Just Stop Oil protesters “wrong” and “arrogant”, Keir Starmer says

Keir Starmer has described Just Stop Oil protesters as “arrogant”, claiming that the decision by the demonstrators to block roads is “wrong”.

In an LBC interview this morning, the Labour leader was asked whether his party in government would ensure that there is “genuinely no more new oil and gas, as Just Stop Oil are asking for”.

Starmer said: “Let me just deal with Just Stop Oil because I think they’re wrong, I think their action is wrong. I particularly think about the images we’ve seen of ambulances coming down the road and not being able to get through because people have glued themselves to the road.

“Fiona, my mum was very ill all of her life. She was in those ambulances when she was alive and there will be other families who are listening to this who are in the same situation. I think it’s arrogant.”

Starmer described the caller’s “underlying” question as “really important”, saying: “I do think the action we take in the next few years… will be absolutely determinative. We won’t get to net zero in 2050 if we don’t take the right measures now and that’s why we’ve set out our green prosperity plan.”

Starmer told listeners that renewables are nine times cheaper than gas, adding: “So there’s no argument for not going for renewables. I think we can have clean power by 2030 and that will do four things…

“Firstly, it will bring our bills down – desperately needed for families this winter. Second, it will give us security. If we use renewables here in Britain then we’re not exposed to the international market. Putin doesn’t get to put his foot on our throats.

“Third thing is: there’s a huge next generation of jobs bound up in renewables, and the fourth thing is that we’ve of course got to be serious about our climate obligations. So we’ve brought that together. I think this is a once-in-a-generation opportunity, Fiona, so I’m absolutely up for that.”

Rachel Reeves announced plans for new green infrastructure including “clean” steel plants, battery factories and “renewable ready” ports funded through a ‘national wealth fund’ amounting to £8bn at Labour’s annual conference.

The Labour leader added this morning: “It’s arrogant of those gluing themselves to roads to think they’re the only people who have got the answer to this. They haven’t got the answer and I don’t know how they can look in the eye the families who have got someone in the back of an ambulance, they certainly wouldn’t be able to look me in the eye if it was my mum.”

Starmer also promised there would be no new oil and gas licences granted under a Labour government. “We accept there’s got to be a transition, so where there is oil and gas already being yielded that needs to continue as part of the transition, but no new sites, no new fields to be opened,” he said.

“We can double our onshore wind, we can triple our solar energy and we can quadruple our offshore wind –and the sooner we do that, the better. I do think that new nuclear, as well, and hydrogen are part of the equation.”

Videos shared online show a fire engine and an ambulance unable to get through traffic after Just Stop Oil protesters blocked three roads in West London earlier this month. A London Fire Brigade spokesperson confirmed that an engine was “temporarily” stopped but “arrived within 14 minutes of being called”.