As part of Scottish Government’s engagement with the business, I attended a recent meeting with Jim Mathers, Minister for Enterprise, Education and Tourism, and local business leaders, most notably from Oil & Gas UK, Talisman, Shell, Venture, Apache, Total and PSN.
Towards the end of the session, I raised several points with him relating to skills in the industry. My point was that if there is a real recognition of the importance of the oil&gas industry, why is the Scottish Government not promoting it as a national treasure?
The massive financial contribution from the oil&gas industry to the national purse is increasingly recognised and the need to ensure its sustainability is now much higher up the national agenda. Within industry and government, there is an acceptance that the supply of skilled people is absolutely critical to this industry now and in the future.
This, in turn, needs a step-change in our approach to attracting and developing the skills required. We, in the industry, can only do so much. With the launch and funding of the Oil & Gas Academy, we are really playing our part. However, is the Government playing its part?
There is no point in going over old ground around the issues of why we are in the situation we are with regard to skills. I think the industry now knows and understands where it has been to blame and has rallied well in the last few years, culminating in the launch of our academy to address the skills issues.
Yet we still face significant national challenges. South of Aberdeenshire, hardly anyone understands this industry; into the central belt and you are lucky if some people know of its existence. The education system and careers advisers are largely ignorant of its importance and its opportunities.
My biggest bugbear is continually hearing from youngsters that their careers advisers know nothing about oil&gas, certainly do not promote it as a career opportunity and, in some cases, advise against it because of the entirely false perception that it is an environmentally unfriendly industry.
Much more needs to be done to promote our industry in order to get the workforce to make it sustainable. The Government must see our industry as a priority and work with us to highlight its national importance.
But it is not enough for us to bang our fists on the table and demand that Government does more. We need to articulate what it is we want and need it to be doing.
In our new role as the academy, we want to lead the way in promoting the industry within our education system.
OPITO – Oil & Gas Academy has already come to some early conclusions about what we need the Government to do in this area, but we would welcome your views as to what we should be asking for specifically.
As the main stakeholders in our academy, please let us know what you think our Government should be doing so that we can present it with actions which it can deliver and which will have real impact.
David Doig is CEO of the OPITO – Oil & Gas Academy in Aberdeen
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