Corbyn: cuts to solar subsidies ‘short-sighted’

Jeremy Corbyn has pledged that support of renewable energy will be a key plank of Labour’s industrial strategy.

In a speech in Birmingham yesterday (24 July), launching Labour’s “Build it in Britain” campaign to support British manufacturing, the opposition leader singled out cuts to solar subsidy as an example of what he described as the current government’s short-sighted approach to industry.

He said that the UK solar industry is “falling back as the industry takes off across Europe” following cuts to subsidies in 2015 and 2016 and increased business rates for buildings with rooftop panels.

As a result of the cuts, he claimed that between now and 2022 France is forecast to add five times and Germany ten times as much solar capacity as the UK.

Corbyn said the cuts had been designed to “save a few pounds in the short term” but had cost the UK “jobs and innovation”.

The Labour leader, said: “It will help us build a clean, green 21st century economy, right here in the UK, building solar, windfarms and tidal lagoons to help us tackle climate change.

“It will focus on creating clusters to boost domestic supply chains to develop the virtuous cycle, where the success of one industry or company helps others.

“We’ll give support to the sectors that we need to deliver the public contracts, to radically upgrade our creaking infrastructure, a core part of our industrial strategy.”

Corbyn’s speech follows on less than a week after the government announced that there would no more support for small scale renewable projects after the existing feed-in tariff scheme ends next March.