On the day that Michael Heseltine’s growth report called for the government to adopt a “definitive and unambiguous” energy policy, ministers are offering anything but. In an interview in today’s Daily Telegraph, the recently appointed Conservative energy minister John Hayes, launched a full-frontal attack on wind farms, declaring that they could no longer be “imposed on communities” and that “enough is enough”.
He told the paper:
We can no longer have wind turbines imposed on communities. I can’t single-handedly build a new Jerusalem but I can protect our green and pleasant land.
We have issued a call for evidence on wind. That is about cost but also about community buy-in. We need to understand communities’ genuine desires. We will form our policy in the future on the basis of that, not on a bourgeois Left article of faith based on some academic perspective.
Unsurprisingly, his outburst hasn’t gone down well with his boss, Lib Dem Energy Secretary Ed Davey. The Department for Energy has let it be known that Davey removed the remarks from a speech Hayes made yesterday and that his comments “will not be government policy”. One source tells the Guardian:
What he planned to say was not government policy; will not be government policy. It might be what the Tory party would like to be energy policy, but it is not. He is not in charge of renewable policies on his own, he has to follow the coalition agreement which is in favour of renewable energy and meeting our legal EU targets for 2020.
He has been very silly to give interviews to the Telegraph and the Mail on a speech he was not allowed to deliver.
The only way we are going to meet our targets is if we include renewable energy which is ultimately a cheap form of energy, and in parts of Wales and Scotland is popular.
The row is another example of how coalition discipline is breaking down. Earlier this week, Nick Clegg denounced Defence Secretary Philip Hammond for “jumping the gun” by announcing £350m of new funding for the renewal of Trident and last week the Lib Dems declared that they would veto Iain Duncan Smith’s plan to cap benefits for larger families. Even taking into account the reduced standard of collective ministerial responsibility in a coalition, the degree of disunity is striking.
After David Cameron’s botched announcement on energy prices earlier this month (which Davey did not receive prior notice of), it’s also further evidence of the government’s increasingly chaotic approach to policy in this area. Expect Ed Miliband to point out as much at PMQs later today.
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