When ministers go out to bat for the government’s position banning new drilling in the North Sea, there are two arguments that tend to be the focus. First, that oil and gas are traded on global markets – therefore fixing prices irrespective of UK production – and secondly, that the UK’s North Sea Basin is 90 per cent extracted and no new government policy is going to change that.
“It is a wrong argument to say that if we were to issue new licences today [it] would affect the energy prices we are facing because of the situation in the Middle East,” trade minister Chris Bryant said, when asked in a debate on the loosening of Russian oil sanctions if we should not also be trying to boost North Sea oil over war in Iran. Recent months have seen Keir Starmer, Rachel Reeves and even energy secretary Ed Miliband focus on a similar line.
