130 billion debt - Truss

[Stephthegreat]

Truss, misguided as she is, has announced a 130 billion bailout for the energy companies. Why saddle our dcs with this enormous debt because, let’s face it, it will be paid back down the line.

Truss completely ruled out a windfall tax.

What next? I fear for our country, we have just had one clown and now we have this no hoper.

How can the UK government tax companies which are not based in the UK?

Poison the ground how?

Nationalised UK energy production would mean the UK Govt could set the price for around 67% of our energy needs across the year.

Plus, when the crisis is over, those companies are privatised again, so we get that money back.

i don't think you understand the difference between supply companies and production companies.

Fracking does poison the ground, due to the vast amounts of chemicals. It gets into the water supply.

Renewables are around 17% (across the year of UK energy needs) why would a private companies that can charge at global rates agree a price cut?

Unless fracking is nationalised, the gas will be priced at global rates and the small print is fracking will only go ahead IF locals support it.....

The new NS licenses wont bring in any new gas for many years and again, priced at global rates, as it is now.
One NS expert said it takes 28 years from licence to gas appearing in your home.... thats disputed but gives an idea of timescales.

Unless she plans on privatising production, we'll be back again in 18 months time... borrowing even more.

Truss is playing for time and hopes the Ukraine war will be over soon, Putin gone & a pro west leader in the Kremlin... my solution to rising energy costs is to buy a scratch card.

Fuel companies pay duties to governments in each country/state.

It's just a plot. As we all know torys are the only party capable of paying debts back and managing the economy apparently so that will just be rammed down everyone's throats before any general election and hey presto another tory government!

Dealing with the absolutely disgusting profits of the energy companies must be to obvious a solution and doesn't provide them enough long term security... Probably some backhanders going on as well.

YANBU. The death of the Queen has also heightened my anxiety over the stability of this country. I genuinely feel as though her passing is significant in more than one way including signalling the end of the U.K.

I’ve been feeling this iteration on the Tories since Johnson was going to finish us off and yesterday cemented this feeling. With her gone and these freaks in charge we will continue to tumble down the list of Richest countries.

Game Over dudes.

To all the people complaining. Why don't you become an MP and show how it should be done instead of just sitting there moaning?

No I thought not.

It is much easier to keep on moaning.

For all people quoting numbers on the energy companies revenues, do you realise that these refer to the worldwide profits of the sector, and that the UK has no legal or moral right to tax companies that are domiciled and operating in other countries?

Last time I calculated, a 100% windfall tax on UK energy companies will bring something like £250-£300 per household per year.

No, that’s not how it works. The wholesale price would not be affected.

Yes, but so what? That doesn’t let us tax a foreign country’s overseas profits, it doesn’t let us get energy for below the wholesale price.

NS oil gas sector is making far more than 8 billion (28m households) so i suggest you look again ...
Plus help should be targeted, no need to give all households money.

Excess profits are not going back into investment, as these decisions are long term, not based on 2 or 3 years of extra monies.

Shell is using 7 billion to buy back shares.

It’s water and sand. Yes, these are “chemicals” (everything is) but they aren’t poison.

Didn’t hear anyone asking why Furlough money was thrown around like confetti when healthy people were locked down unnecessarily. The wholesale shutdown of the economy is a bigger contributor to the costing living crisis than Ukraine.

But the double standards from people here and everywhere are staggering. It’s ok if free money printed so you can sit at home and watch Netflix. But not ok if private businesses charge market rates and make profit based on market rate.

For those that don’t understand inflation, £450bn printed to pay for Covid did far far more damage to our economy than borrowing this amount to pay energy cap will.

Look again how? £8bn divided by 28m homes is £250-300 per household, as claimed.

Fracking puts toxic chemicals into the air and water. This study was out just last week www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jan/27/people-living-closer-us-oil-and-gas-wells-higher-risk-dying-prematurely-study

Of course it can, thats the main advantage of a privatised industry... there would be no compulsion to sell NS gas as a global commodity.

There may be many valid and varied reasons why privatisation would not work but saying UK PLC would not be able to set the price is rubbish.

No, that’s posited to be from the oil and gas itself, not from fracking materials.

I don’t actually care if we frack or not, I’m fine with us being a bit cold for a few years while we bring more nuclear plants online. It’s a price worth paying to reduce our carbon production.

Oh sorry wrong study - it's this one about higher risks of childhood leukaemia that was out last week -

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/aug/17/young-children-fracking-wells-leukemia-study

Lol i did your math.

The sector is making far more than 8b, its 15b since last year and will be similar again over the next 18m.

Just for comparison instead of increasing National debt by £150 billion to cover energy costs for just this winter you could instead use the money for:
Insulate every house in the UK for free - cost £10 to £17 billion
Provide free solar panels to 18 million of the UK"s 22 million residential properties (assuming 4 will be flats) at a cost of £6k each - total cost £108 billion

So for the same money as it costs to subsidise energy bills for one or two winters you could insulate and provide solar panels to every house in the UK.

Great economics Liz.

Shes just another puppet. She will make things worse, then pack her bags and off she goes.

@1dayatatime in principle agree and a valid criticism of the last 12 years of energy policy though to be fair, what you would spend would still leave households in serious trouble given domestic solar PV in Winter probably wouldn't cover individual daytime domestic electric consumption let alone at night. Also, relatively few houses have completely electric heating and cooking and even electricity consumption requires gas so the UK is dependent on international gas prices. Don't have accurate numbers but even spending what you've proposed on insulation without subsidy might lead to 80%? of the increases households were facing?

So you want to 100% tax ALL companies in the oil and gas sector, upstream, midstream and downstream, not only those directly profiting from the gas prices? Oil profits too, even though it hasn't been through a similar extreme price hike, despite having a lot of volatility and appreciating too since the start of the year?

Why not 100% tax all companies in the country then? Easy.