The price of power

ALMOST everyone piling into the Government over its failure to find anyone to construct its planned new offshore wind farms has one thing in common – they don’t have to account for taxpayers’ money.

It is said the price guaranteed to potential developers for the energy they would provide was set too low. If so, ministers must try again to come up with a mutually acceptable figure.

But a cautious approach is surely better than flinging public money at the problem. As Labour’s disastrous Private Finance Initiatives proved, bad spending decisions can reverberate down the years – leaving future generations to pick up the tab.