Clean Energy Transition: Spending Review

1. What steps she is taking through the spending review to support the transition to clean energy.

The Prime Minister’s plan for change sets out our ambitious but achievable target for clean power by 2030. We have already announced £300 million for offshore wind supply chains, in addition to the significant uplift for the clean industry bonus scheme. These measures support clean energy and growth in the UK’s industrial heartlands, and further details will be set out at the spending review.

Successive Governments have failed to deliver a fair energy transition for workers and communities. We have seen the devastating closure of the Grangemouth oil refinery, and now we are seeing uncertainty around the gas storage facility off the east coast. Just seven out of 87 offshore oil and gas companies are planning to invest anything in renewable energy by 2030, so the Government must be the ones in the driving seat to ensure that our North sea oil and gas workers do not meet the same fate. What discussions has the Minister had with the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero on new financial support to create recruitment and retention pathways for workers moving into the clean energy pathway?

Our skilled workforce in the oil and gas industry will be important for the continued role of oil and gas in the energy mix, but also for the transition to renewable and net zero energy, as the hon. Lady has pointed out. That is why we have invested significant sums of money in carbon capture and storage, working with exactly those companies, and we will set out details of further support for the industry at the spending review in the coming months.

I welcome the £200 million commitment to Grangemouth and clean energy through the national wealth fund, and I also welcome the Department’s confirmation to me recently that that money will not be fettered exclusively to the Project Willow proposals. The need for investment is urgent, with jobs lost and the broader economic impacts impending. We need to move further and faster, so what conversations are Treasury Ministers having with their Cabinet colleagues to encourage them to act on the Project Willow policy recommendations and deliver investment in Grangemouth?

I thank my hon. Friend, who is a champion for his constituency and for industry. As he has alluded to, the Government have already made hundreds of millions of pounds available through the national wealth fund for the company in question. We are working to ensure a just transition, harbouring the skills of people in Scotland and across the country. We are now in active discussions as the spending review comes to an end, and we will be able to present more detail to the House on 11 June.

I call the shadow Minister.

The Climate Change Committee says that we will need oil and gas until at least 2050, but rather than maximise North sea production, the Government are taxing it out of existence. Harbour Energy has just announced hundreds of job losses as a result of the Chancellor’s 78% windfall tax. Instead of costly transition imports, will Ministers use the spending review to think again and focus on an energy policy that will deliver cheaper and cleaner energy that is affordable for consumers and businesses?

I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s encouragement. That is why we are investing in home-grown secure energy, including renewables, nuclear and other forms of energy. In yesterday’s UK-EU trade deal—which I am sure the shadow Minister would like to welcome—we have enhanced our arrangements with the European Union on electricity trading, enabling us to export energy we produce in the UK to the European Union and vice versa. That will ensure energy security, as well as good jobs and good businesses in the energy sector, for decades to come.