Last Thursday, the UK government unveiled a £15bn-plus policy package to address energy prices, big enough to redistribute close to one per cent of national output. That a Tory chancellor, Rishi Sunak, should preside over such massive redistribution and market interference illustrates the scale of the challenge faced by most European governments today.
Addressing the cost of living crisis is their most acute political imperative. It is tempting to do so with short-term solutions. But this risks aggravating even greater medium-term challenges: the carbon transition and the need to resist Russian President Vladimir Putin’s designs on the balance of power in Europe. Both require fundamental reform of our energy systems, not financial sticking plasters.
Sticking plasters are needed too, of course. The rise in energy prices in Europe has been breathtaking. Prices for natural gas have grown five to tenfold higher than normal since last autumn, when Putin began to tighten supplies. Electricity has followed suit, because gas-fired power plants often provide the balance of fluctuating energy demand in Europe’s power markets. Global oil prices are double their 2019 levels.