UK GOVERNMENT ministers have been criticised for “cosying up” to the oil and gas industry on the day the IPCC report issued a stark warning on climate change.

Anne-Marie Trevelyan MP, Minister of State for Business, Energy and Clean Growth, and David Duguid MP, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Scotland, were pictured officially opening the new Oil and Gas UK (OGUK) offices in Aberdeen on Monday August 9.

The Tory politicians were pictured smiling as they unveiled a plaque with their names emblazoned on it at the OGUK office in photographs released on social media.

It comes as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned the world will reach or exceed temperature rises of 1.5C – seen as a threshold beyond which the worst impacts of global warming will be felt – over the next two decades.

READ MORE: UN ramps up pressure on governments to act on climate crisis

One of the key ways to stop this, the report said, is to halt oil and gas exploration.

The UN Secretary General, António Guterres, said that the report “must sound a death knell for coal and fossil fuels, before they destroy our planet”.

However, the Oil and Gas Authority (OGA) are currently assessing whether or not to sign off on a huge new oil field off the coast of Shetland, which is estimated to hold around 800million barrels of oil.

Friends of the Earth Scotland (FoE) hit out at the “cosy photo shoot” by ministers and the Scottish Greens said that the UK Government’s credibility on climate change is “in tatters”.

The National:

Maggie Chapman said that the UK Government needs to stop oil and gas exploration

Maggie Chapman, Scottish Greens MSP for the North East, said: “Despite all their rhetoric on the IPCC’s findings and importance of COP26, they were in Aberdeen on the same day the IPCC issued the ‘code red’, cosying up to the fossil fuel industries who are accelerating this climate crisis.

“The people of the North East deserve a secure future and that can only happen by starting the just transition now, stopping the expansion of oil and gas and investing in the alternative jobs we need.

“That requires the UK Government to change tack on the North Sea and shift subsidies now. We cannot repeat what happened to the coal mining communities in the 80s and 90s.

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“And although energy is reserved, it’s also time for the Scottish Government to finally recognise that business as usual for the oil and gas industry can’t go on.”

Off the back of the IPCC report, UN Secretary Guiterres urged countries to urgently step up their efforts and set out national plans for cutting emissions this decade ahead of a crucial UN climate summit taking place in Glasgow in November.

FoE Scotland said that this was far from what the UK Government are currently doing, and said current oil and gas drilling combined with further extraction from the Cambo oil field will “blast through safe climate limits”.

Caroline Rance, FoE Scotland Climate and Energy Campaigner, said: “UK Government ministers are sticking two fingers up at people sounding the alarm on climate change by choosing to spend the day of the IPCC report launch cosying up to the oil and gas industry.

“The UK Government has bent over backwards to help these international oil companies keep on drilling and destroying our climate, from billions of pounds of subsidies to writing laws in their favour and cosy photo shoots.”

Rance said that the drilling plans already operating in UK oil and gas fields will “far exceed our share under the Paris climate goals” and hit back at the industry for pushing ahead with extracting more oil and gas.

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She said: “Governments should be sitting down with workers and communities to plan the managed phase out of oil and gas that is necessary to protect people and the planet.

"This means saying no to new projects like the Cambo field and instead planning for a rapid and fair transition away from fossil fuels.

“Oil and gas industry claims about transition are greenwash and PR spin and cannot be trusted.

“They want to distract people with talk about the emissions from getting oil out of the ground but are silent on the far greater climate impact of burning the oil and gas they produce.”

The National:

The UN Secretary General said oil and gas exploration must stop 

In response to the criticism, OGUK said that the oil and gas sector is a “key part of the solution to tackling the climate crisis”.

A UK Government Spokesperson said: “Ministers Trevelyan and Duguid’s visit to OGUK’s office ties in with the progression of the North Sea Transition Deal which will see the Scottish oil and gas industry’s skills and innovation encourage emerging technologies such as hydrogen production, offshore wind and decommissioning.

“It’s all part of the UK Government’s commitment to a low carbon future as we strive to reach Net Zero by 2050 – an aim that’s never been more important following this week’s IPCC report and with world leaders set to tackle climate change in Glasgow at COP26 in November.”

READ MORE: Cambo oil field: What does it mean for climate targets?

A spokesperson for OGUK said: “OGUK member companies are the same companies pioneering renewables like wind, tidal and solar energy, as well as low carbon technologies like hydrogen and carbon capture that the Climate Change Committee says are crucial to the UK hitting net zero emissions by 2050.”