LONDON — U.K. hospitals, town halls and government departments will be heated via a massive energy deal with a subsidiary of a firm still importing Russian gas to Europe — just days after U.K. ministers boasted they were “driving Putin out of the market.”
The National Health Service (NHS) is among several British public sector bodies set to benefit from a four-year gas supply contract, worth up to £8 billion, agreed last year between the U.K. government and TotalEnergies Gas and Power.
The company is a subsidiary of the French fossil fuel giant TotalEnergies which, two years after Russia rolled its tanks into Ukraine, continues to be a major importer of Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG) into Europe.
The U.K. has publicly taken a strong stand against Russian fossil fuel exports to Europe, which help finance Vladimir Putin’s war. But under this deal, billions of pounds of British taxpayers’ cash will ultimately flow to a firm that is still trading in Russian gas.
