‘If you see Sid, tell him!’ How energy nationalisation is making us all poorer

With energy prices going through the roof, the rich get richer while the poor get poorer – and Westside businesses are suffering too. Westside business leader MIKE OLLEY partly blames Buzby and Sid.

The nation finds itself in a bit a mess over its energy policy. Rising prices are a significant issue, and are we even going to be able to produce enough energy to keep the lights on?

Labour, Tory (and to be fair Tory and Lib Dems) offer the same old story. In recent years there’s been lots of greeny type statements with too little cost-effective action.

Watch and listen to the latest Olley’s Oracle here:

We’ve seen the closure of dirty old power stations, but nothing to replace them. What’s going on? Bizarrely, we now find ourselves on the cusp of paying more for our energy than we do for the NHS.

We sold the giant state assets off that produced the gas and electric several years ago. Since then, key wealthy individuals have got even wealthier. We in business are paying ever increasing prices to keep the super-rich more so.

The 1980s spearhead of the denationalisation was, of course, dear old Buzby, the talking cartoon bird. He promised us all a shareholding democracy. The British Gas “Tell Sid” campaign was built on this.

Unfortunately, Sid didn’t bother to tell us that part of belonging to a shareholding democracy meant many having to choose between fuel or food. Sid also didn’t point out that businesses would be forced to close due to escalating energy costs.

We look at Russia and condemn Putin’s oligarchs who got their hands on state assets at a steal. We overlook the fact that we seem to have done the same in Great Britain.

No wonder over half the Tory Party membership would welcome renationalisation of gas and electric. Presumably better to put up with petty bureaucracy than rampant profiteering.

Household energy bills are poised to go through the roof. As are energy prices for Westside’s businesses.

Take a modest sized pub or restaurant. It’s safe to say they pay about £1,000 a week. Yes, that’s a week, each and every week. Talk of that doubling, trebling or more in the months to come, which will put people out of business.

Our government, whoever that may be, need to get a grip of the situation. Sid and Buzby, I’m afraid, now appear to have been allied with dark Soviet agents rather than the British public, or the business community.