Today [Tuesday 2nd September 2025] Kemi Badenoch MP, Leader of the Conservative Party, will pledge a series of new measures to unlock our Oil & Gas industry.
Speaking at the Society of Petroleum Engineers Offshore Europe conference in Aberdeen, Kemi Badenoch will set out that the next Conservative government will:
- End Labour’s ban on new Oil & Gas licences, freeing the industry to explore and extract
- Reverse the ban on providing “financial or promotional support for the fossil fuel energy sector overseas” and allow UK Export Finance and trade networks to finance and promote our domestic Oil & Gas sector and their technologies abroad.
- Scrap all mandates on the North Sea Authority (renaming it from the North Sea Transition Authority) and replace them with one overarching mandate: “maximise the extraction of our oil and gas”.
By scrapping the ban on new Oil & Gas licences, reversing Ed Miliband’s disastrous decision, the Conservatives would make clear that the North Sea is open to business, and that like neighboring countries like Norway we are ready to harness the full power of our natural resources.
And by reversing the ban on our diplomats, trade networks and UKEF promoting our Oil & Gas sectors and their technologies abroad we will unlock billions in new markets for this industry – with the government supporting £21 billion of UK Oil & Gas exports through trade promotion and export finance between 2010 and 2020.
Together, these new measures, end the red tape on the industry, scrap many of the Net Zero requirements burdening operators, and give confidence and security that the industry needs to invest and grow.
In her speech, Kemi Badenoch is expected to say:
“Under new leadership, it is only the Conservative Party that is backing Britain’s North Sea industry.
“Reform want part-nationalisation, which means the government and politicians running our oil and gas fields, taking us back to the bad old days of the 1970s when the government controlled British industries, running them into the ground.
“Meanwhile the Labour government have Ed Miliband strangling the North Sea in his dogmatic and ideological pursuit of net zero 2050, refusing new oil and gas licences, and refusing to support UK companies who export oil and gas technologies abroad.
“The Conservatives are focused on securing jobs, investment, and energy independence. The foundation of economic growth is cheap, abundant energy—and that must be our priority.
“That’s why it is time to overturn the absurd, anti-prosperity, anti-business, anti-oil and gas, anti-British ban on supporting UK Companies who export their world leading technologies overseas. A ban that has done nothing but see business destined for British businesses go to companies from overseas.
“We should be proud, indeed I am proud, of the cutting edge technology being developed here in Aberdeen and around the UK. We should be championing this technology and these companies – flying the flag for the skills and expertise developed here in Scotland.
“Instead, in a perverse move, we stopped British diplomats from supporting British businesses, we stopped our Trade Envoys promoting our own exports, we banned our Export Finance organisation from financially backing Britain and we allowed other countries – countries with far less scruples when it comes to human rights or environmental concerns to move in.
“It was, and remains, a mad decision. And I say that it needs to go. And when I am Prime Minister it will go.
“Labour sees the North Sea as a relic of the past, we see it as a cornerstone of Britain’s future. By restoring common sense to energy policy, we will unlock billions in revenue, secure our supply, and rebuild confidence in the UK economy. Under the Conservatives, British energy will power British prosperity.”
