The language of “job creation” is seductive, but Ed Miliband’s promise to create 400,000 ‘new’ green jobs is deceiving, writes Matthew Bowles

Ed Miliband is back in the headlines, dusting off a familiar pledge: a “Green New Deal” involving a promise to deliver 400,000 new jobs in clean energy, doubling the existing opportunities in the sector by 2030. It’s a big round number designed to inspire hope, suggesting that Britain’s green transition will not only decarbonise but enrich us all as well.

On paper, the promise of green jobs has obvious appeal: a booming sector that puts people to work, while making the economy greener. But headline figures rarely tell the whole story. These “new” jobs are usually displaced roles shuffled around the economy, with no absolute guarantee of a net gain, and potential losses elsewhere.

The language of “job creation” is seductive. But economies aren’t built on Whitehall spreadsheets where ministers can simply insert a number in the “employment” column. Jobs are the product of investment, competition and productivity. When governments attempt to micromanage employment, the results are usually wasteful and distorted.

Energy jobs are no different. Every worker trained as a wind technician is one fewer worker available to build refineries, to drill, to manufacture or to innovate in other sectors. Pretending otherwise is political theatre. Even if we got 400,000 green jobs in the next five years, it is likely we will have lost more jobs than that elsewhere as a direct result of green policies.

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