Ed Miliband wrapped up his speech at the New Statesman Christmas party last night with his best attempt at lifting the spirits of the Labour faithful in attendance:
“Polls are not a forecast, they are a snapshot… if polls were a forecast, I would be currently celebrating my tenth year as Prime Minister. For those of you paying attention, that didn’t happen. I was 15 points ahead of David Cameron… I say this to the Labour people in the room: fatalism, pessimism, never lifted a single child out of poverty, never created a single job, never won a single vote for the Labour Party. We are 18 months into a government. I think Reform are incredibly vulnerable and totally beatable…”
He never quite got over that 2015 drubbing, did he…
There is heightened suspicion in Labour circles regarding the loyalty of Ed Miliband to the Starmer government amid a series of internal briefings aimed at further destabilising Reeves and No10. One Cabinet minister told the Times last night:
“Why did Keir and Rachel allow the country to believe for so long that we would break our manifesto by putting up income tax by 2p when they would have known that wasn’t true? At no point were the cabinet told about the reality of the OBR forecasts. Had we been told, we might have been in a position to advise against setting hares running on income tax and giving the public the impression we are casual about our manifesto commitments. The handling of this budget has been a disaster from start to finish.”
One Cabinet minister told HuffPost “no comment” after being asked if Reeves was honest with her top political colleagues about the forecasts. Classy…
A Downing Street source tells Guido: “We are all pretty sure it’s Ed.” Co-conspirators will remember senior Labour figures fingering Miliband for inflammatory briefings in the late Summer and after a No10 attempt to remove him as Energy Secretary…
Miliband – a Lucy Powell backer – is seen within Labour special adviser circles as a key orchestrator of the ‘soft left’ in the PLP who think the time has come to put strong pressure on Starmer. Many speculate that Ed is ‘on manoeuvres’ and potentially keen to be the next Chancellor under a new PM…
Guido hears there is no massive internal worry about either the repeated battering from political journalists or any probes from the FCA. There is no current suggestion that Laurie Magnus can or will go for an investigation. Why are the political editors particularly annoyed? Because those WhatsApps they got from SpAds turned out to be deceptions…
Instead it is more political damage attached to Starmer and Reeves. Approaching haymaking time for any and all of Starmer’s political rivals…
An annual assessment of the UK’s gas security by the independent National Energy System Operator warns of an emerging critical risk to Britain’s gas supply. Thanks Miliband…
The report, due to be released later today, has “identified an emerging risk to gas supply security where decarbonisation is slowest or in the unlikely event of the loss of the single largest piece of gas infrastructure on the system.” NESO predicts that severe cold weather for 11 days combined with the failure of the UK’s “single largest piece” of gas infrastructure would result in an unbridgeable gap between demand and gas supply. Shutdown point – factories, power stations, and homes…
As it happens Britain is still reliant on gas. NESO says it has observed a “rapid decline” in gas fields and decarbonisation will not unilaterally fix the problem. It has suggested ministers construct new storage facilities, LNG terminals, or onshore pipelines to mitigate an inbound crisis. The government has launched a consultation in response. Co-conspirators can decide for themselves whether Miliband will get the wake-up call…
A DESNZ spokesperson said:
“Gas will continue to play a key role in our energy system as we transition to clean, more secure, homegrown energy. This report sets out clearly that decarbonisation is the best route to energy security – helping us reduce demand for gas while getting us off the rollercoaster of volatile fossil fuel markets. We are working with industry to ensure the gas system is fit for the future, including maintaining security of supply – which is paramount.”
A new report from Policy Exchange warns that unless the government rips up planning rules to fast track new nuclear power plants, Britain faces energy shortages which will cause household bills to skyrocket. Not quite the sunlit uplands promised by Miliband in the run-up to the election…
The report, backed by ex-Cabinet Secretary Simon Case, argues that the closure of a third of the UK’s gas fleet by 2030 will gut tens of gigawatts of reliable energy supply just as demand soars. Case writes:
“Policy Exchange’s new report demonstrates that the UK is barrelling toward an energy crisis – and an urgent change in policy is needed to stop costs continuing to rise, and to secure our energy security as a nation. To do otherwise is to risk energy shortages.
“The need to put nuclear enterprise at the heart of government reform is why I will be chairing Policy Exchange’s new Nuclear Enterprise Commission, where international experts will come together to work out the best way forward.”
Electricity bills are already ticking up. Time to get spades in the ground…
Read the full report here.
By building small modular reactors on the site of the old large Wylfa nuclear power station on the island of Anglesey Miliband is essentially ruling out the construction of a new large nuclear plant for generations. That was a highly rare viable site…
The Americans wanted to build a large reactor at the site and are fuming at the decision. Ed Miliband has done an ASMR video to boast about this. Future PM, anyone?
Ed Miliband has insisted he isn’t angling for the top job if Keir Starmer resigns. Speaking on the Today programme, Miliband gave Starmer his backing and claimed he’d already had his leadership ambitions flushed out by his last attempt:
“No, no, no… I support Keir. But I’ve had the, if you like, the inoculation technique against wanting to be Leader of the Labour Party because I was the Leader of the Labour Party, and that was a very successful inoculation.”
He also called for the sacking of those responsible for starting yesterday’s No10 briefing war. He must’ve been furious when his allies were blamed for starting the last anti-Starmer briefing war, then…
Speaking at his speech on how to achieve “progressive capitalism” Wes Streeting fired a dig and Andy Burnham:
“Bond markets are not bond villains and fiscal rules matter.”