Why are politicians all talking nonsense right now?We’ve reached the Talking Heads moment in the energy crisis: the moment when everyone decides to Stop Making Sense. It’s all just too difficult. The political classes are in denial, left and right, north and south.

The complexity of the crisis is too manifold, the implications for society too scary. In times like these, politicians resort to addressing their own narrow constituencies, their tribes.

The most obvious politician not making sense is our likely next Prime Minister, Liz Truss. She wants to tackle the cost-of-living crisis by tax cuts instead of “handouts”.

This is implausible because cutting the taxes of people with nothing or very little, the ones most at risk this winter, means nothing or very little. Even those on middle incomes would see a negligible diminution of their bills from scrapping the National Insurance hike.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies insists that tax cuts right now will only increase inflation and public debt, so why is Ms Truss persevering with this policy? Because it plays well with the narrow Conservative Party membership for whom tax is a kind of religion.

Tax cuts allow people to keep more of what they earn, boost productive investment and prevent politicians “spending other people’s money”.

‘Big Five’ folly

THE Tories aren’t the only ones in a state of ideological denial. The Scottish Green Party and most of the left think the solution to the energy crisis is nationalisation of energy companies like British Gas. “It will cost only £2.85 billion to nationalise the Big Five, when the Government is looking to subsidise them with £29bn,” they cry on Twitter. “You do the math.” But when you do it, you see that this is nonsense on stilts. Spending public money nationalising loss-making energy supply companies, those that haven’t already gone bust, will be zero help for people who can’t pay their bills this winter. It just adds to the tens of billions the Government will need to underwrite crippling world energy costs

It is the international oil and gas extraction companies like BP and Shell who are making super profits. BP’s aptly named Bernard Looney confessed that his company was currently a “cash machine”. But the left know that nationalising companies like BP, Shell and Total would be nigh impossible. Their market capitalisation is over £400bn.

These are also international companies. BP is merged with Amoco, the biggest oil producer in America. If Big Oil were threatened with seizure by the UK state, they would likely relocate to low-tax Ireland and halt investment in Scotland’s renewable energy. Try seizing the North Sea assets of Equinor and Norway would cut off 30 per cent of the UK’s gas supply.

Lie of the land

THE left are always accusing their opponents of “lying” – for example, claiming the UK sent £350 million a week to the EU. In fact, that wasn’t a lie – just extremely misleading. But their energy campaign is even more misleading. Nationalising retail basket cases like Bulb would pitch the UK Government into a quixotic battle against the international energy market.

What the politicians could do is apply a higher windfall tax to energy super-profits and provide incentives to speed up investment in renewables. Now that Britain is no longer in the EU, the Government could also take what is called a “golden share” in BP and press the board to maximise oil and gas production in the North Sea.

The Greens, of course, believe it is better to import oil and gas from repellent regimes like Russia and Saudi Arabia. They want to keep North Sea oil and gas “in the ground” no matter how many old people freeze. Nicola Sturgeon has also adopted this moronic rhetoric.

She says we can rely on the 25 gigawatts of offshore wind in the recent ScotWind licensing. She was rightly criticised for giving away this bounty for a paltry £700m, but that’s another issue.

The ScotWind farms will not be generating power for at least a decade and the energy crisis is now. The Government should be getting global experts like Sir Ian Wood to advise on how to extract more oil and gas from the North Sea. Importing hydrocarbons is far more carbon-intensive, and environmentally damaging, than using our own.

This is obvious to everyone, but people are afraid of being labelled climate-change deniers, so they keep quiet.

Yet helping finance Putin’s war machine doesn’t advance net zero by a single day. North Sea oil and gas is a strategic resource and has to be managed rationally in the transition to renewable energy.

Scrapped by SNP

In 2017, Nicola Sturgeon promised to set up a publicly-owned energy supply company, a policy with much merit at the time. In a market of five million, where competition is weak, there is a case for state ownership if regulation fails. But that plan was scrapped, which is why Ms Sturgeon is not talking about it. Nor does she want to talk about North Sea oil revenues which have rebounded recently. The SNP prefer to berate the UK Government and demand more money.

It has become a dismal game of public sector pass the parcel. Local government workers, like Edinburgh binmen, strike for more pay. Nicola Sturgeon says give them 5 per cent, half of which should come from Cosla, the local government confederation. Cosla says it can’t afford it because the Scottish Government has cut local government funding for a decade. To break the deadlock, both sides unite to demand more cash from Westminster.

Yet, the Scottish Government has its own revenue-raising powers, and can set the rates and bands of income tax. It also has generous funding from Westminster which means Scotland has 20% more spending per head than England. And powers to borrow up to half a billion a year and issue green energy bonds for more.

Political risk

Scotland’s cash-strapped local councils also have powers to raise revenue since the end of the council tax freeze. But they don’t want to suffer the political risk of putting their money where their mouths are. This abdication of fiscal responsibility is demeaning and helps no-one.

Finally, the trade unions in Enough is Enough campaigning for a general strike are also in a world of their own. Only 14% of private-sector workers are in trade unions, which are now overwhelmingly the preserve of public-sector workers with relatively secure jobs.

The wages of public-sector workers are paid for by the taxes of private-sector workers, who make up 80% of the labour force.

These ragged-trousered philanthropists have poorer remuneration when generous public-sector pensions are taken into account. Consequently, a general strike of state employees, from doctors to binmen, would be politically disastrous for all concerned.

Anyway, there is no way of meeting the Enough is Enough demand of inflation-indexed public-sector pay without wrecking public services.

There just isn’t any more money. In the winter of discontent that’s coming, sectional interests would be wise to use their muscle sparingly.

And a bit of coherent thinking all round would not go amiss.