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00:00We sort of need Donald Trump to find somebody else to be really angry with.
00:03I absolutely do not want Nigel Farage to come to my house.
00:06Who's got that sort of money just kicking around?
00:08This week, the US-Iran war has shown no signs of stopping.
00:12Pushing oil prices through the roof.
00:14So while the costed living crisis has stayed in the minds of most people,
00:17it's firmly back on the agenda in Westminster.
00:19Today we discuss whether the government can respond in any meaningful way to the energy crisis.
00:24And what Keir Starmer can do about his rather tricky relationship with Donald Trump.
00:28And we're also going to chat about Reform's bizarre game show-style solution.
00:32I'm Cleo Watson, a former special advisor in Downing Street.
00:35And I'm Helen McNamara, the former Deputy Cabinet Secretary.
00:38And this is In The Room.
00:43Welcome back.
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01:06intheroom.pod.
01:08So since the latest conflict in the Middle East started last month, as day follows night,
01:13one of the things that has happened is obviously the price of oil has gone up quite significantly.
01:19So at time of recording, she says, frantically checking a piece of paper in front of her,
01:23oil prices are now above $113 a barrel.
01:27So this is one of those things where inside the Cabinet Office and Number 10,
01:33I think both of us would say most of the time it's not the case that everyone's wandering around the
01:37corridors
01:38talking about the price of a barrel of crude.
01:40But then suddenly everyone's somehow literate in oil markets.
01:43And it's, you know, a barrel of crude rather than a pint of milk that is the thing that everyone
01:47needs to know the price of.
01:49And actually, the situation in terms of energy supplies and security is getting worse.
01:53So just this week, we've seen the Iranian attack on gas refinery in Qatar.
01:58And Donald Trump has threatened to, I mean, something appalling annihilation-wise
02:04in terms of more and more and more attacks on energy supply capacity and security in the region.
02:09And there is just no question about this.
02:11Of all of the consequences of what is happening now, this is not one of those.
02:15It's happening on far off shores and it looks a bit stressful on the news
02:18and it's nothing to do with me.
02:19When you get something like this in a big energy shock, it affects all of us,
02:23not just kind of today, but tomorrow.
02:26And we'll have quite profound effects on us for the rest of, well, God knows when, to be honest.
02:30Yeah, that's absolutely right.
02:31I mean, so quick note on cost of living,
02:33because it's one of those phrases that has been rumbling around for a very long time, actually.
02:38You know, the Cameron government were talking about it.
02:40The Brown government were talking about it.
02:42Theresa May had her Just About Managings.
02:44Keir Starmer has his working families.
02:46Cost of living is the kind of everyday cost for a normal household, whoever you are.
02:52So it's the cost of your energy, the cost of your fuel, the cost of your food, your clothes,
02:58your chockies, your cinema tickets, your leisure centre passes, whatever it might be.
03:05It's anything that is affected because it is made using energy.
03:09And so we are going to feel the effects in our pocket, if not imminently,
03:13although we're seeing that already at the petrol pumps, in the weeks and months to come,
03:17because everything will tick up based off what is happening in the Middle East now.
03:21So again, one of the inevitabilities of being in this situation is that, you know, you're absolutely right.
03:25This is a thing that people expect their governments to do something about straight away,
03:29because you can feel the pain.
03:30So it was night follows day again.
03:33Here we are with the government this week announcing a package of emergency measures.
03:38One of my least favourite government phrases, package of measures to help respond to the energy crisis.
03:44And we've had Ed Miliband, the Energy Security and Net Zero Secretary,
03:50which we definitely had to look up to find his proper title.
03:53He said in a post on X earlier this week.
03:56Amidst a conflict in the Middle East, there's one thing I want you to know about this government.
04:00We are going to fight your corner.
04:03On Friday, we called in the petrol retailers to say that unfair practices like price gouging would not be tolerated.
04:10Today, we're announcing £50 million of extra support for low-income households
04:15that are facing the costs of higher heating oil prices.
04:18And we've announced plans to regulate the market for the longer term.
04:23It's really, it's sort of remarkable thinking about where we've come from,
04:26that it's like just entirely normal now for governments to be talking about
04:30interfering on capping pricing rather than doing anything on the kind of supply side.
04:36Yeah.
04:37But you, I mean, you talked about your much-loved expression, a package of measures.
04:42This is not your first radio, if I'm right in hand.
04:43It's not my first package.
04:46So, yeah, I mean, so if I think back to what happens when there is a crisis in energy production
04:52and whether that was, you know, now we've got a Middle East conflict.
04:55More recently, it's because of Russia that we've had to have kind of really significant correctives.
05:01So, in 2014, when Russia invaded the Crimea, that put the kind of gas pipelines that supplied an enormous amount
05:09of gas.
05:09I mean, something like 96% of the gas to Germany then came through these pipelines.
05:14So, there's this huge correction and this big energy supply package that we produced back in 2014
05:19in response to what was happening then.
05:21And then, obviously, more recently, the Russian invasion of Ukraine led to the government taking a huge amount of action
05:26back in 2022.
05:27And then here we are again, you know, different bit of geography, different location, different mix of supply,
05:33but all effectively the same problem, which is we import in a large amount of our energy these days,
05:38which, by the way, also a decision of governments to have made over time.
05:42The UK used to be a massive oil and gas and coal producer.
05:45We used to be one of the 10th biggest producers in the world back in the 1980s
05:50and for lots of reasons have decided not to do that anymore.
05:53So, now we are somebody who has to buy in our energy from outside.
05:57And so, we are incredibly vulnerable when it comes to these external shocks and then have to correct.
06:03And so, what you have the government kind of doing at the moment is a bit like kind of whack
06:07-a-mole on energy prices.
06:10So, it's kind of what can we do to solve the problem that we can see in front of us?
06:14Sometimes, actually, it's about, you know, addressing the causes of the moles, maybe.
06:19Well, Helen, come of the hour, come of the man, because Robert Jenrick from Reform
06:23has got all the answers we could possibly hope for to the cost of living and energy crisis.
06:27And we should just, there's definitely a trigger slash health warning that needs to be applied
06:30before watching this rather dystopian intervention in our political landscape this week.
06:35How would you like Nigel Farage to come to your house
06:37and pay yours and your entire street's energy bills for a year?
06:42If that sounds good, enter our draw.
06:45Go to www.nigelcutmybills.com
06:49I absolutely do not want Nigel Farage to come to my house.
06:53Don't enter the draw then, Claire.
06:54Yeah, that's true.
06:55Well, we'll get into why I also wouldn't enter the draw.
06:58But I also find it extraordinary that Robert Jenrick is really firmly committed to this shadow chancellor.
07:04But based on the kind of size of the party in the House of Commons,
07:07he'd actually be something like shadow, shadow, shadow chancellor.
07:11The worry about that is I think it might make him, if he's too many shadows,
07:15doesn't he in fact then become the chancellor?
07:17Like a negative chancellor.
07:20Maybe that's why, maybe that's the game.
07:22He's going to get on technicality.
07:24Well, that's the current situation on cost of living and energy prices and the government's reaction.
07:29But next, we're going to talk about reform's latest stump
07:32because it is actually quite important and it's not quite what it seems.
07:36So surprised.
07:37And we'll get into how governments actually put together emergency packages like this
07:41and why Donald Trump could yet worsen our cost of living crisis.
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08:55So we just heard that extraordinary clip from Robert Jemmerich,
09:00NigelCutMyBills.com.
09:02But what's actually, what else is going on here with this generous offer
09:05to pay a whole street's electricity bills?
09:08Why are they doing this?
09:09Yes. So this is not actually Reform's only stunt on cost of living.
09:13They did a campaign a fortnight ago in Derbyshire at a petrol station
09:17doing Reform Refuel, where they knocked 25p off the pump price for people to fill up.
09:24Very exciting.
09:25All done up in their branding.
09:26And the idea was they are campaigning against the government's scheduled 5p fuel duty rise.
09:33There is some kind of method behind, not the madness, but the campaigning anyway.
09:37I personally think this is a little bit different.
09:41So on the one hand, very tantalizing offer.
09:43This could tot up to a fair amount.
09:46It depends on the street, I guess.
09:47It depends on, and the house.
09:48You know, Buckingham Palace could have some major energy bills.
09:54Downing Street, a bit drafty.
09:54Quite.
09:55So the reason I think this is not quite what it seems
09:59is because I have been part of something similar myself.
10:03When I worked for Vote Leave in the 2016 European referendum,
10:08we had a competition called the 50 Million Prize,
10:13where if you correctly predicted all 51 games from the Men's Euros 2016 football tournament,
10:21you could win £50 million.
10:24£50 million?
10:26Did anybody win £50 million?
10:28They did not win.
10:29But the backup prize, if you did not accurately predict all the results,
10:34the next best person got £50 grand, and he did get £50 grand.
10:40Thank you very much.
10:41So we did follow through on that.
10:43But the bit that is more important here is not what are your odds of winning,
10:47although the odds that were pointed out to us by the Remain campaign at the time
10:51were one in a six billion.
10:53How many?
10:53It's a many, many zeros that I'm sure Robert Jenner,
10:57because Shadow Chancellor could...
10:58Shadow, Shadow, Chancellor.
10:59Shadow, Shadow, Shadow, I think, Chancellor could reveal to us.
11:03But the point of the exercise was to draw people in to give us their data,
11:10which is fine and legal.
11:11You can't buy lists of data anymore, which was quite common practice.
11:16And you had to have people voluntarily give up their information.
11:21So what sort of information would it be?
11:23Name, address, postcode, and like contact information, basically.
11:30So it's to build mailing lists, basically.
11:32Exactly.
11:33And actually to get hold of people that, you know, it was particularly relevant for us at Vote Leave,
11:37people who may not have voted before.
11:39So they're not on the electoral roll, but they think, yeah, I'll have a pun to this.
11:44And I think, you know, it could be the case that reform are trying to do something similar to here,
11:50because if you go to NigelCutMyBills.com, you are given the opportunity to give them
11:55a whole load of your private contact information.
11:58Ah, so like NigelHere'sMyData.com.
12:01Yes, but of course, if Nigel were trying to get hold of you to pay your bills because you've won
12:06the competition,
12:07he would obviously need to turn up unannounced in your house.
12:11But I just think people should be quite aware of this kind of thing.
12:16There are lots, there's lots of this kind of practice, to be honest, amongst political parties
12:21and particularly reform, who obviously are quite new.
12:24So they are trying to build up a base and a kind of understanding of where people are very, very
12:30quickly.
12:30They haven't got old data to rely on.
12:33Right. So they've got to start from scratch.
12:34So we can expect to see quite a lot more of these sort of innovative bits of competition opportunities for
12:39us in the public.
12:40It's possible. NigelPayMyNurseryBills.com.
12:44NigelPayMyFoodShopForAYear.com.
12:45Well, Helen, if you don't win the competition to have your entire streets bills paid,
12:50there are, of course, alternatives, including packages that the government can come up with.
12:56And we've obviously seen that this week.
12:59You have been involved in one of these in the past, or more than one, and I'd love to hear
13:03what it's like.
13:04You know, we see the shiny announcement at the end.
13:06It's 53 million and this is what it'll do.
13:10How do we even get there before this is announced?
13:12Well, so you're right, this is not, unfortunately, the first time that the government has had to step up
13:17and present an emergency package in response to an energy crisis triggered by something that's happened,
13:22not in the UK, right?
13:24So in 2022, when you had the invasion of Ukraine,
13:27similarly, the government had to put together another package of measures.
13:30Package of measures.
13:31Honestly, it makes me slightly...
13:33But, you know, nevertheless, yet again, you're assembling a package of measures to announce
13:38and some of that is short term, some of it's long term.
13:40And then here we are again with another external shock.
13:43And then, you're absolutely right.
13:44Some of this is that you do actually have to.
13:46There is a time pressure.
13:47You can't say when you've had...
13:48You have not decided that there should be this external trigger.
13:51It wasn't on your grid of activity for the first quarter.
13:55It wasn't let's have an energy crisis and try to kind of get really stuck into energy.
14:00And if you remember, just the week that this happened in the spring statement,
14:04in fact, Rachel Reeves in more benevolent time was talking about how they'd got a very kind of measured,
14:10slow, bringing people's bills down in the next quarter.
14:14And obviously, all of that is out of the window now.
14:16So there definitely is when you're inside government and you get some of these external shocks,
14:20you can totally see what's coming in terms of energy prices.
14:23This is not one of those really mysterious, you know, wait and see whether the real reaction will be
14:29an increase in the cost of energy like this, because energy is the underpinning of the whole economy
14:33and you have to buy it today.
14:35Like, absolutely hits hard and fast.
14:38So there's an element of, and it will be, I mean, I imagine it's the same as it ever was.
14:43You've got the Treasury, you've got the key departments, the Energy Department,
14:45not just the Energy Department, but transport, and it goes right across the whole of government,
14:51one of these questions.
14:52Housing, because like concrete is going in between.
14:54Yeah, all of these things.
14:55And then you're trying to assemble together something that is going to sound confident and reassuring,
15:01that ministers want to stand up and be able to reassure the population,
15:04look, we've got this, that is going to make a difference.
15:07So one of the worst things you get, and we've seen a bit of this this week, obviously,
15:10is, you know, the government announced something that sounds like a really big number,
15:13and then everyone does the calculation about, hang on a second,
15:16when you look at what's really happening with the prices,
15:18and you see that actually that's an effective subsidy of 30 quid a household,
15:23but actually each household is going to be paying 150 quid more,
15:26so thanks very much, doesn't make a difference.
15:28But you do need to meet the moment of, it's got to sound good on the day,
15:33it's got to be real life help that's going to come soon enough to make a difference.
15:37And then also, at these moments, you're also thinking, how the hell did we get here?
15:42How do we try to not be in such a bad position next time around?
15:46And what are all the other things that should be there?
15:49So some of the stuff has been announced, I would expect,
15:53or at least it was definitely true, the last time I was closely involved with these things,
15:57that there'd be all sorts of other stuff that the government is now mapping out.
16:00We talked a bit, if you remember, a few episodes about domestic consequentials,
16:05when they said that, do you need to start thinking about
16:08what are all of the things that now come from an energy shock?
16:12And how are we going to see that bleed out in every single tiny bit of policy,
16:16because it's going to make everything more expensive for government too?
16:18And then how do we reprioritise or think about what this looks like?
16:22So we've seen some of the stuff that's been announced now.
16:25There'll be lots more underneath the surface, she says, hopefully.
16:28And you really hope that there is some urgency applied to all of the things that you can do now,
16:34particularly now while the weather is good.
16:37And then you will probably have, or definitely back in my day,
16:41you'd have a group of officials and probably a group of ministers
16:44who then will be really staying on top of this for the next six months.
16:48So getting together every week and thinking, right, OK, this has worked.
16:51How has that worked? What else do we do?
16:53What's the next thing we do?
16:54I'd be amazed if what was announced this week is the full set of things that government could do,
16:59because although things look pretty bad, we're not at kitchen sink time yet.
17:03And you would hope that there are other things that, if needs be,
17:07the government can come forward and do.
17:09Yeah, but by the time of the government's party conference season in the autumn,
17:13it might be possible that they are compelled to announce a few things.
17:16So they have to get it all together now.
17:19Yeah, you have to be ready for what comes next.
17:20And also, you know, unfortunately, there are going to be deep consequentials.
17:25Wherever we can see that this shock to the energy market is going to last for some time,
17:30it is highly unlikely that all of the lovely optimism we had about inflation going down,
17:35all of those things, like all bets are off when something like this happens.
17:39And you don't have to be an amazingly competent economist to know that that's actually what happens.
17:44And there is, I'm afraid, a really hard correlation between energy crisis and political instability.
17:51And that will be in their minds, too.
17:52I went to some quite interesting focus groups in the autumn.
17:57Focus groups are when a group of people come together.
17:59They don't necessarily know they're going to be asked about politics.
18:03They could be coming to, like, try a new ice cream or watch a trailer for a film.
18:06So, poor them.
18:07A bit like entering a competition to get some football results.
18:10And lo and behold, being part of a political project.
18:13Yeah, but you get there.
18:13You get there on a Wednesday evening, you get a cup of tea, 50 quid,
18:16and then, oh, my God, you're going to be talking about Net Zero and Ed Davey,
18:21or whatever it might be.
18:22But be that as it may, you come along and you're asked a series of questions about,
18:26you know, what your priorities are and how you're finding your life.
18:31And the ones I went to were, I cannot emphasize enough the extent of the cost of living crisis.
18:39A lot of these were in poorer towns, generally the north, quite a lot in the southwest, though,
18:46quite a lot in the Midlands.
18:48And people really feel, you've got a few different ones, people who are basically managing,
18:54people who feel like they can't do anything nice to themselves.
18:58There's nothing at the end of the month to just go to the cinema or, I don't know,
19:03take their kids to swimming or something like that.
19:06And then there are people who honestly are having to decide between whether they heat their house
19:10or whether they eat something.
19:13And, you know, it's interesting that the number of new-build houses that are being built
19:18have not got ovens because people are using more energy-efficient means like air fryers and so on.
19:25So I was really struck by that period, but that was six months ago.
19:29And that's what people were saying then.
19:31And then Keir Starmer in January came out and said, for any moment we're not talking about cost of living
19:37is a minute wasted.
19:39Well, also, and I've had this experience actually from politicians of, you are quite isolated.
19:44You're already in a special category of person if you are a politician,
19:48as in it's not what most normal people do.
19:50And then you're definitely working in London a lot of the time.
19:53You're in quite, you are, you know, in quite a bubble.
19:56And I think and think of numbers of times with different politicians where you are
20:01trying to explain that £100 is a lot of money.
20:04So you'd quite have a, well, you know, this is going to, you know, it's going to be great
20:08because people can spend, you know, one of the announcements this week is you can,
20:11you might be able to quite soon buy a manufactured in China,
20:15solar panels that you can plug in in your own house.
20:17And it's only, you know, in the low hundreds of pounds.
20:20Low hundreds of pounds is an extraordinary amount of money for a lot of people.
20:25And there can be just this mindset that everyone's fixing and really doesn't,
20:29doesn't remember how actually the vast majority of the country live.
20:34Yes.
20:34And I think actually one of the most interesting and revealing bits of the cost of living crisis
20:38in recent years is that quite a lot of people that these politicians know have actually been
20:45affected and they, you know, that they're being priced out of private schools or whatever
20:49it might be, or holidays and things like that.
20:51Like it's starting to bite their immediate circle.
20:56Bearing that in mind about what actual real people actually really think.
20:59Let's take it back to what the government has announced this week in terms of the
21:02measures that are there to support particularly people who are struggling with bills.
21:06What does that, what's the politics of all of that?
21:09Yes.
21:09Well, again, one of the problems with doing this stuff in a hurry is that you tend to pick
21:14quite an arbitrary line on, we are going to support the people who do not meet this kind
21:19of income threshold, I suppose.
21:21And people have seen this played out in so many other formats, welfare, winter fuel.
21:26The trouble is with picking a sort of quite arbitrary line on, we're going to help the people
21:30below here, is that the people immediately above that line do not benefit at all.
21:35In fact, they're worse off than if they were below the line, because what they are not
21:40getting in support, they don't make up for in their income.
21:43And a great example of this, you know, away from energy is childcare support, where if two
21:51couples could earn £99,000 each, they're entitled to a whole load of benefits because they come
21:58under the £100,000 threshold.
22:00But one couple could have, you know, one of them not earning at all, and one of them
22:05is on £101,000, and they're not entitled to anything.
22:08That's still quite generous, even then, if you're making that kind of money.
22:11But you can enrage people because it's actually, you know, the people who just tip over the
22:18top of your line is actually quite a loud and vocal piece, and they get onto their MPs,
22:23and you end up in these positions where actually, you know, on welfare reform, the government
22:29is actually now more generous than it was before they tried to make their cuts.
22:33It doesn't feel like it.
22:34And that's the problem, is that actually, how do people feel, and whether they feel it's
22:38fair?
22:38And when they see all these kind of big numbers being chucked about, about all the help that's
22:41being offered, it's quite hard to see all of that, and then still find that actually
22:46you personally aren't getting any help.
22:48And you definitely categorise yourself in the kind of need help, to your point about
22:51actually, nobody feels very wealthy at the moment anyway, and then they are struggling,
22:56and then they're not going to get this help.
22:58And I think the other problem the government have got for themselves is the rural communities,
23:02again.
23:03If you think about something like Northern Ireland, a large rural population, no mains gas,
23:07and you have to buy whole tanks.
23:09It's like, imagine you go and fill your car up with petrol, like that's, you can see how
23:13expensive it is, because it now costs you £10 more to fill your car up with petrol than
23:17it did three weeks ago, you try buying a whole tank of heating oil.
23:20And we saw the Prime Minister asked this at Prime Minister's questions yesterday, it's
23:24like actually some people are now having to pay three or four times more, and that's
23:27hundreds and hundreds of pounds more.
23:29Who's got that sort of money just kicking around, you know, spare just in case?
23:33And so some particular people, we've already talked about some industries are more effective,
23:38but some particular people who are not wealthy people are particularly suffering when something
23:42like this happens.
23:43And unfortunately for those people, I don't think that situation is going to get any better.
23:46A lot of this relies on the Prime Minister's relationship with the US President Donald
23:50Trump, which is not going terribly well.
23:52We sort of need Donald Trump to find somebody else to be really angry with, I think really,
23:56for the sake of all of us, because he just keeps on kind of punching and punching and
24:01punching.
24:02It's his new fun thing to do.
24:03It was an especially weird week for Keir Starmer, because he also had Kemi Badenok coming out and
24:07saying Donald Trump stopped picking on him too, and it's childish.
24:09I mean, blimey, when you've got those people saying this looks like a bit much, it's not
24:14good for you.
24:15It's tricky, though, because on the one hand, the Prime Minister's approval ratings are sort
24:18of trickling up.
24:20I mean, admittedly, from a very low base.
24:22In general, his stance on the war, the public and certainly the Labour Party membership and
24:27the Labour Party MPs do not want to get involved in conflict.
24:31So actually, people appreciate that stance.
24:34The trouble is, will they remember that feeling in six months' time when Donald Trump raises
24:39tariffs and energy prices have gone up and we're on the receiving end on a lot of that
24:44and people will be feeling it in their pockets again?
24:46Only this time, we won't be approaching the summer, we'll be approaching the winter and
24:50they'll be much more worried about heating.
24:51And it will feel much more real.
24:53You're absolutely right.
24:53But we're going to come on to talk about, actually, should the Prime Minister be this
24:57bothered?
24:57How would you, what would our advice be, as always, nailing our colours to the mast about
25:01what we'd be advising if we were there now, including what would we be saying about how
25:06you handle a very cross Donald Trump who's being mean?
25:11We've been recording for 40 minutes now and the price of a barrel of crude oil has gone
25:18up $2 just in the time we've been talking.
25:20They're listening to us.
25:24Yeah, it's really, it's really worrying.
25:27And this is unfortunately going to be a trend, you know, spiking the wrong direction for some
25:33time.
25:33And again, even if the price of oil comes down in, say, a month, we will be feeling this
25:39for some time afterwards because there's a sort of latent trickle down effect with this
25:43stuff.
25:44And this presumably also means the government is going to have to return to more emergency
25:49energy packages because, frankly, 53 million isn't really going to cut it.
25:54I mean, you said that the 2014 package you did after Russia invaded Crimea was $7 billion.
25:59I think Liz Truss's package was $4 billion in 2022.
26:05And look, you can get into like how many billions are you spending?
26:08One of the weirdnesses about these kind of interventions is that we've gone from a place
26:13where we used to, you know, have a market that functioned to some degree.
26:18And I don't know if you, some of the politics of this.
26:20So in 2015, Ed Miliband, then leader of the Labour Party, had a proposal of an energy price
26:26cap.
26:27So there was going to be nothing, not to do with controlling supply, not to do with controlling
26:31the real cost, but putting a ceiling on how much energy could cost.
26:35At the time, this was a very big political issue in the 2015 German election.
26:39And David Cameron accused Ed Miliband of wanting to live in a Marxist universe.
26:45And then one of the weird things that happened is, I don't know if you remember, Nick Timothy
26:49was Theresa May's chief of staff and he was the author of the 2017 manifesto, which contained
26:57some things which are really, by any measure, not very conservative.
27:00And one of these not very conservative party policies was to introduce an energy price cap.
27:05So two years later, two years later, stealing something from Ed Miliband's manifesto.
27:09And so that energy price cap still, which is a really unusual bit of market intervention.
27:14And so we're left in this...
27:15And it's completely normal now.
27:16Completely normal.
27:17We're all living in the Marxist universe.
27:18It turns out that all chaos with Ed.
27:20I can't remember which of those things we're supposed to be living in.
27:23But, you know, we need it.
27:25And the energy price cap is going to stay because it is unaffordable for most people to pay the
27:29real costs of the energy because of the supply mix that we have now.
27:32So I think one of the things I would say, and it was interesting, I was reading...
27:36It was interesting, Cleo.
27:37I was reading somebody from the European Union kind of making this exact point about what
27:43the block of the European Union are doing, is this keeps on happening.
27:48We keep on having an external shock.
27:50If you import all your energy from whatever source it is, you are very vulnerable to external
27:55shocks.
27:56Yeah.
27:56And I think the government should really be thinking of their future selves.
27:59I mean, it's a good bit of advice anyway.
28:00What will my future self thank me for?
28:03So they're sitting in these rooms at the moment, scratching their heads, thinking, what
28:06on earth can we do?
28:08As part of that conversation, there definitely is going to be things you think, if only we
28:11had done this.
28:12If only we had, when the prices were low, made sure we had a reserve of heating oil,
28:18made sure we had done this thing or that.
28:20There will be a list of like, damn it, if only we'd had those things.
28:22And if you just track back at what government has been doing for the last over 10 years,
28:28like, why not think about those lists?
28:30And however much you are doing, solving the problem in the moment, where you are going
28:34to have to subsidise in a really economically inefficient way, you are going to have to
28:38subsidise actual pricing costs and help people out right now.
28:42You have to also go to the fundamentals.
28:44And I don't mean the fundamentals of, you know, it's going to be brilliant when we've got
28:47all these new nuclear power stations in 50 years time.
28:49And it's not going to be fantastic, which I mean, yes, let's do that too.
28:53But there is something more in the medium term about how do you make sure we have a bit
28:58more energy resilience as a country?
29:00And I think, unfortunately, looking at the state of the world, we also need to think much
29:04more in a much more kind of old fashioned way about actual security, security.
29:09And we have made an astonishingly fast transition as a country from going from being a major oil
29:16producer and gas producer in the 80s to having like about 45% of our energy was powered by
29:24electricity was powered by coal in 2012.
29:27That is none now.
29:28Yeah.
29:28The transition has been at absolutely breakneck speed.
29:31And it might be worth thinking about, actually, we definitely need a mix.
29:35How are we going to make sure, you know, do, is it a really good idea to keep on punishing
29:40people for exploring gas and oil in the North Sea?
29:43Are there other things that we can be doing which give you that much more sustainable mix?
29:47And I would say now is not the time for a kind of religious ideology about the environment,
29:53especially when it's not true.
29:54And that actually, the real price of renewables, it has some massive fossil fuel production underneath
30:01it.
30:01And we could do with being a bit more honest about that.
30:04Yeah, I think that's true.
30:04I think there's a couple of things I'd love to pick up on.
30:07The first is, you're right, we do keep having to sort of pick up the pieces when there's some
30:14energy security fallout.
30:17The slight problem now is the public are also just used to that too.
30:20So totally.
30:21Totally.
30:22That means in the autumn, the government is probably going to have to intervene again,
30:26and people will just expect it.
30:28They won't necessarily even thank them for it.
30:30The other thing is, is that building on what I was saying about politicians not really listening
30:33to the public, not listening to focus groups and so on, there's actually a way of putting
30:38people further off, actually quite important net zero and green measures, by hammering it further
30:44when they're thinking, you know, I need a fleet of vans for my business, and I now can't
30:50really afford to run them.
30:51So the whole thing's going to a halt for me.
30:53And by the way, I'm worried about national insurance on my staff and like various other
30:59taxes and levies that have come along for small businesses.
31:05But more than anything, it's being set out.
31:10I mean, in government, there are no easy choices.
31:12The infrastructure we have for lots of this green energy isn't there.
31:15Yeah, we are not insulating houses properly.
31:18Isn't there always something in this?
31:19So you're absolutely right about, we also need to think of before next winter, like we're
31:22lucky this is March, not November.
31:25And there is a whole kind of like, what can you do to actually reduce demand by next winter?
31:29So that's why insulation is so important.
31:31What else can we look at to try to actually not just try and smooth out the price spike,
31:37but actually try and take out some of the demand or manage some of the demand better?
31:41And I would hope, you know, like, let's always find a bit of optimism.
31:45This country has got some incredible like engineers, scientists, innovators.
31:50Some of the answer to the energy situation we are now in as an economy is actually if we were
31:56to be the country that first really sorted out battery storage, or innovated on like the
32:03efficiency of transmission from the grid to whatever it is you're trying to power, or was
32:09able to find a really clever way of powering these enormous servers, which are actually
32:12the bedrock of the new economy for AI or any of these things, I would hope there is something
32:17where, you know, at various times in the UK, you've had scientific innovation, which has
32:24made like massive breakthroughs.
32:26And if I was the guy in the room, if I was in the room, now I'd also be saying
32:30like, yes,
32:30of course, let's do something about trying to reduce demand, particularly for vulnerable
32:34people, particularly about heating, literally fix the roof while the sun is shining, let's
32:39do all of those things.
32:40But also, let's think about how do we use this opportunity where the economics of investing
32:46in something might well have changed, because we've talked a lot about the downside in this
32:51conversation.
32:51Actually, there are sometimes upsides, because something that was inefficient before, we saw
32:56this again after 2014, that renewables suddenly became worth investing in because the oil price
33:01was so high again.
33:02So there are kind of upsides here.
33:04How do you make the most out of that?
33:06And how do you really try to sponsor developing this sort of innovation in tech and energy
33:10production and storage and supply, and all of the things that could give the UK like a
33:15world-beating advantage?
33:16The US is now the world's leading energy producer.
33:20Donald Trump, as part of the negotiations with the EU about the tariffs, which were, you know,
33:25tasty and quite tough earlier in the year, part of the deal that was done included the
33:29European Union promising to buy some astonishing, and I say astonishing, I can't remember, but
33:34it's something like £550 billion worth of energy from the US over the next time period.
33:41So, I mean, they are definitely making hay while the sun is shining.
33:46Yeah, it does.
33:46It feels like we've managed to lose out on all fronts at the moment.
33:50And it's difficult.
33:51You know, for Rachel Weeuse, for Keir Starmer, for Ed Miliband, there are lots of very unpalatable
33:56decisions here, and Keir Starmer is having to weigh up two, you know, two quite aggressive
34:03sides here.
34:04He's between a rock and a hard place.
34:06One of them is Donald Trump, and one of them is his own sort of party and his own supporters
34:12and his own base.
34:13And I think it's important on Trump not to let it get too much in Keir Starmer's head.
34:18That would be my advice.
34:19Don't let it get to you.
34:20Like, don't react to it too much.
34:22You know, of course, it's important that all of the other levels of government in the
34:26US, all of the other very strong ties that bind the United Kingdom to the US, there's
34:32like, through businesses, everybody needs to be stepping in and doing their part to make
34:37sure that any relationships we've got with the US are as secure as possible.
34:41And then I'm pretty sure by next week or the week after, the US president will have found
34:46somebody else to pick on.
34:48She says crossing her fingers.
34:49Some of the poor souls are good.
34:51But in the meantime, it's important to get not to get too distracted by it, actually.
34:55I think that's true.
34:56The only thing I would say is, as per the attacks on the gas field in Qatar today or
35:03overnight, which is yesterday for listeners, these are our allies.
35:08So taking the US out of it, the more countries who are natural allies in that region being drawn
35:15into this is a big problem for us because it is our energy.
35:18But also, you know, there are lots of UK citizens living there.
35:22I think the case for being drawn in in some way becomes more and more difficult and hard
35:28to push up against for Keir Starmer if this doesn't conclude quickly.
35:32So in summary, if we were in the room advising now, Cleo, what we'd be saying to Keir Starmer is
35:39don't let that man in your head.
35:41The key things, I think, are like make the most of the sunshine, quite literally.
35:45You've got from now till the winter.
35:46So all of the things that can be done to try to protect people from what will be, I'm afraid,
35:53even worse energy price situation by the winter.
35:56Even the optimists will be saying that.
35:58So insulation, homes, improvement, all of those things that can be done.
36:02And then I think there is a really, I think it is important to have a proper, proper think
36:07about what our energy security, sustainability and mix of supply really is in an honest way
36:14about what the impact of fossil fuels is and where our sources should come from.
36:19And, you know, I mean, you've talked about how actually they need to catch up with where
36:23real people really are.
36:25And I think there's a horrible bit of politics in this long term, short term.
36:28And I'm afraid you cannot persuade people right now today that they should be making
36:33sacrifices for imagined people in the future when it's not about, you know, can I go on
36:38a slightly nicer holiday or not?
36:40It's literally I cannot pay my bills.
36:42I can't, you know, I can't have a baby.
36:44So I'm not going to have any grandchildren.
36:46Thanks very much.
36:46It's it's really, really, really tough.
36:49And the net zero messaging just isn't isn't working for those people, as you've heard in
36:53the room yourself.
36:54Yeah, that's exactly right.
36:55And I guess my last little bit of advice will be, although he's keeping some other
37:00men out of his head, he wants to keep Nigel Farage.
37:03And I'm sure he feels this very firmly out of his house.
37:07Maybe they should enter that competition from Downing Street.
37:10That'd be great.
37:11Give them their data.
37:13Give them their data.
37:14And Nigel Farage could be paying the bills.
37:16It's Keir in Whitehall.
37:17It's quite a drafty building, that.
37:19Yeah, it certainly is.
37:21It's got some expensive heating bills.
37:22Thank you for listening to today's episode.
37:24Remember to follow the show on your podcast player and leave us a five star review if
37:28you enjoyed it.
37:29Or if you didn't, we'd take any reviews.
37:32And you can keep up to date with the best bits of the pod on Instagram.
37:36Follow at intheroom.pod.
37:39This podcast is part of the Independent Podcast Network and is produced in association with
37:43Next Chapter Studios.
37:45The executive producers are Carrie Rose and Olivia Foster.
37:48And the producer is Sam Durham.
37:50And his special thanks to Maya Anoushka and Vali Raza.
37:54Thank you for listening and we'll see you next week.
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