Shadow Environment Secretary Victoria Atkins has slammed Labour for breaking their election promise to cut energy bills, following today’s announcement of another price cap rise.
Speaking to GB News about the hike, Atkins said the increase “will be a blow to households across the country”.
Victoria Atkins has hit out at Labour for ‘breaking another promise’ to Britons as energy bills are set to rise again
GB News / PA
She said: “Let’s not forget, during the general election campaign, they promised to cut our bills by up to £300 over the course of this Parliament.
“This is yet another promise that they have broken, because they made promises at the election that they seemingly had no intention or way of delivering now they’re in Government.”
The Shadow Environment Secretary expressed particular concern about Labour’s approach to renewable energy infrastructure.
“These plans for plaguing our prime agricultural land with solar farms, with wind farms – this goes against not just energy security, but also food security,” she said.
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Atkins emphasised how the promised £300 reduction could have made a significant difference, following their cuts to the Winter Fuel Allowance for millions of pensioners.
She explained: “At the back of our minds as well, we will be remembering that terrible impact of the winter fuel payment being slashed for the most vulnerable pensioners in our society.
“This winter alone, in my own very rural constituency, where not everybody is on the grid, a lot of us have to fill up our oil tanks.
“That £300 would have helped people heat their homes this winter, and yet Labour has removed that from some of our most vulnerable pensioners.”
Taking aim at Energy Secretary Ed Miliband, Atkins expressed her concern for Labour’s approach to renewable energy infrastructure.
Atkins told GB News that she is particularly concerned by Ed Miliband’s plans for Britain’s energy infrastructure
GB News
She told GB News: “We believe first of all that we can have a secure energy supply, but we’ve got to do it in a way that reflects our countryside and our population.
“So these plans for plaguing our prime agricultural land with solar farms, with wind farms – this goes against not just energy security, but also food security.”
Highlighting the ongoing inheritance tax raid on Britain’s farmers, Atkins concluded: “As Defra Shadow Secretary, I’m particularly focused on today of all days, when the NFU has come to London to have its conference and to listen to city Steve Reed about his plans for farming.
“But what we need to see is a careful and thought-through plan for energy. My worry is, at the moment, we just have lots of plans from Ed Miliband to plaster our countryside with these renewable energies, whilst at the same time closing our oil fields in the North Sea, which has a huge impact, of course, on each and every one of us.”
