Meeting of the Parliament 24 March 2026 [Draft]
I was pleased that the just transition commission was complimentary about how we had embedded just transition throughout the draft plan. The commission is, rightly, often critical of some of the measures that we perhaps do not take fast enough. I was therefore really pleased to get its endorsement of the draft plan.
Mercedes Villalba makes a critical point, which is that we have to face reality. Two realities are happening. One is that we are far too reliant on the burning of fossil fuel. That is the case not only in this country but in countries across the whole world, and we are seeing the effects of that, including in the weather events that are impacting all our communities. The other reality, which is closer to home, is the fact that we passed peak oil and gas a couple of decades ago. We cannot rely on the North Sea to keep delivering oil and gas domestically for another 50 years. It is a declining basin, and so we need to have a fair and managed transition.
At the moment, I believe that the decline of the industry and the supply chain in North Sea oil and gas is happening too quickly and in a cliff-edge way. That has to be avoided, because we need to ensure that we have all the work associated with oil and gas, and renewables and decommissioning, for our wider supply chain. That is what I am trying to do as energy minister, and that is what my Government is trying to do. We will work with any partners who have that at their heart.