Billionaire Sir Ian Wood said the beleaguered oil and gas sector was beginning to show slight signs of recovery.
But he said he “wasn’t surprised” about a report this week which revealed the UK North Sea will have shed 120,000 jobs by the end of the year.
Sir Ian, who lead the Wood Group for 30 years, said the Oil and Gas UK (OGUK) report on jobs had put a “disastrous” period for the industry in perspective.
Speaking after it was revealed the oil and gas services tycoon had been made a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire in the Queen’s Birthday Honours, he said: “We are still in the middle of it. We are still going to lose more jobs.”
He predicted that when the oil and gas trade body updates the report again next year it will still reveal the sector has shed jobs “but very significantly less than now”.
“I don’t think now we are going to have a sudden recovery. I think this is going to be a slow recovery,” he said.
“We are not going to go back to where we were.We will go back to a reasonable level of prosperity.”
But the recovery, albeit slow, would see some investment coming back into the North Sea next year, he believes.
“It is still a tough, tough time in the oil and gas industry.
“The worst of it is when you still see blackness looking down. I now don’t see more black looking down.
“We are slightly back up again.
“Probably by 2017 there will be slightly more and it will be tangible.
“There will be real efforts made to get some investment underway and the government will help – small investment, not big investment but starting some investment again,” he said.
Sir Ian is currently the chair of the fledgling Oil & Gas Technology Centre (OGTC), the flagship £180million project backed by his economic development agency, Opportunity North East (One).
Although he said the scheme was in “early days”, the Aberdeen centre would underpin the future of the region’s industry once the North Sea is depleted.
“I do sense the industry now and the operators in particular are changing their mind sets. They see technology as an essential part of the future,” he said.
The OGTC is about “having a major technology base as opposed to an operations base” in the north-east.
“Talking to a number of supply chain companies – some of the really good high tech ones – ask what would it take for you to stay here long term.
“The answer is if we get a critical mass of technology then we will get some of the industry to stay here post the North Sea.”
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