OEUK Presses UK's New Energy Secretary on Levy Reform as North Sea Capital Moves Abroad
With Rosebank and Jackdaw licences unresolved, North Sea supply chain firms are already redirecting work and staff overseas.
Offshore Energies UK chief executive David Whitehouse met the UK's newly appointed Secretary of State for Energy, Miatta Fahnbulleh, on Thursday (2026-07-23), and the industry body's position was unambiguous: reform HM Treasury's Oil and Gas Revenue Levy immediately, or forgo GBP 50 billion — roughly $66 billion — in new basin investment that OEUK analysis says hangs in the balance. ICE Brent crude front-month was at $88.29 a barrel on Friday (2026-08-28), down 1.21%, offering no price tailwind to ease the economics of marginal new North Sea development.2
OEUK described the encounter as "constructive," a diplomatic term that leaves open whether the new secretary of state is inclined to act on the levy or to listen politely and move on. The industry body's case rests on a regulatory and fiscal reset, not incremental adjustments. Without it, OEUK says, the GBP 50 billion stays undeployed.2
The sharpest test of government intent sits with Rosebank and Jackdaw, the UK's two biggest unproduced oil and gas fields. Both licences were quashed in environmental legal challenges and now await a government decision on restoration. Energy Voice reported in July (2026-07-31) that Rosebank is pivotal to the future of the area west of Shetland, and that restoring its licence would give any prospective buyer the commercial clarity needed to assess a North Sea acquisition. Continued delay is itself a decision.3
The supply chain is not waiting for a signal. North Sea businesses that have long depended on basin activity are increasingly bidding for work abroad, according to a report published in May (2026-05-25). Major oil and gas operators are continuing to cut costs, and workforce reductions are already underway at the top of the supply chain.1
Yet 93% of businesses in the industry chamber's 43rd annual Energy Transition survey said they still see a future for North Sea oil and gas activity, provided the UK introduces the right fiscal and regulatory conditions. That conditionality is the point. Confidence in the basin's geology is intact; confidence in its policy environment is not.1
Where businesses expect to generate revenue over the next five years is a more granular and sobering read. Offshore wind, once promoted as the basin's adjacent growth market, was cited by just 4.6% of respondents as a likely source of significant work, down from 8.4% the year before. Carbon capture and storage fell further: only 2.8% expected it to generate meaningful activity over five years, against 5.9% previously. Decommissioning, another transition-era promise, drew just 8.8% expecting growth, compared with 12.1% in the prior survey.1
The pattern across all three alternative revenue streams is the same — declining expectations each year, from already-low bases. Businesses in the North Sea supply chain were told the energy transition would supply replacement work. Those plans are not landing in commercial reality.1
The skills base reflects the same trajectory. Fewer than one in ten survey respondents were confident the UK would have the workforce capacity to deliver the energy transition at current trends. Forty percent believed it would not. Just over half — 51% — of energy services firms expected staff numbers in the North Sea region to rise, but one in four still anticipated job cuts.1
ICE Endex TTF front-month was trading at €66.79 per megawatt hour on Friday (2026-08-28), down 1.79%. Lower European gas prices reduce the commercial urgency for new UK upstream gas development and make the fiscal arithmetic for marginal North Sea projects even less forgiving. That dynamic works against OEUK's argument to Treasury.
The Rosebank and Jackdaw licence decision is the next concrete government action that will test whether the July (2026-07-23) meeting with Fahnbulleh produces anything beyond goodwill. If the licences remain in limbo and the levy is unchanged into autumn 2026, more of the 93% who still say they believe in the North Sea will find themselves believing in it from Aberdeen — while executing the work somewhere else.2,3