Reform UK’s Richard Tice boasted putting solar panels on his company’s properties could help tenants with their bills – despite publicly claiming people are being “ripped off” by the renewables industry.
In a speech last week, Tice, Reform’s deputy leader, pledged that if it wins the next election the party would impose new taxes on the renewable industry which he called “a massive con”.
He said there was a “direct link” between higher electricity prices and the growth of renewable energy generation.
But Tice has been accused of “blatant hypocrisy” because his company has fitted solar panels and electric car charging stations at commercial properties it owns in England.
“These initiatives will save hundreds of tonnes of CO2 every year and help our occupiers with lower electricity bills than they might otherwise have to pay, as well as provide an attractive return for shareholders,” Tice wrote in the 2022 annual report for Quidnet REIT, a real estate firm in which he is the largest shareholder.
Critics claimed The Ferret’s finding showed Reform’s “performative” opposition to renewables was “more about scoring culture war points than genuinely helping British households”.
Tice claimed he had “always said unsubsidised solar panels on roofs can make sense for the homeowner or business tenant”.
“It cuts out middlemen via the grid,” the Boston and Skegness MP told The Ferret. “What does not make sense is gobbling up productive farmland and subsidising renewables as that drives up electricity bills.”
This is just another example of the party’s performative ‘war on net zero’, more about scoring culture war points than genuinely helping British households.
Dr Will Stronge, The Autonomy Institute
The solar panels appear to have been lucrative for Quidnet REIT.
The firm makes most of its money from collecting rent, but its 2023 accounts note that it has cashed in on the sale of energy to tenants and the electricity grid.
Income from activities other than rent increased from around £5,000 in 2022 – when the solar panels were being installed — to over £150,000 in 2023.
Tice is not the only Reform politician with interests in renewables.
Great Yarmouth MP, Rupert Lowe, has installed solar panels on his farm. He also owns a company which installs renewable systems and says that “local, carbon-neutral generation of energy is much cheaper than buying gas-powered electricity”.
In his speech, Tice said net zero policies were to blame for higher energy bills and the argument that renewables would make energy cheaper was a “lie” because of subsidies paid to the sector.
However a rise in wholesale gas prices was the main cause of the recent energy crisis which sent bills soaring.
It’s gas prices that have sent our bills through the roof, not renewables.
Mel Evans, Greenpeace
Energy bills in the UK do include ‘green levies’ which help pay for projects like renewables and home insulation.
Some experts argue that green levies on bills are regressive because poorer households spend a larger proportion of their income on them, and have suggested moving them to general taxation.
But supporters say scrapping them completely could hamper the rollout of home insulation and renewables projects and leave the UK reliant on foreign gas, which can fluctuate in price.
They argue this could drive bills up further, while critics have claimed Reform’s tax plans could cause energy costs to “skyrocket”.
Greenpeace described Reform’s proposals as a “jumble of misinformation and gaslighting” which would “allow Big Oil bosses to rake in even more billions in profits”.
“It’s gas prices that have sent our bills through the roof, not renewables,” the group’s head of climate issues, Mel Evans, said. “Reform’s quack cure will only worsen the disease by making us even more reliant on gas and the dictators controlling its price.”
Dr Will Stronge of the climate change research organisation, The Autonomy Institute, accused Tice and Reform of “blatant hypocrisy”.
Stronge added: “His company profits from providing solar panels and electric vehicle charging points, whilst Reform MPs use solar to lower their bills – yet Reform continues to weaponise them for political gain.
“This is just another example of the party’s performative ‘war on net zero’, more about scoring culture war points than genuinely helping British households.”
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Main image: House of Commons/Flickr
