Cameron reshuffles his pack

Chris Miller

Does anyone know Mr Clark's view on the Climate Change myth ? I am getting increasingly tired of hearing from people who I would otherwise regard favourably (eg William Hague, Boris Johnson) accepting the Climate Change bollocks as real.

luke

Greg is at the forefront of the global warming campaign and is privately known to be a strong green tax radical

strapworld

I agree with Mr Miller, someone at some time has to call a halt to these latter day doomsayers!

We need nuclear power stations NOW and I hope the Conservatives will shout to the heavens. To expect these damned windfarms to produce enough power is simply "whistling in the wind".

I expect, thoug, all will be bogged down, enquires, reports, further examinations, ministerial briefings, Further enquiries, calling for more reports and deeper examinations will allow this incompetent government to sidestep making a decision.

Buy your own generators is my advice...the two day week is coming.

Faceless Bureaucrat

"Greg is at the forefront of the global warming campaign and is privately known to be a strong green tax radical"

Oh.........

TrevordDen

Then he is a pillock.

But the Spectator is clearly uninterested in economics - what opinion does it have of Darling wasting all our time today and effectively standing up in parliament and fiddling whilst Rome burns.

Searcher

Luke, thanks for the info. After hearing Lansley on the NHS, and now with Greg Clark, I’m sorry to say that I’m just beginning to wonder if Heffer and Hitchens may be right: a Cameron government will make no difference.

TrevorsDen

I think Lansleys OK on the NHS.

Get real - its here right now and the last thing our health care needs now is more pointless reform. It need simple straight forward allocation of its considerable funds with direct accountability.

Global warming is another matter - some bigwig at The Spectator needs to take the Tories to one side and point out such warming as we have had, has stopped. Right now the very very last thing we need worry about is CO2.

David Lindsay

Who?

"The clashes between him and Miliband should be something to savour"

And people ask me why I don't move to London! Is there nothing else than that to look at?

TGF UKIP

Interesting info Luke and let's not forget this is the silly pillock who said that the Tories should draw more from the ideas of Polly Toynbee than Winston Churchill.

Searcher, Heffer and Hitchens have been right all along. Painful for many, impossible for some, on this website to accept but interesting to note over the weeks and months the increasing number of Coffee Housers seeming to come round to this point of view.

The Tories' ludicrously lightweight, unreal and green posturing energy "policy" might be set to get even dafter.

What's then going to be amusing is that Gordon has obviously sized up this as another opportunity to label the Cameron Tories as lightweight PR men and come after them on energy in a big way. And boy oh boy does he have plenty of ammunition.

David

"that the Tories should draw more from the ideas of Polly Toynbee than Winston Churchill."

He really didn't - what he said has been taken astoundingly out of context. And nor is he an advocate of green taxes.

Out of the three put forward he was comfortably the most talented and suited. Good choice.

mac

We need an unequivocal approach to energy provision, one that rejects an over-reliance on external suppliers for strategic reasons and which engages in some long overdue straight-shooting about the unrealistic aspirations by assorted tree-huggers. It's nuclear and coal. Let's get real, let's get on with it, now.

Cogito Ergosum

Mr. Ainsworth MP, shadow environment minister, graduated in English. Greg Clark MP graduated in economics.

How nice it would be to have scientists in these positions, able to make their own critical judgements.

Dirty Euro

I do not get why someone who thinks claim change is a myth would still support nuclear energy. Chernobyl killed over a quarter of million. It is gift to terrorists. Global wamring is a fact.

Tiberius

Heffer and Hitchens have frozen political thermometers. No one pursuing their lines of argument would beat Labour in a GE.

The global warming issue is a political theme whether we like it or not. Yes it's twaddle, but it is one of those areas (like the NHS) that Labour can attack the wicked Tories on if they take a dismissive approach to it. Luke seems to suggest, somewhat unwittingly, that this guy can neutralize it.

Remember, before any of us can have any influence on remedial policy, Labour has to be defeated at a GE. The electorate will only allow that if the Tories present themselves in a certain way, and the last 15 years of polling suggest they are doing it right this time.

mac

DES -every time I read one of your posts I am reminded of that classic Python sketch of the team with knotted handkerchiefs on their heads declaiming loudly: "Well, I think . . ." Or Citizen Smith.

TGF UKIP

Mac, bang on! For energy security reasons nuclear and coal have got to be the bedrock but with gas also playing a part.

We'll still have N. Sea and Norweigan gas for decades to come but we must loosen our dependence on gas from Russia, Algeria and the Middle East.

While the majority of coal consumed by generators is imported, coal can be sourced more widely from more politically stable and friendly countries than gas.

Nuclear must also have a cap for the simple reason that a nuclear accident and major radiation leak anywhere in the world (a "when" not an "if") would inevitably require a blanket worldwide shutdown of nuclear plants pending, probably lengthy, investigations. I would also add that there is a considerable haze over the total and ultimately true costs for nuclear generation.

So called renewables like wind would only be required to make people like Dave and his mates feel better but would make electricity significantly more expensive for the rest of us (was there ever a subject more in need of a referendum.)

Overall, a balanced energy supply would be something like

Gas 33% (38%)
Coal 33% (36%)
Nuclear 24% (20%)
Wind etc 10% ( 8%)

Figures in brackets = present

I would also make the point that rather than pratting about with landscape spoiling wind turbines, it would make far more green sense (if that isn't an oxymoron!) to concentrate on electricity generation from methane (methane is 23 times more dangerous to the atmosphere than CO2.)

Searcher

Tiberius – I totally agree with everything you say, but the fact that policies approved by Heffer and Hitchens would be unelectable is beside the point. Regardless of what they think should happen, they are also saying that after Labour is defeated in a GE, nothing much will change. The Tories must present themselves in a certain way, as you put it, in order to get elected, and I agree that this is the right strategy, but it is wishful thinking to imagine that after that there will “significant influence on remedial policy”. Global warming may be twaddle, it may be a subject on which Labour cannot be attacked, but if the Shadow Minister believes it, why should anything change after a GE?

AmandaP

The comparison with lansley is unfair. Lansley is hopeless and whilst everyone says he is trying to neutralise the issue I would just point out that whilst we are 20 points ahead overall we are still 6 points behind on the NHS!!

That is scandalous.

Greg is a much more capable politician.

Paul B

Quite right Tiberius. Its all very well Heff & Hitch spouting forth ideologically pure opinions, but they aint got an election to win. One is tempted to say those who can, do, those who can`t, write columns (and in blogs)

Paul B

TGF what would your opinion be on a Severn barrag?, Potentially it could produce huge amount of "renewable energy" (I have seen fugures of upwards 20pc of the UKs needs) That it would cost a lot of money to build, and have a considerable enviromental impact (you cannot make omlette without breaking egg). I believe its a project whose time has come. It would assist with the UKs energy security and independance- it would provide a bedrock supply level- along nuclear & coal and once built the only costs associated with it would be maintence & staff-no fuel.It looks enveitable now they we are heading now for deep and prolonged recession. Although normally I am not an advocate of public spending, I believe a commitment to build a Severn barrage could be public money well spent if managed correctly. A modern day Hoover dam.

I also feel yur figure of 10pc for wind generation is rather on the pesimistic side. I have no great love of wind farms, and I certainly do not want them sited in areas of natural beauty/national parks etc etc. But I have no great objection to offshore farms. Once they are established they should be able to provide a significant amount of power to the grid with very little enviromental impact.

Ian C

Wise words Tiberius. The facty is we have a choice between a Labour and a Tory gov't. We can either wish for one or the other. If we want right of centre policies we need to vote for the Tory option and work from within to get the barmy, expensive green (and other) tawddle dropped. To carp from the sidelines is not an option.

PS - 35% of maximum output should be the nuclear target as this is the lowest level of demand so this has to be switched on permanently, as nuclear stations do. Wind should be dropped as too expensive. Wave/tide and solar need massive research budgets and subsequent investment.

Tiberius

Searcher: you make a fair point, and there is no guarantee that Cameron will go as far as many of us would want, but it will be an improvement regardless. This point is the crux of the periodic spats TGF and myself have (what he calls "the ugly duckling")

I have seen enough on education, welfare and family taxation to suggest "the swan" may indeed come along if the electorate give it a chance. Further, on security for example, we know Cameron would ban Hib ut Tahrir, and Boris has got rid of a failed Met Chief Constable when everyone else indulged his shortcomings. But with so many areas of policy in need of attention, it is going to take time, and prioritization is essential.

The Cameroons have more teeth than many appreciate, and as I read recently, George Osborne more than most.

David Parker

Paul B.
There may well be a place for tidal barrages as a long term source of alternative energy, but they could not be constructed and brought on stream anything like rapidly enough to prevent the energy shortfall crisis which is facing us in the short term.

Whilst offshore wind factories might be marginally less environmentally damaging than onshore ones, they suffer from the same practical drawbacks of needing almost total back up capacity and being economically totally unviable, even more so in the case of offshore installations, where the construction and maintenance costs are at least double those of land bases ones.

Nuclear, gas and coal fired plants can all be fed into our existing grid, however, wind power, on the scale envisaged, would entail the additional construction of a new grid system.

Even if one accepts the need to reduce CO2 emissions, only the lunatic fringe still believes that we are approaching a climate change crisis point which will bring a premature armageddon. However, it is a very definite fact that, if we do not take urgent and practical steps to resolve the looming power shortages, Britain will soon be facing both social and economic upheavals which may feel like armageddon.

TGF UKIP

David Parker, dead right and if we bang on enough about it in the Coffee House, the fanzine might start to take it seriously and kick their Cameron mates in the arse and tell them to drop their wishful thinking energy "policy" and get real.

Paul B

David P, I take your points.

Let me explain myself, I do not accept there is anything such thing as man made global warming. I believe its a hysterical argument drummed up by opponents of capitalism and by scientists keen for public money to fund their various projects. In short I believe its all a load of bow locks.

That said, I believe we do have a duty of care towards the planet and for future generations. As such the "cleaner" the energy we can produce the better, but we need to be realistic and marry the benefit to how clean the supply is against its costs. Further we need to consider supply- by which I mean two consideration first being the base level supply to national grid and the and the fuel needed to produce the power.

I also fully understand that the UK is facing a crisis in next few year in that many of our aging power stations are reaching the end of the working lives and we are not building enough to replace them.(Although the coming recession will go some way to offset this)

I also fully realise a Severn barrage cannot be built overnight. I would have thought the build time would take between 5-10 years probably longer. Likewise any n-stations, even if we start tomorrow, are going to take 10 years to come on tap. So we are faced with a large problem.

I advocate building Severn barrage, not to alleviate short term problems, but as partial long term solution to Britain energy supply demands,, with the addedshort tem benefit such a huge project would give to the construction industry, thinking about the enormous lay offs the industry is undergoing at present. The recessionary times aheadmaybe , just maybe, the public could negotiate a good deal, although I do remain deeply skeptical about that prospect.

So what do we do in the short ? I certainly think we need to build incinerators we would help at the margins -rather than land filling. Further we need more large coal fired stations built quickly. Didcot and other large coal fired stations need to have linvestments pumped into them to bring them up to date and kept working, and our courts-jury's- need to come to their senses and find ,the so called eco-warriors, I would call them vandals and common criminals, guilty of the offenses they undoubtedly commit and then given appropriate that will make others think again if they were about to commit similar offenses.