UK Energy Secretary Miatta Fahnbulleh is due in Aberdeen, where oil and gas leaders will press her to back the Rosebank and Jackdaw developments in the North Sea. The visit turns attention to her own record: before entering Parliament, Fahnbulleh led the New Economics Foundation, which signed a 2023 open letter urging Labour to block Rosebank, and in February 2022 she wrote that the world could not open any new oil or gas fields and still keep warming within 1.5C.
Offshore Energies UK chief executive David Whitehouse said he was encouraged by Fahnbulleh's commitment to be 'pragmatic' and would press her to prioritize domestic production. He told Daily Business that the change of government was 'a chance for a reset,' both in the language ministers use about UK production and in the policy toward projects such as Rosebank and Jackdaw.
Unions have repeatedly warned the government that refusing to allow more North Sea oil and gas output would cost jobs. Prime Minister Andy Burnham has pledged to honor licenses already granted while holding to Labour's oil and gas policy of issuing no new exploration licenses. Fahnbulleh, in her first interviews as Secretary, has said oil and gas remain 'part of the energy mix' and has stressed protecting jobs through the transition.
Russell Borthwick, chief executive of the Aberdeen & Grampian Chamber of Commerce, said pragmatic language is welcome but now needs decisions behind it. He said approving Rosebank and Jackdaw would show that the UK still welcomes investment, values its own energy production and takes the jobs at stake seriously. Industry wants certainty, he said, and the Aberdeen visit is a chance for Fahnbulleh to show the government is ready to provide it.
