Wasting Millions of Pounds and Thousands of Lives

In response to the news that the Government is introducing offshore processing of asylum seekers in Rwanda, Emily Fielder, Head of Communications at the Adam Smith Institute, said:

“The Prime Minister has called the Government's decision to send asylum seekers to offshore processing centres 'innovative.' This overlooks the fact that Australia already has such a system in place; one which has been criticised for its failure to ensure basic human rights - hardly a model the UK should be following.

The inhumanity of this policy aside, it will neither deter asylum seekers from crossing the channel, nor will it cost the Government less. Rather than throwing out ineffective red-meat policies which will cost the British taxpayer millions of pounds, the Home Office should should work more constructively with European partners, and focus on evidence-based solutions to reducing dangerous asylum seeker crossings.”

Notes to editors:  

For further comments or to arrange an interview, contact Emily Fielder, emily@adamsmith.org | 0758 477 8207.

The Adam Smith Institute is a free market, neoliberal think tank based in London. It advocates classically liberal public policies to create a richer, freer world.

The new Energy Security Strategy lacks basic arithmetic

In response to the Government’s Energy Security Strategy, Tim Ambler, Senior Fellow of the ASI, said:

“The authors of “Energy Security Strategy” have not heeded the advice of a previous Energy Chief Scientific Advisor, Professor Sir David Mackay, who wrote that his “sole recommendation is this: Make sure your policies include a plan that adds up!” Unfortunately, the new Strategy does not.
The best part is the recognition, at last, of the importance of nuclear to provide the baseload for wind and solar. The Prime Minister claims that 95 percent of energy needs will be low carbon generation by 2030, but Hinkley Point C will be the only nuclear plant planned to be operating by then, contributing seven percent. And if North Sea oil and gas are to be ramped up, we will apparently be relying on carbon capture and storage, which are untried technologies at scale.

Storage can provide some shifting of peaks to troughs and hydrogen will be the main means of that, albeit wastefully. It is not an energy source itself: of the electricity used to make either form of hydrogen, you only get about half back when you use the electricity it generates.

Transmission losses and risks are not addressed at all. Weather volatility apart, cyber antagonists could crash the whole grid, and the UK still seems to be lacking any kind of back-up in either eventuality.

Unfortunately, this Energy Security Strategy fails on electricity usage, capacity, storage and, most of all, arithmetic.”

Notes to editors:  

For further comments or to arrange an interview, contact Emily Fielder, emily@adamsmith.org | 0758 477 8207.

The Adam Smith Institute is a free market, neoliberal think tank based in London. It advocates classically liberal public policies to create a richer, freer world.

Emancipate Channel 4 from State Ownership

In response to the news that the Government is set to go ahead with the privatisation of Channel 4, Emily Fielder, Head of Communications at the Adam Smith Institute, said: 

The Government’s decision to privatise Channel 4 is a welcome one. There is no need for the Channel to remain in public ownership- the current funding model provides little demonstrable benefit to the taxpayer, and the UK does not require two state broadcasters. 

Channel 4 has the potential to flourish in a free market, but its progress is currently hindered by its lack of access to private funding and capital, and its own intellectual property. Emancipating it from state ownership would allow it to compete effectively with streaming services, without requiring recourse to state funding, benefitting both taxpayers and the broadcaster in the process.

ENDS

Notes to editors:  

For further comments or to arrange an interview, contact Emily Fielder, emily@adamsmith.org | 0758 477 8207.

The Adam Smith Institute is a free market, neoliberal think tank based in London. It advocates classically liberal public policies to create a richer, freer world.