One of the Ukip manifesto pledges that’s making certain types a bit grumpy today is a pledge to abolish the Department for Energy and Climate Change. Unite has said that this ‘beyond barmy and would create chaos’.
Unite is a union and is naturally keen to support the jobs of those who work for DECC and in industries covered by the department. But this particular Ukip policy might be one that a party of government ends up adopting. Nigel Farage’s party’s manifesto said today that DECC should be abolished because its ‘essential powers and functions can be merged into other departments’. Influential Tories agree with this: in 2013, the Free Enterprise Group of Conservative MPs published a pamphlet written by Dominic Raab called ‘Weight Watchers for Whitehall’ which proposed cutting nine departments, including a merger of DECC with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. It said:
‘The division of environmental responsibilities between two departments has led to duplicated spending.
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