The UK’s Energy Secretary Ed Miliband is set to argue that clean energy offers “the biggest opportunity for job creation for decades”, while warning that Reform UK policies would “wreck everything we are doing.”
Speaking at the Labour Party Conference in Liverpool this week, Miliband will highlight the opposing party’s initiatives designed to cut energy bills, expand renewable capacity, and secure workers’ rights.
“What is so exciting about clean energy is that it can answer that call for a different kind of economy … run for working people,”
Miliband is expected to say.
“It offers the biggest opportunity for job creation for decades. Skilled jobs in proud professions.”
He is also expected to announce an expansion of Great British Energy’s scheme to install solar panels on schools and hospitals, as well as a jobs plan aiming to double clean energy employment from 430,000 to 830,000 by 2030.
Miliband may criticise Reform, arguing its stance amounts to:
“A war on the working people of Britain.”
He is anticipated to claim: “Reform’s energy policies would betray every young person in our country and every person yet to be born.”
Ed Miliband co-chairs the Solar Taskforce, a joint government-industry body, with Chris Hewett, the Chief Executive of Solar Energy UK.
At Solar & Storage Live in Birmingham last week (23–25 September), Hewett echoed concerns about Reform, linking fossil fuel interests to opposition campaigns against renewables.
“The electrification of everything, primarily powered by solar and wind, with backup from batteries, is increasingly seen now as the best way to run the energy system,”
Hewett told attendees.
Hewett warned of a growing international movement of anti-renewables political parties, saying they are “backed by oil and gas interests” seeking political power.
He accused Reform UK figures of threatening investor confidence in solar and storage, stating:
“Nigel Farage wants to subsidise fracking in Lincolnshire.
He wants to send the Welsh working class back down in the coal mines.”
“His sidekick, Richard Tice, has been sending threatening letters to investors in the solar and battery sector, saying that if Reform were to win power … it would cancel CfD contracts…
and the consequence of that would be that Britain remains hooked on expensive oil and gas from petrol states like Russia, the Middle East, and the US.”
Hewett also raised concerns over former US President Donald Trump’s “malicious lies” against renewables, referring to the Trump administration’s preference for fossil fuels over clean energy.
Despite political backlash, Hewett insisted that public support for renewables is unwavering:
“The vast majority of Britain still want renewables.
They still want it quickly. They want low bills. They want economic security. They want the investment and the jobs.”
“Our role here is to stand firm. It’s to play our part in making the positive and real vision happen.”
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