MPS have demanded more help from the Labour Government for North Sea workers during the transition away from oil and gas.
On Wednesday, Kirsty Blackman, SNP MP for Aberdeen North, led a Westminster Hall debate on transitional support for North Sea oil and gas workers.
Blackman urged the UK Government to deliver a credible plan to protect jobs and communities during the transition away from fossil fuels.
Citing evidence from the UK’s seventh carbon budget, Kirsty Blackman noted: “As of 2021, direct employment in oil and gas in Aberdeen has declined by nearly one-third since 2015. Household disposable income has fallen and poverty has increased… some estimates indicate that around 14,000 people in the region will need to have moved to other roles or sectors between 2022 and 2030.”
Blackman said: “We are at a tipping point. The risk is that these highly mobile, highly paid oil and gas workers will go abroad. They can up sticks and move to another country, because drilling is the same there – even if the carbon cost is higher and conditions are worse.”
“If we don’t take control of the situation now, we will lose the skills we need to power the renewable future. Whatever rhetoric the Government uses, the industry doesn’t believe they’ve got it right – and that needs to change.”
Blackman (below) called on ministers to act, adding: "My key ask is that the Government listen to people and have a plan. One of the UK Government’s founding missions is to grow the economy. We won’t be able to do that if we don’t take advantage of this situation – and the time is now."
Also speaking in the debate was Brian Leishman, Scottish Labour MP for Alloa and Grangemouth.
Raising the planned closure of the Grangemouth oil refinery, he said: "The fate of the skilled workers of the oil and gas sector hangs in the balance, currently nowhere more so than in my constituency in Grangemouth.
"Once known as Scotland's boomtown, Grangemouth has refined oil for over a century."
He called on the UK Government to "do the same for Grangemouth" as it did for Scunthorpe, when MPs were recalled from recess to vote on saving the steel plant.
"The argument that Grangemouth should be treated differently to Scunthorpe is a total nonsense," he added.
Green Party co-leader Carla Denyer said: "Whilst oil and gas companies lobby for lower taxes and more drilling to boost their own profits, workers and communities are bearing the brunt of a disorderly transition.
"In a declining basin, last-ditch attempts to double down on new oil and gas will not provide workers with the long-term security they deserve.
"It is high time the Government stops betting on the private sector to do the right thing and starts delivering in the interests of workers, communities and the country as a whole.
"That means stopping the expansion of new oil and gas, investing in good quality renewable energy jobs and putting workers and local communities at the heart of transition planning."
Responding for the Government, Energy Minister Michael Shanks said: "The truth is we should have been planning for this transition a long time ago... There is no greater example of the failure to plan when we knew years ago that Grangemouth was in a precarious position. We should have been planning at that point for the workforce.
"My driving purpose in this role is to make sure we don’t make the same mistake again in the wider North Sea sector."
Commenting after the debate, Blackman told The National: "Labour’s decision to treat Scotland’s world class energy sector as little more than a cash cow has deterred investment, jeopardised our energy security, put jobs at risk and has seen bills soar by more than £300 on their watch.
"We were promised that there would be no cliff edge approach to the energy transition yet this Labour UK Government has done little to quell that suspicion – if you don’t have investment then you don’t have jobs and in the real world outside of Westminster it really is that simple.
"Scotland’s has an immense energy wealth that should be used to support families and our transition to renewables, but all the Labour Government has offered is confusion to an industry in dire need of certainty.
"SNP MPs will always stand up for Scotland to ensure our vast natural resources are used to benefit the people of Scotland because to Westminster, Scotland's offshore industries are simply there to be plundered."
