Despite the swagger, KK has no solutions to energy poverty

Kwasi Kwarteng, minister for your gas bill, is the closest thing we have to a Cavalier in government: if he could wear a sword, he would. He breezed into the Commons energy committee – “Hello! Hello!” – trailed by a squire, a tired-looking civil servant called Daniel who probably sent in his resignation months ago, forgetting that KK never reads his emails.

Ofgem warns the price cap will hit £2,800, began chairman Darren Jones, and fuel poverty is predicted to affect 12 million homes, so what are you going to do about it?

I’m sure help is on the way, said KK, though it’s not his place to say what or how we’ll pay for it. “A windfall tax,” asked Jones. Not a fan, said KK: I’d rather gamble on growth.

However, the problem with relying on economic growth is, first, it’s predicted to stall – “my understanding is we’re in a period when the rate of growth is going to slow”, corrected KK, an interesting exercise in semantics – and, second, even if a chap gets a new job with Nissan, wahey ... that won’t lower his grandmother’s bills.

“People will die of hyperthermia,” warned Andy Macdonald.

“Do you want to come in?” KK said to Daniel, looking for a little support. “No, no,” said Daniel, the rotter.

And then it was the turn of the SNP’S Alan Brown, which I’m sure KK was dreading – not because the Ayrshire accent is, in general, difficult to understand but because Mr Brown is one of those people who barely moves their mouth, shrinking each question to a wasp’s buzz. He noted that the Government says energy efficiency upgrading must be done in a way that is “practical, cost effective and affordable”, but what do those words mean?

Conceding that “I am not a linguistic philosopher”, KK nevertheless rattled off some dictionary definitions: “Affordable means something that’s inexpensive, practical means something we can do fairly quickly, and I can’t remember the third adjective.” Perhaps stung by the minister’s withering tone, Mr Brown’s lips pursed to the point of a whistle, and uttered something very long that involved the words “exempt”, “EPC” and “band C”. We were nonplussed.

“Please,” said KK, “write me a letter and I will get back to you” – a genius solution, although poor Daniel, the one who will actually have to read it, was no doubt praying that Mr Brown’s handwriting is legible.

KK is not only the last High Tory but also the last Thatcherite, for he explained why we can’t legislate our way out of this mess – and though the committee is right that the market is a mess, politicians don’t have all the answers. I noticed that we were sitting in the middle of an energy crisis, early afternoon, with the blinds down and the lights on.

“If you had a magic wand,” asked Nusrat Ghani, “and could do anything, what would it be?” The honest answer would be “make Kwasi Kwarteng prime minister and cut taxes to zero”, but that’s as likely as a Stuart reformation – and in its absence, we’ll have to burn candles and shiver.

‘Fuel poverty is predicted to affect 12 million homes, so what are you going to do about it?’