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Louis Dor
Apr 24, 2017
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Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images
On Saturday, it was reported by the chief political correspondent for the Financial Times that the next conservative manifesto would contain a pledge to cap household energy bills.
The 2015 @Ed_Miliband promise to freeze energy bills was labelled "shocking" & "extremely dangerous" by Tories. Pen… https://t.co/AUS11sBGvg— Jim Pickard (@Jim Pickard) 1492939254
Work and Pensions Secretary Damian Green told ITV that people felt "taken advantage of" by energy firms and told Peston on Sunday:
There will be a lot about energy policy in the manifesto [and] obviously there will be more detail.
I think that people feel that some of the big energy companies have taken advantage of them with the tariffs they have got.
If this all sounds incredibly familiar, it's because it's bears impeccable similarities to a policy of Ed Miliband's in 2015.
As people pointed out.
"can I copy your homework?" "yeah just change it up a bit so it isn't obvious" "sure" https://t.co/BXH3jnnTD7— Abby Tomlinson (@Abby Tomlinson) 1492946958
Downing St confirms that all Labour policies condemned by the Tories for this election will be Tory policy for the 2019 Election. #energycap— David Schneider (@David Schneider) 1493029615
Michael Fallon says the Tories' energy price freeze is nothing like Ed Miliband's energy price cap and he'll carve it in stone to prove it.— Oonagh (@Oonagh) 1493031303
When @Ed_Miliband wanted an energy price cap it was Marxist and taking us back to the the 1970s but now Tories steal it and say it's great?— Angela Rayner (@Angela Rayner) 1493022790
Even Ed was furious, discarding his regular pinch of sass:
Where were these people for last 4 years since I proposed cap?Defending a broken energy market that ripped people o… https://t.co/ixvwLVhpXJ— Ed Miliband (@Ed Miliband) 1492946377
Mr Green said his party's promise was different to Miliband's 2015:
We would have [energy regulator] Ofgem setting the limits.
So it would be a cap, it would be more flexible, it would be able to reflect market conditions [and] the market would still have an influence.
That would mean in practical terms that if the oil price fell again, then consumers would benefit, which they wouldn't have done under [former Labour leader] Ed Miliband's proposal.
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