KEIR Starmer has been called out over his “mission” to make the UK a clean energy superpower when he is refusing to agree that Scotland should have more control over its burgeoning renewables sector.
The Labour leader told his party conference last week that he wanted to make the UK zero carbon by 2030 – but SNP MSP Paul McLennan pointed out that the majority of renewables are in Scotland.
“One of the main reasons they want to hang on to Scotland is because they see the renewable potential Scotland has,” he said.
“Most of the potential in the UK for renewables is in Scotland.”
McLennan said that even without independence, more power over regulations could be granted now to allow Scotland to benefit more from projects and encourage investment.
He said: “One of the problems is that we are producing renewables here but getting no benefits coming through. At the moment, energy costs are based on gas prices rather than electricity but we don’t have the powers over setting the costs and that is key.”
McLennan said it was ironic that Labour talked about how they would bring in a windfall tax on oil and gas companies but won’t support Scotland being given the power to do the same.
“We have an energy strategy but we need regulation powers,” said McLennan, who is chair of the cross-party group on renewables.
“For example, the levy on renewables that the UK Government brought in is a massive drag on investment.
“They are literally taxing renewable projects, but if we had control over regulations and a windfall tax, we could say where that would fall – and that would not be on the renewable sector because that is just a drag on developments.
“The levy impacts on their viability because it costs more to develop projects and that comes through in prices.
“Scotland should be able to control how energy prices are set too because at the moment they are set on gas costs and not the costs of electricity.
“If prices were based on electricity, that would see costs coming down.”
He said Holyrood also needed more power over the community benefits from offshore wind farms.
“We need full powers over that because that money could be invested nationally and locally into fuel poverty schemes like improving insulation,” he said.
“We would have cheaper electricity because we would have control over setting the price and then we would also be able to better help the most vulnerable people.”
McLennan added that the process of setting projects up also needed to be made more efficient.
“The whole process needs simplified because it takes years to get projects going at the moment,” he said.
“The process needs to be quicker and simplified. A lot of things that are controlled by the UK Government need to be controlled by Scotland so we can move things on as quickly as possible.”
