I remember the first time energy bills landed like a sucker punch after the last big spike. The missus staring at the letter, me muttering about whether we'd need to choose between heating and eating again. That familiar ache of watching politicians chase grand green dreams while the lights flicker and the North Sea sits half-forgotten. So when Andy Burnham shuffled his pack on 20 July and plonked Miatta Fahnbulleh into the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero seat, it felt less like fresh thinking and more like doubling down on the same old script.
Fahnbulleh, the Peckham MP who's been in Parliament since July 2024, takes over from Ed Miliband, who has shuffled off to the Foreign Office. Burnham's move comes after Keir Starmer's resignation, part of the early cabinet tweaks in this new Labour setup. On paper it looks like a promotion for the woman who ran the New Economics Foundation from 2017 to 2023. Oxford PPE, a PhD in economic development from the LSE, stints at the Cabinet Office and IPPR. Smart credentials, no question. But the real story is what she actually believes about energy.
She's long been painted as the radical accelerator on net zero targets. The sort who wanted to shut the door on new North Sea drilling while the rest of us were wondering how exactly Britain keeps the lights on without freezing or bankrupting every factory from here to the Midlands. Energy security is in the job title, yet the track record suggests the "net zero" bit will be doing the heavy lifting. Industry voices have already been nudging her to put homegrown production first if we want reindustrialisation that doesn't cost the earth, literally and figuratively.
Let's be blunt. This appointment signals continuity when what was needed was a sharp change of direction. We've watched for years as ideological targets distort markets, push up costs and leave families paying the price through higher bills and unreliable supply. Fahnbulleh's previous roles at the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero and then Housing, Communities and Local Government show she's been deep in the machinery. Yet the pattern remains: accelerate the green transition, consequences be damned.
The cost of zealotry
It's the same old dance. Government after government talks tough on "security" while prioritising abstract targets over practical realities like keeping North Sea fields productive and bills affordable. Fahnbulleh's background at a green-leaning think tank hardly screams balance. Instead it whispers more subsidies, more interventions, more pain passed on to households and manufacturers who can't simply offshore their energy needs.
