Britain must become energy independent, says Dan Wootton

The outgoing Prime Minister, with less than 100 hours left in Downing Street, did his best today to secure his energy security legacy, just as the country is plunged into a catastrophic winter crisis because of our reliance on bad actors.

As I have done the past few weeks, Boris Johnson called out the Conservative’s former coalition partner the Liberal Democrats, whose ex and current leader Nick Clegg and Ed Davey are at least, in part, responsible for where we find ourselves.

Thanks to their short-sighted, knee-jerk lobbying to halt new nuclear power and see fracking banned. Watch them boast about it…

Those two are, without doubt, on the wrong side of history.

Speaking in Sizewell, as he announced a belated expansion of nuclear energy, Boris also turned on the last two Labour Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown for short-term thinking and a failure to invest in nuclear energy that has led us to this perilous position…

But Boris is only telling part of the story. It was the NIMBYism and paranoia of the Tories that halted fracking, for example.

It’s the Net Zero obsession that has seen has move too quickly away from fossil fuels, without the green energy to back it up.

Unbelievably, we closed our biggest gas storage in 2017.

Why are we only going all-in on nuclear – a safe and effective energy supply – now? It’s too little too late, unfortunately.

Now the baton – or some would say the poisoned chalice – will likely pass to Liz Truss on Tuesday, when the Foreign Secretary will have to move immediately to secure our energy independence, with a code red short-term strategy, matched by medium and long-term plans.

I may be criticised for saying it as an environmentalist, but the deranged push to Net Zero to 2050 needs to be dialled back with so many British businesses and families facing financial ruin this winter.

In her final pitch to Conservative members before voting closes on Friday, Truss used a column in The Sun today to insist she is a woman of steel who can guide us through such a colossal challenge.

She wrote…

"I firmly believe in these grave times, we need to be radical.

"If elected, I will lead the British people through the economic storm with my clear and truly Conservative plan.

"I will also deliver immediate support to ensure people are not facing unaffordable fuel bills. I will be robust in my approach.

"Let me reassure Sun readers that I can be trusted to rise to the challenge.

"I will take decisive action to provide help and ensure we never again face such an energy crisis.

Let’s be honest, it will not be easy. But I have the inner steel to get the job done and a proven track record of delivery. "

She's going to need that inner steel.Because from this Tuesday, once in Number 10, the political establishment, the blob and the MSM are going to do everything possible to derail her bold strategy to make Britain energy independent.