Britain’s North Sea oil and gas industry is projected to lose more than 113,000 jobs over the next 25 years, according to figures produced by the Labour government, exposing the scale of the employment shock facing one of the UK’s longstanding industrial sectors.
Data obtained from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero through a Freedom of Information request by the Conservative Party suggests that the industry’s combined direct and indirect workforce will shrink by 82.7 per cent between 2024 and 2050.
The figures put the sector’s workforce at 136,675 in 2024, the year Labour came to power. By 2026, that number had fallen to 115,720. By 2050, only 23,584 positions are projected to remain.
That represents a loss of 113,091 jobs over the period.
The contraction is expected to accelerate over the coming decade. More than 54,000 positions are forecast to disappear by 2030, while by 2035 the industry is projected to have shed 77,783 jobs — more than half its 2024 workforce.
The figures have intensified the political dispute over Labour’s strategy for managing the transition from fossil fuels to a lower-carbon energy system.
Labour entered government with a manifesto commitment to prohibit new oil and gas exploration licences, while maintaining the windfall tax imposed on producers.
Critics argue that the combination risks shrinking domestic production faster than Britain can replace it with alternative sources of energy, leaving consumers increasingly dependent on imports.
The economic impact extends well beyond the oil platforms themselves. DESNZ analysis indicates that every direct job in the industry supports a further 4.4 positions across the wider supply chain.
That makes the projected decline potentially significant for Aberdeen, north-east Scotland and communities across the wider UK that provide engineering, maritime, manufacturing and specialist services to the offshore sector.
The government is simultaneously considering billions of pounds of investment in new energy infrastructure as Britain prepares for greater reliance on imported supplies. Ministers are understood to be considering the acquisition of a vessel capable of transporting liquefied natural gas as part of efforts to bolster energy security.
The contradiction is increasingly apparent: Britain is shrinking domestic fossil-fuel production while preparing to spend heavily to ensure imported energy can fill the gap.
The immediate test for the government will come with decisions expected next month on two major Scottish developments, Rosebank and Jackdaw.
Rosebank, about 80 miles north-west of Shetland, is the largest undeveloped oil field in the North Sea. Jackdaw lies about 150 miles east of Aberdeen.
Reports suggest Prime Minister Andy Burnham is inclined to approve Jackdaw while rejecting Rosebank, a compromise that would expose him to pressure from both sides of his party.
Burnham has previously acknowledged the continuing role of hydrocarbons in the British economy.
“We won’t be able to stop using oil and gas for some time, that’s just a fact.
“The question is whether we can accelerate use of it so that we pay for the transition, and one thing helps the other… whether that extraction can be the bridge to the clean energy future we need, and bring it forward.”
That position has left the Prime Minister caught between Labour MPs committed to achieving Net Zero targets and Scottish politicians concerned about the future of the North Sea economy.
Developers behind Rosebank and Jackdaw argue that approving the projects could support more than 3,500 jobs and generate more than £20bn of economic activity.
For the Conservatives, the government’s own employment projections amount to evidence that the transition is being pursued without sufficient regard for energy security or regional employment.
Claire Coutinho, the Conservative shadow energy secretary, said: “It is complete economic insanity to shut down our own oil and gas industry when we’ll need both for decades to come.
“All we will be doing is importing more of what we need with higher emissions, and as we can see, tens of thousands of livelihoods will be lost in the process.”
The government maintains that the decline of the North Sea does not mean an immediate end to oil and gas in Britain.
A DESNZ spokesman said: “We are clear that oil and gas will continue to play an important role in our energy system for decades to come while we transition to clean power.”
The numbers nevertheless expose the scale of the structural change ahead.
The question for ministers is no longer simply whether Britain should eventually move beyond North Sea oil and gas. It is whether the workforce, supply chains and domestic production capacity can decline at roughly the same speed as the country’s ability to replace them.
For an industry that once underpinned Britain’s energy security and supported hundreds of thousands of jobs across its wider economy, the projected disappearance of more than four out of every five positions would represent an industrial transformation on a formidable scale.
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