Best Of

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As I’ve said continuously I’m fully supportive of more North Sea oil drilling but I think the idea it would have any impact on energy bills is thin.

Why are supportive of opening up new fields when the vast majority of experts say no? What do you know they don’t?

https://theconversation.com/would-more-north-sea-drilling-lower-uk-energy-bills-our-analysis-says-no-278467

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-67945281

https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-would-opening-up-north-sea-oil-again-resolve-the-current-energy-price-problems-for-the-uk

Kemi and her front bench team are going to have to u-turn on this, so they are in future backed up by the science and the facts in what they are claiming.

No they don't.
They say it won't change oil and gas prices, which it won't.

As a matter of economics, it will earn the country money, and won't make any difference at all to our oil and gas consumption.

We could even put the £2bn or so extra that government might earn into solar plus grid backup projects.

So there is no good argument not to do it.

The Unions game here is wholly interested in taxpayers money keeping people in jobs, by government subsidising any industry, anywhere, that’s not economically viable or profit making. That’s what Unions are doing in the lobby.

The industry lobby says it’s all government policy decision, not geology at all.
Green Lobby says UK North Sea is waning due to geology, and UK policy is still too much commitment to drilling fossil fuel for far too long. Here’s an example of Green Lobby spin:
https://www.upliftuk.org/post/the-declining-economics-of-the-north-sea

North Sea policy is a war. There’s various sides, each have vested interest in not sticking to fact or balance - including government with their net zero policy, and the Conservatives who invented net zero policy in office, but prefer to argue Populist position against net zero in opposition.

Truth is the first casualty of war. It’s very hard to for us to spot what’s smartest in long run with this one imho.

That's just babble.
If the government allowed licenses for the new fields, industry would develop them at their own expense.

There's no argument about that.

Nigel - but this is exactly the point I am arguing about. 🤷‍♀️

Industry would not develop them at their own expense. They haven’t even been doing so, even when the basins were more mature than they are now. Private ventures drilling UKs North Sea do this with bungs of tax payers money.

Remember the bad old days before Lady Thatcher, where factories, coal pits etc etc etc were not making profit, but Labour and the Unions were bunging them help with tax payers money? That’s what Kemi and Farage are pushing for, from the opposition benches.

Both Farage and Kemi have said the same thing at PMQs this past week.
UK gets All the gas. Factually not true.
UK gas prices will be cheaper. Factually not true.
But thirdly, quite importanty what they are not saying, the jobs are secured, the private ventures take a dividend, but based on a hefty tax payer bung to the new drilling.

The UK is highly integrated with the European gas market, being physically linked with the wider continent through undersea pipelines. It will be the European market price UK customers will pay, unless we can change that marginally buy pumping an awful lot more than anyone’s currently suggesting.

UK needs to make the right decision here, for now, the short term, medium and long term of National interest. The post you called babble was me saying, wherever we go for the facts of what that is,we are being met with spin, lobby groups, vested interests, and political opportunism.

And your “unarguable point” is one of very many arguable nuances towards getting it right - especially for anyone with a liking and a love for Thatcherism. Kemi Badenoch was in bed with the UK Unions and 1970s British Socialism at Lunchtime today. When in coalition government with Reform after the next election, both Kemi and Farage will hang portraits of Lady Thatcher in their offices. But that’s fake, it’s ignorance and cosplay, if they’re not practicing the economic philosophy Lady Thatcher bequeathed to us.

Don’t use ChatGPT

Instead look at the Norwegian sector of the North Sea. They are drilling wells. Lots of them. Right next door to fields we are shutting down.

I’m glad you brought that up.

The fourth piece of ignorance both Kemi and Farage are bringing to the North Sea drilling debate is where they keep saying Norway are doing it, so why don’t we - as though it’s as easy as copying Norway to get the same result for UK that Norway will get.
That line is a con. To coin a phrase: One Piece Economics. Just go and pick up the treasure and get rich. In many ways UK in a vastly different place than Norway regarding this.

Direct ownership in oil/gas fields is very different currently between the two countries, meaning income is going to be very different. The Norwegian oil and gas industry is not fully nationalized, but it is heavily controlled by the state through a hybrid model. The state owns all resource rights, holds a 67% stake in Equinor, and maintains direct financial interests in fields and infrastructure via Petoro. With these different models, while UK and Norway have produced similar total volumes of oil and gas over the years, their financial outcomes differ by quite a bit. In 2018, for recent example, Norway generated roughly 34 times more oil tax revenue than the UK from similar total volumes.

In recent years - once you look at net figure minus all the bungs making it happen - UK government income has been averaging £3.5BN. No new drilling, this falls to £300M by the end of this decade. With the new drilling Farage, Kemi {and their economic advisors the Unions} are pushing for, it is £1.5B income at end of this decade instead of the £300M. It’s definitely not the great easy to pick up treasure trove being spurned, that it’s being made out to be.

The geology was never perfectly split. Eight of the ten largest fields in the North Sea are located in Norwegian waters. Norway's sector tends to have thicker reservoirs and larger "structural closures," which provide longer production tails. Norway still has relatively underexplored "frontier" areas like the Barents Sea. And UK pumped ours out faster leading to UK production peak in the last century - 1999.

The two countries are in different places as regards what they have left, and how they have been generating income from it. Are you saying this is factually wrong to say?

There’s a really great Norwegian tv series about that called State of Happiness . It’s 3 seasons , it’s a shame BBC Iplayer only now have the 3rd . If you get a chance to find the whole series I’m sure you’d enjoy it .

That is a very good series.

As I've already said, the WhatsApp backup is fairly unreliable.

The iCloud backup significantly less so - but it's not clear what backup is being referred to.

In any case, to get the messages back they need to restore them to a new phone that McSweeney owns or has access to. I am not sure how that works from a data privacy POV, whether he can be compelled to restore the backup. I am sure lawyers would know.

It's not private date. It is government business and should be on record.

It should.

Furthermore, members of government (and advisors to, and civil servants) should not be communicating via WhatsApp, given its weird backup systems thart make it very hard to move between Android and iPhone.

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As I’ve said continuously I’m fully supportive of more North Sea oil drilling but I think the idea it would have any impact on energy bills is thin.

Why are supportive of opening up new fields when the vast majority of experts say no? What do you know they don’t?

https://theconversation.com/would-more-north-sea-drilling-lower-uk-energy-bills-our-analysis-says-no-278467

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-67945281

https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-would-opening-up-north-sea-oil-again-resolve-the-current-energy-price-problems-for-the-uk

Kemi and her front bench team are going to have to u-turn on this, so they are in future backed up by the science and the facts in what they are claiming.

No they don't.
They say it won't change oil and gas prices, which it won't.

As a matter of economics, it will earn the country money, and won't make any difference at all to our oil and gas consumption.

We could even put the £2bn or so extra that government might earn into solar plus grid backup projects.

So there is no good argument not to do it.

The Unions game here is wholly interested in taxpayers money keeping people in jobs, by government subsidising any industry, anywhere, that’s not economically viable or profit making. That’s what Unions are doing in the lobby.

The industry lobby says it’s all government policy decision, not geology at all.
Green Lobby says UK North Sea is waning due to geology, and UK policy is still too much commitment to drilling fossil fuel for far too long. Here’s an example of Green Lobby spin:
https://www.upliftuk.org/post/the-declining-economics-of-the-north-sea

North Sea policy is a war. There’s various sides, each have vested interest in not sticking to fact or balance - including government with their net zero policy, and the Conservatives who invented net zero policy in office, but prefer to argue Populist position against net zero in opposition.

Truth is the first casualty of war. It’s very hard to for us to spot what’s smartest in long run with this one imho.

That's just babble.
If the government allowed licenses for the new fields, industry would develop them at their own expense.

There's no argument about that.

Nigel - but this is exactly the point I am arguing about. 🤷‍♀️

Industry would not develop them at their own expense. They haven’t even been doing so, even when the basins were more mature than they are now. Private ventures drilling UKs North Sea do this with bungs of tax payers money.

Remember the bad old days before Lady Thatcher, where factories, coal pits etc etc etc were not making profit, but Labour and the Unions were bunging them help with tax payers money? That’s what Kemi and Farage are pushing for, from the opposition benches.

Both Farage and Kemi have said the same thing at PMQs this past week.
UK gets All the gas. Factually not true.
UK gas prices will be cheaper. Factually not true.
But thirdly, quite importanty what they are not saying, the jobs are secured, the private ventures take a dividend, but based on a hefty tax payer bung to the new drilling.

The UK is highly integrated with the European gas market, being physically linked with the wider continent through undersea pipelines. It will be the European market price UK customers will pay, unless we can change that marginally buy pumping an awful lot more than anyone’s currently suggesting.

UK needs to make the right decision here, for now, the short term, medium and long term of National interest. The post you called babble was me saying, wherever we go for the facts of what that is,we are being met with spin, lobby groups, vested interests, and political opportunism.

And your “unarguable point” is one of very many arguable nuances towards getting it right - especially for anyone with a liking and a love for Thatcherism. Kemi Badenoch was in bed with the UK Unions and 1970s British Socialism at Lunchtime today. When in coalition government with Reform after the next election, both Kemi and Farage will hang portraits of Lady Thatcher in their offices. But that’s fake, it’s ignorance and cosplay, if they’re not practicing the economic philosophy Lady Thatcher bequeathed to us.

Don’t use ChatGPT

Instead look at the Norwegian sector of the North Sea. They are drilling wells. Lots of them. Right next door to fields we are shutting down.

I’m glad you brought that up.

The fourth piece of ignorance both Kemi and Farage are bringing to the North Sea drilling debate is where they keep saying Norway are doing it, so why don’t we - as though it’s as easy as copying Norway to get the same result for UK that Norway will get.
That line is a con. To coin a phrase: One Piece Economics. Just go and pick up the treasure and get rich. In many ways UK in a vastly different place than Norway regarding this.

Direct ownership in oil/gas fields is very different currently between the two countries, meaning income is going to be very different. The Norwegian oil and gas industry is not fully nationalized, but it is heavily controlled by the state through a hybrid model. The state owns all resource rights, holds a 67% stake in Equinor, and maintains direct financial interests in fields and infrastructure via Petoro. With these different models, while UK and Norway have produced similar total volumes of oil and gas over the years, their financial outcomes differ by quite a bit. In 2018, for recent example, Norway generated roughly 34 times more oil tax revenue than the UK from similar total volumes.

In recent years - once you look at net figure minus all the bungs making it happen - UK government income has been averaging £3.5BN. No new drilling, this falls to £300M by the end of this decade. With the new drilling Farage, Kemi {and their economic advisors the Unions} are pushing for, it is £1.5B income at end of this decade instead of the £300M. It’s definitely not the great easy to pick up treasure trove being spurned, that it’s being made out to be.

The geology was never perfectly split. Eight of the ten largest fields in the North Sea are located in Norwegian waters. Norway's sector tends to have thicker reservoirs and larger "structural closures," which provide longer production tails. Norway still has relatively underexplored "frontier" areas like the Barents Sea. And UK pumped ours out faster leading to UK production peak in the last century - 1999.

The two countries are in different places as regards what they have left, and how they have been generating income from it. Are you saying this is factually wrong to say?

There’s a really great Norwegian tv series about that called State of Happiness . It’s 3 seasons , it’s a shame BBC Iplayer only now have the 3rd . If you get a chance to find the whole series I’m sure you’d enjoy it .

PC + GRN could (almost) govern on those numbers. Two distinctly left wing parties. None of this 'left of centre' business, proper left. We could be looking at the Socialist Republic of Wales. If so, I'll be rooting for them and taking regular holidays there.

Though probably only for one term, given the number of businesses that will close or leave Wales as they hammer them with tax and regulation

The usual scaremongering whenever anything designed to shift a bit of advantage from capital to labour is mooted.

How are you feeling about the first female head of the church, H? Quite a moment.

Wales is already one of the most taxed and highest public spending nations in the world, it needs tax cuts and some fiscal conservatism not even more of the same.

I am fine with the first female Archbishop of Canterbury, 2/3 of Synod voted for female bishops a decade ago but I would still allow alternative episcopal oversight for those conservative Anglo Catholic or evangelical churches which still believe St Paul only allows male headship in churches

Plaid did turn your head once though istr.

Yes, a positive event. I'm not religous but I'm not unmoved by it.

I voted for all 4 Tory council candidates in that town council election, I had 6 votes though and as Plaid were the only other party who had bothered to stand candidates I voted for 2 of them as I on principle use all my votes. Had a LD or Labour or UKIP candidate stood I would have voted for them ahead of Plaid