Tories need to “step up” as Labour at Westminster and the SNP government at Holyrood are making the UK “more vulnerable”, acting shadow energy minister Andrew Bowie has said.
The Scottish Conservative MP criticised both Labour and the SNP over their opposition to new oil and gas developments in the North Sea.
Accusing the UK Government of “overseeing the wilful deindustrialisation of this nation”, Mr Bowie hit out at the “frankly dangerous eco-zealotry of Ed Miliband”, the Energy Secretary.
Speaking at the Scottish Conservative conference at Murrayfield in Edinburgh Mr Bowie told his party: “We must step up. Britain needs us more than ever.”
The Tory insisted: “The future of Scotland and Britain is at stake, our country’s security depends on a strong Conservative Party to stand up for what is right.”
He recalled how former US president Ronald Reagan had “once said the first duty of government is to protect” – but added that “on every front the SNP and Labour are failing to do that”.
Attacking both Labour and the SNP, Mr Bowie, who is also his party’s shadow Scottish secretary, said: “They haven’t protected everyone’s economic security, by raising taxes, or ripping away their winter fuel payment, even if they are now apparently going to hand it back to them.
“They haven’t protected our energy security by insisting on no new oil and gas developments.”
The Conservative MP continued: “We can all see what is happening in the world, there is more risk out there, we as a country are more vulnerable.
“That is why the decisions of this Labour Government are so gravely concerning. Their economic incompetence, coupled with their frightening ineptitude when it comes to our energy security is making the United Kingdom more vulnerable.”
He attacked the Labour Government over its “madcap drive to clean power by 2030”, as he said ministers were “actively accelerating the decline of our North Sea”.
This, he said, was “forcing us to become increasingly exposed to over-reliance on imports from overseas, imports that are shipped in diesel-chugging tankers across the Atlantic from America or from Norwegian wells”.
The Tory said the opposition to new oil and gas developments meant “investment is drying up, work is being put on pause, companies are literally shutting up shop and jobs are being lost”.
But he added: “This hostility for our oil and gas workers is not simply the preserve of the zealots in the Labour Party.
“The SNP have their fingerprints all over the job losses, the well closures.”
It's Scottish Conservative Conference! 🇬🇧🏴
— Andrew Bowie (@AndrewBowie_MP) June 13, 2025
Hello Murrayfield! @ScotTories @Conservatives pic.twitter.com/FjxMucHUxu
Mr Bowie added: “We need Conservative leadership because we know where the SNP and Labour will take us.”
He also used his speech to attack the “snake oil salesmen” in Reform UK, insisting that Nigel Farage’s party do not “care one jot for Scotland, or for our United Kingdom”.
The Tory said: “Let me be clear. Reform is quite simply not a conservative party, not a unionist party, frankly they are not a serious party.”
The Scottish government energy secretary Gillian Martin said: “The Scottish Government is clear in our support for a just transition for Scotland’s valued oil and gas sector, which recognises the maturity of the North Sea basin and is in line with climate change commitments and energy security.
“We are deeply concerned at recent announcements of planned job losses in the North East and have called on the UK Government for the earliest possible end to the Energy Profits Levy (EPL) – which was supposed to be a temporary measure but was extended by the previous Conservative UK Government.”
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