MICHAEL Gove has been urged to green light the new coal mine in Cumbria to ease Britain’s reliance on China.
The Levelling Up Secretary is expected to give the go-ahead to reopen the mine next week after months of postponing the decision to avoid embarrassing Rishi Sunak at COP27.
Michael Gove has been urged to green light the new coal mine in Cumbria to ease Britain’s reliance on China
The new coking pit is vital to producing more domestic steel in the UK and will create hundreds of jobs.
Tory MP Mark Jenkinson told Trending In The News: “As Britain still needs coking coal for the foreseeable future to make our world-leading steel, it should come from here, not imported thousands of miles away – which will only increase our carbon footprint any further.”
Fresh analysis by the Green Alliance says it could produce the same emissions as putting 200,000 more cars on UK roads.
Fellow Tory Alex Stafford warned: “Approving the mine would undermine trust in the UK’s climate commitments, and increase local pollution.”
But critics say it will be even less green to get it from elsewhere.
Meanwhile, plans to insulate 19 million homes in the next decade in a bid to slash bills will create half a million new jobs, new analysis shows.
Labour’s bid to stop heat from escaping from millions of draughty homes will boost Britain’s army of builders and construction workers, according to PwC.
580,000 jobs would be supported every year from building retrofits with higher levels of energy efficiency.
94,000 of those would be essential trade jobs like heating engineers and plumbers.
