Rees-Mogg: ‘Britain must get every cubic inch of gas out of North Sea’

theguardian.com:

Jacob Rees-Mogg has told staff Britain “must get every cubic inch of gas out of the North Sea”, a leaked video shows. Critics have accused the business secretary of “putting his ideology before the climate” and “greenwashing fossil fuels” by prioritising gas over renewables.

A video, passed to the Guardian by a whistleblower, shows Rees-Mogg telling an all-staff meeting in the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy on Wednesday that the public needs to be persuaded that fossil fuels are the answer.

In it, he says they will be “handing out lots of money” to get Britain producing more gas, and that he is aware some will say this is “not free market enough”.

Rees-Mogg said the mission of his department would be to “get back to national security within energy so using as much of our own resources as is possible”, adding: “It is unquestionably more environmentally friendly to use our own gas which doesn’t have to be liquefied, doesn’t have to be transported thousands of miles, than it is to pull in gas from overseas, and if we want therefore to be both prosperous and green we need to use our own resources.”

He added: “And that is why I have said we have to get every cubic inch of gas out of the North Sea, because actually it’s better for our economy and it’s greener. And this will be a challenge for us to get out to the country because one side will say we are not being austere enough, and the other will say we are not being free market enough.”

However, critics said the mission of Rees-Mogg’s department should not be to exploit more fossil fuels but to boost investment in renewables and insulation.

Greenpeace’s head of politics, Rebecca Newsom, said: “The government’s business department should be the coordinating