As the UK’s Prime Minister struggles to remain in post, doubts arise regarding his ability to deliver the legislative programme set out in the King’s Speech delivered yesterday. If he fails to deliver the programme, it may be just as well, given that its contents are about as confused and dysfunctional as his government.

Whatever the desirability of airport expansion from the perspective of the UK economy (“Legislation will be introduced to unlock the benefits of airport expansion [Civil Aviation Bill]”) and expanding the road network “enable roads to be built at pace including the Lower Thames Crossing [Highways (Financing) Bill]”) such measures sit extremely uncomfortably alongside this government’s Net Zero agenda.

As for this:

My Ministers will also introduce legislation to enable peerages to be removed [Removal of Peerages Bill].

Perhaps the answer is to stop appointing dodgy people to the House of Lords. Or better still, expedite the proposal contained at page 108 of your general election manifesto:

Labour is committed to replacing the House of Lords with an alternative second chamber that is more representative of the regions and nations. Labour will consult on proposals, seeking the input of the British public on how politics can best serve them.

But I digress. There are some other issues that I wanted to talk about, such as this:

My Ministers believe that energy independence must be a long-term goal of national security and that the nation’s energy security requires long-term investment and reform, as demonstrated by recent events in the Middle East. Increased production of clean British energy will help to ensure that enemies of the United Kingdom cannot attack the economic security of the British people. My Ministers will therefore introduce an Energy Independence Bill to scale-up homegrown renewable energy and protect living standards for the long-term [Energy Independence Bill].

I don’t know how many times we have to point this out, but the extension of renewable energy in the UK is damaging the UK economy by increasing costs for both commercial and domestic energy users. It is leading to increased reliability on interconnectors with mainland Europe, as UK generation fails to come up to snuff. The interconnectors were supposed to be a two-way street, but whenever I look at the generation data, we seem to be importing quite a lot of electricity through them, regularly between 10% and 30% of our needs, and usually at high prices. I have just randomly checked the statistics, and I see that we’re currently importing a a net 14.7% of our electricity through the interconnectors, and the price is £127.02 per MWh as I write (it is £132.34 per MWh at the time of posting).(Gas is also generating more electricity than is being generated by renewables at this time). Indeed, for the whole of the past week, we have been importing a net 13.6% of our electricity, and the price has averaged £102.23 per MWh.

The interconnectors are vulnerable to hostile acts by bad actors, so I fail to see how all this “will help to ensure that enemies of the United Kingdom cannot attack the economic security of the British people.”

And there’s this:

My Government will remain a leading advocate for tackling climate change and achieving a world free from poverty.

It’s interesting to note that reality may be dawning. No longer does the government seem to be talking about “climate leadership” or the “Clean Power Alliance” (“a coalition of countries at the cutting edge of climate action”) (page 123 of the Labour Party manifesto). Gone is the restoration of “the strong global leadership needed to tackle the climate crisis”. No, now we’re reduced to being “a leading advocate for tackling climate change”. It’s good that the hubris is being diluted, or at least it would be if that were consistently the case. In the very next line of the King’s Speech we are told: “The United Kingdom will also take action to reduce humanitarian need and conflict around the world.” Amazing. I don’t know why we haven’t done this before. Who needs Superman?

Page 35 of the Labour Party Election Manifesto included this:

We will ensure our industrial strategy supports the development of the Artificial Intelligence (AI) sector, removes planning barriers to new datacentres.

This is something which is also missing from the King’s Speech, and perhaps that’s just as well too. But then again, the government made a pretty astonishing announcement about AI “Growth Zones” almost exactly six months ago. Perhaps, then, there was no need for it to feature in the King’s Speech. After all, the government is already rolling over to have its belly tickled, announcing things like “supporting all AI Growth Zones through the Connections Accelerator Service”; “Prioritising AI Growth Zones by reserving and reallocating grid capacity”; “to help prioritise projects identified by government as strategically important, such as AI Growth Zones, for grid connections”; discounts for “a 500 MW data centre this will be up to: £24/MWh in Scotland; £16/MWh in Cumbria; and £14/MWh in the North East…”.

How do AI datacentres fit in with “decarbonising the grid” by 2030 and Net Zero by 2050 (both of which are also government objectives)? Well, it’s fair to say that the Guardian seems to be extremely hostile to AI datacentres, and to be running a campaign against them and, as with all such Guardian campaigns, what they say must be treated with caution. Nevertheless, there seems to be quite a lot in the case that says that AI datacentres en masse are incompatible with “decarbonisation” and Net Zero objectives. An article that appeared on the Guardian website yesterday claims that “Datacentres using 6% of electricity supply in UK and US, research says – Industry body says energy consumption driven by AI up 15% globally in two years as it warns of societal backlash”.

In early 2025, the UK government estimated UK datacentres used 2.5% of electricity, but predicted this would increase fourfold by 2030. In the first half of 2025 the queue to connect to the grid grew by 460%.

The UK, where 5.9% of electricity is used by datacentres, and the US, where the figure is 6%, are well above the global average of 2%.

Earlier in the week, the Guardian also claimed that “Google developers significantly misstate carbon emissions of proposed UK datacentres – Emissions understated by factor of five in Essex plans for tech giant, while Greystoke’s Lincolnshire plans show similar error”.

“Google has serious questions to answer about its dubious datacentre pollution figures,” said Tim Squirrell, the head of strategy for Foxglove, which discovered the errors. “By comparing one year of datacentre emissions with five years of UK emissions, they’re making the environmental impact look five times smaller than it really is.”

He added: “Unless they can explain themselves, it looks like they are seriously misleading the council and the public over the climate pollution their facility will cause.”

These apparent misstatements are another example of a pile-up of faulty calculations surrounding AI development and its environmental footprint in the UK…

…The two government departments behind these plans appeared to differ on their estimates for how much UK energy datacentres will use – by a factor of 10….

Last month, the Guardian joined the dots – the ones the government is failing to join – even more explicity: “UK departments at odds over energy demands of AI datacentres – Discrepancy in forecasts raises questions over government planning for net zero”.

One vision of the UK’s future involves a decarbonised economy powered by clean, renewable energy. Another involves making the UK an AI superpower.

The government departments responsible for these two visions do not appear to have agreed on their numbers.

The Department of Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) thinks AI datacentres will consume 6GW of electricity by 2030. The Department of Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) appears to think they will use less than a tenth of that.

Tim Squirrell, the head of strategy for the NGO Foxglove, said: “The government’s cluelessness over the environmental impact of datacentres would be laughable, if it weren’t so alarming.”

I think that’s an appropriate point on which to end. The UK government, and its policies over a whole range of areas, but especially with regard to Net Zero, “decarbonisation” and energy policy, would be laughable if it weren’t all so terribly alarming.