A Place to Stand

   There is a council byelection coming up on the 17th in Hillhead and I am standing as the UKIP Scotland candidate. I doubt I will win (it is only for 1 member in a multimember constituency and thus FPTP) but expect to increase markedly on the previous UKIP Scotland vote as they didn't stand (though I did as 9% Growth Party and previously as a LibDem).

    They produced a leaflet blaming rising electricity prices on "The hugh rise in worldwide gas and oil prices" and how they are campaigning to help, having "forced energy companies to spend much more on providing free and discounted insulation". Anybody capable of logical thought will see that increases costs and therefore prices yet more but they take credit for promising redistribution of the costs and blame "worldwide" for the costs. To be fair to the LD the entire LabNatConDem political class behave the same.

     I sent this letter to various papers but it has not been published.

In the current council by-election campaign in Hilhead the LibDems have produced a leaflet claiming that energy prices are being driven up by "the hugh rise in worldwide gas prices" and that they are "campaigning to help". In fact according to the UN "As the world market for natural gas is fragmented in different regional markets, it is not possible to talk about a world price for natural gas". Prices in many areas are far lower than ours. In particular the US price has been falling dramatically because they are embracing a new technique to reach natural gas from great depths (known as fracking).

Perhaps the LibDems can be forgiven for their ignorance of the engineering. More difficult to understand is their claim to be trying to help. A field of such gas has been found in Britain containing 200 TRILLION cubic feet of gas. There are likely to be more. This is an economic windfall likely to at least match North Sea oil and able to once again make Britain's electricity and energy prices competitive with the rest of the world. The correlation between supplies of cheap power and economic growth is a basic of economics and explains why we are in recession while China's economy and electricity use have been growing in tandem at 10% for 30 years.
The reaction of their Energy Minister, Chris Huh, to the discovery of this windfall was to publicly promise "We will not consent so much gas plant so as to endanger our carbon dioxide goals," . That is to say they will prevent gas providing any drop in electricity prices that would further undercut the exorbitantly subsidised but still very high price of windmill electricity.
The LD's should not alone be blamed for this policy - all the traditional parties endorse it to a large degree and they are perfectly entitled to hold such ideological views. However they are not then entitled to claim they wish to "help" reduce prices which are rising purely because of their actions.
Neil Craig

UKIP candidate for Hillhead Ward

Refs Chris Huhne promise http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/sep/20/chris-huhne-dash-for-gas

UN say no world gas price http://unctad.org/infocomm/anglais/gas/prices.htm

200 trillion cu ft gas find http://www.petroleum-economist.com/Article/2904268/Unconventional/Cuadrilla-unveils-huge-new-UK-gas-resources.html