Britain has been here before. When essentials become unaffordable and institutions lose public confidence, communities themselves have the potential to find bold new solutions to the challenges of the day.
At the end of the 18th century, as war, enclosure and speculation pushed bread prices beyond reach, riots erupted across the country. But in Hull, working people built something more enduring: pooling savings to create the Anti-Mill Society, a co-operative mill to make food “convenient for the lowest capacity”. It lasted a century and inspired models across Britain.
Fuel prices, as much as food prices, drive today’s cost of living crisis. Millions face fuel poverty, with every Ofgem price cap announcement bringing fresh anxiety. Meanwhile, the government sends mixed signals: wavering on green targets, trailing cuts to insulation schemes, voicing uncertainty over offshore wind investment. Research from the Social Market Foundation shows nearly half of Britons feel the net zero transition is happening to them, not with them, and the government’s polling shows most expect it to raise their costs. That is not the basis for a rapid clean power shift.
Yet local self-determination never disappeared. Across the Humber from Hull, Grimsby Community Energy installs solar on public buildings, cutting bills and reinvesting profits locally. In Bristol’s Lawrence Weston, an area with high fuel poverty, Ambition Lawrence Weston operates the country’s largest onshore wind turbine, 100 per cent community-owned and projected to generate £40,000 annually for local services. Energise Barnsley, a community-council partnership, has cut energy costs for social housing residents by as much as half. In Enborne, Hampshire, land once allocated as “fuel allotments” for the rural poor to obtain essential fuel for heating and cooking, will soon host a community-owned solar farm.
Across the country, 583 organisations like these deliver savings and build community wealth. As Ed Miliband has noted, Denmark and Germany built their transitions on citizen ownership – more than half of Danish wind and 40 per cent of German renewables are citizen-owned.
Community energy alone cannot meet all of the UK’s power needs, reform our energy market, or do the work needed to reduce demand – like insulating millions of homes. But it gives people a real stake in the energy transition. Local organisations can reach households in fuel poverty far more effectively. Octopus reports spending nearly half of its budget for its low-income insulation scheme simply trying to identify who needs help. When people see renewables funding local services, the transition becomes owned rather than imposed. Without consent, top-down investment cannot deliver at the speed and scale required.
Yet despite high public support, community power remains marginal. Not because people oppose it – 62 per cent would back a community-owned scheme in their area, compared to 40 per cent for a privately-owned one – but because the market is structured against it. Projects face multi-year grid connection queues, cannot secure long-term purchase agreements or stable prices, and lack the statutory right to sell energy locally. Most communities need help with skills and early-stage development. The enthusiasm exists; the infrastructure does not.
This matters far beyond energy policy. Recent Hope Not Hate analysis shows many Reform voters are driven less by culture wars than a feeling of political powerlessness. They are not inherently hostile to climate action. Their frustration reflects a deeper challenge for Labour: people want change, but they also want control over how change happens in their communities.
The central question is this: how can Britain deliver clean power fast, cut bills, and rebuild democratic trust at the same time? What kind of transition brings people in rather than pushing them away, creating visible local benefits?
The answer lies in the tradition first embodied by those 18th century mills: democratic ownership of essential infrastructure. Labour’s Local Power Plan (LPP), a core GB Energy function, is a chance to turn community energy from scattered success into national strategy – but only if designed with genuine ambition.
A new report from Common Wealth, Ashden, Locality and Power to Change sets out four essential steps. Labour must maintain the £1bn annual commitment for the LPP and ringfence 25 per cent for the lowest-income communities. It must create a stable price floor for community energy and open the door to local energy markets, without which most small projects remain unviable. It must treat capacity building as core infrastructure, investing in skills and trusted local organisations. And Great British Energy, the new publicly owned energy company, must act not only as a national energy developer but as a strategic partner and co-owner, using public ownership to help communities get local projects off the ground.
If these conditions are met, the LPP can achieve the three goals above: charging up clean power, saving households money, and strengthening confidence in democracy and national institutions.
The new Up the Energy campaign has been launched to push community power into the centre of national debate. Labour has staked much of its political identity on Great British Energy, lowering energy bills, and a fairer and faster transition. Falling short risks deepening the sense of abandonment that fuels support for Reform, and rival parties on the left.
The Anti-Mill Society reminds us that when systems fail, people do not simply wait – they organise, build and reclaim control. The task for Labour is to make that spirit the foundation of a modern and democratic energy revolution: one that gives every community not just cheaper power, but real power.
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