Thousands of jobs in the North Sea are being put at risk because the UK Government is driven by “zealotry”, according to the Conservatives.
In a fiery House of Commons exchange, Shadow Environment Minister Andrew Bowie said the government will be forced to rely on imports if it shuts down the UK’s oil and gas industry, as he pressed ministers on their plans for Rosebank and Jackdaw.
Energy Minister Michael Shanks said the government is having to “clear up a mess” created by the Tories and it will be following “due process” when it comes to the two fields.
This comes after a judge upheld a legal challenge by environmental campaigners against the decision to grant consent to the Rosebank oil field north-west of Shetland, and the Jackdaw gas field off Aberdeen, last month.
Greenpeace and Uplift said the former Conservative government and North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA) had acted unlawfully when granting consent to the projects, because assessments did not take into account downstream emissions resulting from the burning of the extracted fuels.
In an urgent question to the Commons on Monday, Mr Bowie said: “It is deeply disappointing and yet unsurprising that this government, driven by the zealotry that it is, is happy to put billions of pounds of investment and thousands of jobs at risk just because it doesn’t align with Just Stop Oil’s vision of the future.
“It demonstrates that this government is not willing to stand up for businesses or workers. The party opposite seems to misunderstand this simple point: if we shut down our oil and gas industry, we will not use any less oil and gas. We will be simply relying on more imports instead.”
Mr Bowie also claimed that “the self harm inflicted on the North Sea is damaging investment in other offshore renewables industries too” and is “wrecking our path forward”.
Mr Shanks replied: “He knows as well as anyone that this is a live process and that the companies involved in these two projects have the right to apply in the future, and it would be wrong for me to, in the House of Commons or anywhere else, prejudice those applications.”
He added: “What he failed to mention in his questions was how we got to this place we are at the moment, the Court of Session clearly outlines in their judgment that the previous secretary of state made a decision which was unlawful.
“And so once again, this Labour government is having to clear up a mess created by the previous Conservative government and, unlike them, we are going to follow due process.”
He continued: “We were very clear during the election that our position is no new licences to explore new fields. These two projects, of course, are already in existing licensed fields.
“The question for the courts to decide was the consent for these individual new projects, and that is the process that we will now take forward if these companies should wish to resubmit their applications.”
Scottish Labour MP Torcuil Crichton made a balanced intervention, adding: "It is not an either/or. We have been in the North sea for two generations, and we will be there for two generations more as we wind down the basin.
"Politics is often about symbols, and the renewed consents for Rosebank and Jackdaw, if they come, offer an opportunity to reassure workers in this industry that they will not be left behind when we plan for a fair and just transition from the old to the new."