Labour MPs urge No 10 not to overrule energy secretary on Rosebank oilfield
Labour MPs have lobbied Prime Minister Andy Burnham and Chancellor John Healey not to overrule Energy Secretary Miatta Fahnbulleh if she decides to block the Rosebank oilfield in the North Sea, the Guardian reports.
Fahnbulleh was minded to refuse environmental permission for the project, the paper said. Rosebank is a proposed oilfield, and the environmental statement for it was prepared by the energy company Equinor in August 2022. Fahnbulleh has described the decision as "a regulatory process not a policy process", and has said she, not the prime minister, will make the final call.
Ministers are not in agreement. According to sources close to him, Healey is in favour of the scheme. Some in government believe Burnham wants the project to go ahead, but the prime minister has said the decision will be for Fahnbulleh alone. Backbench Labour MPs are urging the party's whips and Downing Street not to let other ministers intervene in her decision.
Fahnbulleh's parliamentary aides have circulated a memo to MPs saying she will have the final say. The memo states that no decision has yet been made on Rosebank, and that the energy secretary is the only decision maker on the project. It adds that no other cabinet member or minister has a role in the decision or sees the advice behind it.
The tension has a financial side. The Treasury had factored in tax revenues from Rosebank of around £500m by the end of this parliament. Treasury officials said the Rosebank money had been included in forecasts from the Office for Budget Responsibility, the government's official economic forecaster, since 2019.
The debate follows the government's approval of the Jackdaw gasfield last week. Burnham called Jackdaw "a bridge to the future". Rosebank would produce emissions about seven times greater than Jackdaw, according to the Guardian's earlier reporting on the cabinet split over the project.
Scottish Labour MPs are believed to be overwhelmingly in favour of approving Rosebank. One Labour MP, speaking to the Guardian, said: "If Healey pushes through Rosebank, there will be blood."
