John Redwood: Labour is sorely mistaken if they think Starmer is ‘having a good war’

Sir John, now Lord, Redwood is a former MP for Wokingham and a former Secretary of State for Wales.

Labour think the Prime Minister is having a good war. If only.

For 48 hours he denied the US President use of US bases on UK territory. This angered the President and kept the UK out of the crucial discussions of what if anything to do about Iran and her proxies. Then the PM did a U turn and allowed their use. He awoke to the uncomfortable fact that whilst he might think he could keep us out of harm’s way by distancing us from the US, Iran saw it differently and attacked UK personnel and assets in the Middle East anyway.

The UK had regardless been actively indecisive before the war started.

The governmentdid reinforce the Cyprus base and send more warplanes there, whilst failing to send a destroyer to give the base better air cover. At the same time inexplicably the UK decommissioned its last destroyer in Bahrain and recalled our last minesweeper from the Gulf. Our minesweeper capability had been an important part of allied planning to keep shipping lanes open in a dangerous part of the seas. It was also a defensive, not an aggressive naval presence which should have been to the PM ‘s lawyerly liking.

The PM decided it was popular to disagree with President Trump , but not popular to undermine the US defence relationship to lose US force to help protect us. The PM decided some war to be called defensive was fine, but more war to pre-empt or disable Iran was not fine. He hoped fence sitting would let him control both sides. Instead it impaled him painfully on his own incompetence.

These nuances got blown away as the President took a simple view. You either fully support them as an ally, or you are a problem to be criticised and disadvantaged. The US relationship was already much damaged by the Mandelson appointment. Starmer’s choice of Ambassador took a memory trip to Epstein land into the Oval office whenever he went to meetings there.

The problem the PM faces is what now happens to the UK and the economy.

Seen by Iran, the Houthis and Hezbollah as an enemy our ships and people are at risk despite Starmer’s legalistic positioning. The US is not listening to advice from the UK or EU on the legal and practical limits to bombing. The UK is going to suffer from the stop on Gulf  trade and the serious damage to Middle Eastern oil, gas , refined products and chemicals output.

The Prime Minister tries to portray an image of calm, but to many of us it looks like ignorant inaction, fearing the reality of energy and food shortages and higher prices.

If the US, Israel and Iran continue this war, energy, fertiliser, microprocessors and food are going to get scarcer and prices will rise faster. Central Banks may add to the deflationary impact of high energy costs, tipping many countries into recession. They have a habit of responding to supply shock price rises with recession inducing higher interest rates. The Bank of England regularly goes on the hunt to create a downturn. Look at 1974, 1979, 1989, 2008, 2022.

The UK government is driving through policies which are destined to make it more difficult for the UK to avoid one of the worst outcomes, as forecast by the OECD. Its stubborn refusal to extract more of our own oil and gas makes us more dependent on dear and scarce imports. Its high energy costs have closed two of our six refineries already and a big part of our chemical industry. The UK will have to  pay penal prices to buy in what is needed through imports and will have to cut back on consumption.

Net zero zealotry means shortages and rationing by price or law beckon.

The idiotic policy of  paying farmers grants to wild their land or to convert it to solar farms will reduce our proportion of home grown food just as food gets scarcer and dearer on world markets. Farmers are replacing crops with wild flowers and Chinese solar panels. Banning new petrol car production will lead to nearly new petrol car imports and shortages.

The government this summer will be dragged into bigger subsidies to those on benefits to offset price pressures on energy and food. This will swell borrowing , keeping interest rates and mortgages higher for longer. It may lead to yet higher taxes on those who do have jobs or run businesses, in another bout of unfairness and anti business policy making.

The correct response to a supply collapse from restricted imports must be an urgent expansion of home production. So lift the bans on new oil and gas, on petrol car manufacture, on new building projects. Remove carbon taxes and cut tax on energy.  Spend farm grants on promoting more home grown food. Refine more oil, make more fertiliser, produce more chemicals at home.

Why is this government so anti jobs and pro putting more people on benefits? Why does it want to close most high energy using  businesses to rely on imports? Why does it think more EU laws and taxes will bring anything other than more misery and slower growth?

Being the Benefits party, not the Labour party is the last thing we need. Meanwhile the PM poses for the cameras and jets around the world burning scarce fuel. He conjures fantasy coalitions of the willing to offer non-existent forces to keep a peace the combatants have not called. The PM wants international courts and the UN to dictate outcomes which usually turn out to be harmful to the UK.

The government’s policy to demand de-escalation of this bad war is completely detached from reality.

The PM says this but is not negotiating with the warring countries and terrorist groups who could bring it about. We all want an end to the war, Prime Minister. We also want an end to terrorist attacks on people and shipping.

The question is what are you going to do to help?