LETTER: Winter is going to be great cost

Winter is coming and it’s going to cost. Wholesale prices have trebled and electricity prices have doubled since this time last year. Rightly, we should rely on green and sustainable sources for our energy supplies and consumption.

Sadly, successive Governments have let us all down with a failure to provide storage for our energy sources. Traders can easily push up our domestic prices because storage capacity is in short supply which restricts our ability to control prices. Germany, as an example, has tenfold electricity capacity compared to the UK. Dull debates about coal have tarnished people's perspectives on a positive energy strategy for the UK.

Political convenience forgets that Harold Wilson closed 253 pits, more than twice as many as Margaret Thatcher (115) who was only ahead of Clement Atlee (101). Though the political claptrap in the media will never be led by facts. Fossil fuels are pollutants and are the past. Leave them there and help generate new energy sources and plans. A little genuine forethought by governments would have avoided the coming energy price crisis.

Government must deal with the present and future energy needs. How will they deal with the catastrophe when exorbitant energy prices hit poorer families across the country this winter?

I expect the powers-that-be will soon add to the level of methane gas produced as they attempt to divert attention from their failure to keep energy prices under control.

Doug James, Walsall

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