New North Sea Oil Expansion

[Tom8]

Good to see a sensible decision being taken. A rational approach to energy and ignoring the eco loons of the world is probably Sunak's only hope of staying in office. He is making the right noises whilst the "just stop oil" brigade are not.

As the language and stupidity of the climate change/global warming brigade increases so do his chances of re-election.

[irc]

If course new licences are not an expansion. Just slowing the rate of decline. We will need Oil and gas for decades. Why import more than we have to? Madness.

[coanda]

Too little, too late.

[768]

Better (very) late than never.

Nuclear too please.

[WelshChris]

Very good Rishi - Now step up to the plate and allow some coal mining please. Then we can end this bonkers scenario of Port Talbot importing coal from Australia when there's a perfectly good supply 30 miles up the road.

[JuanCarlosFandango]

A small sop to reality while still beholden to climate change bks. What this really means is we will be destroying good jobs while relying on Russian and Middle Eastern energy for decades to come. Manufacturing and other industries that require lots of energy will be pushed abroad and consumers will be hammered.

All so politicians can trumpet their green credentials.

[Master Of Puppets]

Just waiting for the SNP grievances to begin.....'But it's Scotland oil...blah blah blah'.

[Tankrizzo]

All this stuff over the last few days just feels like a desperate red meat chucking exercise. Almost like they haven't been in office for the last 13 years and overseen all this nonsense.

[Grumps.]

WelshChris said:

Very good Rishi - Now step up to the plate and allow some coal mining please. Then we can end this bonkers scenario of Port Talbot importing coal from Australia when there's a perfectly good supply 30 miles up the road.

Yeah I never really understood why we were doing that.

Madness

[cirian75]

Gas and Oil sold is on international market.

So the claim to "boost British energy independence and grow the economy" is red meat pleasing rubbish.

The likes of Shell and BP pay very little tax

They are just making their petrochemical donors happy and playing the public for suckers.

[Al Gorithum]

This is how thick the Tories think you are. It's probably their last roll of the dice before the next election.

[snuffy]

It's almost as if, after the recent by-election results, Rishi has finally thought "Hang on, maybe the majority of the UK electorate don't agree with our energy policies".

But, it's too late now. You don't thank someone when they finally stop kicking you in the gonads.

[Grumps.]

Too late for what?

[snuffy]

Grumps. said:

Too late for what?

To stop them losing the next GE. That is all they are doing this for.

[2xChevrons]

Grumps. said:

WelshChris said:

Very good Rishi - Now step up to the plate and allow some coal mining please. Then we can end this bonkers scenario of Port Talbot importing coal from Australia when there's a perfectly good supply 30 miles up the road.

Yeah I never really understood why we were doing that.

Madness

Because it's not economically (or politically) viable to extract coal from UK collieries - it's cheaper to ship it in from huge open-cast mines on the other side of the world with lower cost bases.

You could always subsidise the UK coal industry on environmental, strategic security and social grounds. But I seem to remember there was an epoch-defining socio-political bust-up in the mid 1980s where this was very much rejected.

Of course consensus can change, but I think it would be quite a change for Sunak to drive through the Conservative Party and its supporters. Especially the day after he did a whole interview sat in Mrs. T's old Rover talking about personal freedom.

[JagLover]

cirian75 said:

Gas and Oil sold is on international market.

So the claim to "boost British energy independence and grow the economy" is red meat pleasing rubbish.

The likes of Shell and BP pay very little tax

They are just making their petrochemical donors happy and playing the public for suckers.

There isn't a global market in gas so new European supply will indeed make a difference.

Shell and BP pay tax on their UK gas and oil operations just like everyone else. This is now a relatively small part of their operations due to the decline in UK gas and oil production and the tax take has been further reduced by decommissioning costs being offset. As recently as 2008/09 the tax take from North sea oil and gas was £10.6bn and then fell rapidly thereafter.

[Tankrizzo]

snuffy said:

To stop them losing the next GE. That is all they are doing this for.

100%. Where was all this years ago when we were getting kicked in the balls? Oh look, an election coming up and several by-election hammerings.

[JuanCarlosFandango]

cirian75 said:

Gas and Oil sold is on international market.

So the claim to "boost British energy independence and grow the economy" is red meat pleasing rubbish.

The likes of Shell and BP pay very little tax

They are just making their petrochemical donors happy and playing the public for suckers.

Not really. Russia has shown its willingness to use energy supply as a tool for getting it's way. Having domestic energy supplies reduces our vulnerability to this.

[Fundoreen]

Good news in a way. Due to being wildly unpopular and expected to lose next election, the tories may as well drop the bullst green angle.
Still had to mention carbon capture and storage to sweeten the pill. So still some comedy lies in the system.

[Yertis]

Fundoreen said:

Good news in a way. Due to being wildly unpopular and expected to lose next election, the tories may as well drop the bullst green angle.
Still had to mention carbon capture and storage to sweeten the pill. So still some comedy lies in the system.

I don't think they're as unpopular as a lot of people think. Despite everything I'd still prefer this lot than the stshow Labour offered as an alternative at the last election. And frankly the Fraggle Rock lineup that Labour are pushing this time around don't inspire in me any confidence that they'd make a better fist of it.