Starmer highlights green measures on Welsh visit and attacks Tories’ ‘incoherent’ energy policies – UK politics live
Good morning and welcome to our rolling coverage of UK politics. My name is Tom Ambrose.
Keir Starmer visits Wales to highlight Labour’s plans to make Britain an “energy superpower” and to address what he termed the “incoherent energy policy” his party inherited from the Tories. The prime minister and new first minister, Eluned Morgan, will travel to a site in West Wales today as part of their first official visit together.
The pair, who held talks on Monday in Cardiff, are expected to pledge to work closely on realising the benefits of a publicly owned energy company. The Welsh government previously launched Trydan Gwyrdd Cymru while the UK government is developing Great British Energy with £8.3bn of funding over the next five years.
Starmer said before the visit:
We have inherited an incoherent energy policy that has left homes up and down the country vulnerable to rocketing energy bills.
Last month, he said it will “take time” to reap the benefits of clean power initiatives but stood by a claim that the UK government’s plans will eventually drive down household bills by £300-a-year.
Conservative shadow energy secretary Claire Coutinho previously said the public have been “sold a lie” by Labour that their energy bills will drop by that amount.
In other news:
The Labour government will invest “unprecedented levels of funding” in cycling and walking as a critical part of plans to improve health and inequality, the new secretary for transport has said. A national network of safe cycle routes could cut GP appointments “by hundreds of thousands, if not millions a year”, Louise Haigh said.
Ministers have launched a pension credit publicity campaign to minimise the impact of the government’s decision to radically restrict winter fuel payments. The government hopes its pension credit awareness drive will help identify households not claiming the benefit and encourage pensioners to apply by 21 December, which is the last date this year for people to make a backdated claim for pension credit in order to receive the winter fuel payment.
A former Conservative minister has called for an end to the demonisation of train drivers and said he understood why the new Labour government had “decided to cut a deal” with unions. Huw Merriman, who served as the rail minister for the entirety of Rishi Sunak’s premiership, apologised for failing to bring in workplace reforms and his inability to reach an agreement to end the strikes.
Ministers have approved London City airport’s application to expand, in a decision that has disappointed climate campaigners. The airport submitted a proposal to increase capacity from 6.5 million to 9 million passengers a year by putting on more weekend and early morning flights. Local campaigners and Newham council opposed the move, arguing the air and noise pollution would affect people living nearby and that it could potentially increase carbon emissions.