From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT
By Paul Homewood
The cost of Renewables Obligation subsidies has now topped £100 billion, according to Government statistics recently released.
Subsidy payments are increased in line with RPI every year, but at 2025 prices the bill since 2010 has now risen to £101.2 billion. Last year alone, renewable generators received subsidies of £7.7 billion. Two thirds go to wind and solar farms, which we are told are the cheapest forms of energy.
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/energy-trends-section-6-renewables
Until last month, all these subsidies were paid for through our electricity bills. (From April 2026, some of the cost is now being funded out of general taxation – but either way, we still have to pay!).
Bear in mind that, in addition to these subsidies, renewable generators also sell their electricity on the market. Effectively we are paying twice for the power they produce.
The Renewables Obligation Scheme (RO) covers renewable generators built before 2017, when the scheme was replaced for new generators by the Contracts for Difference subsidy. The scheme lasts for twenty years for each generator, so we will continue to pay billions out for many years to come.
Every year Ofgem sets a target for licensed electricity suppliers. Suppliers must source a certain proportion of the electricity they supply to customers from renewable sources, expressed as a number of Renewables Obligation Certificates (ROCs) per megawatt-hour (MWh) supplied.
In turn, wind farms and other renewable generators, accredited under RO are awarded ROCs. Suppliers can either buy these from the generators or pay into OFGEM’s “Buy Out Fund”, at a fixed price set at the start of the year and increased each year in line with RPI. (From April 2026, CPI is used instead). Effectively then, OFGEM sets the market price for ROCs.
Nobody ever voted to pay £100 billion to wind farms and the rest, as far as I can recall! The policy was never included in any party’s manifesto. Instead, it was imposed by government diktat.
The RO scheme was originally introduced by the DTI in 2002 via a Statutory Instrument, about which the Parliament website says:
“Statutory instruments are the most common form of secondary (or delegated) legislation.
The power to make a statutory instrument is set out in an Act of Parliament and nearly always conferred on a Minister of the Crown. The Minister is then able to make law on the matters identified in the Act, and using the parliamentary procedure set out in the Act.”
In other words, a Minister can use an SI to make law, without the need for an Act of Parliament. The original legal authority was embedded in the innocuous sounding Utilities Act 2000, a wide-ranging bill designed to regulate the gas and electricity industries. It was never the intention of that Act to empower Ministers to levy tens of billions from bill payers in order to pursue their perverted political agenda.
· And in 2010 the scheme was extended from 2027 to 2037, by which time the bill will probably have doubled, again using an SI.
And these are not the only subsidies for renewables, that we pay for on our bills. The Contracts for Difference, mentioned above, has already cost £13 billion since 2016.
Meanwhile, the Feed in Tariff scheme, which covers smaller generators, has now paid out more than £17 billion since 2011.
There was never any democratic mandate for any of this. At no stage were the public consulted, never mind given the opportunity to vote on renewable energy policy, Ed Miliband’s 2008 Climate Change Act or Theresa May’s suicidal Net Zero law.
But we are all paying the bill.
I know someone who claims renewable energy is cheaper than fossil fuels. But he supports subsidies for renewable energy. When I point out that this makes no sense, his response is that I don’t understand renewable energy. My response is that I understand arithmetic.
Well, we certainly do understand Renewables. They don’t exist without massive subsidies. They also don’t exist without ”fossil fuels”
Don’t forget the Henry VIII powers. Parliament doesn’t get a look in.
What are Henry VIII powers and why might Keir Starmer use them?https://uk.news.yahoo.com/henry-viii-powers-why-might-131346056.html
For anyone who doesn’t follow this, they are talking enabling legislation.
You pass a law which gives you the right to issue decrees having the force of law. The same force as if they had gone through the full Parliamentary process.
The result is the power to rule by decree. Maybe restricted in scope, but maybe not. In 1933/4 it was total and the legislature never met again.
The thing about the UK Constitution is that its unwritten as a whole, and the statutes that make it up (along with Common Law decisions and tradition) are legislation like any other. So it can be amended by a simple majority vote. An example was when the UK recently went to fixed term Parliaments, and then reversed this, within a few years.
Its not like the US or some other democracies. If a government wishes to introduce detention without trial, repeal Habeas Corpus, it can do so on a bare majority vote. If it wishes to establish re-education camps in the Scottish Highlands for those detained, it can do that too. If it wishes to extend the life of this Parliament by 10 years, or indefinitely, or constitute Parliament in some other way (eg by appointment, by proportional representation, anything really..) a simple majority vote will do it. And there is no oversight by any court. There is no written constitution to appeal to, there is no court which can decide that the legislation is unconstitutional.
Plus concurrence by the appointed House of Lords and the Crown, of course, as with all other primary legislation.
What we are looking at in the UK is the final days of the two previously main political parties, Labour and Conservative, and with them, potentially, the final days of liberal democracy.
For US readers, imagine that the Republican and Democrat parties together fell below 40% of the vote, and that the rest of the vote was dominated by a populist right and an Islamist left. Couple this with a pending financial crisis, because of unsustainable spending on welfare and Labour affiliated unions, and culture wars over immigration, race and gender, climate and energy.
Its Weimar, with British characteristics.
No open violence on the streets – yet, but they aren’t listening. It’s about the party, them and their survival.
83 MPs have called for him to go. The bar was 81. And…
Deluded Starmer tells Cabinet he WON’T quit
This guy is like superglue.
Think its over 80 now, but to trigger a party leadership contest they have to be votes cast for some particular contender. That may yet happen. One of the contenders may yet declare and get the 80 supporters.
Of course the other big factor, which I left off the list of underlying factors in the crisis, is Europe.
Imagine – you have catastrophic losses in an election. Your losses are hugely in areas which voted for Brexit, and to leave the EU. So you think about this over the weekend and come up with a plan. You make a reset speech, and your main proposal in it is closer ties with Europe, perhaps up to and including rejoining the Single Market.
Next he will probably propose to build yet more wind farms and solar farms and restrict oil and gas even more, and raise energy prices still more. Did I say that he will do these things…? Already done them.
To describe this as out of touch doesn’t begin to do it justice.
Farage, who is probably the ablest politician active in the UK at the moment, has said its the end of the left-right division. One can see what he means.
I can remember when a politician resigned as a matter of honour. The last one could well be Lord Carrington.
Over 90 now.
But they are going to have to all vote for one candidate for them to trigger a Party leadership contest, and even then there are a couple more hurdles it may fail at.
Otherwise the only way is a vote of confidence in the House of Commons. In the slightly fictional world of the British Constitution this would mean that the PM no longer has the power to form a government, ie cannot command a majority in the House, and must report that to the Head of State, the King. This traditionally leads either to a General Election, or the Palace then invites someone else (it would be a Labour MP in present circumstances) to form a government, based on reasonable assurances that he or she does have the confidence of the Commons and can command a majority.
I think the Palace has discretion on whether there is an election or whether it accepts a proposal from another MP. Not sure which it would choose in the current situation.
It seems foolish to me to expect honour from people who gain their positions through bribery and cannot even honour their own conscience.
“The guy is like superglue”
But you can get a release agent for that. What you can’t get is something that cures Starmers total lack of self-awareness…
How do you fill an empty suit?
Starmer is, despite that rhino thick hide, a gutless, spineless, gormless, direction-less, neurotic, underachieving, snivelling, cowardly third rate lawyer. That applies to the PLP, come to think of it.
He’s not even that good. Who would replace him though? The labour party is nothing but dross.
To a first approximation the entire political class is dross.
Many years ago my wife allowed herself to be put forward and the experience was dreadful. Surrounded by imbeciles, constrained by externally imposed limitations and obligations, and no budget for anything considered important by the locals. It was soul-destroying.
Her few energetic colleagues soon chose to take their skills elsewhere. Those who remain are the ones who seem to actually enjoy squabbling or imagine they are admired. They are a sorry lot.
What can be done to put it right now? I have nothing…
What you need, is what the US used to have. A constitution that strictly limits the powers that government is allowed to use.
Unfortunately, here in the US, the courts have completely twisted the meaning of the commerce clause and used it as a get out of jail free card, that grants government unlimited power. All they have to do is declare that some side effect or penumbra of the act will have some marginal impact on interstate trade, and the courts roll over and allow it.
That’s a very good description of political parties. To thrive in one you need to be a very particular type of person. Unfortunately this type should never be in any level of government.
I think you are right, he is in over his head and as the phrase is, not waving but drowning. But its important also to focus on the underlying situation. I doubt there is any Labour politician who can save the party, because in the same way as the Liberal Party in 1910, its whole rationale and approach is based on a fit to a vanished world. Its the vanishing of the world where it fitted that is going to wipe it out, just as it did the Liberals, despite their having very able leaders.
The only thing that would rescue them would be a series of U-turns on almost everything they have done in the last two years – on what the left of the party wants and is determined to get. Everything from tax to welfare to energy to pay awards to immigration to Europe.
Its not going to happen, and so the most likely outcome is stumbling along into oblivion with Starmer. Think the Liberal Party in the UK in 1955. An irrelevant relic only voted for by nostalgics, reading the news by candles, because Miliband will have destroyed the electricity.
Like dog shite on your shoe, difficult to get off and the smell lingers for a long time
“What we are looking at in the UK is the final days of the two previously main political parties, Labour and Conservative, and with them, potentially, the final days of liberal democracy.” Yes.
What counts now is what replaces them. A multitude of parties will not do. It is the way the party system enables mediocre people to rise in politics that is the cause of current chaos which in turn strains the political establishment.
What comes next must bring forward much better people to Parliament.
I am of the opinion that the way to achieve that is for the people to eschew parties and vote for independent MPs.
This would constitute a revolution of great consequence.
Remember the golden rule. “Rubbish in = rubbish out”
“What comes next must bring forward much better people to Parliament.”
Of course . . . but the only way to do that is to establish standards – qualifications – that must be met by all prospective parliamentary candidates . . . AND then be applied to sitting MPS.
The nonsense of going to Oxford, gaining a PPE, and going straight into “politics” as a career has . . . GOT TO STOP!! We end up with a bunch of elite clowns who have never – and never will – experienced real-world responsibility and accountability.
And it doesn’t matter whether or not those utter clowns are Labour or Conservative . . . and hence the total shambles the UK finds itself in.
And do we actually need 650 bloody MPs? Of course we don’t . . . if we had people who were recruited from the business, engineering, military, medical, etc, sectors who HAVE had real-world experience of accountable responsibility, who are going to be paid well to do a job which IS OF BENEFIT TO THE COUNTRY, and will NOT be part of the idiotic ideology of a ridiculous political party – people who can say, “doing THAT would be ridiculous . . . so we’re NOT going to do it.”
Dream on . . . I’m only a humble mining engineer.
And I believe the best example we have of an “elite clown” is Miliband.
He has never been in a position of real-world responsible accountability – his only experience of the world is ideologically driven politics . . . from the day he graduated!
He has a PPE from Oxford, so he can’t be dumb . . . you would think. But he’s been given responsibility for the bloody nation’s energy sector despite being . . . engineering and science illiterate!!
And we wonder why we’ve got the highest energy costs in the entire bloody world?!!
These problems originated from the acceptance that government agencies have to regulate industries without understanding the impacts of their regulatory actions. We see these actions every day in California and consequently have by far the highest energy costs of the 49 continental states.
California once had about 30 refineries. There are now only 13 left. Major refinerValero will be shutting down soon.
Chevron was founded in 1880 in California. Last year Chevron threw in the environmental towel and moved its headquarters to Houston
“Denier Math is wrong. You need to use Planet Math”.
The model output…
Denier math -> Death miner
Planet math -> Lament path
Story tip – The BBC obligation
Many only watch streaming services now and the BBC is short of money in a big way. Labour to the rescue.
Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+ and Apple TV subscribers who do not even watch the BBC could still be forced to pay the £180-a-year TV licence fee to help fund the corporation.
https://www.dailymail.com/news/article-15810087/Netflix-Amazon-Prime-subscribers-forced-pay-TV-licence-fee-fund-BBC.html
“She said last year: ‘If you believe, as I do, that one of the greatest strengths of the BBC is its ability to unite the nation that has found multiple ways to divide itself, then I think you’ve got to be cautious about the use of subscriptions and paywalls.’”
Does ‘she’, the Minister of Culture (?!), realize how Orwellian this statement is?
The idea that you can promote national unity by forcing people to pay for a broadcasting service they do not want to watch and are refusing to watch, one which has basically turned itself into a the broadcasting arm of left pressure groups.
Where on earth do people get these ideas? Its a bit like the idea that it would be wrong to get rid of Starmer in the middle of international crises.
Because that would stop him giving away money to the EU and giving bases to China and picking fights with the country’s main ally, and destroying self sufficiency in energy generation and….
All of which is so important to British prosperity and security….
Its like the old days of the nationalized industries, when the Post Office defined its mission as rationing phone lines. Or as now, when a socialized health service that is supposed to be the envy of the world spends its efforts on managing the waiting list or abolishing the terms ‘mother’ ‘woman’ and ‘breast’.
Yes, that will improve the nation’s health no end!
But this is a country which lays rail track between Oxford and Cambridge, buys rolling stock, and runs trains on it. Supposed to do great things for the economy. The trains then run on schedule, but they run empty. They carry no passengers because of a dispute with the unions, who will not accept their running without the totally unnecessary guards who used to be needed back in 1955.
“The taxes will continue until national vigour is restored.”
Could they be more insensible? The nation is voting with its feet (err, eyeballs). The BBC doesn’t do it for us. In fact its ham-fisted attempts to promote causes disappoint the believers and enrage the sceptics.
Also, here’s a question. In general the Treasury is opposed to hypothecated taxes. That’s why we pay massive amounts in vehicle excise yet the roads are in ruins. The money goes into general revenue. Why is the Beeb entitled to have its own special teat to suck on?
It’s the propaganda arm of the party.
It is not. It is completely rogue.
By chance there is sometimes a party in power that somewhat aligns with the BBC, creating the impression that the BBC is its propaganda arm. But make no mistake, the BBC has its own agenda and is jealous of its autonomy and the public money gifted it.
I said party, not government.
You’ll have to explain what you mean by “party” then. The BBC is devoted to itself IMO. It gives not the tiniest stuff about anyone or anything else. And it doesn’t have to. It is gifted loadsa money to do with as it likes.
I think he really meant ‘policies’, The BBC has a set of policy agendas which are more or less in line with those of the left wing parties at the time and reports and distorts its coverage accordingly. At the moment their hot topics are are climate/energy, Gaza and Israel, gender, immigration, Europe. Though, having realized what side of their bread may be buttered, they are now covering Reform with a kind of engaged interest.
The set of topics currently roughly coincides with the left of Labour, but not quite the Corbynite left, and it does sometimes diverge.
Yes, its truly amazing, but its of a piece with Starmer’s proposal to deal with a rejection by Brexit areas by rejoining the Single Market. That will bring them around to us.
Here we have a comparable proposal: Problem is they are leaving the BBC, they don’t like it, don’t want it, they cancel their license fee payments, they are stopping watching live TV in general, they are moving to streaming where they can get what they want when they want it.
So lets charge them a tax to watch anything streaming! That should… that should…. let me think… Right. That should make them watch the BBC again…
I need a few minutes to go over that one again….
Reverse Robin Hood. Take from the poor and give to the rich.
Dennis Moore, Dennis Moore
Riding through the land
Dennis Moore, Dennis Moore
Without a merry band
He steals from the poor and gives to the rich
Stupid b*tch
Looking at it another way, Robin Hood stole from the government and gave back to the taxpayers.