The contest for Aberdeen South, a constituency that spans urban social housing and detached homes with sculpted gardens, has been dominated by one topic: the future of North Sea oil and gas. The drama gripping the Labour party at Westminster and Andy Burham’s nascent leadership pitch in Makerfield barely affects this byelection, which takes place on Thursday. The vote is touted as a straight fight between the Scottish National party and the Conservatives, and one in which energy policy dominates.
Aberdeen South includes the port where vast oil rig support vessels tower over the quayside, and to the west borders the River Dee as it winds past plush villas in outlying villages through the city into the docks. Richard Thomson, a former MP and council leader who is attempting to retain the seat for the SNP, puts it this way: “If you don’t work in the energy industry, you will know plenty of others who do – your family and your friends.”
“Aberdeen South byelection dominated by North Sea oil and gas future, straight fight between SNP and Tories.”
The cost of living crisis and questions about the SNP’s fitness for government after the scandal of Peter Murrell’s theft of £400,000 in party funds flare up too on the doorstep. But with oil and gas jobs being shed at a significant rate, the byelection is largely a contest between oil fundamentalists and oil pragmatists. Pushed hard to the right by the surge of Reform UK, the Tories are now fundamentalist advocates of maximising oil and gas extraction to, they say, protect jobs, increase revenues and improve Britain’s energy security.
That security claim is widely rejected by energy experts who point out the oil is sold on the open market, which also sets energy prices, but Kemi Badenoch, on her third visit to the seat on Tuesday, is undeterred. Voting Tory would give the sector a “kiss of life”, the Conservative leader says. The Tories believe they can pull off an unlikely victory: defeating the SNP in its heartland. Their candidate Douglas Lumsden predicts lots of tactical voting.
Channel 4 News reported that Thursday will see two key Scottish by-elections, in Arbroath and in Aberdeen South, where the contest is looking like a close fought race between the Tories and the SNP, and the polls are dominated by the future of the oil and gas industry.