Labour is pledging it will get working within months of election victory to build clean power that will “turn the page” on the cost-of-living crisis.
Sir Keir Starmer will accuse the Tories of failing to make Britain resilient, as he launches the logo and website for Great British (GB) Energy at an event in Scotland with Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar.
Labour’s pledge to set up a publicly-owned company to invest in domestic sources – part of the party’s “first steps” policy – aims to tackle the cost-of-living crisis by cutting energy bills.
Investments by GB Energy will include wind and solar projects, as well as making Scotland a world leader in new tech such as floating offshore wind and hydrogen, Sir Keir is pledging.
Labour plans to fund the company, which will be headquartered in Scotland, through a windfall tax on big oil and gas firms, with an initial £8.3bn capitalisation over a parliament.
It comes in the wake of the energy price shock which saw costs soar in the aftermath of the Covid pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Labour says that in the last two years a typical family paid £1,880 more on energy bills than if prices had stayed the same, while the Government spent £94bn on capping energy costs.
The party says the Office of Budget Responsibility (OBR) has warned that if the UK remains dependent on gas, families and taxpayers could see a repeat of the recent crisis, and accused the Tories of leaving households at risk of a £900 annual energy price spike.
Sir Keir said: ”Family financial security depends on energy security. The pain and misery of the cost-of-living crisis was directly caused by the Tories’ failure to make Britain resilient, leaving us at the mercy of fossil fuel markets controlled by dictators like Putin.
“It doesn’t have to be this way. Our clean power mission with Great British Energy will take back control of our destiny and invest in cheap, clean homegrown energy that we control.”
Ed Miliband, shadow energy security and net zero secretary, said: “GB Energy will kick-start our mission for clean power to lower bills and boost our energy independence.”
Alasdair Johnstone from the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) said: “The UK has spent £100bnn on gas during the energy crisis of the last couple of years, placing a burden not only on bill payers but also tax payers as bills were subsidised.
“Recent polling showed that the public think that the best long-term solution to the energy crisis is to decrease dependence on gas and transition to renewable energy.”
By Emily Beament, PA Environment Correspondent