Andrew Bowie
MP for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine · Conservative · United Kingdom
“The ongoing events in the middle east have rightly brought the state of Britain’s energy security back to the forefront. We are witnessing growing geopolitical instability, and it is having, and will continue to have, a direct impact on our energy security, supplies and, of course, bills.”
“We do not know when the pipeline will once again be operational, and as we have already heard, Saudi oil stocks for export could be depleted within days. With the safety of navigation through the strait of Hormuz remaining uncertain, the continued squeeze on energy supplies will only become tighter.”
“We are talking today about national security, and the Government are putting party before country. Great Britain has become increasingly and dangerously over-reliant on supplies of oil from overseas.”
“I do not think the Conservative party will take any lectures from Labour on records in the north-east of Scotland, given the result in Aberdeen South only a few months ago, but I would like to thank the Minister for warmly welcoming me to my new position.”
“I have a simple question for the Minister: will the Government finally approve Rosebank and Jackdaw—something we already did in government—or will they continue the previous Secretary of State’s campaign against Britain’s North sea oil and gas industry?”
“Where does the Minister want the energy that we need to come from if the Government do not get on and approve Rosebank and Jackdaw? The question today is a simple one, but the answer could be transformative—for the North sea industry, for the north-east of Scotland and for the United Kingdom’s economic and energy security.”
The complete record
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“I agree with the hon. Gentleman that we are far better when we work together on these islands than when we drive each other apart. The Scottish National party’s model for higher education in Scotland has been nothing short of a failure. Disadvantaged teenagers are less likely to get into university in Scotland than their peers south of the border. The Scottish National party is failing the least well-off in society, blocking social mobility through the transformative power of education.”
“The Scottish National party should be more focused on supporting working families and improving the economic outlook and prosperity, rather than proposing unfettered immigration. It might take the radical approach proposed by the Scottish Conservative party of making Scotland the lowest-taxed, rather than the highest-taxed, part of our United Kingdom and see what that does to attract people north of the border.”
“Let us address the utter absurdity of the Scottish Government’s proposed additional Scottish graduate visa, which would allow graduates four unsponsored years. It is even possible that those on the four-year graduate visa would qualify for permanent residence. Members have also raised the issue of Scotland’s declining birth rate. Proposing immigration as a quick fix for a declining population is wrong-headed and short-sighted. High immigration to solve low birth rates and an ageing population is a pyramid-scheme response. Working-age immigrants initially slow the growth of the age dependency ratio; however, they will in turn age and perpetuate the same crisis. Nations across the developed world face the myriad issues that an ageing population presents.”
“It ill behoves me to correct the hon. Gentleman, but I was not talking down Scotland; I was talking down the Scottish National party’s record. I know the SNP thinks that it is Scotland and that Scotland is the SNP, but it most certainly is not. As for setting out a long litany of failures, I have only just started, believe you me—but as this debate must conclude at 2.30 pm, we simply do not have time to go through the list of failures of the Scottish National party in government over the past 18 years. The people of Scotland will have the chance to demonstrate at the polls next year whether they have confidence in the Scottish National party to continue in government. That is the only poll that matters, and we will see what happens in May 2026.”
“Time and again, they refuse to do the right thing. Devolving immigration policy to the Scottish Government is clearly not the right thing, and Labour should have the courage of its convictions and say so. As set out this morning, there is no case for the devolution of immigration. This is an invented exceptionalism. Scotland is no more dependent on immigration than the rest of the United Kingdom, and the purported crises—funding for universities, the rural workforce and the declining birth rate—are not solvable by this supposed silver bullet. This is a lazy solution to a series of complex issues that the SNP in Holyrood have neglected to resolve with the power already in their hands.”
“Turning back to the Government, it is a real shame that the Labour Government are choosing to talk out this private Member’s Bill rather than be forced to take a stance, but that is unsurprising, because we are well used to Labour Members demonstrating the utterly supine nature of the Scottish Labour party on Scottish issues. When faced with the madness of the SNP’s gender recognition Bill—this was raised this morning—Labour whipped their MSPs to vote to allow male offenders into women’s prisons. When the Labour leader in Scotland pays lip service to the plight facing oil and gas workers in the north-east of Scotland as a direct result of the Government’s damaging policies, Labour MPs stay silent. They refuse to stand up for women in Scotland; they refuse to stand up for working people in Scotland.”
“As I often used to say when I was on the Government Benches, I will write to the hon. Gentleman with my answer—I am sure there is one. The idea that immigrants to a country as compact as ours would not seek job opportunities in other areas of the UK, should they so wish, is for the birds. Are we talking about border posts at Berwick, or papers being checked on the Caledonian sleeper? We are talking about a party founded over 90 years ago with the sole aim of achieving Scotland’s separation from the rest of the UK—but it still cannot tell us what currency should be used in that separate Scotland. The idea that SNP Members could design an intuitive scheme so foolproof and clever that nobody could take advantage of the situation is absolutely absurd, and nobody takes that seriously.”
“We could spend countless hours in this place on statutory instruments designed to realign Scotland with the rest of the UK where needless duplication has already occurred—for example, across the justice system, and across welfare and benefit payments. We do not need more needless duplication to be created by thoughtless legislation. I have set out His Majesty’s official Opposition’s opposition to this motion on the basis of its economic and political impacts, but this is also a matter of principle. It is about whether we ought to be introducing sub-national visa and immigration systems, creating a more powerful sub-national or devolved Government in Scotland. The record of the SNP Government is damning, and we cannot in good conscience allow yet further vandalism.”
“Instead of those in the SNP coming up with madcap schemes to sow more division and create more difference across our one nation, they ought to spend more time and money on proposals for investing in Scotland’s underfunded universities, tackling violence in the classrooms, bringing down the length of NHS waiting lists, reducing drug deaths, building desperately needed new roads and bridges, improving community policing and making our neighbourhoods safer; but we see where their priorities lie. It is not just that the plans in the Bill are unviable, would be grossly inefficient and are completely unnecessary; devolving power over immigration to the SNP-run Scottish Government would be to the detriment of Scots and the United Kingdom.”
“We must ensure that we do not have devolution for devolution’s sake. We must decide whether the devolution of a certain power to the Scottish Parliament will have a beneficial impact on people and businesses in Scotland. If the answer is no, the answer to devolving the power must be no, and the Government should have the courage of their convictions and say so. The Government could have demonstrated that they understood that. They could have forced a Division and voted down this flawed and fanciful Bill. There is no case whatsoever for the devolution of immigration and asylum policy to Scotland, but even if there were, it would not be practicable to do that. It is not viable.”
“Just as many Labour Members believed in 1997 that devolution would kill nationalism stone dead, too many UK politicians of all parties, mine included, believe that giving ever more power to the Scottish Government will appease the Scottish National party’s desire for independence. It will not; that is the reason the SNP was founded, and it is a perfectly rational and respectable position to hold, but the desire to break Scotland away from United Kingdom will not be diminished by devolving ever more powers to Holyrood. Far too often, far too little thought is given to the impact of devolution on the policies or functions on which people rely. Is the complex, expensive, duplicative and bureaucratic quagmire brought about by Social Security Scotland working with the DWP in Scotland really to the benefit of those in receipt of benefits?”
“A month ago, I was on a Statutory Instrument Committee on the devolution of the operation of some Social Security Scotland competences in order to avoid duplication with the Department for Work and Pensions. I said that in devolving these powers to the Scottish Government “We have created additional barriers, burdens and borders where there were none before, and we have added no benefit whatsoever for those receiving…payments either north or south of the border.” —[ Official Report, Third Delegated Legislation Committee, 25 February 2025; c. 5.] By the way, it has cost more than £650 million so far to establish Social Security Scotland, so lessons should be learned by the Labour Government.”
“I represent a part of the country that relies on tourism for its economic prosperity, and when I speak to the Scottish hospitality sector, it is not immigration that it raises as its biggest concern, but the failure of the Scottish National party—the Scottish Government—to pass on the rates relief for hospitality businesses across the United Kingdom. That is the biggest issue facing hospitality and tourism in Scotland right now, and the hon. Member would do well to raise point that with his colleagues in the Parliament north of the border who have power over that rate of tax. Parcelling out reserve powers to the SNP Government will solve none of the problems raised in this debate, and as I said, the Labour party should have the backbone to say so.”
“So far there is very little in what the Secretary of State is saying that I can disagree with. If he does believe that the Bill is unnecessary, why are his Government adopting tactics today to avoid a vote on it? Why do they not have courage of their convictions and vote it down?”
“When we engage with oil and gas companies, it is the language and the tone that we use to describe the situation in the North sea that they say is driving away the investment that they need to drive forward new technologies such as offshore wind, whether floating or fixed bottom. When we say “decline”, “ageing” or “terminal”, that does not give investors from overseas a thriving and attractive investment picture. We need to address that language.”
“That town is the subsea exploration capital of the world and home to Total, Technip, Tetra, Subsea7 and more. The oil and gas industry is the lifeblood of the north-east of Scotland. That is evident to anybody who visits. Although I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Aberdeen North for the passion that she brings to the debate and her concern for her constituents, I cannot help reflecting on the rhetoric emanating from the Scottish Government over the past few years and their presumption against oil and gas, which has contributed to an increasingly pessimistic outlook for the North sea.”
“It sounds incredibly intangible at times, but for the 200,000 people employed in the oil and gas industry, directly or indirectly, the impacts of the transition in the North sea will be very tangible indeed. As the decline accelerates, we risk seeing lost incomes and lost futures in whole communities without a purpose. That is 200,000 employees up and down the entire United Kingdom: the oil and gas supply chain touches nearly every single constituency in the United Kingdom, but more than 68% of all direct employment is in Scotland, and more than 80% of that is in the north-east of Scotland, in and around Aberdeen. In my own constituency of West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine, everybody knows someone who relies on the offshore industry for their livelihood. Just last week, during recess, I was in Westhill speaking to companies.”
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this morning, Sir Desmond. I congratulate the hon. Member for Aberdeen North (Kirsty Blackman) on bringing such an important issue to Westminster Hall today and on opening the debate with such an eloquent and passionate speech on behalf of her constituents. For many of us here today, this is a deeply personal debate. We all know or are related to people employed in the oil and gas industry off the north-east coast of our country. Finding a solution and ensuring that the transition is indeed just for those workers is vital for our constituents. We often talk about needing the North sea for our energy security, to produce the tax revenue for the Exchequer and to support supply chains and local economies.”
“Gentleman to engage with the industry and speak to individuals—as I have; I know that the Minister, the hon. Member for Aberdeen North and others do too—because that is exactly what they tell us. They want to contribute to the transition—indeed, they lead it—but they want the negative atmosphere overshadowing the North sea to change. That means changing some of the rhetoric and language used to describe the industry, which is so important to the economy of the north-east of Scotland.”
“Of course, the hon. Gentleman is right that it is a declining basin—everybody is aware of that—but we must be careful about the language we use about it. We should point out the positives that can be achieved through further investment and recognise the profits being realised by energy companies engaged primarily in the extraction and exploitation of oil and gas underneath the North sea. They will be investing in those new technologies, and they need to convince shareholders—who are deciding whether to invest in the middle east, south-east Asia, the United States of America or elsewhere in the globe—that the North sea is still an attractive place to invest. The language that we use about that basin and the industry in the United Kingdom is incredibly important, so I urge the hon.”
“Yes, of course we believe in net zero, but not in setting arbitrary targets and dates that are unachievable without making this country poorer or more reliant on foreign imports for our energy supply. The fact is that imports of LNG have doubled just to keep the lights on as we actively accelerate the decline in our own North sea oil and gas industry. That is nonsensical—it is madness. It is an act of national self-harm. We should revert to our policy of maximum economic recovery from the North sea while doing all we can to ensure that the companies involved invest in new technologies.”
“Member for Alloa and Grangemouth (Brian Leishman) spoke eloquently about his constituency. Workers in Grangemouth, who are looking with great trepidation at what the future holds, tell us that there is nothing just about the transition as it stands. It is incumbent on the Government to do what they can to ensure the safety and security of jobs, the continued profitability and investability of our oil and gas industry as it seeks to transition into the technologies of the future, and the economic success and sustainability of north-east Scotland and the Scottish economy as a whole.”
“We were promised that by 2020 there would be 130,000 green manufacturing jobs, but frankly only a fraction have materialised. The hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Pippa Heylings) talked about the need to expand capacity in our ports. Aberdeen South harbour, in the port of Aberdeen, was built specifically to take advantage of the investment that it was assumed would come from the expansion of the deployment of offshore wind, but still to this day only 1% of its overall profit is driven by offshore wind and renewables, whereas 60% comes from the oil and gas industry. Until the balance shifts, we need to ensure that the companies driving that investment continue to invest in the North sea, but I am afraid they will not do so if this Government’s policies continue. We need a just transition. As ever, the hon.”
“When we call on those assets to help speed up the deployment of new offshore wind farms, they will not be there—the skilled workforce that we will need to develop wind farms and other technologies will be overseas because those people will be offered high-paying jobs in existing energy sectors in the UAE, Qatar, Australia, North America and south-east Asia. We cannot just flick a switch and expect all those workers and the supply chain to be there. That is why we need a profitable and successful energy industry. Like it or lump it, at the minute that is reliant on continued investment in our oil and gas industry. That is good for our energy security and the Treasury, so it makes abundant sense to continue to support it. The highly paid jobs in renewables that are going to exist simply do not exist yet—that is a fact.”
“I am not in any way trying to talk down the North sea. What we need to do is talk up those companies—especially those in the supply chain—the technologies and the skilled workforce, which rely at present on a successful and profitable oil and gas industry, because we will need them to develop new technologies in the North sea. The ships engaged in drilling for rigs, for example, will be used to work on the new offshore wind farms. Right now, as work is drying up in the North sea as a result of the accelerated decline, those assets are being sent to other parts of the world and being redeployed or redesigned.”
“I pay tribute to the Minister’s continued commitment to and engagement with the industry and the region. It seems, given the amount of times he is in and out of the north-east of Scotland these days, that he may be buying a second home in my constituency. Of course, we welcome that, because any engagement with the Government is positive. The tone with which the consultation on the future of North sea energy was launched was incredibly positive and has been warmly welcomed. However, there is also an ongoing Treasury consultation on the post-EPL fiscal framework; what engagement is the Department having with the Treasury on what that will look like? Is there any opportunity to speed up the process by which we can replace the energy profits levy?”
“I know we agree on that, but will the Secretary of State also acknowledge the devastating impact on Scottish university budgets of his own Government’s national insurance increase, adding £45 million to their salary bills, or will he continue to defend that job-killing, anti-growth tax on workers?”
“I associate myself with the Secretary of State’s remarks about the passing of His Holiness Pope Francis. I also wish all those not fortunate enough to have been born north of Hadrian’s wall a very happy St George’s day. While he is not a graduate of the University of Aberdeen, like me the Secretary of State is a beneficiary of a Scottish university education. Scotland has some of the finest and most respected higher education establishments in the world, but as we saw last week at the University of Aberdeen, in warnings from the University of Edinburgh and, most starkly, at the University of Dundee, where over 600 jobs are being shed to make emergency savings, the current funding model, overseen by the SNP, is failing our institutions and our young people.”
“Does the Secretary of State agree with the Scottish Labour leader, who says there is no question but that there has to be new oil and gas, or does he agree with his colleague the Energy Secretary, who has banned new licences in the North sea and is overseeing the accelerating decline of the UK’s oil and gas basin?”
“I think we all heard that, and I am sure Anas Sarwar did. The Secretary of State was unable to agree with his own leader in Scotland, and is so in hock to the UK Labour party that he cannot stand up for Scottish workers or the Scottish oil and gas industry. It has always been the party interest over the national interest for Labour, with no notice taken of the Scottish Labour party. Ten years ago, the Scottish Labour party was described by its own leader as being simply the “branch office”. Nothing has changed, has it?”
“The order provides a route to approval for onshore wind that entirely bypasses the consent of local communities and empowers the zealotry of the Secretary of State to impose infrastructure irrespective of the concerns of local people.”
“In just four short weeks, people across England will go to the polls to determine the future of their local communities. At that same time, the Labour party seeks to impose on those very same communities vast new energy infrastructure: huge solar farms and wind turbines with blade heights of 180 metres to 200 metres, destroying swathes of England’s green and pleasant land and going against the wishes of local people. As ever, only the Conservative party is standing up for those communities, and only the Conservative party believes that people in those communities should have a say over their local area. Labour would silence those communities, choosing to impose rather than to seek consent. In four weeks’ time, voters across this country will have that choice before them.”
“In Lincolnshire’s prime agricultural land, the breadbasket of England, this means a potential onslaught of proposals, despite the county council’s opposition to large-scale plans. I know how much this means to local communities—my hon. Friend the Member for Gordon and Buchan (Harriet Cross) has also made this point. I represent a constituency that is being subjected to vast swathes of energy infrastructure, and over the next few years approval will be sought for a whole host of new plans that will indelibly change a landscape that people are proud and happy to live in right now.”
“Today, the Minister seeks to go further still. In increasing the threshold for solar, he pushes for the development of giant solar farms. To be eligible for sign-off by the Secretary of State, solar farms have to be 100 MW in capacity. Currently, the largest—Shotwick solar park in Flintshire—is 72 MW. The change signals a free-for-all for giant-scale solar, and the instrument brings onshore wind over a 100 MW capacity into the NSIP scope. In Lancashire, that means Scout Moor II being in the Secretary of State’s gift to approve. Calderdale wind farm, with 65 turbines covering 9 square miles, is planned for Yorkshire and will be built on grouse moorland and farmland.”
“I could not agree more with my hon. Friend, living, as we do, in the north-east of Scotland and seeing around us the huge increase in energy infrastructure planned for rural communities over the next few years—it is quite daunting. It is therefore no surprise that there has been such vociferous campaigning against the plans, whether those for wind turbines, pylons, energy substations or battery storage facilities, all of which are in the pipeline for our communities. That is why there is such a pushback there and also such concern across many of the communities that will be affected by the change in England over the next few years. That is why we oppose the SI before us. In their first week in office, the Government approved three solar farms across Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire and Rutland, against the wishes of the local communities.”
“Absolutely. I would be keen to see exactly what the Government are proposing on that front. Their plans, which are stripping away the rights of local communities, are doing great damage to communities across this country with shocking disregard—”
“In Lincolnshire, Lancashire and Yorkshire, they are silencing local opposition. They risk alienating the British public in their costly rush to a renewables-based system without consultation and with no consent. The race to Clean Power 2030 is being done at the expense of all else. It is being done at the expense of our energy security, our national security and our standards on ethical supply chains. Just last week in this very House, Labour whipped its MPs to vote in favour of allowing Great British Energy to invest in supply chains despite evidence of modern slavery—the Labour party! The week before, the Secretary of State was collaborating with the People’s Republic of China, sacrificing our national security and tacitly admitting that his wrong-headed targets were unachievable without imports made with coal power.”
“I would be delighted to come back and compare notes on how our respective parties have performed in the local elections on 1 May. The choice before the people of England who are going to the polls on 1 May is quite clear. Where they have a Conservative local authority, they get better services and better value for money, as is being demonstrated right now by the comparison between Birmingham and Bromsgrove. There could not be a better illustration of the difference between Conservative party local delivery and Labour party failure. That is what is on the ballot paper on 1 May, and I will debate the arguments around that with the hon. Member any day of the week. The Labour Government have made no secret of their plans to double onshore wind and treble solar, to be achieved by empowering themselves while disenfranchising local communities.”
“What is his message to the residents of Lincolnshire, Lancashire, Yorkshire, Cambridgeshire, Buckinghamshire and elsewhere, as they make their decisions on 1 May?”
“Yesterday we saw the price cap and bills go up. On the Opposition side of the House, we stand with communities, seek to empower local people and understand their concerns. We oppose this instrument, which enables the Secretary of State to continue to ride roughshod over the concerns of local communities in vain pursuit of the Government’s own legacy. Will the Minister recommission the whole-systems cost analysis that his Government scrapped on day one, and look at the facts? Can he tell us the cost of running the gas-fired power station fleet for 5% of our power, in addition to the rising curtailment costs, paid to turn off the growing number of wind turbines? Can he confirm that his proposed community benefits package is significantly lower than the scheme considered by the previous Government?”
“We are very proud of what we achieved during our years in government, building the first and fifth largest offshore wind farms in the world, which are generating power for Great Britain right now, and halving our emissions while growing the economy faster than any other developed economy. But this Government need to be honest with the British people about the cost of their arbitrary targets. The Labour party makes no attempt to account for the whole-systems cost associated with the renewables-dominated system. In fact, the Secretary of State cancelled the analysis commissioned by his predecessor. He does not want to know how much it costs, and it is clear that the Government do not want to know. It is wilful ignorance driven purely by ideology. At the election, the Labour party promised us £300 off energy bills.”
“I bow to my right hon. Friend’s expertise on raptors and on British bird life in general. That sounds like an entirely sensible suggestion. The Minister is taking notes, and I very much hope that he will take that suggestion back to the Department in which he is lucky to serve. The Minister has told us that onshore renewable infrastructure can unlock lower bills and that it is the cheapest energy source, but that is not the case. We have the second highest on-stream renewables in Europe, yet the UK’s domestic energy bills are among the highest in Europe. We also know from the Office for Budget Responsibility that the cost to businesses and households of subsidising renewables will increase from £12 billion to £19 billion by 2030. That is the true cost of the Government’s rush to net zero.”
“I wonder what those titans of that proud labour movement would make of this today, because it was on this day in 1807 that the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act received Royal Assent, and 218 years on, Labour MPs are going to be whipped to allow the state to directly fund imports of goods built by slave labour in China. [ Interruption. ] They complain, but it is true.”
“It is in the context of our increasing reliance on foreign states that I wish to speak to the Lords amendments, and particularly Lords amendment 2, tabled by Lord Alton of Liverpool. I am grateful to him, and we all recognise his long-standing dedication to this serious matter. I said that this was a sad day, and I feel for those Labour MPs, for many of whom I have a great deal of respect, who came into this House, into politics and specifically into their party because they believed in social justice and decency, and for whom this is not just a job but a vocation. They came here in July believing that they would be part of a project to create a better world, in the spirit of Bevan, Attlee, Hardie and Wilson.”
“I wonder how he would characterise the People’s Republic of China, where political opposition is illegal, where citizens have more limited political rights than in the Russian Federation, where dissent is invariably punished and where the use of forced labour is proven. In 2022 we blocked China General Nuclear from involvement in Sizewell C. In 2020 we prevented Chinese influence on our communications networks under the guise of Huawei. Yet despite serious concerns about the national security implications, the ethical implications and the high climate emissions, the Secretary of State and Ministers are opening the gates to Chinese technology in our North sea wind farms, to solar panels made with slave labour and to using coal power.”
“We were told it would generate energy, but it will not—it does not have a licence to do that. We were told that it would guarantee a positive return on every investment, but that is impossible. I therefore ask the Minister again: what will the entity actually do? Do they know? Will it be seeking an electricity generation licence? How will it bring down energy costs in this country? Turning to today’s proceedings, far from the Secretary of State and the Minister’s insistence that Great British Energy will free us from reliance on foreign dictatorships, this headlong rush to clean power by 2030 will, in fact, make us more reliant than ever on the People’s Republic of China. He and his Ministers are quick to note the reluctance to rely on petrostate dictators.”
“This is a sad and quite incredible day in this House. We have debated this Government’s energy policies on many occasions in the past few months. We have frequently debated the merits, or lack thereof, of Great British Energy, an organisation about which we still know very little—what it is for and what it will do. We were told by the Labour party that it would bring down bills by £300, but bills have gone up. We were told by the Labour party that it would create jobs, but nobody can tell us how many or by when. We were told by the Labour party that it would be based in Aberdeen, but the interim chairman is based in Manchester and it looks unlikely that we will see little more than a brass plaque in the granite city. We were told that it would employ thousands of people, but that then turned to hundreds.”
“That is something that we have debated time and again, and I am sure we will come back to this House to debate it again in the future. Great British Energy is not great, it is not British and it will not generate any energy. Public funds should not be—must not be—funding imports tainted by modern slavery and slave labour. British taxpayers deserve better: a domestic supply chain that creates jobs at home rather than funding abuses abroad. That is why we support Lords amendment 2, and I urge Labour Members to do the right thing today and vote for it as well.”
“My hon. Friend will not be at all surprised to learn that I agree with him entirely. It is purely the imposition on this country of arbitrary, needless targets, such as clean power by 2030, to generate headlines and get the Secretary of State’s name up in lights that is requiring us to become more reliant on the People’s Republic of China for the goods, technology and equipment to develop the solar farms, nearly all of which will be tainted by slave labour in some way, given the reliance on slave labour in part of that country for that infrastructure and technology. So of course I agree with him, and of course it would be much better if we were issuing new licences and continuing to support our own domestic oil and gas industry.”
“On 6 February, the Prime Minister announced that he would “take on the blockers” and build new small modular reactors, but do those blockers include his own Government? With essential work being delayed and paused at Sellafield, possible job losses at the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority and still no certainty for Sizewell C due to a general fear in the industry that the spending review will stymie the ambitions of Great British Nuclear, are the biggest blockers to new nuclear in the UK not in Labour’s Treasury?”