Speaking at her first Prime Minister’s Questions, Liz Truss promised “immediate action” to help people “struggling with the cost-of-living” and rebuffed Labour’s calls to extend the windfall tax on oil and gas firms.
Addressing Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer across the despatch box, Truss said that taxing energy firms more would deter investment in the UK when it was needed to help the economy recover.
The existing windfall tax amounts to 25 per cent of oil and gas firms' profits which are sourced in the UK. It will remain in force until the end of 2025.
Truss also suggested that she would seek to shore up energy security by building more nuclear power stations in the UK and extend North Sea exploration for further fossil fuel supplies.
The new prime minister is to outline her targeted support package for households in the Commons on Thursday, which could see energy bills frozen in a move that could cost as much as £100 billion and would be financed in the short-term by more government borrowing.
Yet, by not targeting what he called the “vast excess profits” of energy companies with taxation, Sir Keir said that Truss was culpable of “protecting the profits” of large corporates rather than “helping families and public services”.
He also accused the new PM of making “working people foot the bill” despite energy firms being set to make “£170 billion in excess profits over the next two years.”
Truss returned fire by saying that she was on the side of hard-working people and that her plan was to deliver new investment and jobs “right across the country.”
She added: “There's nothing new about a Labour leader who is calling for more tax rises. It's the same old tax and spend.”
Photo by Simon Dawson / No10 Downing Street - Information Rights Unit on Wikimedia Commons
