Member Info for romaron

Plenty more twist and turns ahead M. I think Labour's front is quite fragile and that Energy is not quite the vote winner they were banking on and the 9X cheaper quote will come back to haunt them. The British will soon have an election choice - bad or worse?

Your post indicates how sloppy and complacent Labour actually are. The UK is a complicated place. In Europe you usually have one City that represents the country e.g. Paris and France. Britain isn't London but our politicians are. Scotland and Ireland aren't collaborative with Westminster. Labour's threats towards the O&G industry don't go down well (I think?) in Scotland and if they do then I'd rather know sooner than later. As for EnQuest our tax credits are untouchable and you know my view on running down the company. Do Labour really have a plan?

I think Sunak has always been underestimated for some time. The British actually like a plucky fighter and his success so far isn't accidental imo. Immigration and Russia is far more worrying to voters than heavenly power.

I don't need time. What I need is a deadline. -Duke Ellington, jazz pianist, composer, and conductor (29 Apr 1899-1974)

No leaks. In this respect AB runs a tight ship too.

Rumours of a GE. David Cameron recalled early from Albania so may be true.

I forgot to add - the £100k a year includes subsidies. Sometimes called income tax which we all pay. I plucked the figure out of the air but I may still be close.

Continuing on from M's link 07:49

"Building renewables projects will see the UK energy industry shift towards a greater share of technical and vocational occupations, which tend to pay lower salaries than in professional occupations such as engineering.

Salaries in the renewables sector also tend to be lower than in the oil and gas sector."

Those dusting solar panels, polishing windmill blades and collecting dead birds will just have to demand higher wages. How does £100k a year sound Ed?

This doesn't sound right - "That’s just a fraction of the £36 billion in the profits oil companies made from the North Sea last year." Same as Labour they pluck figures out of the air.

"The enemy of my enemy is my friend" - maybe Unite are not actually Labour's enemy but Labour will listen to them.

Sign the petition. Echoes of the the miner's strike. I'd turn out for Unite in a demo.

Er? - ""The temporary windfall tax on oil and gas firms actively encourages investment to create jobs and grow the economy – the more investment they make the less tax they will pay," a spokesperson for the UK Treasury said."

I need help. Can somebody explain the logic of this?

Hi Frac - my interest in politics has come late in life. Blame it on EPL. It means that sometimes I have a fresher more naive approach to the backroom machinations. Having said that the majority of people are also pretty ignorant of the games being played. There are so many conflicting interests and positioning going on that I get lost. Expediency as always rules and many of these alliances are temporary until the election.

With all this going on you need to trust science, costs and common sense. Miliband is betting the house on technological advances. Presently he's losing but quite easy to advertise that for example "today our energy was 100% renewable/clean" which of course doesn't include tomorrow or yesterday and of course includes interconnectors (foreign energy). NZ has enough acolytes and flag wavers to suck this up without enquiry. That's the science.

Costs - where is the cheap electricity? The 9X lie is out there and on record.

Common sense - maybe it will make a comeback.

Https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2024/05/19/john-robsons-history-of-the-97-scam/

Next time someone uses the 97% argument you can explain that was a lie/misrepresentation that crept through. The 9X did for a while but once they saw the evidence piling up they stopped using it. The 97% has become embedded. Its still a massive lie.

I was in the West End yesterday and needed to cross the road from South side Piccadilly to North side after visiting Fortnum's around 3:30. I couldn't. There was a line of protestors taking up the whole road and I couldn't see the beginning or end. They were going from Regents Street to Trafalgar Square. It was a March for Palestine and there were a lot of people. It was well organised but apart from the crowd the route was lined by police. I asked how long the march was so I could cross at beginning or end. They didn’t know and weren’t from London anyway. Another policeman said the tube was the best option and I crossed via Piccadilly Circus.

A couple of points. The march was hardly mentioned on the news. I’ve read 25,000 protestors and I can believe it. The costs of policing it must be huge. It was very well organised and I imagine there were many activist groups involved who join any protest march. It puts juststopoil in perspective – irrelevant. The last time I saw them [JSO] was also in Trafalgar Square and they had half a dozen lost souls around a banner.

Protesters will always go for the march grabbing the most media attention and jso are fading away but damage has been done. I’m not even sure that the late support from Unite is of benefit. Their General Secretary, Sharon Graham, is a Corbynista and wants to nationalise O&G. Mind you she wouldn’t answer Trevor Philips question ”would you nationalise BP?” on Sky this morning.

Https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2024/05/18/labour-and-unite-go-to-war-over-oil/

OEUK says O&G jobs have plunged from 117,900 to 74,100 in 10 years. Over the same time the number of job's in Scotland's low carbon/renewable sector has grown from 23,200 to 25,700 (and I imagine that includes dusting solar panels and polishing windmill blades).

juststopEdlying - at least you don't have to collect dead birds under offshore turbines so that's a bonus.

I think this adds a bit of colour to the discussion. Yesterday I had lunch with an old friend who is a staunch lifelong Labour supporter. He accepted that parts of Labour are ideologically driven and mistakes have and will be made. I’ve convinced my friend over the costings of renewables and their intermittency which are ignored by the Labour crusade. I then asked him why Labour tolerate such an incompetent left wing ideolog like Ed Miliband whose track record is pathetic. His demonic attack on O&G started with coal-fired power stations in 2009 finishing off the work Thatcher started. My friends did throw me because he is one of the most fair-minded and unprejudiced people I know. He said “it’s because he’s Jewish”. It threw me. He wasn’t being anti-Semitic but stating the facts about the Labour Party and the problems caused by Corbyn and his anti-Zionist approach. With Ed on board Starmer has appeal to the Corbynistas and a defence against any residual antisemitism in the Party. Then there is the bonus that the Greens and climate activists warm to him.

Another point to consider. It is pretty pointless arguing about O&G from the “essential” perspective or even energy security. Few things are more important to life than water yet it is expected to be sparkling spring water delivered to our homes for free. There have been corporate abuses (Macquarie with Thames) but fundamentally not enough has been spent on infrastructure. Up until the 1960’s rain water and sewage ran jointly. The release of sewage into rivers and the sea is mainly because they act as an overflow. If you didn’t have that option many would have what you put down the toilet come straight back to you in times of heavy rainfall. Then you have these “wild water” swimmers demanding our rivers to be as clean as tap water. I’d like it too but as with spotlessly clean air there is a cost that the politicians pretend isn’t their responsibility. I’m sure that what we see in overseas hotels as tourists doesn’t often extend to the hastily erected shanty towns surrounding many exotic locations. They are banging on about nationalising water and everything else. It too has mixed results but you can’t get away with paying Zero and you either pay through your taxes or accept that a company won’t do it unless there is a profit to be made. The parallels with O&G are obvious but once again the media is following the outrage narrative about "them" and that most disgusting of words "dividends".

‘Don’t push North Sea workers off a cliff’

In its campaign, Unite said the Labour policies will “push North Sea workers off a cliff edge” and lead to the UK importing more oil and gas.

According to the Herald newspaper, the campaign will cost more than £100,000 and involve billboards, paid advertising displays and canvassing residents.

The campaign will focus on the areas of Aberdeenshire North and Moray, Aberdeen North, Alloa and Grangemouth, Bathgate and Linlithgow, Falkirk and Orkney and Shetland.

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said Labour needs to “pull back from this irresponsible policy”.

“There is clearly no viable plan for the replacement of North Sea jobs or energy security,” Ms Graham said.

“We should not be letting go of one rope until we have hold of another.

“These types of transitions must have workers at the heart. Unite will not stand by and let these workers be thrown on the scrap heap.”

Ms Graham said North Sea workers “cannot be sacrificed on the altar of net zero”.

----------------------------

Get out of that one Labour. Pressure building nicely. The O&G industry and Unions can work together on this. Common purpose backed up by real figures.

Https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2024/05/17/net-zero-watch-calls-on-energy-minister-to-come-clean-about-renewables-costs/

There is an even neater sidestep that Lord Callanan can use. A simple "Ask Ed?" gets him off the hook. After all Ed stated that “solar and wind power is 9X cheaper than fossil fuels” on 6 Nov 2022 Sunday with Laura Kuensberg

Or Keir at the CBI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDZID_lyrxc (listen at 20:40).

TBF they haven't apologised but TBF Keir did reduce the superiority of renewables over fossil fuels down to 3X in Scotland on 19 June 2023 while Ed did the same 5 weeks later (14:20) https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0g3cqqn

I somehow don't see Labour rushing to the defence of Lord Callanan or perhaps they'd like to explain how the science and costs work in fantasy land? Facts are that O&G is the cheapest form of reliable energy. 3X is a big enough lie but surely all credibility is lost when you quote 9X to the CBI and at Davos?

"Only one barnacle remains on Starmer’s boat. We were reminded of it when Ed Miliband came on stage like a Shakespearean comedy interlude character, to talk about a net-zero domestic energy sector by the end of the decade. British renewables are cheaper, he intoned – and more secure. This is nonsense, as even the Tony Blair Institute admits. An all-out dash for renewables, it concluded in a report only yesterday, “could increase energy costs or reduce energy security, with major economic and social consequences for the country.” Quite.

So Miliband’s plan would be a disaster, but one that’s unlikely to be ever attempted because it would quickly dissolve on contact with reality. Gary Smith, head of the GMB union, once told me that he doesn’t bother worrying about Miliband’s plan because it’s so obviously impossible.

So why is the policy still there? Perhaps because Labour fears the Greens (who may run them close in Bristol) and needs to keep some delusions going. But the £28 billion-a-year green spending plan, for years the signature Miliband policy, is now abolished – so it may seem cruel to take away what little there is left."

Gary Smith's comment is reassuring.

We're a political football. We need something to come to our rescue. Does pragmatism ever beat expediency? The costs of renewables are real and cannot be ignored forever. Energy security is a meaningless phrase but neither party will address it seriously until the election is over.

I like the use of "cargo-cult scientism" (I had to look it up). It fits perfectly. Especially this from wikepedia:

"pushed for the revival of ancestral traditions or the adoption of new traditions (often in the form of ritual acts like dancing, marching and flag raising) in order to appease ancestral spirits."

It describes juststopoil and Green activism.

*I think all UK political parties have tied themselves into knots by thinking populism and purple hair was the way forward, a vote winner. You can't fool all of the people all of the time. Like Canute; they can't stop the rising tide of renewable costs.

Might as well throw this in too - "Subsidies for generating green energy will be cut by €1 billion a year"

Remind me - how much are we cutting them by?

And from the land of the windmills - "Wind turbines will be placed offshore as much as possible, taking fishing fleet needs into account"

Ed is gonna build them onshore. Good luck with that. Goodbye golf courses (I knew there'd have to be a use for them one day).

The new Dutch government is essentially to bin the green agenda entirely: Cuts to farming gone. Fuel taxes cut. Subsidies for heat pumps and insulation gone. Electric car subsidies cancelled. 4 new Nuclear plants.

They're tossing the whole thing in the trash.

https://www.dutchnews.nl/2024/05/hope-guts-and-pride-the-new-right-wing-dutch-coalition-plans/