Quote:
Originally Posted by rhyds
Not Really
If you haven't noticed, the world oil price is down as well, leading to lost jobs in the oil and gas industry. Also, oil and gas are in much higher demand than coal.
Mining is skilled, dangerous and most of all deeply unattractive work. You can't just send Job Centre Johnny off underground. It's going to cost millions and take years to train them and for what? Coal mining is a dying industry, and has been since the 1970s. You might as well train them as betamax video repairmen for all the use it'll be.
As for OAPs benefiting from cheap fuel, how many people actually have a proper fireplace at home any more? 85% of homes use gas. You can't burn lumps of coal in a gas boiler.
There are many. Our deep mines are expensive and inefficient for one thing.
Why would you dig coal out of the ground here for (say) £120/tonne when you can buy it from the open market for £80/tonne?
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Because Arthur thinks it's a good idea and it'll give him an excuse for blaming the Tories for the extra costs which will have to be made up from higher taxes and/or prices in one way or another.