North Sea Oil and Gas

Debate between Gill Furniss and Brian Leishman

Wednesday 24th June 2026 Westminster Hall

[Brian Leishman (Alloa and Grangemouth) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Furniss, and I thank the hon. Member for Bromsgrove (Bradley Thomas) for securing this debate.

Let me say at the outset that we should not rewrite history. We know that under the Conservatives there were mass job losses in the oil and gas industry. It was also interesting to hear in the last 20 or 25 minutes that, after decades of not having a plan for the industry, the SNP now does have one. I look forward to hearing more about that in due course. Then, of course, there is Reform. Its Members just want to carry on regardless and to hell with the environmental consequences. Their absence from this debate shows their contempt for workers and working-class communities.

But in all honesty, I do not care about any of those parties, because I am a Scottish Labour Member, and there is no doubt that right now our oil and gas policy has left voters incredibly worried. My congratulations go to the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Douglas Lumsden). It was an excellent victory last week, and I commend him and his party on it. That by-election result in the north of Scotland really was telling for the Scottish Labour party. Even though we had an excellent candidate, we finished fourth. As a party, we often say the right things: that oil and gas will be part of the energy mix for decades to come, that we must detach ourselves from relying on the volatile fossil fuel market and, crucially, that we want to provide a just transition for the highly skilled workers of this industry. So far, however, all of that is just words. Scotland judged Scottish Labour in the Holyrood elections and in Aberdeen last week.

Put simply, if one set of jobs is lost and a new set of jobs is not available, that is the very definition of an unjust transition. That is clear and obvious. People want evidence of what a genuinely just transition would be and how we can provide it, but most importantly, what people really want is action. There has not been nearly enough of that. It was 16 months ago this week that the Prime Minister promised £200 million for Project Willow and a bold new industrial future to be homed at Grangemouth. So far, we have had the MiAlgae and the Celtic Renewables announcements, and I welcome them, but again, those jobs are for the future—they are not for the now. Workers need jobs.

An unjust transition means an exodus of skills and talent, with workers and their families having to leave the local area—the place they grew up in and call home. That means that communities then become poorer. I do not how many times I have asked the Minister this, but I will ask again, in the hope that he will give an answer: when will we see these new industries come to Grangemouth? When will my people in my community, who I am here to represent, see the change that they desperately need? They need jobs and reindustrialisation. Will the Government take at least some form of ownership of these new industries, which they will definitely need for decades—centuries—to come?

Finally, in a party political moment, I say to the Minister that the electorate in Scotland do not know what the Scottish Labour party is about any more. In providing a genuinely just transition for workers and communities, we have the chance to say exactly who we are and who we are for, and to re-establish ourselves as the political voice for workers and communities. My constituency needs reindustrialisation, and so do the constituencies of many other hon. Members and right hon. Members. We have a blank canvas in Grangemouth. We could create something special that would transform my community and Scotland for generations. The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero has to shape up and deliver that, and it has to do it quickly.

[Gill Furniss (in the Chair)]

I call the Minister. [Interruption.] Sorry, I call Pippa Heylings—I will learn how to do this one day; I blame it on the heat.