“The net zero madness makes us cold and poor”. Those nine words in a tweet from Jacob Rees-Mogg, former Cabinet Minister and now conservative broadcaster on GB News , were his response to a graph compiled by the FT which listed electricity prices in countries around the globe. At well over $400 per MWh, Britain is the inauspicious world leader (the next worst, Germany, is $250, with the US, Canada, Russia and China all under $100).
The reasons for our outlandish prices are myriad and complex, but it doesn’t matter, in the end. The tweet was sent one day after the election of Donald Trump, and in the world of Trumpianism, nine words is comfortably enough. During the recent Conservative leadership contest, I was largely of the view that it was of little consequence whether Kemi Badenoch, or Robert Jenrick, or the previously eliminated James Cleverly or Tom Tugenhadt emerged.
All conventional wisdom, from 1979, 1997 and 2010, led me to believe that we were highly likely to be at the start of a multi-term Labour government, and that the Conservatives would rattle through two or three leaders before they found one who was ready to take a credible message to the electorate and return the party to Downing Street. Read more by Andy Maciver Moderates must rise to the challenge of populist nationalism A risky Budget at a difficult time However we are now, I think, compelled to ask whether conventional wisdom is dead in western democracies. We are compelled to unthink everything w.