New management, old energy: The UK Labour Party's revanchist energy policy

Abstract

Abstract:The Labour Party's proposals on energy are arguably the most progressive feature of their programme, as they attempt to address climate breakdown. This article shows that a substantial part of the party's proposals are continuous with the attempts, in the later years of New Labour, to compensate for the various problems created by energy liberalisation under Thatcher and Blair, whilst still remaining within a broadly neoliberal paradigm. Current Labour policy takes these compensatory measures to their limit - a limit which is insufficient for the scale of the ecological crisis. The fundamental reluctance to challenge private ownership of energy means Labour are, at best, revanchists for a form of 'progressive' neoliberalism which is increasingly out of touch with the material reality and challenges the UK faces.