Red Wall Tories warn Boris: Ditch green agenda or lose
RED Wall Tory MPs yesterday urged Boris Johnson to ditch a string of green policies if he wants to win the next general election.
The northern Conservatives called on him to reduce energy bill taxes.
Currently 25 per cent of electricity bills are made up of green and social levies designed to fund renewable energy.
Some MPs also demanded that the Prime Minister gives the go-ahead to a new coal mine in Cumbria to help cut bills and avoid an energy black-out this winter.
They spoke out as they gathered in Doncaster for the inaugural conference of the Conservatives’ Northern Research Group.
Mr Johnson pulled out of the conference at the last minute so he could travel to Kyiv to meet Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky. NRG chairman Jake Berry, a Lancashire MP and former Northern Powerhouse Minister, said many group members had problems with the Government’s green agenda. He told reporters: ‘There’s wide support from colleagues for this agenda, but there’s also real concern about it affecting the people we represent.’
He added: ‘There’s an underlying concern of people in the Red Wall potentially being quite hard-hit in a period where there’s already a lot of concern about how we pay to heat our houses.’
Bishop Auckland MP Dehenna Davison told the conference: ‘I think the easy win on cost of living in the short term is reducing the green levies, reducing VAT on energy bills. We know it’s a small contribution but it’s something.
‘But the bigger thing I’m pushing for at the moment is to try and get VAT reduced on fuel as a short-term measure – six months, 12 months – just to ease those cost of living pressures.
‘The Treasury have had a massive windfall from this because of the rising price of fuel over the past few months.’
Miss Davison said she wanted VAT on fuel to be taken down temporarily from 20 per cent to 10 per cent or even zero. Bolton West MP Chris Green called on No 10 to approve the Cumbrian mine so Britain can use home-grown coal in steel factories rather than import it from China.
Tom Tugendhat, who attended the meeting despite representing a seat in Kent, also called for cuts to fuel taxes. In January he became the first Conservative to say he would throw his hat in the ring in any leadership contest to replace Mr Johnson.
He said: ‘Looking at the way in which we charge tax on fuel is incredibly important because the feed-through of that into every other area of the economy is enormous.’
Some MPs were angry at Mr Johnson’s decision to miss the conference. A senior NRG member said: ‘The PM has burnt through colleagues’ goodwill. He is clearly scared of voters and holds his colleagues and the north of England in contempt.’
Another member said: ‘This is a snub to the 40 or so MPs in the group.’ A third MP said: ‘This was the first test of outreach to his colleagues [since the PM’s confidence vote] and he’s failed it.’