THE closure of Grangemouth's oil refinery is an emergency situation which should have been foreseen and planned for a decade ago instead of being left to billionaires, an MSP has said.
Central Scotland MSP Gillian Mackay said workers at Grangemouth who learned on Thursday that 80% of them are going to lose their jobs “deserve so much better than this” and that they have been dealt the “complete opposite of a just transition”.
Petroineos (Ineos) announced on September 12 that Scotland’s only oil refinery would cease production by the second quarter of 2025 with hundreds of workers being laid off.
Mackay, who grew up 200 yards away from the oil refinery and still lives in the local area, said that Grangemouth’s transition into new green industries should have happened more than a decade ago.
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“The just transition to green [energy] should have been under way when I was a teenager,” she said.
“Not when I am now in parliament having to fight for constituents because the refinery is now going to close.
“We've known since I was quite small that something needed to be done with the refinery at Grangemouth, to transition into those new industries that should have been done or at least started more than a decade ago.
“Not now, not throwing £100 million at it.”
The money is to be invested in existing industrial sites and to encourage new businesses to set up shop in the region and take on Grangemouth workers – a decision which Mackay says is not enough.
She added that Grangemouth’s closure proves that you “can't leave it in the hands of billionaire shareholders to drive the just transition” and has called for more ambition from governments of all colours.
“We have a closure date for the refinery - we absolutely now have to take this as an emergency situation and absolutely accelerate whatever anybody had in mind to get something done for the community and for the workers,” she said.
“One of my big concerns is that Ineos isn't interested and if they aren't interested in whatever we do, maybe for now anyway, and that's certainly not something that I want to let the community think at the moment because that is all hope lost.
“I think they need some hope that everybody's doing everything that they can and put some pressure on Ineos because they need that pressure to know how serious the decisions they're taking are for everyone concerned.”
Mackay said that in the coming weeks, her fellow Scottish Greens MSPs will aim to put pressure on Ineos and that Thursday’s announcement from the oil and gas firm has raised “about 100 more questions”.
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She added that through having conversations with people in her local communities, there is a lot of anxiety around what happens next and there is a lot of frustration around the lack of answers and transparency with Ineos.
The MSP also said that getting Grangemouth the just transition it deserves can be attributed to a lack of political will.
“We have a lot of things to address, to speak to some of these workers in other industries as well, who could be going ‘are we next’, ‘is this what everybody means by a just transition’ when in actual fact, the workers at Grangemouth deserve so much better than this,” Mackay said.
“This is the absolute opposite of a just transition.”
A spokesperson for Petroineos said: "We have seen no evidence of a credible bid for the refinery. If a genuine offer is forthcoming, we will engage seriously with it.
"Since Petroineos was formed in 2011, our shareholders have invested nearly £1bn in the refinery, absorbing losses of more than £590m in the same period. This year alone, we are anticipating losses of more than £150m.
“We have engaged extensively with governments at Westminster and Holyrood - as well as other parliamentarians, trade unions and several other interested parties - to demonstrate the financial and operational challenges that shaped our decision to cease refining and invest £30m in creating an import terminal.”
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