Following the conclusion of the Labour Party Conference, many press and people are saying the main takeaway is that Labour are obsessed with the Reform Party. But take a step back, look at how the press covers Reform – allowing them to control the headlines and conversations. Read the news articles, comparing policies of each parties to Reforms – not to other parties, just to Reform.

So let’s take some of the bigger announcements from the conference which may have gone missing in some of new headlines since……

Energy

Fracking will be banned permanently in England under a new law that will be brought in, as announced by Energy Secretary Ed Milliband. The government want to focus efforts on the renewable energy sector and want clean power to meet 95% of electricity by 2030.

To drive this target, Ed Milliband announced the expansion of Great British Energy’s scheme to install solar panels on roofs of schools and hospitals. There will also be a boost in jobs in the clean energy sector and improve workers rights.

This is a big step forward in terms of fracking and clean energy. Fracking has been long opposed by communities and the drive away from fossil fuels means there is no need for fracking. More investment in clean renewable energy is needed, especially to meet the demand that will prevail going forward. Solar panels on top of publicly owned buildings is also a giant plus.

You can argue all you like about climate change and the race to net zero, but these buildings will be producing their own electricity for the first time. That helps towards a cleaner energy future and the keep costs low. As the classic saying goes – if we are wrong about climate change what will be so wrong? Cleaner Renewable Energy.

There was also a discussion in a fringe event where the Energy Minister, Michael Shanks, made a comment about the government reducing energy bills. Apparently they are considering removing policy costs from energy bills to make electricity cheaper. Policy Costs are government taxes used to fund environmental and social schemes. If that were to go ahead, it would lower the intake of taxes to help with environmentally friendly policies, but it would help the bills for the public which is a big help.

Immigration

The new Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, announced some changes to immigration policy in efforts to “do whatever it takes to secure our borders”.

Migrants will have to meet new conditions in order to qualify for indefinite leave to remain. These standards are as following:

• Learn English to a high standard.
• Clean Criminal Record.
• Volunteer in their community.

On top of that the government are also going to increase the time period before migrants can apply for indefinite leave to remain from 5 years to 10 years.

I get that the government are trying to take a stronger stance on immigration than perhaps former Labour governments have, and I do praise them for trying. Where I do have to disagree is an approach on just trying to bring figures down. Immigration has brought so many positives to this country, the vast majority of people in this country are here because of immigration at some point in history.

We’ve got industries that are struggling with filling vacancies and immigration can help with that. Get those vacancies filled and help push on with growing the economy and get public services working again for people.

The problem in this country isn’t going to be sorted by limiting those people we need, this country could be far more advanced in it’s economic growth and quality of public services if we actually treated migrants with the positive energy that we always say they bring.

Yes we need to stop those who have got criminal convictions coming in and those who pose a threat to this country. But let’s not stop those who will benefit us, let’s use them to our benefit.

There is far more that has come out of the conference and in this coming week it’s the Tories turn.

Tomorrow I will post about Rachel Reeves and the economy.