Rosebank and Jackdaw: green-red panic setting in

They're tugging at the heartstrings, scraping the barrel, lighting the gaslights and pulling out all the stops  -  Stop Burnham Approving New Oil & Gas!  As a planted piece of the purest propaganda of desperation (and the Guardian is a willing receptacle) it would be hard to beat this one. 

Burnham risks first revolt as PM over apparent support for North Sea drilling - Labour MPs fear No 10 team lack up-to-date energy insight and don’t fully recognise voters’ climate concerns   

Burnham, of course, has done nothing more than offer a bit of glaringly obvious commonsense. As the article quotes him saying: “The question isn’t whether Britain will still be using oil and gas, the question is where does it come from.”  Well, yes.  What's more, the article helpfully goes on to display two graphs that prove his point: we'll be net importers of both oil and gas for the foreseeable future.  QED.  

So what 'arguments' do the green-reds throw into the mix?  They are many, varied, disingenuous, shrill, and reeking with desperation: every damn' thing they can think of.  Including Gaza!  I kid you not - see below.  As part of the usual service I distill them for you here in order of appearance, starting with the one in the headline:

• Burnham's team is ignorant / stupid / out of touch / whatever ...
• ... though not Andy himself, of course - so he's in danger of looking like a gullible dupe
• He'll face a revolt.  His first revolt!
• FFS, Andy, we're on fire here and it'll be your fault!
• Climate Experts (no less) are against his proposed pragmatism
• The UN Secretary General is against it [features twice in the article]
• Labour MPs are fearful they'll lose votes to the Greens - a new 'surge' of defections looms
• The ice caps are melting, the world is on fire, etc etc
• It will only make a 'tiny' difference to energy prices.  [Tiny?  I'd say "undetectably small" or more probably zero - and it's wholly irrelevant anyway, see below]
• It would "send the wrong signal internationally".  [In fact, the only argument that's even vaguely coherent {1} - and even then, it's wrong]
• Lewis said approving the field would show Burnham was “not looking at the evidence” ...
• ... and that Labour risked adding “the stain of the climate crisis” to the party’s record, alongside Gaza.  [Are we getting into a new variant of Godwin's Law here ..?]
• Britain was the first country to industrialise and we have a duty to lead the world on net zero
• The case made by oil and gas companies is self-interested  [- and presumably also that of the Unions that are also pro drilling - which is not mentioned, of course]
• Allowing production will be to exploit a (wicked) "loophole"
• It's (arguably) against Labour's GE Manifesto [Glad they added 'arguably' because on a close reading, it ain't - the Manifesto was carefully ambiguous] 
• If it comes to a vote he would need Tory and SNP votes 
• If it doesn't come to a vote [which it won't], it'll be a (wicked) "administrative measure", how evil is that?!
• Concerns "extend across the Labour party, transcending factions and 'tribes'. The Guardian has contacted or been told of concerned MPs including ministers and junior members of government, longstanding senior backbench MPs and committee figures and new MPs from the 2024 general election intake" 
• Several influential economists told the Guardian that increased drilling would not help the UK economy ... [followed by some utterly ignorant 'economic' bullshit + doubling down on some of the above.  Have these 'economists' not heard of the benefits of employment?  Tax revenues? Balance of payments?  When have they ever opposed local production of any other commodity or product?]
• It runs counter to the 'clean energy superpower' mission
• It will lead to "extra use [of oil & gas] and more greenhouse gases". [Now which is it, eh?  Too small to have any macro impact on the market - correct, see above - or big enough to cause an increase in demand?  FFS]
• "Keep the peace" by allowing Jackdaw but scrapping Rosebank.  [It's fair to say the argument for Jackdaw / gas is much the easier to understand, not least because the gas will definitely be used in the UK, and will back out equivalent quantities of the far more polluting US-sourced LNG]
• It Will Cause Political Damage - and poor little Andy, badly advised as he obviously is, Just Can't See It !

Wow.  If you think I'm kidding - when did a Guardian article last contain 24 arguments? - check it out for yourself.  As I said: reeks of absolute desperation.

We must hope young Andy is proof against such stuff.  From the C@W standpoint, he's on probation here.  Anyone care to predict how he'll come down?

ND

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{1} I did say that, in amongst the plain risible and the politico-hysterical, I did say there was one semi-coherent argument in there, albeit false.  It's the old business of asserting that we must nobly lead by example, even if that comes at a cost to ourselves.  Well, as least that's a tacit admission we're talking about virtue-signaling, and that there is no other rational case that stacks up on its own merits.  But of course it falls down when we recognise that none of the USA / China / Russia / India / Saudi Arabia / Brazil etc etc gives a flying f**k what we say or do - they are guided entirely by their own assessment of their own interests.

'Wealth Tax' hoves into view. Discuss.

The green-left has long hankered after a 'wealth tax', using Gary Lineker as their human face / shield.  Gary Stevenson - a rum cove if ever there was one - happily works himself up into a semi-coherent rant-frenzy on the topic at the drop of a hat, as every TV producer knows: he's a form of walking click-bait.  And now all these people are (like so many lobbyists) projecting their fantasies on Young Andy.

But for all the charlatanism and carnival nonsense, there's something in it.  There's nothing clever about passively allowing the entirety of the new economic magnate class to blag and bully its way into global personal tax immunity - not to mention immunity for their hi-tech rent-seeking enterprises.  We all know these people have the best lawyers, own most of the meejah of all kinds + a large number of venal politicians, and are ruthless with it.

Before opening the floor to y'all, I have a couple of random inputs to offer.

1.  HMRC:  a badly underpowered, broadly unaccountable, ramshackle organisation that fosters an opaque world of thriving tax evasion on the one hand (sheer inability to get to grips with the complexities of 2026, and the depth of fraud it can only sit back & ignore), and injustice on the other, meted out to an unlucky sub-set of taxpayers it randomly does get its teeth into. 

It is my strong contention that the sheer complexities inherent in a tax on total assets, would defeat HMRC right from the get-go.  In the process, however, the opacity, fraud and injustice would multiply several-fold, with the high likelihood of serious political and even economic fallout.

2.  Real estate:  the one taxable asset class that doesn't suffer from crippling complexity is of course Land.  Our good friend, the very much lamented Mark Wadsworth, spilled much virtual ink promoting Land Value Tax, the high-level theoretical attractions of which are really obvious.

This thing is as long as a piece of string because we have a low-level form of land tax already - the Council Tax[1].  It has long been my contention that George 'Boy Genius' Osborne (who is as much to blame as Gordon Brown for the present state of our economy) missed a massive trick when, in his first "all in it together" budget, he failed to create a dozen new Council Tax bands.  At a stroke[2] he would have raised a bunch of £££ and injected a bit of justice at the start of his destructive "austerity" regime.  And all for near-zero effort: it would have leveraged a pretty efficient existing tax structure at minimal cost and next-to-no unintended consequences or evasion.  In 2010 he could do whatever he decided; but from the word 'go' and over the following 5 years it turned out that he was indeed as useless a chancellor as we've ever had.  

Big topic, to which I reckon we'll be returning quite soon.  Over to y'all.

ND  

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[1] Recall that Heseltine invented and implemented it in just a few months.  Him and his instantly available army of estate agents.

[2] see [1] above.  Implementing new bands would take even less time.

No honeymoon for Burnham: very revealing

Yesterday furnished us with a very significant clue.

In a post several weeks ago I described the then by-election candidate's demeanour thus: 

Burnham makes a pretty unconvincing saviour of the nation. He comes across as an odd combination of entitled, nervous and petulant.

Obviously, I'm still fishing around for a good understanding of the man, who's been out of the national gaze for a long time.  He is without doubt an unusual party leader and PM.  For example, I believe I'm correct in saying he's the first post-war leader of either of the two trad Major Parties not to have come directly from the ranks of the existing Cabinet / Shadow Cabinet (need to check Alec Douglas Home).  Of those who went to an English university at all, he's the only one from Cambridge.  

He seems to have a degree of decisiveness, of cut-and-thrust, maybe even a bit ruthless (more so than Sadiq Khan, clearly, who also plotted the same strategy for becoming PM but fell at the critical hurdle, somewhat to my surprise.[1])   He is obviously also ambitious, and always has been.  And an extremely personable guy, who commands affection (we'll find out about his command of loyalty as time goes on).  But although these things are good and even necessary, it's not necessarily sufficient: there's also that streak of domesticity, in the sense of not-really-made-for-the-global-league.  Like one of those really good, popular sportsmen (I'm thinking rugby, soccer, cricket) who makes a huge contribution for his club team, is absolutely idolised by the supporters of that club, but never makes it as an international - and you sort-of know why.   The step-up to test match sport is a big one, and not everybody can make it.

I could go on (as you know), and certainly will over the coming months.

Anyhow, to yesterday's big clue.  We all saw it in realtime.  His Big First-Day Announcement, the removal of VAT on electricity, is duly wheeled out.  What a brilliant quick-win, a declaration of intent!   To be 'funded' by scrapping[2] digital ID - even better!!  And then, only 12 hours out of retirement, along comes Darren Jones who torpedoes it in the space of a single tweet.  In Burnham's Brave New World of No More Hostile Briefing!  Hahahah.

But here's the thing.  Starmer got away with sheer murder as regards adverse media coverage, for many months before the last GE, and many weeks thereafter.  But HMS Burnham, being torpedoed having barely left harbour, instantly became the main headline across all meejah!  

The difference?   The meejah instinctively feared Starmer: he has the air of a potentially very vindictive person (with a track record to boot).  With the position he commanded from about 2023 onwards, nobody was about to piss on his shoes - not until they knew they'd got him cold (on the freebies thing).  But we see very clearly - On Day One! - that even with Burnham's massive Parliamentary majority, and popularity, and the gallons of early-days goodwill sloshing around, the meejah - including the Beeb - have no fear of retribution at all.

Is this just a function of Labour's weak position in the polls?  I don't think so.  No, it's a judgement on Young Andy's personality.  That he likes to be liked is a commonplace observation.  But the meejah mob sees something else: it reckons he's soft.  We're in the territory young officers are always warned against when getting a bit too matey with their soldiers.  If you become One Of The Boys, very soon you'll be Just One Of The Boys.  Respect gone.  Doom.

Andy (mate!), it's a crisis: remember these words.

And now ... Listen great things... We must straight make head / Therefore let our alliance be combined / Our best friends made, our means stretched. / And let us presently go sit in council / How covert matters may be best disclosed /And open perils surest answered. ... For we are at the stake / And bayed about with many enemies / And some that smile have in their hearts, I fear / Millions of mischiefs.    

ND

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[1]  So he may indeed be as ill as he looks

Miliband - guessing-game over!

So Mili neither gets the Treasury, nor keeps his manic mission at energy.  Safely dispatched to places over the horizon.  (What must David M be thinking?)  Please don't put him in charge of another COP.

I feel his first mission should be to China, to investigate Uighur slave labour in the open-pit neodymium mines and solar PV factories; to deliver a lecture on dumping tactics with special reference to 'green' manufactured products; and to initiate a detailed study of the carbon content of said 'green' goods.

I stand ready to join the Labour Party and enter the House of Commons to take up the reins at DESNZ.  With the new government being such accomplished masters of the snap by-election this shouldn't be a problem.  A peerage will do, if needs be.  But I fancy Rosebank and Jackdaw will already have been approved, while they await my arrival for some more complex decisions that require attention.

ND    

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UPDATE:  Gotta love this from Guido - 

Is there a funnier post for Miliband than one that requires extensive use of the government jet?

The great Miliband guessing game

Well, then: is it to be:

• Thanks, Ed, but you're not needed now
• Ed, I need you to to stay where you are, it's great job you're doing in keeping the greens onside
• Ed, you're my Chancellor - you're the only one who can solve Rubik's Cube
• Ed?  No no, it's David I wanted on the line

And so we all wait.  Meanwhile, however, a couple of big energy decisions must surely be made real soon:

1. Rosebank (oil) and Jackdaw (gas)
2. DESNZ capital budget being sacrificed for Defence spending: where does the axe fall?

1.  The joke is that the Jackdaw platform has already been built and is out there in the North Sea, fully installed and ready to go; first gas in October if the starting gun is fired this month.  Surely, surely that wouldn't have happened without a clear nod from the Treasury?  Nobody develops an offshore platform on spec.  It really does look as though the formal go-ahead decision is just a formality.  Also, the case for home-produced gas is the easier to make, for Mili or whoever has to front for it.  (Mili always gets Shanks to front for the decisions he's unhappy about.)

Rosebank is a bit different: it'll be produced via a floating structure / subsea completion.  Again, the structure is complete and making its way over from Norway, but the briefing is, that's being done at the producers' own risk.  And if it's a 'no', it could be used elsewhere.  Also the argument for loacl oil production, though still perfectly sound, has just a couple of extra (low) hurdles to jump: and Mili has staked his colours to the 'No Rosebank' mast - so, a bit of humiliation involved.

What would be even funnier, is if he gets offered the Treasury provided that he green-lights both Jackdaw and Rosebank on his way to the DESNZ door.  Does Burnham have a sense of humour?  He certainly likes industry and jobs.   

2.  OK, so the A46 Newark Bypass extension has been sacrificed for Defence spending.  Big deal: it was only ever a nice-to-have.  Yep, the big capital budgets to be raided will be those of Mili at DESNZ.  Now most DESNZ capital schemes are loaded onto electricity bill-payers' bills, the big exceptions being:

    (a)  HMG's equity contributions to Sizewell C, given that EDF refuses to take equity risk (which we've written about many times)

    (b)  The farce that is Carbon Capture and Storage - by far the biggest (thus far) at £21bn (sic) of HMT's best pounds, NOT recharged to bill-payers.  Very unusual.  And very stupid. 

I think we can guess which will be the sacrificial lamb, notwithstanding Mili's considerable attachment to it.  

More popcorn, please, as I raise a hopeful glass to Burnham's sense of fun.

UPDATE:  Right on cue, this from the DTel: 

Miliband willing to approve North Sea oil to land job as chancellor - Energy Secretary wants to prove he is a ‘pragmatist’ rather than a ‘zealot’ on environmental policy to help his case for being chancellor

ND