Labour 'must confirm' North East as GB Energy HQ as MPs return

Sir Keir Starmer at the Scottish Labour general election campaign launch event. Image: Shutterstock

Labour must confirm the North East as the headquarters of its new state-owned energy investment company immediately following the summer break at Westminster or risk betraying voters, according to a Tory MP.

Sir Keir Starmer has repeatedly refused to confirm the new home for GB Energy – despite putting the initiative at the heart of his pitch to Scottish voters.

The new prime minister previously confirmed it will be headquartered in Scotland but stopped short of saying exactly where.

Labour plans to hand GB Energy £8.3 billion over the next five years funded through a windfall tax on the profits of oil and gas giants.

Industry leaders have called on Sir Keir to station the new initiative in Aberdeen given the ongoing shift away from fossil fuels and the uncertainty around what comes next.

Ed Miliband with Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer and Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar at St Fergus Gas Terminal in Aberdeenshire. Image: PA

In a letter to new Energy Secretary Ed Miliband, seen by The Sunday Post, West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine MP Andrew Bowie calls on the government to make a statement on GB Energy “in the first days follow the summer recess”.

He adds that Miliband should confirm Aberdeen or its close surrounding as the headquarters and the expected remit for the company.

‘A promise is a promise’

Bowie told us: “The promise of starting a new energy department in North East Scotland plainly didn’t attract voters like Keir Starmer hoped it would.

“That may be because of the apprehension here that Labour will turn off the taps in the North Sea – leaving up to 100,000 workers out of a job.

“So soon after the Bute House agreement which allowed the Scottish Greens to demonise oil and gas, a Labour government has sent employers into a tailspin.

“But a promise is a promise and Labour must outline concrete plans as soon as possible.

“That’s why I am urging Ed Miliband to actually put this scheme – whatever it’s called – in the North East of Scotland.

“Anything else will represent a betrayal by the Starmer government.”

We revealed previously how industry leaders had warned funding plans for GB Energy do not make sense and could risk a permanent exodus from the UK’s energy sector.

Jenny Stanning, external relations director of Offshore Energies UK (OEUK), said it is not logical to penalise firms to help set up GB Energy and then ask those same businesses to back it with direct investment.

The government’s election manifesto states GB Energy will be a publicly owned company and will be “operationally independent, with an independent board”.

Specific projects will be owned by local councils and communities.