Liz Truss’s fossil fuel ‘sticking plaster’ will cost taxpayers and the planet

Their demand? To make sure all homes were retro-fitted with measures to improve energy efficiency and protect against heat loss in the next decade years.

In February this year, the Insulate ­Britain group announced “with an extremely heavy heart” that they believed they had failed to move the “irresponsible” government to take meaningful action and “prevent ­thousands of us dying in our cold homes during the energy price crisis”.

Today, their demands look, well, ­eminently sensible. As the cost of energy becomes painfully high, one stark fact is that in many of our old homes – from damp tower blocks and tenement flats to grand Victorian villas – the heat goes straight out draughty windows, roofs and doors.

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One recent survey carried out in August by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit found poorly insulated homes were facing bills of almost £1000 more than ­others on energy bills this winter.

It’s not the same everywhere – as usual, the Nordic countries are one step ahead. Visiting Finland one bitterly cold winter, I noticed how cosy their houses were, despite temperatures reaching minus 30 degrees centigrade.

A Finnish friend tells me quadruple ­glazing is not uncommon there and flats are often linked to district heating systems. The coldness and dampness of our homes here was noticeable when she moved to Scotland, she told me.

As a country experiencing frequent harsh weather – and which has long had a tense relationship with neighbour Russia – it’s also a tradition in rural areas of Finland to have a wood-fired baking oven which can be used for both heating and cooking in the event of supplies failing during conflict and war.

Here, it’s no surprise that it’s taken far too long to wake up to the energy crisis.

Last week newly installed Prime ­Minister Liz Truss finally confirmed a plan – much leaked in advance – committing to ­spending billions of pounds on freezing bills to an average of £2500 a year for two years for households across the UK. Although what couldn’t have been predicted was the ­unexpected turn of events which meant the long-awaited unveiling of the action was quickly overshadowed by the ­announcement of the death of the Queen.

Let’s face it, some form of ­immediate financial help was left as the only thing Truss could do after two months of ­inertia by the Tories while their leadership ­contest trundled on. The threat of ­­endless headlines on freezing pensioners and ­failing businesses rapidly looming this winter prompted her in action.

One glaring omission in the UK ­Government’s energy package was any effort to get the insulation of homes ­underway.

The focus is on fracking and oil and gas reserves in order to boost domestic ­energy supplies, with the expectation of more than 100 new licences for fossil fuel extraction in the North Sea. There was also a vague pledge to “speed up our deployment” of clean and renewable technologies – which hardly sounds like a revolution.

Instead of improving the homes we live in and attempting cut permanent cuts to bills, it will bring a renewed boom for ­energy companies.

Less than a year ago, world ­leaders gathered in Glasgow for COP26. ­Former prime minister Boris Johnson said he hoped the summit would be the ­“beginning of the end of climate change”, while US president Joe Biden pointed out climate change is not a hypothetical threat but “destroying people’s lives and livelihoods” every day.

How quickly these promises and dire warnings have been forgotten.

Looking back now, it seems the most accurate summary of the event will be from activist Greta Thunberg, who said it could be considered a “two-week-long celebration of business as usual and blah, blah, blah”.

It doesn’t make sense to attempt to solve one crisis by adding to the biggest threat facing humanity, which is ­unfolding ­before our eyes with events such as ­devastating floods in Pakistan and closer to home, record-breaking temperatures recorded in England this summer.

Truss could have taken radical action to ease the crisis, but instead reverted to the sticking plaster of more fossil fuels.

What’s more she announced the lifting of the ban in England on one of the most controversial energy exaction processes.

Truss says she hopes to get gas flowing from onshore shale wells in as little as six months where there is “local support” for fracking.

Tell that to the campaigners who have said they are prepared to “pull out all the stops” to prevent the controversial ­drilling technique going ahead – after all, fracking had previously been halted after ­scientific studies warned it was not ­possible to rule out “unacceptable” ­consequences for those living near the sites.

The UK’s only active fracking site in Lancashire was brought to an immediate halt in 2019 after multiple earth tremors were triggered.

Experts have also previously warned that a US-style boom in fracking is ­unlikely, as the UK has “the wrong kind of shale” – and the idea it make a ­significant difference in as little as six months was described as “laughable” by ­environmental campaigners.

It has also been discounted by none other than Truss’s own Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng, who as business secretary wrote in a newspaper in March this year: “Even if we lifted the fracking ­moratorium tomorrow, it would take up to a decade to extract sufficient volumes – and it would come at a high cost for communities and our precious countryside. No amount of shale gas from ­hundreds of wells dotted across rural England would be enough to lower the European price any time soon.”

Meanwhile, Truss has also said her ­government wants to deliver up to a ­quarter of the UK’s electricity generations with nuclear by 2050. Her energy policy has also once again, shown the vastly different approaches ­being taken north and south of the ­Border.

NICOLA Sturgeon has said the position here on not granting licences for fracking – which is a devolved issue – is unchanged and she does not support new nuclear, “certainly not with existing technology”.

The Scottish Government wants to ­focus on developing renewables instead, with the country’s vast resources of ­offshore and onshore wind.

As the SNP have pointed out, an independent Scotland would have ­already been able to take actions such as passing an emergency budget and ­introducing a windfall tax on the excess profits of major companies.

There were many finer details ­missing from Prime Minister Truss’s statement.

Struggling ­businesses have been given a pledge of “equivalent support” to that promised to British households for six months, followed by a vague promise of further support to “vulnerable sectors”.

That’s hardly the solid reassurance needed for tens of thousands of firms which are at risk of going under because of soaring energy bills.

But the part which has been most skipped over was the issue of who will ultimately pay for the much-needed ­financial support this winter.

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Opposition parties and ­environmental campaigners made endless calls for a windfall tax in the run-up to the ­statement, with reports that a leaked analysis from the Treasury has estimated UK gas ­producers and electricity generators could make excess profits of up to £170 billion in the next two years.

That’s a road Truss has refused to go down – and now it is expected her initiative will involve the transfer of around £150bn in taxpayer funds to energy suppliers to make up the difference between the ­buying costs and the capped price which consumers will pay.

The threat of simply unaffordable bills may be eased in part this winter and more supplies could soon be flowing from the North Sea.

But with a Conservative government which puts profits before people, it means that the energy giants will continue to rake in obscene amounts of cash – while ordinary people and the planet will be paying the price for years to come.