PM’s energy security strategy looks set for further delay

Boris Johnson’s energy security strategy looks likely to be further delayed amid suggestions Chancellor Rishi Sunak is resisting new spending commitments.

Downing Street had been expecting the plan in the coming week after it already slipped from the Prime Minister’s earlier billing of the week before.

The Financial Times reported officials suggesting April 4 was now the earliest date for its publication as Mr Sunak resists providing any new money.

A Treasury source did not deny the delay, telling the PA news agency: “Policy is still being decided on.”

During a visit to the Gulf on March 16, Mr Johnson said the strategy will include a “massive jump forward on renewables, more nuclear, using our own hydrocarbons more effectively”.

He also said it would come “next week”. After that timetable slipped, Downing Street continued to anticipate its arrival this month.

Meanwhile, Cabinet minister Nadhim Zahawi suggested that energy bills for people living near onshore wind farms could be slashed under the reforms.

Mr Zahawi told Sky’s Sophy Ridge On Sunday programme: “I would say that if we are going to make sure that we carry the will of local people, whether it’s onshore wind or nuclear, we have to learn from how it’s done well in other countries.

“The way you do that is to make sure the local community has a real say.

“But also we’ve seen great examples of other people where if they build a nuclear power station, within a certain radius of that power station they get free power.

“So it’s right to look at innovation to make sure we wean ourselves off hydrocarbons, we have to do that, we have to do that well, part of that is making sure we look after the will of the local people.”