Prax Lindsey Oil Refinery

Charlie Maynard Excerpts

Monday 30th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Michael Shanks]

I do not agree with the hon. Lady’s proposed piece of legislation, so I will not be supporting it. I think that that is the wrong approach, although she has highlighted the right problem. We are moving as quickly as possible to plan the transition properly, although we should have been doing that many years ago when it started, and as a result we have lost a third of the workforce in the past 10 years. More than 70,000 people have lost their jobs because we failed to plan for this.

I recognise the problem that the hon. Lady has described, but I think that the answer is for us to do two things: to manage the existing fields and support the industry for the lifetime of those fields, and to build up, at speed, investment in the industries that come next. In the spending review the Government supported industries in respect of carbon capture and storage and hydrogen, and, of course, significant investments in the supply chain through Great British Energy to ensure that we are building infrastructure in this country again and securing the jobs that come with it. The transition is important, and we are doing all that we can to ensure that workers are at the heart of it.

[Charlie Maynard (Witney) (LD)]

I appreciate the Minister’s words of support for the workers who are facing such horror and shock, and the Liberal Democrats will work hard to hold him to those words. I have two questions for him. The carbon border adjustment mechanism leaves UK refineries at a disadvantage when it comes to the trade in international fuel. Will the Government now consider including that trade in CBAM so that our UK refineries can be level pegging with the rest of the world? Secondly, the UK now has only one refinery left facing the North sea. How many refineries is it okay for us to have when it comes to maintaining fuel security? Can the Minister be precise in telling me how many more can fall after Grangemouth and the one that we are discussing?

[Michael Shanks]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his questions and his promise to hold us to account; I look forward to that. He was right to reiterate the point that I made at the beginning about the importance of support for the workers, and we are calling for the company’s owners to do the right thing. As for the carbon border adjustment, we have looked at three factors: the UK emissions trading scheme, the carbon leakage risk, and the feasibility and effectiveness of inclusion. The refining sector does not currently meet all those criteria and is therefore not included in scope at present. We are looking beyond 2027 and also considering whether there is more we can do in the short term, but clearly there are questions about carbon leakage and other matters that we need to work through. That is partly why I got those in the sector together—the first time that had happened for 13 years, as it turns out—to talk about some of those issues, and about their own views.

I am not going to answer the hon. Gentleman’s second question with a specific number, because I do not think that is the right way to look at anything around business planning. What I can say is that refineries are incredibly important to this country. They are crucial parts of our energy infrastructure, and they are important businesses, but businesses have to operate as successful businesses. While some refineries are absolutely doing that, this one is clearly an example of where that has not happened. We will do everything we can to support the sector, but I am not going to put a specific number on how many refineries we should have in the future.