TRAPPED: Nobody Asks Scotland · The chapters

Chapter 17: A Pound Spent in Croydon

"A pound spent in Croydon is far more of value to the country than a pound spent in Strathclyde."

Boris Johnson, Mayor of London, interview with HuffPost UK, 28 April 2012.

The state scores investment by the same geography its accounts bill Scotland for and charges Scotland most for the power it makes; neither is physics, both are rules, and the rules are held in London.

The receipts

The source list for this chapter, as the publisher maintains it. Archive links are given wherever a cited page could move or die.

• Boris Johnson interview: HuffPost UK, Chris Wimpress, "Job Creation Should Be The Mayor's Top Priority, Concludes LinkedIn Poll", 28 April 2012, 06:37 BST; the quoted paragraph verbatim, both limbs, "Strathclyde" throughout. Context: HuffPost/LinkedIn poll of Londoners before the 3 May 2012 mayoral election, question put to all three candidates. Corroboration: The Guardian, Aditya Chakrabortty, 30 April 2012 (links to and quotes the HuffPost primary); Hansard, Ian Blackford to Theresa May, PMQs, 19 June 2019 ("Strathclyde", unchallenged). The "strict utilitarian calculus"/"Hackney" variant appears in no primary source and is not printed; some sources misdate the interview to 2011 and 28 April 2012 is correct. registers/discarded-claims.md row on the quotation.
• HM Treasury, Green Book Review 2020: Findings and response, CP331, November 2020, verbatim: para 1.3 (why the review was set up), 1.9 ("not by itself found to skew outcomes"; "current appraisal practice risks undermining the Government's ambition to 'level up' poorer regions"), 1.12 (heavy reliance on a BCR "not aligned to the decision makers' objectives"), 1.17 ("ranked purely by their BCR with adjustments to that ranking made in an opaque fashion"), 2.23 (the "focus of appraisers on a UK-level BCR" sentence, whole), 2.27 (place-based analysis), 4.3 (SR2020 "bids were not ranked purely by their BCRs"). The review names England's regions, not Scotland; devolved administrations appear once, as consultees; the Scotland application is the book's stated inference..
• A428 Black Cat to Caxton Gibbet improvements scheme, full business case (updated July 2023), National Highways and the Department for Transport, published 22 February 2024: Table 0-2, document page 6 (initial BCR 0.92, adjusted BCR 1.63); strategic case, document pages 28-29 (agglomeration effects "decay over distance"; "for agglomeration to occur the relative travel times must be within 45 minutes") and document page 29, verbatim ("Of the £321m wider economic impacts calculated for the scheme agglomeration accounts for 91% of these benefits"). The strategic case's £321m and the updated economic table's £282.3m of wider impacts are different vintages within the same document; the £321m appears only inside the quotation and no arithmetic is performed on either figure..
• A417 Missing Link scheme, full business case, National Highways and the Department for Transport, published 30 June 2023: Table 0-1, document page 10 (initial BCR 1.14, adjusted BCR 1.99); document page 91, verbatim ("Whilst the benefits decay rapidly once journey times exceed 45 minutes, London and Reading have such large economic mass they still influence the traffic model results and gain benefits from the scheme"); safety case (fatal casualty rate "10 times higher than the national average for a similar road", paraphrased in the prose; 292 killed or seriously injured avoided)..
• HM Treasury, Green Book Review 2025: Findings and actions, June 2025, verbatim: para 1.5 ("insufficient progress"; "continuing to impede public investment in areas outside London and the south-east of England"); para 2.4 (no conclusive evidence of regional bias in the methodology); the six actions..
• HM Treasury, Green Book Review 2025: One year on, June 2026: para 1.9 ("sustained over time without the need for active policing from HM Treasury"); shortened Green Book published February 2026; discount-rate recommendation 3.5 to 3.0 per cent, not enacted; four place-based pilots (Liverpool, Birmingham, Port Talbot, Plymouth), expected autumn 2026; 14 business cases published, mixed departmental compliance..
• Centre for Cities: response to the 2020 Green Book review, 28 September 2020 (BCRs not themselves regionally biased; the competitive-bidding architecture is the problem); Henry Overman, 18 June 2025 ("went some way, but not all the way"; "added complexity rather than reducing it")..
• IPPR/IPPR North, 9 June 2025 (authors including Lord O'Neill): £140bn more for the North of England had it received London's per-head transport spending 2009-10 to 2022-23; per-head annual averages London £1,183, UK £603, North £486. Total transport spending, not capital only; the North of England, not Scotland; used as pattern only..
• HM Treasury, Country and Regional Analysis 2025, published 19 November 2025, Table A.8e (Accredited Official Statistics): transport capital per head computed from the CRA's own population base, five years as tabled; 2024-25 totals London £7,349m, Scotland £2,242m, UK £28,771m. Footnote 2 to A.8e: figures include HS2, allocated where construction happens..
• ONS, Country and Regional Public Sector Finances, FYE 2025, Table S6: Scotland £21,117 identifiable spending per head, 2024-25, highest of the twelve, £100 above London; as printed and sourced in Chapter 19; validated in against crpsf-fye2025-regional-per-head.csv.
• HS2 and Scotland: comparability factor 100 per cent for Scotland (HM Treasury, Statement of Funding Policy, Annex B); £545m consequentials on the northern-leg cancellation, 2023.; registers/discarded-claims.md HS2 row.
• Levelling Up Fund (£4.8bn) and UK Shared Prosperity Fund (£2.6bn) routed around Barnett under the United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 s.50: carried in Chapter 17 with its own sourcing; referenced here only.
• Barnett mechanics: HM Treasury, Statement of Funding Policy, 10th edition, November 2023, paras 3.7 to 3.9 (change in departmental spending, comparability factor, population share; "does not determine the total allocation"), para 2.6 (right to make allocations directly on top of the block grant). Non-statutory: HL Paper 139 glossary; Institute for Government explainer..
• Barnett repudiation, carried in one paragraph of indirect speech, no quotation printed: Lord Barnett, oral evidence to the House of Lords Select Committee on the Barnett Formula, 28 January 2009, HL Paper 139 evidence pp.1-10, Q31 ("I do not think it is fair", paraphrased as "in terms, that the formula carrying his name wasn't fair"); the committee's First Report, HL Paper 139, 17 July 2009 ("should no longer be used"; needs-based replacement); Government response, Cm 7772, December 2009, para 2.11 ("no plans"). Lord Barnett died 3 November 2014. The full evidence, the committee's membership, the Smith Commission continuation and the dates are Chapter 19's..
• Lottery regressivity: Theos, "The National Lottery: Is it Progressive?" (Paul Bickley, 2009): 1.84 per cent of household expenditure in the lowest income decile vs 0.64 per cent in the highest (Sawkins and Dickie, Family Expenditure Survey data); Theos/ComRes 2008 polling ("over three times as much" as a share of income); average stakes £7.20 Scotland, £5.55 GB, £5.95 London (one 2008 survey, flagged as a single data point in the prose); Theos's conclusion verbatim..
• Olympics lottery diversion: Horserace Betting and Olympic Lottery Act 2004 (Olympic Lottery Distribution Fund); £9.298bn package (House of Commons Library SN/SG/3790, 27 July 2010); £2.175bn lottery contribution and its tranches (Lord Gardiner, HL Deb 13 January 2015; the debate shows the tranches were not fully reconciled by the minister, stated in the prose); distributor table for the £1,085m (HC Deb 22 March 2007, cc1053-4W, via SN/SG/3790 Table 4): sportscotland £13.1m, Scottish Arts Council £12.5m, Scottish Screen £1.8m, £27.4m in total from Scottish distributors; £675m repayment from Olympic Park land sales, nothing received (National Lottery Community Fund annual report 2025-26); GLA share of net proceeds expected 2029, "substantially lower" (Civil Society, 18 August 2026; Third Sector); Jay Kennedy, Directory of Social Change, verbatim..
• Lottery aggregate fairness: Scotland Office, 19 November 2014: Scotland "contributed to and benefited from over £2.6 billion" of £32bn UK good-causes funding, about 8.1 per cent against 8.2 per cent of population. registers/discarded-claims.md lottery row.
• Duty reservation: Scotland Act 1998, Schedule 5, Head A1; untouched by the 2012 and 2016 Acts. GERS apportionment by consumption: GERS Detailed Revenue Methodology 2023-24, pp.24-25 ("the burden of duty is borne by the final consumer"). Duty figures: GERS 2025-26, August 2026, Table 1.3: tobacco £769m, alcohol £1,041m (the tables workbook's Table_A.5 carries prior-year central estimates and is not used)..
• Tobacco cost: Scottish Government, Public Service Reform Strategy, June 2025, Annex A Figs 1 and 3 (Landman Economics, £1.56bn in 2024); confirmed in Scottish Parliament written answer S6W-39516 (Jenni Minto, 18 August 2025), verbatim: "a public spending cost of smoking to Scotland, including wider costs to the health service, social care and responding to fire-related incidents, of £1.56bn in 2024, projected to reach £2.5 billion by 2035-36." NHS-only estimates £172m to £509m, stated in the prose as under the duty..
• Alcohol costs: health and social care £500m to £700m (Social Market Foundation 2023, via Scottish Government FOI 202400441124); £5bn to £10bn societal figures not budget-comparable; no headline printed, per registers/discarded-claims.md alcohol row.
• MUP sequence: Alcohol (Minimum Pricing) (Scotland) Act 2012, Royal Assent 29 June 2012; licence-condition mechanism under the Licensing (Scotland) Act 2005; Scotch Whisky Association v Lord Advocate: Outer House [2013] CSOH 70; Inner House reference of six questions, 3 July 2014; CJEU C-333/14, 23 December 2015; Inner House [2016] CSIH 77, 21 October 2016; UKSC hearing 24-25 July 2017, judgment 15 November 2017 ([2017] UKSC 76, Lord Mance, unanimous; sequence at para 2); commenced 1 May 2018 at 50p per unit; continued by order April 2024; 65p from 30 September 2024. Devolution point settled after Imperial Tobacco v Lord Advocate [2012] UKSC 61.; registers/discarded-claims.md MUP row.
• Welfare mitigation: DHP bedroom-tax mitigation £20m (2013-14) to £74.84m (2024-25), cumulative £618.34m, 100 per cent Scottish-funded since April 2017 (Scottish Government FOI 202400423770); benefit-cap DHP £27.80m (from 2021-22); total pure mitigation £646.14m, printed as £646 million with the benefit cap counted alongside. The "sliver" and "most of that bill" sentence rests on the same dossier's finding (mitigation 2.0 to 2.6 per cent of the cumulative social-protection gap; devolved benefits £6,034.85m in 2024-25, GERS Table 3.5), with no figure printed: the size and composition treatment is Chapter 19's., 6; registers/discarded-claims.md welfare-mitigation row.
• Museums: DCMS grant-in-aid to its 15 sponsored national museums £484m in 2024-25, 13 of 15 in London (NAO, financial resilience of DCMS-sponsored museums, March 2026); British Museum £74.2m (2024-25 accounts); National Museums Scotland £27.8m and National Galleries of Scotland £23.0m, both from the Scottish block grant. Visitor-survey allocation of the London museums (CRA methodology workbook, DCMS rows) and the culture-per-head table carried in Chapter 19, referenced here only. "No say", never "no share", per the 24 August 2026 correction..
• Demography and migration: National Records of Scotland, Scotland's Population 2024 (Registrar General's Annual Review), 2 December 2025: 46,400 births, 62,000 deaths, natural decrease 15,600; verbatim: "There were more deaths than births so the population would have gone down without migration"; 2022-based projections, all growth to mid-2047 from migration. Rural Visa Pilot: Scottish Government proposal published September 2022; endorsed by the Scottish Parliament 29 September 2022, 79 votes to 29; never opened; still proposed, with a Scottish Visa and Scottish Graduate Visa, in the Scottish Government's response to the UK Immigration White Paper 2025 (gov.scot, Tailored Migration Proposals, p.6). Item 7.
• Asylum dispersal: NAO, The Home Office's asylum accommodation contracts, HC 874, 7 May 2025 (dispersal contracts from 2000-01; Mears holds the Scotland contract; Figure 3: no large sites or vessels ever used in Scotland). SPICe briefing SJSS/S6/24/6/1, 23 February 2024, p.4 (Glasgow the only dispersal region in Scotland for around 20 years; full dispersal from 2022). Glasgow City 56.6 asylum seekers per 10,000, second-highest UK local authority (Home Office data via Full Fact). Somerville letter, 25 February 2024, verbatim ("announced prior to any consultation"); Robison letter to Priti Patel, 21 October 2021, verbatim ("I note that you did not inform Scottish Ministers of these new plans"; "This approach is not acceptable") (gov.scot correspondence pages). New Scots Refugee Integration Strategy 2024, 28 March 2024, Scottish Government/COSLA/Scottish Refugee Council, vision verbatim. Barge refusal: Susan Aitken, 7 August 2023, via STV News, verbatim. Funding: Home Office Full Dispersal Grant £3,500 per new occupied bedspace plus one-off £750 per person (Home Office funding instructions via local-authority committee papers). Glasgow homelessness overspend £27m in 2024-25, projected £43m and £66m (Glasgow City Council figures reported 18 August 2025, Scottish Housing News); Aitken "machine that creates homeless refugees" quote, same report. Items 1-6.
• Cameron Barracks, Inverness: Highland Council news releases, 28 October 2025 ("Plans to house asylum seekers in Inverness"; formal notification 27 October 2025; joint statement Lobban/Bremner/Christie), 14 November 2025 (joint letter; Bremner verbatim: "While welcoming people in need and seeking safety, elected members last week raised a number of valid concerns about this proposal and the way it has been communicated"), 27 November 2025 (no management plan or funding clarity; Bremner verbatim: "meaningful engagement from the Home Office"; "tolerance, compassion, and humanity"); STV News, 20 January 2026 (council verbatim: "We have had no confirmation on arrival date, nor replies to letters sent to the Home Office"; delay to April 2026; £1.3m refurbishment). Special council meeting 6 November 2025. All captured to Wayback, 24 August 2026 and prior (capture log in). registers/discarded-claims.md row 30 (the Western Isles/Shetland/Orkney claim discarded; Cameron Barracks substituted).
• Compiled dossiers (24 August 2026, eight strands); data validation in From old chapter 21:
• Ofgem, Benchmark Maximum Charges for the Charge Restriction Period 17a, covering 1 October to 31 December 2026: the fourteen-region electricity table, Other Payment Method, single-rate metering, at nil consumption and at Ofgem's 2,500 kWh benchmark. Merseyside and Northern Wales £943.50; Southern Scotland £876.79; Northern Scotland £859.91 (eighth of fourteen); London £821.53, with fixed charges of £246.95 and £156.64 at the two ends. All values exclusive of VAT, in Ofgem's own words. The regional tables are not readable on Ofgem's web page; they are in this document, linked from the price cap page. Saved. Two secondary tabulations consulted first both misdescribed the position and were discarded; see §4.
• The components of a network charge (operating costs, depreciation, and a regulated return on capital), and the fact that the asset base does not amortise to zero because new investment continuously enters it: §1. NESO's description of transmission charges as recovering the cost of "installing and maintaining" the system is quoted from NESO's own charging material.
• Péréquation tarifaire: §5.
• Postal Services Act 2011, section 31: the universal postal service at affordable prices "in accordance with a public tariff which is uniform throughout the United Kingdom". gov.uk and checked for amendment.
• CORRECTION LOGGED 26 August 2026. Two statements in this chapter claimed that household standing charges in the north of Scotland were among the dearest in Britain: the question opening "The obvious question", and the third fact in "Side by side". Ofgem's own table puts Northern Scotland eighth of fourteen. Both have been corrected. The naive question now asks why none of the exported surplus reaches the bill, which needs no ranking and which the section's three-part answer already answers. The chapter must not claim, anywhere, that Scotland pays the most in Britain.
• NESO, Final TNUoS Tariffs for 2026/27, Version 1.0, January 2026, Table 2 (Generation Wider Tariffs): Zone 1 (North Scotland) intermittent generation example tariff £27.137522/kW; Zone 27 (West Devon and Cornwall) −£8.459911/kW; the "generation adjustment" keeping total generator recovery "within the range of €0-2.50/MWh on average". Saved; Wayback capture confirmed 26 August 2026. The example tariffs are the table's intermittent-generation class (45 per cent load factor), the relevant class for wind; printed rounded to £27.14 and £8.46.
• NESO, Five-Year View of TNUoS Tariffs for 2026/27-2030/31, Version 3.0, 18 September 2025. Saved.
• David Bol, "Transmission charging regime 'not fit for purpose' as Scottish renewable projects braced for £1bn bill", The Scotsman, 7 June 2026: the NESO FOI forecast for 2030/31 (£669m north of Scotland, £291m central and southern Scotland, £436m net received in England and Wales); Claire Mack quoted verbatim and in full; the article's own caution that transmission charges do not directly impact energy bills. Archived snapshot confirmed (web.archive.org/web/20260617214031); full text saved.
• Scottish Renewables / TEL (The Energy Landscape), Transmission Charging in Scotland: Jeopardising Britain's Energy Transition, 24 February 2026: the £2.9 billion increase against point of investment (or 2015); the 500MW worked example (£13m in 2025 to £27m by the end of the decade); the cost-reflectivity design principle stated; the retained EU cap identified. Saved.
• Regulation (EU) 838/2010, retained in UK law at EU exit: the €0-2.50/MWh cap on average transmission charges recovered from generators, confirmed in NESO's 2026/27 tariff document and referenced in ENTSO-E's synthesis.
• RenewableUK, Charging the wrong way: How electricity generators access the GB market, 24 May 2021, citing ENTSO-E, Overview of Transmission Tariffs in Europe: Synthesis 2019: 20 of 36 surveyed countries levied no transmission charge on generators; Germany and the Netherlands named. Saved. The 2021 report's per-MWh comparison (£6.42 Scotland, £0.49 England and Wales, £0.46 European average) is 2021/22 GB data against 2019 European data and is not printed; ENTSO-E's Synthesis 2023 (saved ) puts the current European generator average materially higher (1.22 €/MWh), which is the basis of the sentence "the figures on both sides have moved since".
• DESNZ, Electricity generation and supply in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and England 2020-2024 and Regional renewable electricity in 2024, both published December 2025: 51.9 TWh generated in Scotland in 2024, 18.2 per cent of the UK's 285 TWh; 90.0 per cent low-carbon; renewable generation in England "around two and a half times that for Scotland"; transfers of 17 TWh to England and 2.5 TWh to Northern Ireland. Carried in §2.6.
• Scottish Government, Energy Statistics for Scotland Q3 2025, published 18 December 2025: 17.8 GW operational renewable capacity at 30 September 2025, up 4.5 per cent year on year.
• Crown Estate Scotland, "ScotWind rapid review" (explainer page) and "Crown Estate Scotland completes ScotWind Leasing review", 24 March 2021: the dated sequence (June 2020 launch, £10,000/km² cap; rapid review with advice from Aurora Energy Research and JLL; cap raised tenfold to £100,000/km² on 24 March 2021; applications closed 16 July 2021; results January 2022, 20 projects, £755m); the rationale for the original cap; Amanda Bryan and Roseanna Cunningham quoted verbatim from the 24 March 2021 release; the Aurora advice that £100,000/km² "should not disadvantage Scottish projects compared to English ones". Saved and; Wayback capture confirmed 26 August 2026.
• The Crown Estate, Offshore Wind Leasing Round 4 results, announced February 2021: £879 million a year in option fees from six projects under open, uncapped bidding, payable annually to a maximum of ten years until final planning consent. Annual basis confirmed 26 August 2026 from Aurora Energy Research's report for Crown Estate Scotland, 2 March 2021, p4, whose results table is denominated in £/MW/year; see addendum §1. Reported via Crown Estate Scotland's own review account and §2.7.
• Shona Robison, Finance Secretary, Scottish Parliament, 23 January 2024: "Any money that is drawn down from ScotWind is used to support the budget, so, in essence, it is used to support public services"; the £350 million drawdown. Carried in §2.7; Official Report column to be pulled directly before verification.
• Ofgem: final approval of Eastern Green Link 2 (2GW HVDC cable, Peterhead to England, estimated £2.1 billion); the up-to-£70 billion estimate of UK transmission investment need by 2030; approval of NESO's TMO4+ connection-reform package, 15 April 2025 ("first ready and needed"). SSEN Transmission: Pathway to 2030, £7bn+ north of Scotland investment (July 2022); National Wealth Fund £800 million guarantee. Primary Ofgem decision documents to be opened directly before verification.
• DESNZ, Review of Electricity Market Arrangements: Summer Update, 10 July 2025: zonal pricing rejected; "reformed national pricing". Ofgem, Call for Input on Locational Charges and Regulatory Siting Levers Under Reformed National Pricing, closed 26 May 2026; Locational Charges Design Group convened after that date. Carried in §2.9 and §5(c). No reform decision taken as of 26 August 2026.
• Scottish Government, Scottish House Condition Survey: 2024 Key Findings, published 24 February 2026: 28.7 per cent of households (approximately 732,000) in fuel poverty in 2024, down from 33.9 per cent (859,000) in 2023; 14.0 per cent (357,000) in extreme fuel poverty; the survey's attribution of the fall to lower energy prices; the statutory definition (fuel costs above 10 per cent of adjusted net income after housing costs, with a residual-income test; "satisfactory heating regime" is the definition's own phrase).
• Same source, section 3, for the closing line: fuel poverty by household type, where families are at 25 per cent and 9 per cent in extreme fuel poverty, against older households at 30 per cent (16 per cent extreme) and other households at 15 per cent extreme. Also published there and not printed in this chapter: social sector 49 per cent in fuel poverty and 22 per cent extreme, against private sector 22 and 11; and a median fuel poverty gap of £1,030 in 2024, down from £1,250, or £770 adjusted to 2015 prices. NOTE FOR THE AUTHOR: families are the LEAST affected of the three household types, below the 28.7 per cent all-household rate printed earlier in "Side by side". "A quarter" is therefore the conservative figure and cannot be attacked as cherry-picked, but the chapter should never imply families are the worst hit, because the survey says they are not.
• SUPERSEDED 26 August 2026. This entry formerly recorded, from secondary trackers, that households in the north of Scotland were at the high end of Great Britain for standing charges. Ofgem's own table for the current cap period shows otherwise and is now cited above: Northern Scotland is eighth of fourteen. The secondary trackers were wrong and are discarded.
• Compiled dossier:, 26 August 2026, including the full source and archive log.
• Publication review additions, 9 October 2026 (the advocate merge; each tag is the edit it sources): - (17-A03#1) (1) Scotland Act 1998, Schedule 5, Part II, Head D (Energy), Section D1, Electricity: 'Generation, transmission, distribution and supply of electricity. The subject-matter of Part II of the Electricity Act 1989.' Exceptions: 'The subject-matter of Part I of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. The provision of consumer advocacy and advice by, or by agreement with, a public body or the holder of a public office, but not any related compulsory levy on persons supplying, generating, transmitting or distributing electricity.' https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/46/schedule/5 (archived: https://web.archive.org/web/20261009092625/https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/46/schedule/5). (2) Utilities Act 2000, Schedule 1, para 1(1): 'The Authority shall consist of a chairman, and no fewer than two other members, appointed by the Secretary of State.'; para 2(2): terms 'determined by the Secretary of State'. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2000/27/schedule/1 (archived: https://web.archive.org/web/20261009092716/https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2000/27/schedule/1). (3) Utilities Act 2000, s.5(1): the Authority 'shall... make to the Secretary of State a report (the "annual report" for that year)'; s.5(2)(d), contents include 'such other matters as the Secretary of State may from time to time require'. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2000/27/section/5 (archived: https://web.archive.org/web/20261009092820/https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2000/27/section/5). (4) Energy Act 2023, s.162(1): 'The Secretary of State may by notice designate a person as the ISOP'; s.162(4): 'The Secretary of State may by notice revoke a person's designation'. s.165(1): the ISOP 'must... have regard to the strategic priorities set out in the current strategy and policy statement'. s.171(2): advice on request goes to 'a Minister of the Crown' and 'the GEMA'. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/52/section/162 (archived: https://web.archive.org/web/20261009093211/https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/52/section/162); https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/52/section/165 (archived: https://web.archive.org/web/20261009093308/https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/52/section/165); https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/52/section/171 (archived: https://web.archive.org/web/20261009093321/https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/52/section/171). (5) Energy Act 2013, s.131(1)-(2): the strategy and policy statement is 'prepared by the Secretary of State' and designated by the Secretary of State; s.135(4): required consultees 'the Authority, the Independent System Operator and Planner, the Scottish Ministers, and the Welsh Ministers'; s.135(8): it must be approved 'by a resolution of each House of Parliament'. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2013/32/section/131 (archived: https://web.archive.org/web/20261009092931/https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2013/32/section/131); https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2013/32/section/135 (archived: https://web.archive.org/web/20261009093059/https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2013/32/section/135)
• The no-withdrawal negative: recorded search of 10 October 2026 (the HuffPost primary carries no correction notice; news coverage through the 2019 hustings found no withdrawal, correction or apology).

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