Manufacturing is buckling under sky-high energy bills. Time to closely regulate price-gouging gas plants or take ownership of supply
E
d Miliband may want his political legacy to be a transition to net zero, but he could find his eventual political epitaph includes words on how he helped bury UK industry under the weight of high electricity charges.
Industrial ovens are being switched off and turbines spun for the last time as businesses add up the cost of powering their factories and decide it’s not worth the time and trouble.
It would be harsh to blame the energy secretary for a crisis he inherited and a decline in manufacturing that has been going on for four decades. But the way the transition to renewables was managed under the Tories, and now under Miliband can only be described as a disaster that will see much of UK industry depart for an easier life elsewhere.
