prices (stealing labour's proposals) after all.

At this point, I really don't know. They know that public opinion is rock bottom so they need something to get people back on side but is this too much to hope for?

I'm hoping so. I know they personally don't care as they can afford the increase, but they want workers on their side for votes so surely something will have to be done.

Inflation and the energy crisis are indeed national problems however other countries are handling it a lot better than the UK government who, for now, seem content to let people deal with it themselves

Which other countries? The US? Europe?

The Euro took a massive slide yesterday, Germany is already in recession, both Germany and France have serious fuel shortages, France is paralysed politically and also by a severe crime wave, Italy’s government has just collapsed … and on and on.

These threads end up being so parochial. Mainly because they start from the ignorant place of

1. assuming that the government is made up of some rich overlords who only care about ‘rich friends’, rather than MPs who might lose their seat the next election

2. a bizarre assumption that the government can control all factors but is somehow deliberately controlling them much worse than the next country.

@PersonaNonGarter I can see we are getting nowhere so will have to agree to disagree.

Apart from one point, "assuming that the government is made up of some rich overlords who only care about ‘rich friends’, rather than MPs who might lose their seat the next election"

I absolutely believe that the government is made up of MPs who might lose their seat at the next election but that is not exclusive from being in cahoots with rich overlords (whether it's them or their chums). The neoliberal trickle down economics is not trickling so the wealth very much stays with the already wealthy. The MPs worrying about losing their seat at the next election might want to reconsider toeing the party line if they'd like to keep their seat.

There are many many MPs of all colours who do care about constituents and are in politics because of this. It does seem that those who want to climb to the top are the other sort though.

Nevertheless, they DO care about being reelected and not ruining the country or having unrest on the street. Neither new Prime Minster would want to be ousted from power with the legacy of the country in ruin therefore they will do something. The bare minimum they can, but something.

I think they will do something along the lines of Labour’s suggestion. The consequences of not doing are so awful that the Conservatives would be finished electorally if they let it happen. (I also believe that the vast majority of MPs of all parties care deeply about this.)

Can you quantify how you judge inflation to be "significantly lower" "throughout Europe"? UK inflation in July 22 was 10.1%, EU average was 9.8%. It's lower, I guess - but only just, certainly not "significantly". France is a bit lower, but most of the rest of the continent is in the same boat as us; with the Netherlands, Belgium and Spain worse off than us. The further east you go, the worse it gets; Poland are on 14.2% and Estonia on 23.2%.

EDF are suing the French government over it. In any case they've got more room for manoeuvre because they invested heavily in nuclear and aren't dependent upon fossil fuels for their electricity generation like we are.

It will be interesting to see what happens come winter, it won't matter how artificially cheap energy prices are if supplies have to be rationed.

@DdraigGoch there is talk of rolling power cuts similar to those in the 1970s.

@Jobotheclown ah sorry, i didn't pay but i accessed through google, not a link and it wasn't behind a paywall.

In summary, it was the chief exec of SSE writing an article about how in his opinion, by the early 2030s, we will have an abundance of secure, cheap energy from renewable sources in the UK. He and other energy companies are asking the government to effectively loan them money to allow them to keep prices low now and keep operating, which can be paid back over 15 to 20 years, when wholesale prices are much cheaper, by charging slightly more.

I am an eternal optimist!

@Blsp sounds interesting. Always interesting to get an idea of what is actually possible long term versus what we're being fed via politicians!

Other eu counties are struggling, Netherlands main airport has been crippled for months,they are also having train strike's this week, and their inflation is higher than ours.

I only know about them because I joined a Netherlands forum because I needed to know stuff before a holiday.

Blsp

That's hopeful.

It's a question of whether the gov will do it.
I wouldn't like to be an MP of any party right now...we have had incredible tumultuous decades and unexpected crises.

However, society will collapse if all our money goes to energy.
With covid lots of people saved money by being at home so each time lock down was lifted,money could flow a little.
It Will strangle is to entirely stop Money.

@Jobotheclown It would be a loan to the tune of £100m i believe! In context Furlough cost £70m. There's more articles about it today, the chief exec of Scottish Power has asked Nicola Sturgeon for something similar.

@PersonaNonGarter

I agree.

Also that the government wants to cripple the so called underlings who are supposed to be working to support their rich overlords.
You would have to have extremely deep pockets to be able to cover these costs!
Richer people aren't going to be rubbing hands with glee that they will be paying thousands of pounds to utilities companies.

What we do need to do is make sure loud and clear that the government knows how people feel about it.

Infact Martin Lewis does an absolutely sterling job of screaming from the roof tops and mumsent hq owners can also help by putting pressure on.

Billion, not million.

If they don’t do anything the economy will fall apart.

People won’t have money for retail, hospitality or leisure. So millions of businesses will fail.

They are meant to be the party of the economy. Although it will pain them, they will have to do it.

According to sky news this morning, Scottish Power's request for a £1bn loan to freeze prices for two years has been backed by EDF who are requesting more government support. If they're really asking for a loan, surely it would be in the government's best interests to do it and at least get it paid back than put in 'support packages' that will cost billions but would realistically be a drop in the ocean for the millions struggling?

It’s not about caring though. You may as well ask why they don’t stop winter happening or us all getting older.

The UK government literally cannot affect the global energy market.

@Imnotswallowingthat oh yes. Just a minor inconsequential error there!

And do you know how much this loan is for? And when the energy crisis will end and whether this is for now or for a few months or years? And do you know who will ACTUALLY be paying back the completely impossible to cost ‘loan’ (clue: customers)?

There are no easy fixes. The perpetually stupid-but-overconfident seem to imagine that there is some solution that the thick rich government is keeping from the people. Just because.

@PersonaNonGarter if you read my post, you'd see the loan requested was £1bn. If you went a step further and put that together with @Blsp's post from 10:08, it might all make a little more sense.

Perpetually calling people stupid gets you nowhere.

Actually, I'll correct my post before I get jumped. It's a loan of £100bn being requested. Currently have Covid so not on the ball.

My point was - do you know where this will end? (No one else does) And if you don’t, and the energy companies don’t, then there will still be pain.

Plus ‘paying it back’ simply means we all keep paying anyway.

At no point has anyone on this thread claimed to know where all of this will end. The conversation was about what the government will do to ease the burden on all of us, if anything. If you really believe they're doing all they can, we'll leave it there.

The neoliberal trickle down economics...

OP, what do you mean by this? Kindly name one person of influence who has advocated "trickle-down economics".

Like it or not, the bottom end of society have benefitted significantly from tax cuts during the last 12 years. The personal allowance (on which you do not pay income tax or national insurance) has risen substantially above inflation,

while the threshold for paying the top rate of tax has stagnated. The burden of funding our services falls on high earners far more than it ever did in the past (and quite right too). Even Brexit has benefitted low earners by rebalancing the jobs market in their favour, at the expense of the middle classes. So it's simply not true that only the rich have benefitted from the current government.

I feel like the tone has shifted on the loan idea from Scottish Power, and it now seems as if it is being more seriously considered. For example, in the article below (although it's just the Express, sorry, but I've read on BBC too). I hope so, as I am really scared about the rise this winter.

www.express.co.uk/news/science/1659517/energy-bills-lifeline-kwasi-kwarteng-freeze-price-cap-update-100bn-scottish-power-crisis

I'm sure this idea has been mentioned before - I head the Octopus boss discussing it on Radio 4 the other day, but is this something slightly different? Or is it just getting more publicity and being headed by Scottish Power now?