OIL: HARVIE CALLS FOR MAXIMUM REVENUE NOT EXPLORATION
Responding to the call from First Minister Nicola Sturgeon for the UK Government to increase incentives such as tax breaks to boost oil exploration in the North Sea, Patrick Harvie, Scottish Green MSP for Glasgow and a member of Holyrood's economy and energy committee, said:
"Given that it’s now generally accepted that the world has far more fossil fuel that we can afford to burn, it’s utterly irresponsible to subsidise the industry to go looking for more. The focus for the Scottish and UK Governments should be to maximise revenue for a shorter period of extraction, to finance public investment in the sustainable energy system that’s being built.
"If we just leave this transition to the market we’ll just be swapping one bunch of multinationals for another, when we have the chance to transform the ownership of our energy industry at the same time as breaking our oil dependence."
Scottish Greens briefing on jobs, including transition away from oil