JM

It’s almost beyond belief, but yes, Labour’s energy policy is to shut down our own domestic oil and gas industry whilst directly funding Putin’s war machine instead. On Tuesday, while Labour MPs were voting to ban new British oil and gas licences, behind the scenes the Government quietly announced that it was easing sanctions on Russian oil. Why? Because by shutting down British production, Miliband and Starmer are making us more reliant on foreign imports. As Kemi Badenoch rightly said at Prime Minister’s Questions, Labour think oil from Russia is acceptable, but oil from Aberdeen is not. We are in the extraordinary position of Ukraine’s sanctions chief criticising our country, whilst UK officials brief out that the fault lies with Starmer and Miliband for being asleep at the wheel as UK energy supplies have been put increasingly under strain. Here’s the problem. Production is not the same as consumption. If you shut down our means of making fuel, it doesn’t mean we need any less. All it does is make us more reliant on foreign regimes for that very same fuel. What’s worse is that this fuel will almost certainly have lower environmental standards and produce more emissions as it is shipped across the world to get here. We lost a third of our oil refineries last year. We have just four left. By the end of the Parliament we could have zero as they are being forced out of existence thanks to an onerous Carbon Tax and high energy costs. Some of our refineries are spending more on the Government’s Carbon Tax – which doubled last year under Ed Miliband – than on their entire wage bill. Guess who doesn’t face this crushing tax? The Indian refineries which are at the centre of the current storm. That’s what lifting the sanctions is allowing in: jet fuel and diesel from these refineries which, unlike our own, use Putin’s oil and have twice the emissions because, unlike our own, they are powered by coal. What kind of climate leadership is this? Where is it leading to? Bankruptcy? We have to face up to reality. The world is getting more dangerous and other countries like the US, the Middle East and Asia have not put punishing carbon taxes on their own industry. They are not shutting down their oil and gas industries – in fact, they are doing everything they can to maximise their own energy supplies. However, this is the logical conclusion of Ed Miliband’s plans. If you place higher burdens on our industry than other countries, then British production will decline. That does not mean we will need any less oil, gas, jet fuel, chemicals or plastics, we will just become more reliant on foreign regimes over whom we have no control. There is an alternative. But it requires a government prepared to abandon Ed Miliband’s zealotry and back our own domestic production instead. We need to repeal the Climate Change Act, axe the Carbon Tax, Get Britain Drilling, double down on nuclear and make electricity cheap. That’s the plan that the Conservatives put forward on Tuesday - but the one that Labour MPs rejected.

Wes Streeting has this morning set out his tax plans - specifically bringing capital gains tax into line with income tax He says that the current system is unfair because it penalises work Higher or additional rate taxpayers will pay 24% on gains in the current financial year. Streeting said that the rates should mirror income tax bands - so 40% for higher rate taxpayers and 45% for additional rate taxpayers He says that the approach could raise £12billion a year Streeting said: “A member of my family is a cleaner in Lancashire. She pays a higher tax rate on her salary than her landlord pays for the growing value of the home she lives in. She slogs her guts out, he puts in far less effort, yet the state rewards him more than her. And we wonder why people are angry. “The system is penalising work. It’s not fair and it’s bad for our economy. We need a wealth tax that works. A pound made from simply owning assets should not be taxed less than a pound made from a hard day's work. We can do it in a way that is pro-growth, pro-entrepreneur and pro-work.”