Miliband rejects North Sea drilling expansion as price risk
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- Ed Miliband told the Parliamentary Labour Party that while the UK is dependent on fossil fuel markets it is a "price taker not price maker," and that "energy sovereignty and national security" require homegrown clean power.
- Energy minister Michael Shanks said expanding North Sea drilling would put the UK "at further risk from volatile fossil fuel markets," arguing households have repeatedly paid the price of exposure to gas.
- Miliband said new North Sea licences "would not make any difference to prices" and defended the windfall tax, which he said has raised £12bn since the start of the Russia-Ukraine war.
- The Conservatives are using an opposition day debate to push for scrapping the windfall tax, ending the ban on new oil and gas licences, and approving the Rosebank and Jackdaw North Sea fields.
- Shadow energy secretary Claire Coutinho called turning backs on domestic gas "sheer lunacy in the midst of a gas supply crisis" and urged fast-tracking Rosebank and Jackdaw.
- Chancellor Rachel Reeves is expected to set out plans in the Commons on Tuesday including an anti-profiteering framework to target price gouging — especially by petrol retailers responding to US-Israeli strikes on Iran — and legislation this year to implement the Fingleton review on faster nuclear build.
- Labour MP Henry Tufnell broke ranks in the Sun to call for North Sea drilling and scrapping carbon taxes, but other Labour MPs said his position was "shot down" at the PLP meeting with little support in the party.
Why it matters: The fight is now internal: Miliband is gambling that the £120bn public investment pipeline in Sizewell C, small modular reactors in north Wales, and renewables delivers lower bills faster than expanded domestic drilling — a bet some in his own party are openly challenging as global energy prices spike and Reeves scrambles for anti-gouging measures.
