National Energy System Operator: Blackout Risk
Douglas Lumsden Excerpts(4 weeks, 1 day ago)
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Michael Shanks
First, whistleblowers are protected under legislation, and rightly so. That is important, and we have reiterated to all those involved in this incident that they are protected in law from their employers when coming forward with allegations, as has clearly happened. However, the inquiry should also protect their ability to speak about their engagement in all this without any other NESO staff present, so that their evidence can be compiled for the inquiry report without the management being part of that process. I take the hon. Member’s point very seriously.
On the second point about an office of the whistleblower, I am afraid that is not in my portfolio, but I will certainly pass it on to other Ministers.
Douglas Lumsden (Aberdeen South) (Con)
This is a really worrying situation that perfectly highlights why we need an energy mix in our grid. In that energy mix, we need to have nuclear, as was mentioned before, but we also need to have gas to provide the inertia in our grid. The people of Aberdeen South understand that, but does the Minister understand that, and is he concerned with the lack of inertia in our grid as we move to more and more intermittent sources?
Michael Shanks
First, no, I am not concerned, because other tools can be deployed to ensure that need is met, and they are being taken forward. Secondly, if the hon. Member looked at the disruption caused by the weather, he would see that a significant part of the issue was caused by gas power stations not being able to operate at full capacity because of the heat. I am afraid that his suggestion is not quite the silver bullet he thinks it is.
Summer Jobs
Douglas Lumsden Excerpts(1 month ago)
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Blake Stephenson (Mid Bedfordshire) (Con)
I start with a point that I think is abundantly obvious to most people, and certainly to Opposition Members, which is that economic growth is possible only with a culture in which we support businesses in taking risks. I mean “risk” in all its forms, including the taking on of staff. Also, we need abundant clean energy. That was proven in the industrial revolution, and in the 1980s.
Douglas Lumsden (Aberdeen South) (Con)
Would my hon. Friend agree that if we want abundant energy, we should produce much more of it in this country? It would be much better for our economy, for jobs, and even for the environment if we produced oil and gas in this country, as opposed to relying on imports.
Blake Stephenson
My hon. Friend makes a compelling case for drilling in the North sea—a case that he made very successfully in the by-election in Aberdeen South. I congratulate him on that, and welcome him to the House of Commons.
In the 15 years that I was working full time in the City before coming here, I saw a ratcheting-up of costs and the de-risking of our economy. Energy costs have increased as we have sought to decarbonise; employment flexibility has gone down; taxes have gone up; and regulatory burdens are uncontrollably high. I will give two examples from my time in financial services. They are not necessarily related to summer jobs, but I will come to that. Anti-money-laundering regulations are now costing the economy £33.6 billion a year, and bank ringfencing is costing banks £1.5 billion a year. The regulatory burdens throughout our economy are absolutely incredible.
We have failed to properly recognise that it is businesses that grow the economy, not Governments. Over the past two years, the Government have missed an opportunity. They came in claiming that they would be the “change Government”, but they have doubled down on all the mistakes of the past. Tax has gone up over the past two Budgets by £66 billion, and red tape has gone up. The Minister said that he had aspirations to reduce red tape, but in fact the Government have demonstrated that they are capable of increasing red tape. With the Employment Rights Act 2025—the unemployment rights Act—labour flexibility is down.
Britain has spent two decades trying to build an economy on less risk, and it is just not possible to do that. The impact, unfortunately, is felt most acutely by our young constituents. In particular, as a result of the Government’s interventions over the past two years, the Saturday job is disappearing. That is absolutely tragic. Hon. and right hon. Members from across the House have spoken passionately about their first job. If you can believe this, my first job in north-west Hampshire was sweeping a weighbridge at a scrapyard. That was not under contract, and I was not promised any particular hours. As a 16-year-old, or thereabouts, I would sweep the weighbridge in the morning and wash the owner’s car—and I would get 20 quid, not 50p, so there was quite some inflation since my right hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Wendy Morton) earned that wage.
Douglas Lumsden (Aberdeen South) (Con)
We have heard lots of people describe their summer jobs, and I will do so too. When I was a student, I enjoyed a summer job. I was working as a postman in my constituency, delivering letters and leaflets to homes up and down Aberdeen—and what do you know, Madam Deputy Speaker? Thirty-five years later, I am still delivering leaflets and letters across the city of Aberdeen. That job was vital to me, because it gave me the resource that I needed—the money that I could spend through the rest of the year—as it is for so many people.
What has changed in the intervening years is that our city now finds itself under attack from not one, but two Governments—the enterprise-crippling national insurance increase from the Labour party and the double whammy of business rate increases and banditry from the First Minister in Holyrood. The First Minister is clearly content in hoarding business rates in Edinburgh to fund his independence obsession and his other failed projects.
That is before we even talk about the barons of Aberdeen city council, which is run by an SNP-Lib Dem coalition of malaise. It will be of no surprise to this House that all it wants to do is tax, tax, tax. That is clear because of the massive 7% tourism tax levied by the council on hotel stays. That is the highest in Scotland—more than Glasgow or Edinburgh. As a result, hotels are sitting empty, with the council content to punish vendors and visitors alike.
Damian Hinds
As the Government look to introduce this hated so-called overnight visitor levy in England—[Interruption.] I believe they are. Labour Members always say, “Don’t worry, it’s not very much money. It will all be hypothecated. It will have no effect on the inbound tourism industry.” Perhaps some of them might look at the example of my hon. Friend’s home city of Aberdeen and consider what could happen.
Douglas Lumsden
Lessons must definitely be learnt from what has happened in Scotland, because we are seeing a big impact.
Why would someone start a business in Aberdeen now? New businesses have to factor in rent, business rates, insurance, energy costs and waste charges, and that is before they even get to national insurance or staff costs. There is a huge cost to doing business, and it is no wonder that our high streets are struggling. My hon. Friend the Member for Meriden and Solihull East (Saqib Bhatti) made an important point about business owners, because often they decide not to take a salary, or to take very little. We have heard about zero-hours contracts, but that does not apply to them, and neither does the minimum wage. Often they are going without in order to pay all their costs.
We have organisations that are trying to make a difference. Our Union Street in Aberdeen, for example, does a great job of providing businesses with incentives and provides start-up grants for new businesses, but it is a private organisation. It should be the council, city council and Governments that are doing more to help industry.
Summer jobs are critical for the hospitality sector. I think of the beachfront in my constituency, where we are fortunate to have two whole days of summer every year. It is so important that those businesses have the flexibility to employ part-time, seasonal workers. Across the city there are so many great businesses that benefit from seasonal workers. I think about Codona’s, a funfair at the beach, which employs hundreds of people, but it is most busy during the summer period. That is also the case for cafés in places such as Duthie park, bustling when the weather is good. They need that flexibility. Recently we have been fortunate to have a huge expansion at Aberdeen harbour, under the stellar leadership of Bob Sanguinetti. That means that cruise ships can now visit Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire. That is a tremendous asset, but it is seasonal and we need to ensure that our hospitality sector is resourced to cope with the demand.
We need to support our hospitality sector, but the SNP and Labour Governments have been woeful at doing that. We have seen job taxes, business rates, bureaucracy and red tape, and all that is hindering our industry, harming our jobs, causing businesses to fail and impacting young people the most. The Government need to think again, allow our hospitality industry to thrive and support our motion today.
Blair McDougall
I am very happy to welcome that summer school from the Dispatch Box, and I congratulate my hon. Friend on getting that into Hansard. I also congratulate him on teaching those students a lesson about the hypocrisy from the Conservative Benches, which they will get used to.
Many hon. Members spoke about seasonal workers as if the legislation was somehow going to force seasonal contracts to be permanent contracts. That is simply not the case—where people genuinely value that flexibility in the workplace, they will be able to continue to work in that way.
Douglas Lumsden
The Minister speaks about zero-hours contracts almost as if they are the devil’s work. Does he accept that those contracts give people the flexibility they want when they are doing a job? For a lot of people, a zero-hours contract fits in with their lifestyle; they do not want to be committed to working so many hours a week.
Blair McDougall
Where the workers that the hon. Member describes feel that way, they will not have to change their contracts. We are talking about the people who work for the same employer as their main job, week after week, without any certainty of income. The right hon. Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) said that only 3% of workers rely on a zero-hours contract as their main job. That is one in 25 workers. [Interruption.] In his constituency, there are 60,000 people of working age, meaning that hundreds of people in his constituency do not have the right to regular hours.
Oral Answers to Questions
Douglas Lumsden Excerpts(1 month, 1 week ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade (Kate Dearden)
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. We are working closely with various stakeholders to ensure that workers understand and claim their new rights under the Employment Rights Act. I know how vital trade unions are not just to organising, but to educating workers on their rights at work. I am so proud that they have been instrumental to development and implementation of these rights, and we look forward to continuing to working with them closely.
Douglas Lumsden (Aberdeen South) (Con)
In Aberdeen South, there is a jobs emergency, with 1,000 jobs a month being lost from the oil and gas sector. So will the Government ditch their damaging policies that are destroying the oil and gas industry and destroying jobs in Aberdeen South?
Peter Kyle
This Government are investing record amounts in the transition to renewable energy. We need to break the dependence on fossil fuels that our country has been forced into by the Conservative party. We will do so by creating wealth, jobs and businesses in the meantime.
North Sea Oil and Gas
Douglas Lumsden Excerpts(1 month, 2 weeks ago)
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Bradley Thomas
I am pleased that the hon. Gentleman supports continued activity in the North sea, and I will address that point later on in my remarks.
Increasing reliance on imports and blaming unstable global markets regardless of the product, when we have the ability to produce it domestically and help stabilise the market, is not just reckless; it is madness. That is not to mention the fact that offshoring our carbon emissions, such as importing from the US, does not help the planet; it simply allows the UK to portray lower emissions in national statistics, while facilitating the generation of three times higher emissions via this method of supply. We should be supporting any domestic production that reduces product cost, generates jobs and has the potential to add billions more into our economy.
It is no secret that households across the country are struggling with their energy bills. The UK currently has the highest industrial energy prices among developed nations and the second highest domestic electricity prices in the developed world. That stark fact is evident to anyone paying energy bills, and it is about to get worse. The Ofgem cap for July to September has risen by 13%, reaching £1,862, which is £294 more than when the Government came into office in July 2024. I am not sure where the Energy Secretary’s promise to decrease energy bills by £300 has gone, but it looks like he actually meant an increase. There is nothing complicated about these figures. The cost of energy is rising, and households and businesses across the country are feeling the impact.
A recent poll found that, although 60% of people across the UK support reducing emissions, 68% of those supporters believe that reducing energy bills should be the first priority. That result was echoed in another poll, which found that 71% of people who support reducing emissions do so on the condition that it does not increase their energy bills. The undeniable fact is that these inflexible targets are driving up energy bills.
As a democratically elected entity, the Government’s first priority should be to represent the nation and act in its best interests, but the public are being hung out to dry. It is not only the bill payers paying the brunt; thousands of oil and gas workers are also on the chopping block. Giving rising unemployment, it would be reasonable to presume that the Government would abandon any policy that compounds the issue further, but of course that is far too sensible a suggestion. They appear to prefer to allow 1,000 jobs a month to be lost from the oil and gas sector in places that rely on the industry such as Aberdeen, rather than admit they are on the wrong path.
I take this opportunity to welcome my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South (Douglas Lumsden) to his place. He emphatically won a by-election last week with almost 50% of the vote, which is a vindication of the fact that the public—particularly workers in places dependent on the oil and gas industry for employment—reject the pace and scale of the Government’s net zero agenda.
Douglas Lumsden (Aberdeen South) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend agree that the clear message that the people of Aberdeen sent last week was that they support the oil and gas sector and the jobs that come with it, and that it is much better that we produce oil and gas ourselves? It is much better for our jobs, our economy and the environment if we produce more in this country, rather than relying on imports.
Bradley Thomas
I thank my hon. Friend for his first spoken contribution as an elected Member. He is already demonstrating his resoundingly strong voice on behalf of the people of Aberdeen South, many of whom are employed in the industry and terrified about what the scale and pace of what the Government are doing represent for their futures.
It appears that the Government would rather ignore warnings that their refusal to replace the energy profits levy is putting 200,000 jobs at growing risk than delay their ideology for even a few years. They would even rather ignore the Scottish Affairs Committee’s warnings that clean energy jobs are not keeping pace with oil and gas job losses, rather than give up on this net zero legacy.
I have one question for the Government: what do they say to the thousands of workers who risk losing their jobs or have already lost them? The Government will claim that clean energy is providing 100,000 jobs, but have they shared the detail on the quality of those jobs and the pay cuts that the workers are having to take? Why has that not happened? Because it means that the Government would have to take responsibility for a mess that they are compounding.
The bottom line is this: if we want to support those workers, we must support the North sea oil and gas industry. The ban on new oil and gas licences is leaving at least 2.9 billion barrels of oil in the ground—billions in monetary value that could be added to our economy, thousands of jobs that could be secured and millions of homes powered.
I predict what the rebuttal point will be: it does not matter how many barrels come from the North sea because it is all sold on an international market and therefore will have no impact on our energy prices, which are dictated by global pricing.
Graham Leadbitter
The SNP backs new licences with the normal environmental assessments and everything that goes with that, which, the hon. Lady will understand, is part of the regulatory process that the previous Conservative Government also followed. Every Government would have an appropriate regulatory and licensing regime.
The roads infrastructure, the foundations of installations, the fuels currently relied on by vessels transporting offshore wind towers and turbines, and even composite turbine blades rely heavily on oil and gas production. More significantly, the skills required to deliver the renewables revolution that will be at the heart of Scotland’s industrial economy are the same skills currently utilised in oil and gas. Those who wish to force the decline of the North sea without creating renewable jobs will do to the oil and gas communities what the Tories under Thatcher did to our coal and steel communities. That would be unforgivable.
Douglas Lumsden
Draft 1 of the Scottish Government’s energy strategy was released over three years ago, with a presumption against new oil and gas. Does the hon. Member agree that that is damaging, and that it is time the SNP scrapped that policy?
Graham Leadbitter
The hon. Member probably needs to keep up a bit because that position has already been scrapped. That was articulated by the First Minister.
Uma Kumaran
I will not give way; I will continue.
We also know what success looks like. Countries in the Beyond Oil and Gas Alliance, ranging from Denmark to Costa Rica, are committed to ending reliance on oil and gas, so this issue is already being discussed globally.
I find it interesting that Conservative Members here are passionately making the case for oil and gas today, because it was their Government that presided over an unmitigated collapse in jobs in the oil and gas industry. Half the jobs in the North sea disappeared in the last decade under a Conservative Government. We did not hear anything from the Conservatives at the time, so let us remember why so many of them are talking about oil and gas today. They are masking what they are saying as standing up for workers, but the truth is that they are fighting climate deniers on their own Benches and Reform’s climate sceptics on their right. They are using the industry as a tool in their own political fights here.
Uma Kumaran
I will not give way; I will carry on.
The case that I am making is backed by science. We heard earlier that a 1% increase in global warming would be catastrophic. We are already seeing extreme temperatures. The news right now is that France has just hit 44°, we have sweltering temperatures in Britain, and people are pooh-poohing the idea of a 1% rise in global temperatures. They continue to deny the reality of the climate crisis. Yes, this debate is about jobs, energy security and our future, but it is also about protecting the planet from the present and very real threat of climate devastation. The simple reality is that North sea production is not compatible with Britain’s climate commitments.