Grangemouth No More

The announcement of the closure of Grangemouth oil refinery as early as 2025, with the loss of hundreds of jobs, represents a severe blow to the Scottish economy. It also throws into sharp relief the complete absence of a viable, urgent Just Transition programme, the precarity of a nation unable to cohere a (re) or (de) industrialisation strategy, the absurdity of key aspects of the economy being in the hands of private companies and the utter failure to step up to or respond to climate breakdown.

Responding to the announcements the Future Economy Scotland Co-Director Miriam Brett said:

“Managed effectively, the transition to net zero has the potential to create more new jobs than will be lost. Where is the plan to secure a thriving future for the communities supported by Grangemouth Refinery? Where are the commitments to harness and develop the existing skills of workers in the transition, and the proactive policies to reskill and retrain workers?

“Decarbonising Scotland’s economy will involve a major restructuring of our labour market. Today’s announcement demonstrates how crucial it is that impacted communities – particularly workers and trade unions – are given a meaningful stake and say over decisions that affect them to ensure the costs and benefits of decarbonisation are fairly shared.”

“The development also underscores why the transition to net zero should not be guided solely by shareholder decisions but instead should be coordinated effectively, with the shared goals of creating a new generation of well paid green jobs, raising living standards, and tackling deep-rooted inequalities.”

Friends of the Earth Scotland just transition campaigner Rosie Hampton said:

“Workers at the refinery and the wider community at Grangemouth deserve better than how they have been treated today by rich bosses in distant boardrooms. Escalating climate breakdown and the move away from fossil fuelled vehicles means that the transition away from oil and gas is essential in the coming years. Today’s announcement is, sadly, the inevitable consequence of the Scottish Government’s repeated failure to grasp this reality and to put concrete transition plans in place with workers.”

“Scotland’s energy future must see our lives powered by renewables that are owned and operated in the public interest.”

Others were less considered.

Alex Massie, who has severe problems with climate reality writes ‘Grangemouth is a reality check for Scotland’s politicians’: “Politicians prattle on about a “just transition” without ever specifying what this actually means.”

This is simply not true. He must know this.

“It is an aspiration and nothing more than that, a collective crossing of fingers in the hope that something will turn up to make it some kind of tangible reality. Dirty and climate-ruining old jobs will magically become clean, climate-saving, new jobs.”

Again this is just completely untrue. The definition of ‘clean’ renewable energy is unquestionable and has been for many decades.

“Like many nice things, this is little more than fantasy; a form of wishful thinking so divorced from reality that it may only be sustained by a kind of collective agreement that delusion is more comfortable than the truth.”

The real delusion here is of course is the world in which nothing is done about our climate catastrophe.

This oration floats fact-free in the pages of The Times, without reference to any of the research or plans for a Just Transition. It’s not clear if Massie doesn’t know any of this or just doesn’t care. He goes on:

“Mutton-headed politicians who support Just Stop Oil protests and oppose the granting of new exploration licences in the North Sea now deplore the closing of an oil refinery. You can pick one of these positions but you cannot sensibly choose both. It is a feature of our Alice in Wonderland politics, however, that so many Scottish politicians incant green pieties while also deploring actions which accelerate the decarbonisation of the Scottish economy they have spent years demanding.”

“This is Tartan Cakeism of a kind even Boris Johnson might struggle to swallow. Petroineos’s decision to shutter the Grangemouth refinery may not be directly linked to the Scottish government’s green ambitions but it serves as a warning nonetheless.”

“May not be directly linked” is doing a lot of heavy-lifting here.

A few facts seem to have eluded the Times columnist.

Energy is  not devolved.

This is happening under the Union.

Over at the Scottish Daily Mail Graham Grant is doing the same ‘SNP’s ‘hostility’ to oil industry blamed as Scotland’s only refinery to be axed – The Mail‘ – he writes: “Opposition leaders condemned the announcement and blamed the SNP’s green energy plans, including its ‘just transition’ agenda, for the shutdown and hefty job losses.”
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The hysterical reaction of the Unionist scribes to these job losses is to conjure a tissue of lies to be weaponised against the SNP-Green coalition which they loathe and to ignore the fundamental reality facing us all, of imminent and catastrophic climate breakdown, a reality which has apparently eluded them.
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It’s a remarkable contortion of the most basic facts and an extraordinary act of deluding not just their readers but themselves about what’s going on. As the playwright Peter Arnott puts it: “Once again, the stripping back to nothing of Scotland’s producing industries WITHIN the Union is harnessed as an argument FOR the Union.”

Comments (21)

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  1. Micheal MacGilleRuadh says:

    Scotland truly is in a perilous situation. On the fateful day in 2014 when the electorate decided to remain in the union the die was cast. The situation we have is the worst of all worlds, a pathetic ‘pretendy parliament’ (to quote a famous comedian), an immovable 50%+ of the electorate content with the union arrangements and a vengeful dominating English parliament at Westminster. Make no mistake, ‘just transition’ investment and jobs will be directed to red-wall seats and Scotland’s industrial base will continue to shrink in relative terms. Compare and contrast with the Republic of Ireland.
    Perhaps, given the unshakable affection a sizeable proportion of the electorate in Scotland have for the union it would be better to admit defeat, sue for peace and disband the horror show at Holyrood. Then we could please for investment on equal terms with Stockton on Tees etc. What is clear is that things in Scotland can’t go on as they are in this no-man’s land of terminal decline.

    1. John says:

      Michael – if you look at how government is distributing out levelling up money you have to deduce that the only way Scotland would get more levelling up money is by having more Tory MP’s.
      I agree the situation in Scotland post 2014 is both depressing and predictable. The only ray’s of light are demographics with younger supporters being more pro-independence and the fact that electorate in Scotland continues to reject Tories and Brexit.
      The immediate future might appear bleak but it can only be addressed by continuing to make the case for change and rejecting defeatism.

      1. MacGilleRuadh says:

        Hi John, if demographics are to be the saviour how come the dial has hardly shifted in almost 10 years? Is it not time to come to terms with the fact that we have a uniquely demoralised and supine population in this benighted ‘country’ and that sufficient of the young become progressively supine as they age, to stymie the process that you hope is happening?

        As to Tory MPs, would the situation wherein Holyrood was scrapped and we all reverted loyally for representation to the ‘mother of parliaments’ be any worse than the absolute bourach that exists at the moment? At lease we could appeal for investment on an even footing with the north of England.

        1. John says:

          I lived in Scotland throughout 80’s 90’s and Scotland had no power against Tory government policies in many sectors- it was worse.
          Polls show support for independence is >50% in all age groups under 45 and opposition at its highest in >65’s. This doesn’t guarantee independence but gives far more hope than if figures were reversed.
          If you want to give up and be governed 100% by Westminster you are either a dyed in wool unionist or a complete defeatist.
          I would have more respect for you if you are a unionist as they are honest whereas defeatists hinder the cause they purport to support.

        2. BSA says:

          At the first setback in 20 years you are hurling your toys out the pram and declaring, as Hitler did about the Germans in 1945, that the Scots are not worthy of your ambition. A blue doo right enough.

          1. Micheal MacGilleRuadh says:

            Fair enough John and BSA but I hope you can find the way out of this devolutionary morass before another 10 years have elapsed because Scotland will be in a parlous state by then.

        3. BSA says:

          No offence but at the first setback in 20 years you seem to be hurling your toys out the pram and declaring, as Hitler did about the Germans in 1945, that the Scots are not worthy of your ambition.

  2. Satan says:

    I think people mistake the slogan ‘just transition’ for just (adjective) rather than just (adverb). It’s really going to hurt, it will hurt everyone, and the plan looks very much like misleading people into believing differently. Probably with good intent but dishonest nonetheless. Some truth would be good. Grangemouth chemical-works technicians sound like unlikely candidates for basic offshore rigging work. There are a lot of Bangladeshi’s who I would prefer and most of the work is outside the 12 n. mile limit. A very dependable, safe, and dilligent lot, but accustomed to low wages and appauling work regimes (2 years at sea / 2 weeks off anyone?). Scots appear to be incapable of building a windmill, or even manufacturing the requirements to do so, but a few people are probably good at calculating blade-pitch efficiency using an engineering computer program written and punted from somewhere else.

  3. Observer says:

    No doubt INEOS are canny with their finances but if there were big profits to be made through refining at Grangemouth they wouldn’t be ceasing these operations. Their Chinese investors have already been burned by this investment despite massive U.K. government assistance.

    Most refinery workers are pretty employable so won’t necessarily need any more assistance than any other group of workers such as those in the 2000s in Silicon Glen

    We will still need refineries in future- just not as many.

    1. Matthew says:

      A sensible voice on a day when the conspiracy theorists are out in force!

      It’s a business facing a global shift away from one of its major products, one that Ineos never wanted to own, making a serious loss……

  4. Alex McCulloch says:

    Can anyone explain if it is important as a Nation to have an oil refinery in future decades? Will there be a need for refined products as a component in the manufacture of certain materials and goods although their need for transport and energy will become redundant?
    That is , will it be strategically important as a nation to continue to have the capacity to refine oil or will importing our needs be low risk?

  5. Betsy says:

    I feel sorry for the workers that will be losing Thier jobs it must be a frightening time for them. However, the refinery hasn’t and doesn’t bring any wealth or opportunity to Grangemouth. Most of the workers less than 4% live in an FK3 postcode. They do not shop or use facilities on the town, not that there is much left.

    Grangemouth should be the richest town in the country but it’s one of the poorest.

    If we had wind turbines the money that we would get would directly be put back into the local community.

    1. Wul says:

      “Grangemouth should be the richest town in the country but it’s one of the poorest.”

      Spot on Betsy. And you can say the same for all the Lanarkshire, Ayrshire and other coal-field areas. The towns where steel-works operated, where ships were built. Anywhere that vast wealth was produced is now poor and deprived. None of the wealth sticks to the area that produced it. Where did it go?

  6. Tony Kilcullen says:

    Where else is the oil to be refined

      1. Alex McCulloch says:

        Can anyone explain if it is important as a Nation to have an oil refinery in future decades? Will there be a need for refined products as a component in the manufacture of certain materials and goods although their need for transport and energy will become redundant?
        That is , will it be strategically important as a nation to continue to have the capacity to refine oil or will importing our needs be low risk?

        1. Well we know we have to stop using Fossil Fuels to keep within liveable planetary boundaries. There are a number of other things that could be produced at Grangemouth that are not massive damaging emissions. We need to create that alternative.

        2. Well we know we have to stop using Fossil Fuels to keep within liveable planetary boundaries. There are a number of other things that could be produced at Grangemouth that are not massive damaging emissions. We need to create that alternative.

          1. Alex McCulloch says:

            I suppose what I am trying to ascertain is the future need / demand for refining oil for other purposes rather than fuel.?
            I believe it is an integral to almost everything manufactured in the modern age if not as a core component then to enable the machinery ( e.g brake fluid!)….so as an oil producing nation we presumably will continue to extract oil for those purposes. In those circumstances it would seem important to have the abilitybto refine it also ( i.e. to have the end to end manufacturing ability / supply chain for future manufacturing on our shoress) ..so should we take action to retain that capability?

          2. Do you have anything to say about the facts as presented about climate breakdown?

          3. Alex McCulloch says:

            Climate breakdown will be alleviated by the diversification of energy supply away from fossil fuels to renewable. Oil is used for more purposes than as a fossil fuel so I am trying to understand the strategic importance of retaining refining capacity to process oil for other purposes?

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