Energy crisis: why ‘keep calm but cut down’ may be a better message for Labour
Labour ministers asked in recent days about the looming energy crisis sparked by the Iran war, including Keir Starmer himself, have essentially stuck to that reassuring wartime slogan: keep calm and carry on.“I think people should go about their lives as normal, knowing that the government is taking action to bring energy bills down,” James Murray, the chief secretary to the Treasury, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Tuesday.But there are growing fears the government’s “don’t panic” messaging may be underplaying the scale of the challenges ahead and crowding out sensible advice on cutting consumption.“It’s the wrong message,” says Andrew Sissons, the director of the climate programme at the research foundation Nesta, referring to the government’s communications on the war’s impact.“The reality is that the global supply of oil and gas is going to be down by maybe 20%.
It’s a supply crisis, which means everybody needs to consume less.”Part of Labour’s challenge is that it dearly wants to claim credit for the £117-a-year cut to household utility bills that was a central theme in the chancellor Rachel Reeves’s autumn budget.That reduction, paid for by shifting the cost of green schemes on to general taxation and scrapping a flawed energy efficiency scheme, comes into effect in April.“Today your energy bills will be cut, because of our action at the budget and whatever happens in Iran, that price is now fixed until July,” Starmer stressed, at his Wednesday press conference.Yet it is already clear that the cost of household energy will rise again in the summer, when the next quarterly price cap is set.
The latest forecast from the consultancy Cornwall Insight estimates the cost of a dual-fuel bill will rise by 17,6% from July – swamping the 7% cut in April,Meanwhile, oil and petrol prices have leapt since the start of Donald Trump’s bombing campaign and Iran’s retaliatory strikes,Over time, these higher costs are expected to feed through to prices across a wide range of products,So having put tackling the cost of living at the heart of their pitch to the public, ministers now face having to explain why energy inflation is expected to increase once again.
No government wants to sow panic – less still panic buying – so the “keep calm” message is understandable,Talking down the economy, by denting fragile consumer confidence, is also the last thing they want to do,And the government is also trying to face down a vociferous campaign from opposition parties about Reeves’s plans to reverse the Tories’ 5p cut to fuel duty, in three steps from September to next March,While income from VAT on fuel will rise as a result of higher prices, wider tax revenues will be hit by the increasingly expected economic slowdown – and the government’s cost of borrowing has risen too since the crisis began, jeopardising Reeves’s fiscal targets,It is these fears over tax and spend that have prompted the chancellor to insist that any help with utility bills must be “targeted” – a view widely shared by thinktanks, including the Institute for Fiscal Studies and the Resolution Foundation.
But the government has found itself unwilling or unable to make the other part of this argument – that many people will have to brace themselves for higher bills, and it would be a good thing if, as a society, we could crimp our energy use.Sissons argues: “The message from the government should be: number one, be more efficient wherever you can – where you can save energy without going cold or stopping travelling, then do; and number two, this is a great time to be switching away from oil and gas on to clean electricity, on to heat pumps and electric vehicles, which is exactly what the government wants us to be doing anyway.”Jill Rutter, of the Institute for Government thinktank, once a senior civil servant in the Treasury, says she would prefer a message that was more like “keep calm, but you can probably find some quite useful savings”, adding: “There are things you can do to manage down your consumption.”At his press conference, Starmer had nothing to say about actions consumers can take: in contrast to the Australian prime minister, Anthony Albanese, for example, who has urged people to use public transport and not overfill their cars.Labour is understandably keen to avoid anything that might smack of the “nanny state”, let alone the dread word “rationing”.
But the risk is that, as the conflict continues, “keep calm and carry on” sounds increasingly adrift from reality.
UK is most vulnerable European country to jet fuel shortages, Ryanair boss says
The UK is the most vulnerable country in Europe to potential jet fuel shortages as the Iran war throttles supplies from the Gulf, the boss of Ryanair has said.Michael O’Leary, the chief executive of the budget airline, said Britain would be the most exposed to jet fuel shortages because it relies on Kuwait for about 25% of its supply.“Of all the European countries at the moment, the one that is most vulnerable is the UK because of the market share that the Kuwaitis have here,” he said. “There could be a surplus of jet A-1 fuel in the Middle East, but you have still got to ship it to Europe and we don’t know when or how that happens.”Airlines around the world have been forced to cancel some flights after the war in Iran triggered a surge in jet fuel prices
Oil tumbles and UK’s FTSE 100 posts biggest daily rise in a year on hopes Middle East war will end soon – as it happened
As the clocks ring noon in the City of London, here’s the situation.European and Asia-Pacific stock markets have rallied sharply, after Donald Trump signalled that the Iran was could end soon.The UK’s FTSE 100 share index is up 1.9% now at 10,369 points, up 192 points to a two-week high.The pan-European Stoxx 600 index is up 2%, with gains in Frankfurt, Paris, Madrid and Milan
‘System malfunction’ causes robotaxis to stall in the middle of the road in China
A “system malfunction” has caused several self-driving robotaxis to stall in the middle of the road in China, police have confirmed, after distressed riders were stranded for hours.Local authorities in the central Chinese city of Wuhan said they began receiving calls “one after another” on Tuesday night from riders reporting that autonomous vehicles operated by the Chinese internet company Baidu had frozen.“Multiple Apollo Go cars stopped in the middle of the road, unable to move,” police said in a statement on Wednesday, referring to Baidu’s driverless taxi service. “After investigation, preliminary findings suggest the cause was system malfunction.”Baidu has a fleet of more than 500 driverless cars in Wuhan
Unregulated chatbots are putting lives at risk | Letters
Your coverage of AI-associated delusions exposes a gap that training-level guardrails cannot close (Marriage over, €100,000 down the drain: the AI users whose lives were wrecked by delusion, 26 March). As someone who has worked in health systems across fragile and low-income contexts, I find it striking that AI companies have failed to adopt a safeguard that even the most underresourced clinic in the world already uses: screening patients before exposing them to risk.The Patient Health Questionnaire-9 for depression and the Columbia Suicide Severity Rating Scale are administered daily in settings with no electricity, limited staff, and patients who may never have seen a doctor. These tools take minutes. They are validated across dozens of languages and cultural contexts
Joyce ‘shocked’ to receive Wales call-up for Women’s Six Nations only months after giving birth
Alisha Joyce returned to the rugby pitch in March just 123 days after giving birth and a week later was named in Wales’s squad for the Women’s Six Nations. The 28‑year‑old says she was “shocked” to get the call-up after welcoming her son, Ralphie, in November but adds it’s “cool” to be a role model for the next generation of players.Joyce was the first Wales player to use the governing body’s new performance maternity programme. The back-row, who shares Ralphie with her wife and teammate Jasmine Joyce, has played only 30 minutes of rugby since returning last month in a game for Brython Thunder where she came off the bench.The call from the Wales head coach, Sean Lynn, was not something she was expecting
Justin Timberlake’s walk-on part back in spotlight as Chelmsford faces closure fears
The oft-troubled history of Chelmsford City racecourse in Essex took its latest turn for the worse on Wednesday when the track lost its licence to host fixtures. This means the cancellation of scheduled meetings including the lucrative Good Friday fixture and putting the long-term future of the venue in serious doubt.There have been enough twists in the Chelmsford saga that Justin Timberlake’s apparent walk-on part in the latest chapter is just one more to add to the list. The singer’s concert at the track on 4 July 2025 led to chaotic scenes when 25,000 fans left afterwards, forcing some to queue for up to four hours and others to abandon their cars and walk along the nearby A131 dual carriageway.A legal action arising from the concert was settled out of court, but the crowd capacity for gigs was lowered and the track’s operator, Great Leighs Estates Limited, went into administration on Monday
Don’t blame AI for the Iran school bombing | Letters
Patrick McKeown obituary
Apple at 50 quiz: top sellers, turkeys and turtlenecks
MP rejects Palantir’s claims that criticism of NHS England deal is ‘ideologically motivated’
US tech firm Oracle cuts thousands of jobs as it steps up AI spending
I wore Meta’s smartglasses for a month – and it left me feeling like a creep