Ali Cook, Salisbury Socialist Party
Coming as a surprise to no one, British Gas, the UK’s biggest supplier of energy, has reported record profits of £969 million for the first half of the year. Around half of these profit’s came from Ofgem’s decision to alter the price cap that allowed it to recoup some of the costs of supplying its 10 million customers during the ‘energy crisis’. Ofgem said these record profits are a “one off” but that’s little relief to workers paying through the nose, or have gone into debt as a result of increased energy prices.
Correctly, Sharon Graham, general secretary of Unite the Union has stated that “we need to stop dancing around our handbags and grasp the nettle. The only way to end the chaos in our energy supply is staring us in the face: public ownership”.
We know the Tories aren’t going to stand up for working-class people facing a cost-of-living crisis – its them that have just allowed nearly a billion pounds destined for the back pockets of British Gas shareholders. We’re not going to hear an announcement that Sunak is going to take control of British Gas and run it in the interests of us all.
Or from Starmer’s Labour Party. Last year, Labour’s Rachael Reeves stated “within fiscal rules, to be spending billions of pounds on nationalising things, that just doesn’t stack up against our fiscal rules.” Starmer himself has said his government will exercise “fiscal restraint” and “tough choices”, we know what this means for working people.
This announcement of profits makes it clear: we need nationalisation, with compensation only on the basis of proven need. That means no more money to the fat cats that have been getting rich. And we need a new mass workers’ party that is willing to fight for it. A workers’ list of candidates in the next election, backed by the unions, would strengthen the fight for nationalisation. This would certainly light a fire under Starmer’s incoming government.
Whether unions make these decisive steps, the Trade Union and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) will be putting forward this electoral challenge at the ballot box as the means to accelerate the fight back against the cost-of-living crisis.
