1. The Telegraph Finally Wakes Up
For years, Reform UK has been warning that Britain’s energy bills are not high because of gas prices, or Putin, or any of the excuses trotted out by Westminster. They are high because of deliberate political decisions.
Now even The Telegraph has had to admit it.
In a major feature last week, journalist Jonathan Leake exposed the truth about the so-called “zombie levy” — the Renewables Obligation (RO). He showed how it has already added £75 billion to our bills, will add another £38 billion over the next five years, and is still costing every household in Britain £108 a year in 2025.
And Richard Tice, Reform UK’s energy spokesman, said it plainly: Net Zero is gross negligence. It is the willful destruction of our economy.
What we are dealing with is not just bad policy. It is one of the greatest stealth taxes in British history — a scheme abolished in 2017, yet still alive and bleeding us dry until 2037. A 20-year zombie subsidy designed by Tony Blair’s Labour government, expanded by Ed Miliband, and waved through by cowardly Conservatives who never had the guts to kill it off.
2. How the Zombie Levy Works
The Renewables Obligation was born out of Blair’s first government. The Utilities Act 2000, driven through Parliament by Stephen Byers, gave ministers the power to force energy suppliers into buying “green certificates” from renewable generators.
Each megawatt hour of renewable energy produced — whether wind, solar, hydro, or later even wood pellets imported from America — earned a Renewables Obligation Certificate (ROC).
Suppliers (the companies that bring electricity into your home) had to buy these certificates to meet government-set quotas. No certificates, no license to trade.
The result? A rigged market where renewable generators could effectively double their money: once for selling the electricity, and again for selling the certificate.
This wasn’t presented honestly on bills. It was buried in wholesale costs, so the public never saw the line item. But we were paying for it all along.
And then came the fatal design flaw. Ministers decided to link the value of ROCs to the Retail Price Index (RPI) — a discredited measure of inflation that always runs higher than the Consumer Price Index (CPI).
Since 2002, CPI inflation has been 88.5%. RPI inflation has been 133.4%. That gap has turned the RO into a bottomless pit of consumer money.
Instead of declining over time, the scheme has grown fatter every year. The OBR confirms it: costs hit £6.7 billion in 2023/24, and will rise to £8.5 billion by 2026.
This is why it has been christened the Zombie Levy. The scheme was supposedly “closed” to new entrants in 2017. But for the 26,000 generators already signed up, the party goes on until 2037 — with the rest of us footing the bill.
3. From Blair to Miliband – The Stitch-Up
It would be bad enough if this was simply Blair’s legacy. But in 2009, Ed Miliband — then Energy Secretary — made it even worse.
Instead of winding the scheme down, Miliband handed out bonus ROCs to offshore wind developers and others. That meant not just one green certificate per megawatt hour, but two or more. In other words, he doubled the subsidy.
By 2015, the cost of ROCs had become so embarrassing that even David Cameron’s government had to act. Greg Clark, Energy Secretary at the time, finally closed the scheme to new projects. But he did not kill it for those already inside.
So here we are in 2025. Blair set it up. Miliband turbo-charged it. The Conservatives bottled it. And the British people are left chained to it until 2037.
4. The Drax Disaster
One of the biggest winners of this scam has been Drax Power Station, Britain’s largest coal plant, converted to burn imported wood pellets.
Drax alone has pocketed £6.2 billion in ROC subsidies. In 2022 it received £617 million. In 2023 another £587 million.
And what fuels these “green” billions? American forests cut down, shipped across the Atlantic, and burned here in Yorkshire. A policy so absurd it would be comedy, if it wasn’t costing families real money and destroying real jobs.
This is the true face of Net Zero: destroy our industry, outsource our energy, and then tell people it’s “green.”
5. The Wider Scam – Levies Everywhere
The RO is just the fattest zombie in the graveyard. There are at least six major green levies hiding on bills: the Contracts for Difference scheme, Capacity Market charges, balancing costs, system operator levies, and more.
Since 2008, the so-called “standing charge” on bills — the flat daily fee you pay before you use a single unit of power — has risen by over 500%. That’s not because it costs more to send you a bill. It’s because successive governments have stuffed every Net Zero subsidy they can’t defend into the standing charge, where the public can’t see it.
Today, the standing charge is the most regressive tax in Britain. Pensioners living alone pay the same as billionaires with six hot tubs. Families in small homes pay the same as corporations with sprawling estates.
And all of it is feeding the Net Zero subsidy machine.
6. Paying for Power We Don’t Get
Worse still, Britain is paying billions for electricity that never even reaches the grid.
Because of grid constraints, thousands of renewable projects are stuck in the queue, waiting for connections that may not come until the 2030s. Others are paid not to generate, because the grid can’t handle the surge.
Yet the subsidies keep flowing. We pay for “ghost power.” We pay for “curtailment.” We pay for “zombie projects” that may never deliver.
No business would survive with this model. But in Britain’s energy system, designed by politicians and rubber-stamped by quangos, it is written into law.
7. Who’s to Blame?
Let’s name names.
Tony Blair – created the legal framework.
Stephen Byers and Patricia Hewitt – drove it through Parliament.
Ed Miliband – doubled down in 2009, creating the most expensive subsidies in British history.
The Conservatives – failed to kill it in 2017, preferring to hide behind “green” rhetoric.
The Climate Change Committee (CCC) – the unelected quango that continues to dictate Britain’s carbon budgets, locking in costs by law.
This is not an accident. It is a deliberate stitch-up. It is the greatest transfer of wealth from working people to corporate lobbies in modern times.
8. Reform UK’s Answer
Enough is enough.
Reform UK will do what no other party dares:
Axe the Zombie Levies – scrap ROCs and all legacy subsidies by primary legislation. End the stealth tax by 2026.
Take Levies Off Bills – stop punishing households and businesses with hidden charges. If government wants to subsidise something, it should be funded openly from taxation, not buried in your energy bill.
Invest in Real Power – put money into Small Modular Reactors (SMRs), domestic gas, and rooftop solar films like Britain’s own Power Roll — not Chinese panels on farmland.
Grid First, Not Net Zero First – rebuild Britain’s transmission system before flooding it with unreliable power.
Energy Sovereignty – stop importing American wood pellets and Chinese solar panels. Britain should power Britain.
9. A Call to Arms
The Renewables Obligation is just one example of how Net Zero ideology has bankrupted our energy system. It is the clearest, most visible proof that this madness is not about saving the planet. It is about squeezing the public dry for decades to come.
If even the Telegraph is now admitting it, then the excuses are finished.
The truth is out. The question is what we do about it.
Reform UK is ready to tear up this stitch-up, scrap the zombie levies, and put Britain first.
If we don’t, the drain will continue until 2037. Every year, another £8 billion bled out of households and businesses. Every year, another £100 taken from your pocket to fund a system designed to fail.
This isn’t just incompetence. It’s theft, hidden in plain sight.
And it will only stop when we, the people, demand it.
SAY NO TO THE DESTRUCTION OF OUR LAND 
Leave a comment