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Thursday, December 19, 2024

JC: Vain Posturing Puts NZ in Real Peril


This is not my headline. It comes from an article by Leo McKinstry in the English newspaper International Express. It had UK in the heading, not NZ but the headline could well apply here, which is why I have used it. The article is essentially about the nonsensical net zero policy.

The article centres on Ed Miliband who is the energy secretary in the recently elected Labour Government. As McKinstry points out, Miliband’s neurotic attachment to the net-zero agenda is driving up energy prices, increasing business costs and undermining economic competitiveness.

Inflation in the UK has shot up to 2.3 per cent, mainly because of rising electricity and gas bills. McKinstry makes the point that, with huge reserves of oil, gas and coal, Britain should not be in this position. He says Miliband’s ideological fervour means this advantage cannot be exploited.

Miliband might be in Cabinet but his spirit is with the Just Stop Oil protesters. In his view, the de-industrialisation of the economy should be hailed as environmental progress, just as the neglect of natural assets, combined with the dependence on unreliable renewables and expensive foreign imports, supposedly displays Britain’s moral leadership of the world.

Miliband sees himself as the eco-saviour of Britain from the Climate Change apocalypse but, in truth, he is a wrecker, with bans on fossil fuels, a deluge of regulations and a growing array of levies and taxes.

The huge cost of creating a new energy infrastructure – including vast swathes of solar panels, wind turbines, pylons, cables and storage facilities – are already bringing heavy burdens to households and businesses. According to the Office of Budget Responsibility, subsidies for renewables alone will amount to £12 billion a year.

And what for, McKinstry asks. Britain accounts for less than one per cent of the world’s carbon emissions, so Miliband’s drive to impoverish the economy is a gigantic act of self-harm that will have no wider impact. Green campaigners talking about Britain setting a global moral example is just deluded, quasi-imperialist, arrogance.

As evidenced at the farce of the COP29 global summit, the rest of the world doesn’t care about Miliband’s rhetoric. America under Donald Trump is about to embrace a new era of cheap energy. Other Western countries are moving in the same direction. Meanwhile, McKinstry says, Britain is about to pay a heavy price for Miliband’s vain posturing.

The above illustrates the similarities between Miliband’s nonsense and the likes of the Greens, Labour and, to a lesser extent, National. We have to be thankful for ‘Prince of the Provinces’ Shane Jones in driving the need for the use of fossil fuels. His penchant for oil and gas exploration and the mining of our natural resources is very much welcome and highly desirable for our economic survival.

As Leo McKinstry says, Britain accounts for less than one per cent of global carbon emissions and they have a population of 68.35 million as of 2023. One wonders what our own true figure is with a population of just over five million plus a reducing number of cows and sheep. National need to stop the zero carbon nonsense and realise that what we do will also have zero effect globally.

Trump will no doubt dump the Paris Agreement and so should we. All it is achieving is to line the pockets of extreme leftists aligned to the United Nations. If we are not careful we, like Britain, will be paying a heavy price for our politicians’ vain posturing.

JC is a right-wing crusader. Reached an age that embodies the dictum only the good die young. This article was first published HERE

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