Minister for Energy Consumers Miatta Fahnbulleh has offered a fierce defence of renewables, insisting they were already slashing prices across Europe
Donald Trump’s call to stop building windmills would see “sky high energy bills”, a UK energy minister has suggested.
The US president had called for Europe to stop with wind power, describing turbines as a “con job” and even complaining they ruined the view from his golf courses in Scotland. Now the Minister for Energy Consumers Miatta Fahnbulleh has offered a fierce defence of renewables, insisting they were already slashing prices across Europe.
Asked about Trump’s suggestion to end the use of windmills, she said “I think if we want sky high energy bills, that’s the right response. The data and the evidence speaks for itself.” It comes after Chancellor Rachel Reeves dismisses Donald Trump’s ‘con job’ wind turbine claim.
READ MORE: Donald Trump seen with mystery mark in Scotland after chronic health diagnosisREAD MORE: Rachel Reeves gives update on wealth tax calls as pressure mounts to target richest Brits
Ms Fahnbulleh continued: “What we have learnt is where countries have invested in clean, homegrown energy, Europe is a brilliant example of this, they are seeing the benefits in terms of their bills.
“The thing that is driving us is not ideology, but the fact that we know that bills are too high and we know it’s because we’re relying on global fossil fuel markets and we know we’ve got to break that link in order to drive down bills.
“We are really clear about what we need to do in this country, and for me the proof will be in the pudding. I think if we get on with it, we show the impacts, then it will show others, both here in the UK and abroad, that might be more sceptical, that this is the way forward.
“Fossil fuels are a declining commodity and asset, and an expensive one. We’ve got to wean ourselves off them and we’ve got to get to cheaper renewables because that is the way in which we secure energy security in this country but critically that’s the way we drive down bills for consumers”.
Speaking in Scotland, the US President had said: “They are killing the beauty of our scenery, our valleys, our beautiful plains… you look up and you see windmills all over the place, it’s a horrible thing. “It’s the most expensive form of energy, it’s no good.”
Last month Chancellor Rachel Reeves also defended solar farms as essential to create “homegrown energy” – preventing a reliance on imports from Vladimir Putin’s Russia. She said “never again can we have the boot of Putin on our neck, which was the experience after Russia invaded Ukraine and energy bills went through the roof”.
READ MORE: Join our Mirror politics WhatsApp group to get the latest updates from Westminster