Floating Offshore Wind Projects

Kenny MacAskill Excerpts

Tuesday 18th October 2022 Westminster Hall

[Kenny MacAskill (East Lothian) (Alba)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Preseli Pembrokeshire (Stephen Crabb) on securing the debate and on an excellent speech. I concur with him on the future possibilities. I have a minor comment, meant as an assistance rather than a chastisement: the pronunciation of the windfarm’s location is actually Kincardine, although he is not from those parts and is not to know. Otherwise, I fully agree.

Scotland has 60% of the UK’s onshore wind; it has 25% of Europe’s offshore wind capacity. It is not simply the Celtic sea; it is all around Scotland’s shores. The Berwick Bank field, between East Lothian, my constituency, and Fife is able to power something like 2.5 million households. Scotland only has 2.4 million, and that is one field alone, so the potential is significant. It follows on from oil and gas and precedes, as has been mentioned, tidal possibilities and even carbon capture and storage, so our country has been blessed with huge natural resources—a significant blessing. Scotland is energy-rich, but Scots are fuel-poor. It is no comfort to be able to see turbines turning—if they are—onshore or offshore if people cannot heat their home, power their business or obtain employment. That is why we ask: where is our country’s and our communities’ benefit from resource?

I appreciate that there is a disconnect that has to be resolved. Scotland has more energy than it requires, as I mentioned with the Berwick Bank field. England has a surfeit of requirement, but not the ability to access that energy and therefore cabling makes sense. But where is the consequent payment? Where are the jobs? At present, they are simply not coming.

The turbines are going to be constructed, but sadly almost none in Scotland. Every yard in Scotland should be clanging and riveting. Every estuary in Scotland should be producing them, but we are bringing them in from south of the border, from the Netherlands, from Indonesia. Where is the work for our people? It is not evident in my constituency or across the country.

Transmission stations are also—correctly—being built. I have one near Torness that will take the cabling south to Redcar. A similar one is going from Peterhead down to Drax, but where is the consequent payment and compensation for Scotland’s losing the energy from our shores? Where is the money that we should be entitled to? It is simply coming in and going on. I get told there are supply chain jobs. I spoke to Scottish Power. The transmission station will employ four people in my constituency. That is an inadequate return. It is simply unacceptable. We accept cabling, but there has to be compensation and it cannot simply be a few pounds for the Crown Estate. It has to be for the communities and the country as a whole.

It is not simply, as I say, the cabling. Although the Berwick Bank field is in Scottish territorial waters and although it lies between East Lothian and Fife, 40% will be cabled directly south to Blyth. The Crown Estate will not even get any benefit. The Scottish Government, Marine Scotland, the councils, the communities, Crown Estate Scotland—nobody is getting any financial recompense. That cannot be right. It has to be addressed.

[Mr Carmichael]

The hon. Gentleman has hit on something really important: community benefit. In Orkney and Shetland for the last 40 years we have derived real community benefit from the presence of offshore oil and gas in our communities. It would be an absolute scandal if we cannot get the same benefit from the next generation of clean renewable energy. Does he agree that it is rather perplexing that when the ScotWind round of leasing was facilitated, a cap of £100,000 per sq km was put on bids in the auction? I do not understand for the life of me why that was necessary. It is a real missed opportunity. Scotland’s seabed has been sold cheap.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kenny MacAskill]

It has. The right hon. Gentleman raises two issues, including the community benefit that there should be. I pay tribute to Mr Clark and Shetland Islands Council, who negotiated that. Anybody who goes to Shetland will see the community benefit. East Lothian would give its eye teeth for that. That community benefit should apply not simply in Scotland and the Scottish islands, but across the UK. There should be a community benefit. It would not be a disincentive to investment, and it should be available for communities.

With regard to the Scotland project, the bulk of my criticism, because energy is overwhelmingly reserved, is against the UK Government, but the Scotland auction has been lamentable. Nobody goes into an auction, whether at a fundraiser for a political party or whatever, and puts a cap on an auction. Normally we put a floor on an auction, but for some reason the Scottish Government decided to put a cap on it. They returned a benefit of £700 million and crowed about that being a great benefit to Scotland. Of course, £700 million is better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick, but one month later New York had the New York Bight. It put up for auction one quarter of what was disposed of in Scotland and it obtained $4.3 billion. The Scottish Government have to answer for their incompetence and the UK Government for their failures.

There are opportunities. There should be employment in Scotland. There should be energy storage, because that is now coming onshore with the battery, so we should be able to keep stuff in Scotland. We should be able to manufacture hydrogen—green hydrogen, not blue hydrogen. In my constituency, what do we require for hydrogen? In the main, we require water and energy, and we have that by the score, so there has to be more. This is a huge potential benefit that has landed in Scotland and its communities, but at present—through failures by the Scottish Government but primarily the UK Government—we are not seeing that benefit in terms of employment. We are not seeing our share, because it is ours and we should be taking it. It is absurd, as the hon. Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock) mentioned, that Vattenfall and the Chinese national corporation are owners and yet our people are not. This potential must be for the benefit of our country and communities. The Government have to up their game and, indeed, so do the devolved Governments.