Mossmorran staff going through a ‘difficult time’, says PM

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has said workers at a Fife plant threatened with closure are going through a “difficult time” after its owner accused the UK Government of “undermining” the business.

ExxonMobil announced on Tuesday it will shut the Fife Ethylene Plant at Mossmorran in February, with more than 400 jobs put at risk.

Speaking in the Commons on Wednesday, the Prime Minister claimed the plant is losing £1 million per week.

On Wednesday morning, chairman of Esso UK at ExxonMobil Paul Greenwood told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme the closure was partly down to “deliberate” decisions taken by the Government.

He said there are “four keys to success” in the sector – a cheap and abundant supply of ethane, along with low-cost operations, good market prices for ethylene and a skilled workforce.

Mr Greenwood said: “I will be blunt – I have one of those keys to success in place, and that is a brilliant workforce.

“Two of those keys I deliberately do not have because of Government policy.”

A constricting North Sea oil and gas industry, Mr Greenwood said, was limiting the supply of cheap ethylene while high taxes for CO2 cost the firm £20 million last year.

Mr Greenwood added: “I also have to deal with high energy costs and those kind of things – so these are deliberate Government policies that are undermining us.”

The comments prompted an attack from Tory leader Kemi Badenoch at Prime Minister’s Questions, who said: “All of this speculation is having real-world consequences. Just this morning, the UK chair of ExxonMobil said, and I quote: ‘The Government needs to understand that the whole industrial base of the UK is at risk unless they wake up and realise the damage their economic policies are doing’.

“Can the Prime Minister tell us is the loss of UK industry the price the country has to pay for having a clueless Chancellor?”

The Prime Minister replied: “It is a difficult time for the workforce there and we must focus on supporting them.

“We’ve been meeting the company for over six months and explored every possible, reasonable avenue.

“They have been facing losses for the last five years – it’s best to do the detail before you chunter – and they’re currently losing £1 million a week.

“But she talks about policy and approach on energy policy, she follows Reform on the European Convention. She follows the man who wants her job.”

Speaking at an event held by the Institute for Government in London on Wednesday, First Minister John Swinney said the Scottish Government had been brought into the talks only recently.

“We were brought into the Mossmorran discussions very late in the day, just in the last 10 days or so,” he said.

“I understand the UK Government has been talking to ExxonMobil for some significant time.”

The First Minister added: “I’m obviously very concerned about the situation because it’s a significant industrial facility, and we have other industrial facilities which have faced difficulties, not least of which is the Grangemouth refinery.

“We have a programme of work under way at Grangemouth which is looking at the development of alternative new business propositions.

“That has been under way for some time, there are a very significant number of business propositions emerging from that, and what we announced yesterday we will essentially open up the consideration of those business ideas with a view to what else can be developed at the industrial site at Mossmorran.”

The Scottish Government has already pledged it will “explore all options” to support workers at the plant – but Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes also made clear it was “crucial” that Labour ministers at Westminster “consider what more they can do for the workers at the plant and take urgent action”.

However, UK industry minister Chris McDonald has indicated the Government is not prepared to keep the site open.

Mr McDonald told MPs on Tuesday that “where Government has intervened in the past, it has been where there’s been a fundamentally sound business proposition”.

Ms Forbes said that in discussions with the firm both last week and on Monday she had been “surprised by how quickly that conversation moved from them actively marking the plant to finding no viable buyer, and therefore moving to the news that they would begin closure in February”.