The Lib Dem energy spokesperson told Left Foot Forward she doesn’t think Labour is doing enough for oil and gas workers
Pippa Heylings MP, the Lib Dem spokesperson for energy security and net zero, said Labour needs to work quickly to deliver the ‘just transition’ and avoid losing ‘highly skilled’ oil and gas workers.
Speaking with Left Foot Forward at Lib Dem conference, she said Labour is “not doing a good enough job” to deliver a “just transition” for oil and gas workers.
Heylings said that currently “highly skilled” oil and gas workers are being told they have to re-qualify to work in the renewable sector. She said “It is just ridiculous, we should make it incentivising”.
The South Cambridgeshire MP told Left Foot Forward that the Lib Dems would work more closely with trade unions and create a skills passport, so workers don’t have to retrain from scratch.
‘Labour thinking about the economy not workers’
Pressed on whether Labour isn’t already working with trade unions, she said the party isn’t doing enough.
“They’re thinking about what we do with the economy and oil and gas companies, they’re not doing enough for oil and gas workers,” she added.
Heylings said that as a result, the UK is losing these “highly skilled workers”. “They’re going to the Gulf of Mexico, right now,” she warned, adding that 75,000 oil and gas workers lost their jobs under the Conservatives.
North Sea oil and gas licences
When asked how she would respond if Labour allows new oil and gas licences next to existing North Sea sites, as has been mooted, she didn’t criticise the plan, but said “they’ve got to shift other things to keep within the carbon budget”.
Labour pledged not to allow any new oil and gas licences, and would need to ‘water down’ this pledge if they allow more drilling in the North Sea.
Heyling added that in the North Sea, “We are marching towards a mature basin that is not economically viable to do any more exploitation in. The market is going to sort that out as long as we’re not sending the wrong signals.”
Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward
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