In an “exclusive”, Reuters reports that UK energy secretary Ed Miliband will visit China in March to restart talks on energy cooperation and meet Chinese investors, “as the Labour government seeks closer China ties amid worsening US- and EU-China relations”. On his visit to Beijing on 17-19 March, Miliband will meet with his Chinese counterpart Wang Hongzhi, “to revive the UK-China Energy Dialogue”, the newswire says. On the agenda will be “clean and sustainable energy, as well as energy security”, the article says, but “allowing Chinese firms to provide critical infrastructure, such as nuclear power plants” will “still be off the table”. Miliband will be the third Labour minister to visit China since the party took office, following foreign secretary David Lammy and chancellor Rachel Reeves, the outlet notes, with UK prime minister Keir Starmer “also expected to visit China later this year”. The Daily Telegraph also picks up the story, noting that Miliband’s visit will come “despite growing concerns over Beijing’s involvement” in a floating wind-farm project off the coast of Scotland, which “could be used for spying”.

Meanwhile, the Mail on Sunday reports, on page two of its print edition, that Miliband “could face [the] axe” from the cabinet in a spring reshuffle as Keir Starmer “sidelines the net-zero environmental agenda as part of the government’s ‘dash for growth’”. Citing unnamed “senior Whitehall sources”, but quoting only one of them, the newspaper says that “Miliband’s voice has been increasingly marginalised around the cabinet table as chancellor Rachel Reeves struggles to inject growth into a sluggish economy”. The article quotes a source as saying: “Ed has felt the earth move under his feet since the election…It’s obvious he is not happy, and might jump if he is not pushed.” Today’s Daily Express picks up the Mail’s story (without credit), while Saturday’s Daily Mail goes searching for any local support for fracking in Lincolnshire in an article under the headline: “Frack you, Miliband!” 

Elsewhere, Reuters reports that the UK government’s competition to select companies to develop small modular nuclear reactors is on track to reach a decision in the spring. Although the Daily Telegraph reports that “insiders fear” that Rachel Reeves “is eyeing cuts to Britain’s £20bn mini-nuclear reactor programme amid a scramble to slash government expenditure”. It says: “It was previously suggested that up to three winners would be chosen…But sources said there was concern this has quietly been scaled back to a ‘maximum’ of two – raising the possibility that only one winner will be chosen. Fewer reactors would be built overall as a result.” MailOnline reports that the CEO of Rolls-Royce has warned that the UK risks losing its leadership on SMRs unless the government speeds up its decision-making. The Financial Times has a “big read” on whether “giving old reactors new life the future of nuclear energy”.

In other UK news, BBC News reports that the National Grid has received backing to build a new subsea cable between the UK and Belgium at its preferred location in the Isle of Grain in Kent, instead of in Suffolk. The Times reports that “Europe’s biggest battery storage project goes live in Scotland”. The Times also says that Labour has been ­”accused of prioritising the drive to achieve net-zero over family businesses”. The Sunday Times reports that the “Planning Inspectorate has been plunged into a row over conflicts of interest after thwarting Gatwick airport’s attempts to win rapid approval to build a second runway”. In a frontpage story, the Yorkshire Post says that a “pioneering Yorkshire carbon capture company backed by Drax, BP and the government has made almost all of its staff redundant as a new owner is sought for the business”. The Observer reports on the “backlash” from, respectively, its backbenchers and development groups for cutting foreign aid in favour of defence spending. The Guardian reports that Anneliese Dodds, the international development minister, has quit her post over Keir Starmer’s decision. And DeSmog says that Conservative party leader Kemi Badenoch “claims she was always a net-zero sceptic, but in government she hailed net-zero plans as ‘crucial’ for a ‘cleaner greener future’”. 

Finally, there is the usual slew of anti-net-zero stories in the Daily Telegraph, including: analysis trailed on today’s frontpage by an investment bank showing that “net-zero has made Britain poorer”; Keir Starmer saying “Britons can keep eating kebabs“; Lloyds bank scrapping limits on flights by its staff; net-zero is “coming for the property market next”; and farms face being “blocked by net-zero campaigners”.