Sir Keir Starmer has vowed to save hundreds of jobs at Scotland’s last oil refinery as he set Labour’s sights on defeating the SNP at the next Holyrood election.
The Prime Minister, who travelled to Edinburgh on Sunday for his first official engagement since his historic landslide win, said he was “very concerned” at the situation at the Grangemouth plant and revealed work had already begun on a rescue plan.
The operator of Grangemouth, Petroineos, has warned operations at the refinery could cease as early as next year, which would result in the loss of at least 400 jobs.
The refinery, part of Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s Ineos empire, produces 215,000 barrels per day and is seen as vital to UK infrastructure.
Closure ‘of great concern’
Should it close, Scotland would become the only major oil-producing country in the world not to have its own oil-refining capacity.
Sir Keir revealed his new government had already begun discussions about Grangemouth’s future, saying the refinery’s threatened closure was “of great concern”.
He described saving jobs as a “real priority for me” and pledged to ensure the plant had a prosperous future.
The pledge came as Sir Keir vowed to usher in a new era of cooperation with the Scottish Government, even as he said “part two” of Labour’s resurgence was to take power at Holyrood in 2026 from the SNP.
Labour returned 37 MPs at last week’s election, while the SNP has plummeted to just nine leading to bitter nationalist infighting.
“We will also start more immediately with discussions about Grangemouth, which is obviously a source of great concern to me, in terms of what steps we can now take to preserve jobs and ensure the future,” Sir Keir said.
“So there are immediate steps we can take that will make a big difference to people’s lives. I won’t go into the detail but obviously, I’m very concerned about the situation at Grangemouth.
“I’m now the Prime Minister. It’s my duty to do what I can to ensure that jobs are preserved and that the future is good, as I’m sure it can be. I won’t go into the details but it is a real priority for me.”
Discussions
Anas Sarwar, the leader of Scottish Labour, said he had already held discussions with Ed Miliband, the new energy secretary, about Grangemouth.
Under current plans, Petroineos intends to turn the site into a fuels import terminal. The refinery supplies much of Scotland and northern England’s petrol and diesel.
However, Ineos has previously said Labour’s plans to ban new oil and gas projects in the North Sea pose a further threat to Grangemouth’s future.
There is an adjacent petrochemical and plastics plant at the site, which relies on oil and gas from the North Sea for energy and raw materials. It is fed by a direct pipeline linking it to 80 of the UK’s offshore oil and gas fields.
Labour won three seats unexpectedly in the Grangemouth region, including Falkirk, which was previously the SNP’s safest seat in Scotland.
Mr Sarwar told journalists: “I had a detailed conversation with Ed Miliband this morning, who really quickly wants to move on pulling people together around the issue at Grangemouth, as well as get cracking to deliver GB Energy. He’s on it, he genuinely cares about it.”
Sir Keir told an audience of jubilant Labour activists and several of his new Scottish MPs that he would immediately start “delivering for Scotland”.
He said his election win last Thursday was “part one” of Labour’s resurgence and that “part two comes in 2026” with the next Scottish Parliament elections.
However, he declined to attack the SNP and its beleaguered leader John Swinney. The Prime Minister has vowed to “reset the relationship between the Westminster government and the Scottish Government” and hand SNP ministers a “genuine seat at the table”.
Meanwhile, a former senior advisor to Alister Jack, who until the election was Scottish Secretary, said the SNP would risk a backlash from voters if it continued to “foment phoney grievances” with the UK Government in an effort to boost support for independence.
Writing in The Telegraph, Magnus Gardham, a former special adviser in the Scotland Office, said the scale of Labour’s victory in Scotland had “dramatically changed the political dynamics between the UK and Scottish governments.”
‘Gripe and grievances’
He claimed that any attempt to stoke division with “gripe and grievances” would be exploited by Labour and boost Anas Sarwar’s chances of winning the next Holyrood election, which is just 22 months away.
“The vast bulk of the Tories’ time in power pitted a UK Government that was unpopular in Scotland against a Scottish Government that was wildly popular,” Mr Gardham said.
“It was easy for the SNP to do what they enjoy best: generate friction and foment phoney grievances as a means to drive support for independence.
“It will be far harder for them to pursue the same approach with a Labour Government that has proved its popularity in Scotland by gubbing them in an election. The SNP’s moans will get much shorter shrift than they once did.”
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