Top pair
attack climate change sceptics

Energy Secretary Ed Davey and Business Secretary Vince Cable have both issued stern warnings that the constant sniping from both backbench and senior Conservatives over renewable energy is creating nervousness in private investors at a critical juncture.

Two of the world’s largest offshore wind farms are due to be built off the Yorkshire coast over the next 15 years, and hopes are high that the region can cash in by becoming a key centre for manufacturing and servicing the thousands of turbines required.

Siemens has already announced plans for a huge turbine factory at the Port of Hull, and it is hoped many more firms will follow suit.

In his keynote address at the Lib Dem conference in Brighton yesterday, Mr Davey said: “For the rest of this decade we need to spend more on investment in our power grid than we do on roads and rail combined.

“Britain’s green growth opportunity is like building 20 Olympic Stadiums every year until 2020. So that’s why British industry wants us to crack on with our energy reforms – the foundation of Britain’s future low carbon economy.”

But he added: “Just like the rest of the global economy, investors crave certainty, stability. The confidence that governments will stick to their word.”

In an interview with the Yorkshire Post on Saturday, Mr Davey said Yorkshire could be “thankful to the Liberal Democrats” for driving forward the green growth agenda in the face of right-wing opposition.

Yesterday he went further, insisting he has “no time for the sceptics” on the Right who “let ideology blind them to what is happening right before their eyes”. He said: “My message to them is simple – no turning back from tackling climate change; no turning back green jobs; no turning back from green growth.

“The Liberal Democrats are not for turning.”

Earlier this year several international turbine firms voiced doubts about investing in the British market owing to the mixed messages coming out of the Conservative Party over wind power.

Speaking at a fringe event, Mr Cable made clear how damaging the words of the naysayers could prove for Yorkshire. The Business Secretary said: “If companies are going to invest in the new platform which will be built in the North Sea, the wind farms, the turbines, they need to be absolutely confident that Government is committed to them – and at the moment there is uncertainty because of the political debate that’s being stirred up.

“It is really alarming that we are now getting this populist backlash against everything green.

“That’s why it is essential that we fight back against it.”