Good morning, and welcome to the 20th meeting of 2023 of the Economy and Fair Work Committee. Our first item of business is a declaration of interest. Before I invite our new member, Evelyn Tweed, to do that, I'd like to take the opportunity to thank Ash Regan for her contribution to this committee. Now I'd like to welcome Evelyn and ask her to declare any relevant interest. Thanks, convener. I have nothing to declare. I understand that Maggie Chapman wishes to declare an interest before we start the meeting. Thanks very much, Claire. Last week, I am a board member of Nescan Hub, and I am also a delegate to the Aberdeen Trent Union Council. Our next item of business is the second evidence session of this part of our just transition work, looking at a just transition for the north-east and Moray. For context to this inquiry, the Scottish Government's target is for net zero emissions for all greenhouse gases by 2045, and Moray in the north-east will play a significant role in that, and the committee recognises the challenges that it faces. That is why we are looking at action, what action is required to support, incentivise and de-risk this transition in ways that will benefit businesses and the community. Today's evidence session comprises of two panels, and I welcome first this morning John Bolin, regional officer at Unite, Moharrick, head of energy transition and supply chain with Scottish renewables, Mia McCarthy, head of sustainability, the SSE group and Maggie McGinley, chief executive of ATZ Ltd. Members and witnesses are asked to keep questions and answers as concise as possible, so we have as much time to cover the areas. I ask the panel members to reflect on what their understanding of a just transition for Moray in the north-east is. One of the areas that the committee is looking at in the inquiry is definitions, and is there a shared understanding of what is being worked to achieve here? I think that a view on what a just transition means is that renewable energy is at the heart of the energy transition and people are at the heart of a just transition, and making sure that that move from oil and gas into renewables is having the most positive impact on the Scottish economy. It can impact people and supply chain businesses in Scotland and make sure that we maximise the economic benefits for them. We are also looking at the number of green jobs that are created as part of the transition and the number of workers that have moved from oil and gas rolls into renewables rolls, but not just oil and gas rolls but other rolls as well, so all about the jobs that are created and the economic benefit that comes from the transition. One of the areas that we are looking at is how will we know if a just transition is being delivered or not? Do you think that there should be targets or miles of marks that are identified? Do you mention jobs? Should there be a target around green jobs? As a trade body for renewable energy, we recognise that we need more robust data within green jobs. We are looking at statistics and things that Scottish renewables has already researched and covered. We did a survey of oil and gas professionals' view on the transition, and 77 per cent of respondents were positive about retraining to join the renewable energy sector, and 86 per cent of those would welcome more support to join the renewable energy sector. Statistics on the movement of oil and gas workers into renewables is important. The other side of things is on academic training and understanding what students are studying in renewable energy-related courses and the change in courses across Scotland. Some research that Scottish Renewables covered in the academic space was about looking at who is studying renewables courses. We found that around 22,000 people are studying renewable energy-related courses across Scotland. That is up 70 per cent in the past three years from the same data that I have taken three years ago. In showcase, 33 colleges and universities across Scotland are delivering courses that include renewable energy elements to them. It shows a huge ambition and appetite from students to learn more about net zero and to train up and upscale for renewables. I think that data and statistics on the movement of workers into the sector, data and statistics on academic training, green jobs and statistics on those individuals and the data around those individuals and the diversity information age profiles, what skillset they are moving into and what levels. We will come back to issues of skills and the numbers and progress in the area, but we will come to Mia and come back to the question of just transition and if there is a shared understanding of what it means and how will we know if it has been delivered or not. Good morning and thanks for inviting SSE here.  SSE is a FTSE 100 company and we are headquartered in Perth in Scotland and we have a workforce of over 10,000 employees. We are a leading generator of renewable energy and one of the largest electricity networks in the UK as well. We are also a credited real living wage employer in a fair tax mark company and in November 2020 SSE became the first company globally to publish a just transition strategy. It was a framework of 20 principles that are outlined in the strategy and it's to help guide our decision making and influence greater fairness for those impacted by the decline of high carbon activity and increase the opportunities for climate action. We followed this up then in September 2021 with a workers report, a report stating our principles to action and that focused on workers in particular and we set out 20 commitments from SSE, 10 recommendations for industry and 10 recommendations for government to support people transitioning from high carbon to low carbon jobs and in the next decade and beyond SSEs remaining high carbon activities will either come to an end of their natural life or they'll be repurposed to a net zero world and to achieve this we plan to invest 40 billion over the next 10 years. So to give a sense of the scale that's required just in Scotland and very much in the northeastern Murray region we're looking at potentially 17 billion in transmission networks over the next seven years. It's Scotland projects which will amount to about 24 billion and then you're looking at onshore wind distribution networks, carbon capture and storage where figures are yet to be known around hydrogen. I suppose it's just kind of a sense of what it is we're kind of looking at when we're trying to do this. Do you think, I suppose, the question around what a just transition is so that's what you use a company have done. Do you think there should be more expectation on other organisations to take that kind of approach? You can describe yourself as being at the lead in this area but that seems to be a choice that's been made by SSE. Do you think there's enough support or encouragement or obligation on other companies to take to understand the importance of just transition and think about how they're going to deliver that themselves? I think there needs to be supports given that we were the first company globally to publish our just transition strategy. We are ahead of the curve as it were but other companies are definitely recognising that there is that need to transition and I think in terms of how that's done it's in kind of a co-creation space so in terms of government support whether it's working with civil society organisations as well as companies coming together so I think for us in all the work that we've done the collaboration piece and the co-creation piece has allowed us to get to the point where we are so bringing in unions, bringing in the employees, bringing in the communities that by yourself in isolation this can't be completed because all of the stakeholders need to be involved in the discussions and just in terms of you were asking there around the question of how do you measure whether a transition has been just I suppose some of the the points we would look at that we would think you know we need to kind of gather the data on would be around security of supply access to affordability of energy and access to energy and the numbers of workers that have transitioned and have been supported for transition from high carbon to low carbon jobs and as well as the economic contribution to the supply chain and scale of community ownership of renewable energy and community benefits so if we're kind of able to maybe pick some of those markers and and look at them as we go through this transition we'll be able to see whether for example are people being left behind in this energy transition and John if I come to you if you want to address the question of what the definition of a just transition is and whether you think that's a shared understanding where position as a union is obviously related to the actual workers that are going to be affected by this and the actual communities that they live in as well and the impact that it could be on that I mean a measure for just transition would be that there was good well-paid jobs for all the workers that actually required them and that the local communities that they lived in weren't devastated as we've seen happened in other transitions previously we see that there's a number of barriers to that actually happening at the moment and we're not seeing a lot of movement on these barriers to actually stop that we hear lots of numbers but the actual reality of jobs and people transitioning from boiling gas into renewables it's much lower and do you think there's enough because you mentioned communities is there enough effort to resolve do you think there's tensions within there that you know how is there if we do something in this way it will benefit this group of people but this group of people might not benefit so much and how do we resolve those tensions and that's enough that some talk about like a shared understanding of what a just transition is yeah there is tensions I mean way of tensions within our own unions regarding actually a just transition and the move away from oil and gas and fossil fuels and greener economies but our focus is on keeping people in work and ensuring that there's jobs for them we fully support the actual move away from fossil fuels but there needs to be actually jobs for people to move in or you're going to have a lot of people unemployed and then in these communities where they live then that's going to have a large impact we've seen impacts when there's been downturns in oil and gas previously in 2015-2019 we saw the hotels we saw the actual restaurants the pubs all closing we saw the actual impact on the taxi drivers other people that actually relied on these jobs the difference is this time unless there's alternative jobs it won't be a downturn it'll be permanent thank you Maggie if I come to you and back to the question of just transition and definitions and how will we know if it's been delivered or not so thank you for opportunity to appear and as ET said limited we're based in Aberdeen and have a remit to support work in Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire and also through just transition funding also extending to Murray as well so it's well documented and we're not for profit so we're all about economic development for the region it's well documented how important oil and gas has been and continues to be for the Scottish and UK economy both in terms of of gva and also in terms of jobs so that the just transition has to be about how do we have a managed transition to deliver on net zero and a managed transition in terms of going from oil and gas to greener lower carbon forms of energy and do that in a way that no one is left behind so it is about individuals in the workforce it is about the communities it is about those businesses that have been involved in the oil and gas sector and who are very keen and ambitious to move into offshore wind hydrogen carbon caption storage etc but need the support to do that and when we we talk about those businesses the north east of scotland has got the largest concentration of energy supply chain companies in the UK so we're talking about companies who are employing 10 people or employing 1,000 people or employing 5,000 people so there's a huge range of companies in there and a real asset to Scotland and the Scottish economy so it's how do we support those companies to continue to be successful as we're moving into cleaner greener forms of energy and therefore that's all about therefore how that continues to maintain jobs, sustains jobs, creates new jobs and also therefore supports communities so the just transition for me has to be about how we do this in a managed way and consider individuals, communities, businesses and and the overall energy sector in that and you think we're clear enough around what is being measured and what success will look like and other witnesses have spoken about data gaps do you think that's a challenge and trying to determine I think it is a challenge I mean as we've heard there are lots of different things that can be measured and I agree with with all of the suggestions it's also about how many people are going into education linked to energy for example I think the key thing is is how do we have the right data to support that and have easy access to that data so that it can be measured easily some of the data is available but I would say some of it is not and I do think we need to revisit all the sick codes and how we're actually measuring industry sectors and therefore how we can easily measure the impact and the difference that that is being made okay thank you I'll now come to Colin Smith to be followed by Evelyn Tweed. Thanks very much convener and good morning to the panel one of the issues that's been highlighted in the submissions we've received is the challenge of skill shortages within the energy sector the Aberdeen Grampian Chamber of Commerce submission talked about their spring 2023 energy transition survey that said there's already challenges for businesses with regards to worker shortages so in your experience is there evidence already of skill shortages in the energy sector and what specifically do you think is required from government to support you tackling those shortages? Emma is nodding so I'll start with Emma I appreciate that actually Scottish Renewables submission highlighted quite a few of where those shortages are so where are those shortages at the moment? If you look at the renewable energy industry at the moment the industry already sports 27,000 Scottish jobs and an economic output of 5.6 billion a year and the industry has a big impact on other areas of Scotland's economy across construction manufacturing and a huge variety of skill sets is required to deploy a renewable energy project so everything from welders to lawyers architects and even caterers there's opportunity within renewable energy projects across the whole project life cycle so right at your development stage all the way through to construction installation and even life extension and decommissioning so there's huge skills opportunities in there and due to decades of experience in North East and Moray as well placed to provide skills for these activities however there are some key skills challenges within the sector we kind of categorise those in three areas so skills shortages skills shortages which is finding and keeping enough people with the right skills across all disciplines the skills gap which is training and upscaling the people we have and what I spoke about in terms of moving oil and gas workers into the sector and skills cannibalisation so that's about keeping people in the sector and in Scotland the sector is characterised by big multinational companies with mobile workforces that move around our members have advice to us that there are some skills gaps that exist in the renewable sector and that includes things in the construction space like welders and technicians but there's also skills gaps in that development stage in the early stage there is a shortage of planners and it's really important that we speed up planning and consenting over renewable energy projects and there is a shortage there there's also skills gaps within electrical technicians and engineers but also you know to work in renewables we don't just need engineers there's project managers and there's a shortage of logistics managers as well and vessel crew people working on the vessels whether that be those doing site survey or those doing transport and installation looking at things that are not necessarily offshore as well across other technologies there's a shortage in low carbon heat installers and also things like robotics engineers so I guess where we see that challenge there is opportunity offshore wind will make an essential contribution to skills in Scotland and we have to consider the cascading benefits as well across other technologies if we have a look at green hydrogen Scottish government's green hydrogen assessment set out three scenarios for hydrogen which delivered between 70,000 and 310,000 jobs and the Cromarty Firth has been identified as an ideal location for hydrogen and the North of Scotland programme hydrogen program is established as part of that green hydrogen of course is really key here when it comes to renewables and it can offer a huge gva to Scotland's economy sort of in that high scenario of 310,000 jobs and 25 billion gva having a look at other cascading areas as well looking at alongside new power generation there will also be substantial investment in the transmission network in the grid and that will deliver high value high quality long-term jobs and there's huge opportunity there. SSEN transmission has plans to invest 10 billion in the electricity grid in the north of Scotland and that can support over 9,000 high value jobs there'll be no transmission without transmission and there's huge opportunity there within the grid space so as much as there are skills gaps and challenges there is huge opportunity coming from renewable energy for all these sorts of roles across Scotland. There's those opportunities what actions do you think are needed from government to make sure that that we have the workers to take advantage of those opportunities you talked about speeding up the consent and process which was one of them that would obviously reduce the pressure on those who've got that role to drive these things forward but what other actions would be needed from government? In terms of supporting the skills a lot of people that are looking to upskill and transition into renewable energy can sometimes need to pay out of their own pocket for upskilling to move into those roles and it's a bit of a barrier for the individuals so establishing a just transition tuition fund to help individual workers to cover the costs of some of the fees required to get their new accreditations or for tuition to help them move into renewable energy roles would be something that would offer support there. And I've seen John Noddon so I'm sorry. Can I just ask Emma a question before you move on? Thanks for the information that Scottish Renewables gave us and I looked down the list in your mind you do tend to see men fulfilling these roles how is what do you think needs to be done to encourage women into these roles it is you've described an expanding sector and lots of opportunities how do you do that and do you know if anybody is collecting the roles in terms of gender disaggregation of the workforce? Of course you know that industry sees diversity is hugely important and as part of the offshore and sector deal there's diversity ambitions in that and I think one of the things that's really important is STEM activity and early engagement here so engaging in early school years and encouraging enthusiasm for science and engineering and technology and maths across that diversity level and encouraging young women to take up those subjects. A lot of our members are carrying out activities in that space already. Ocean Winds is a developer of the Moray East and Moray West projects has launched a STEM programme and is working with schools in Fraserborough, Bucky and Edinburgh and they have STEM ambassadors that go into local schools and encourage enthusiasm for those STEM subjects but also raise an awareness of the skills that are required to deliver renewable energy so that young people know what roles are there for them as an opportunity to go into it and that does have a focus on diversity as well in making sure young women are interested in those roles. Okay thank you Mr Smith I'll come to John again because you're obviously you're not near John about about the challenges of skill shortage there's obviously an issue facing your members how we make sure that they have the skills to presumably take advantage of the opportunities Emma talks about. Yeah I mean there's no doubt there's the skill shortage I mean there's a skill shortage across the whole of the UK and actually trained people and experienced actual people and some of that's maybe done lack of apprenticeships and that I've come through over the years there's the difficulty that we see is the actual people transitioning from like oil and gas into renewables because of the barriers that are there and Emma touched on one of the barriers there which is like round about your actual certification and your competencies and that alignment between the different sectors between like oil and gas and when some work's been done on that we the skills passport but that is still uncertain as it stands at the moment but there's other barriers big barrier is paying terms and conditions between offshore oil and gas and actual offshore wind you would be speaking probably in the range of about 20 000 difference for an electrical technician offshore and oil and gas and the same role on offshore wind another barrier is the jobs the jobs in actual renewables are not there in the quantity or numbers that are going to be required and by the time that actually that number ramps up there will be a downturn in actual oil and gas and a lot of the skills that are there will be lost to other sectors as well so these are actually the main barriers that we see for people actually transitioning it is good to actually go into the schools and advertise actual renewables and get people interested but that's a long-term goal because there's a lot of time there time gap for people to actually go through school get the training and actually come into that industry and it's the big problem as we see is going to be the period between now and probably 2030 where there is going to be a downturn in oil and gas there will be less jobs there but there isn't going to be the level of actual growth in renewables to support these jobs that are getting lost is there any actions that you feel that government could take during that period to make sure your members could benefit from those opportunities yeah there's several actions i think the government could take i mean uh one of the main actions we think is actually supporting investment in manufacturing within actually particularly within the actual offshore wind there is the opportunity for that a lot of that at the moment is done abroad and if you look at the actual estimates on numbers for example in offshore wind they've been estimated at about 50 000 when you take out the actual manufacturing and construction element of that it drops significantly uh again that's an area where support for actually having a manufacturing base so that some of the actual work could be done in scotland would be great uh you've got actually sites like byfab or nig that actually could be developed in actually doing that particularly for the floating actual platforms another ask oh government would be to support removing these barriers raised previous way uh to allow oil and gas workers to transition into renewables as i say some work's been done with the skills passport it's in a difficult phase at the moment the terms and conditions there's no union recognition there's no collective agreements actually for offshore wind we've got collective agreements for offshore oil and gas that could easily be transferable in offshore wind or in hydrogen or ccs the agreements that we've done for oil and gas just a couple years ago were left to be that flexible that could be actually done as well and as i say the main thing is that jobs but then again that comes back to the way to get jobs at the moment is to capitalise as much as possible on basically offshore wind because that's the main renewable at the moment it will come into hydrogen and ccs but offshore wind is the main one that could produce the jobs at the moment when it's needed that's very helpful John thanks for that and coming to to me and Maggie I mean are you already facing skills shortages at scotland at the moment and what do you think the government should be doing to support your tackling there um yeah i suppose it's kind of repeating a lot of what Emma and John have already said but around the urgent skills mapping piece to see and identify where exactly roles are needed and what are the the skills that are needed within those roles and being able to provide say green energy training academies so very concerted and direct focus and high quality conversion programs so as John's just said there in terms of making it easier for people to be able to transition over from high carbon to low carbon and funding universities and colleges so in terms of you know what are the courses at the moment that are being offered to students and in two three four years time when they graduate will they be fit for purpose in terms of what the industry is looking at or needing and again stem has been mentioned very important in terms of kind of that early years intervention in terms of being able to provide the education and knowledge and the the interest in the various topics that will be again needed and that kind of gets to the heart of the the diversity piece in terms of encouraging more young girls at an earlier age to become interested in certain topics and then i suppose in terms of kind of apprentice schemes and funding schemes being able to have more flexibility around the delivery of those and we recognize that there is the skills shortage in terms of what we've kind of set out is that we need 1000 new roles a year to be able to kind of service the the scale of what we're looking at doing in terms of our operations one of the recent reports from the robin gordon focused on the northeast of scotland and identified that there was 45 000 employees there in the energy sector 40 000 of those which were in oil and gas and it also identified that out of that 90 percent have the skills that would be very easily transferable to a low carbon industry so it's being able to i suppose ensure that those people are facilitated in in making that transition just from our own from our own terms and back in 2021 we started surveying our employees and we put in questions particularly around the just transition and asking them how they had they transitioned over the last two years from high carbon industry into sse and we've continued to do the those questionings and those surveys up until now we now do them on a six monthly basis and so the most recent findings from that would say that one in four workers now that come to sse have transitioned from high carbon industry so that's about 28 percent of our workforce and interestingly enough as well about the same proportion of men and women have transitioned so about 30 percent on each side so that would say i suppose that would maybe give a slight argument to the the idea that there isn't that diversity in terms of those transitioning and also interesting enough now in terms of our renewable side of the business 40 percent of the workforce are now made up of people that who have transitioned over and when we've kind of drilled down as we've gone along we've asked more detailed questions to really try and identify kind of what the environment or the landscape is out there and interesting enough in terms of the the pay piece the reward piece that was always something where it was said that it's a barrier for people to transition in terms of you know maybe the the pay scale is not being quite what they would be in the oil and gas industry but the most recent responses have shown that actually of those who've transitioned the the numbers that answer the questions would say that they're more satisfied than the general population of sse's workforce with reward and also with leadership and and other kind of indicators that we've asked for but that was something that came out to us just recently and we were surprised by that because we thought in some instances that that may be kind of the barrier for people and and then there's other things around safe flexibility and kind of work like balance and things like that but that data would show us that there's a steady flow of people coming through and as we move along and continue to survey people and continue to think of other questions that we can ask it'll kind of throw up I suppose more more information for us but going back to the point there is the skills gap and I suppose in terms of you know what we're doing as a company things are on a smaller scale so for example identifying mechanics and them retraining within our distribution sorry that the business for kind of electrician roads but all of that is on small scale we weren't talking about it's a thousand employees a year you know you may have a cohort of 20 people so it's being able to put in place I suppose a more robust framework and something that can cope with the larger numbers that will that will need to be transitioning over time in order for us to be able to access the opportunities that that the low carbon sector presents and do you think that the current skills development landscape is set up to enable you to deliver that other changes that are required there that would enable that to happen I think those changes that I mentioned before would facilitate probably a faster transition um because as we see at the moment from our from our the data that's coming back people are coming and they are transitioning and the skills that they have are skills that are easily transferable because they're coming to roles and they're taking up the roles you know in them without any issues but there is definitely areas we're actually undergoing a piece of research at the moment which is more I suppose the long term kind of planning piece around kind of over the next five years ten years what are the sunrise industries what are the sunset industries you know so those that will be burgeoning and those that will be going into decline and being able to really I suppose have a targeted look at what what that landscape looks like and within that then what are the skills that people have within those roles because we know in terms of say any of our operations if we take offshore for example the roles across the whole operation you know you're going from an environmental specialist on one end to legal financial on the other and everything in between like all of those people will be needed to to ensure that these operations get off the ground and then actually run after that um so it's it's a wide range of skills that will be required sometimes people again kind of maybe look at it in a more narrow view and kind of say engineering or you know very specific roles but roles across so many different parts of the operations will be needed over time that's really helpful I'm tempted to ask you Maggie if there's any ideas that you think there's not a skill shortage in at the moment within the sector be all of us to speak to the businesses all the time that you're working with I mean are these skill shortages issues something familiar to you and again what actions do you believe the government needs to take to support that that challenge so short answer is yes so I won't repeat what my colleagues have said um I think in terms of what action can be taken I mean we've heard about the the sort of the transferability of skills so often the skills are the same they're just deployed in a different way whether they're coming from oil and gas into offshore wind or other sectors so that's a really important point and um we've also heard about the there's a risk that the offshore projects are not offshore renewable projects are not yet at a scale and therefore we need to continue with oil and gas projects so that there's not this massive gap that's going to create lots of lost jobs so one of the challenges is about attracting young people into the sector um and I think therefore the rhetoric around the importance in oil and gas and how importance oil and gas continues to need to be for the economy um as we build up the the scale of offshore renewables I think is really important and I think that's really important for government and others to to give those clear messages because the young people may be going into an oil and gas operator who's now really an energy operator so most of them are now going into offshore renewables or whether they're going into a supply chain company the reality is they may be working in oil and gas projects now because that's where most of the work is but over time they will then develop their skills and start working on offshore wind projects or hydrogen projects etc so we want people to be encouraged to come into the industry um get their skills maybe in oil and gas but then they're there as we build up the the capacity in offshore renewables so the messaging and the positive messaging around this is an energy sector and we need a managed transition is really important that that's that's better understood and better messaged in terms of some of the other things I mean the just transition fund has been really helpful in supporting the national the national energy skills accelerator um with work to put on short term courses about upskilling and reskilling and they've been really welcomed so the universities both universities locally and nesco the college have put on those short courses and they've been a really good uptake so so continuing to support in those ways is really important the Scottish funding council has been supporting nesa with a pathfinder project and that's been helping to help people better understand the pathways that they can take so that it's clearer that you maybe start off in this business doing this job but actually this can then lead to opportunities as offshore renewables picks up so those sort of pathway and pathfinder projects are really important and doing more of those would be really helpful we need more sustained funding of tertiary education provider so that the new courses that are needed because there is a percentage of jobs that we don't yet know what they are and so therefore sustained funding for tertiary education is really important so that our universities and colleges can adapt to to what the needs of the industry will be and they are you know they are evolving those needs and then if it was finally the just transition fund has also supported the energy transition skills hub in Aberdeen which is within the energy transition zone it's under construction at the moment that's predominantly funded by the just transition fund and also through Scottish Government ETF fund that's attracted 1.8 million investment from Shell and also nesco will be the operator for that the local college will operate that and so that's a great example where that's about providing more welding and fabrication facilities it's going to be flexible so that whether it's hydrogen fuel cell or wind turbine technicians or whatever is needed that the college has got the facilities and can respond quickly to that importantly it's also got an outreach vehicle so it's going to go around the secondary schools and help young people understand better what the types of jobs are that we're going to start to seeing in hydrogen and offshore wind etc so young kids can better understand what subjects they may want to study that will then lead to jobs in low carbon and green energy and then finally it's also got an outreach for community and being able to offer courses for upskilling and rescilling for people that are maybe on evenings and weekends so that people don't have to take time out of their full-time job but can maybe do some upskilling and rescilling at other times is I think a really important opportunity for people in the community and to get funding support for that through government I think will be really important as well. I'll have to make some progress if I could ask witnesses to be as concise as possible on the questions we do have a big panel this morning. I will allow Kevin Stewart one supplementary but if you can direct it to one of the panel members before I come to it. A very brief supplementary convener and it's for Mr Bolland because he said that the skills passport is in a bit of a difficult phase. Obviously SDS are on the panel after you. What do you think the difficulties are Mr Bolland and how can they be overcome quickly? Well quickly the skills passport was meant to be in place by a quarter three this year and it's not in place at the moment. There was a recent meeting three weeks ago which I attended with all the main actual stakeholders there and there's still as far as I can see a big gap between what is looked for on the skills passport and bringing the wind industry on board because as it stands at the moment the skills passport was to allow that transferability between oil and gas and actually wind primarily at the moment but at the moment there's no agreement or an alignment on the survival the actual competencies in that that are actually required so there's another meeting getting set up in January and there's meant to be some work going on between there but I think come January that will tell whether the skills passport is going to be successful or not. Maybe two million meetings and not enough action by the sounds of it. That's what we've been saying for five years. Thank you very much Mr Bolland. Okay thank you Evelyn Tweed to be followed by Colin Beattie. Thanks convener. I think that Colin's line of questioning sort of covered quite a lot of the things that I was going to ask about but one thing I was going to ask the panel was that Aberdeen city council has said the elements of the skills development infrastructure are in place however there remains a cluttered landscape and I think that that had been mentioned earlier by the panel and they also said it's an unclear landscape on both funding and delivery. Do the panel share that view? How do you feel about this? Because from the things that we've been saying about upskilling etc there's various things that the panel members are saying how can it be clearer? Would anyone like to come in? Maggie, you're smiling. I'm not going to smile any more. I think the importance is about the pathway so from schools through to whether it's college and further education, higher education and into jobs whether it's through apprenticeships and then if we can get a clearer pathway so I'm talking specifically about the energy sector. I think it then helps industry to understand where they can best do work with schools and STEM subjects or when they can better interact with the college and it provides a clearer route for people who are looking to change jobs or upskill or reskill so there's something about that pathway and having clearer about what it takes from what sort of subjects you do at school through to what opportunities that can lead you to do at college or university or through apprenticeships or jobs and then what sort of jobs that leads you through and if we can get those pathways clearer I think that then helps declutter to a certain extent the landscape because then it's clearer where everyone can play their role. There are lots of really good initiatives around STEM subjects for examples in schools and again it's just other opportunities to try and make them more efficient and consolidate them more so that schools maybe don't have lots of opportunities coming at them when we know that teachers are really really busy but they can sort of try and prioritise and manage what they do so yeah I think there's definitely things that can be done but I'd also say that that's a good problem to have because I think there's a really good a lot of private sector are doing a lot of really good stuff to try and encourage young people to understand the opportunities in the energy industry and encourage people into the sector. I think just in terms of um as Maggie said you know there's a lot out there probably a part of it is the scale that everything is moving at so we need people kind of you know trained and ready to go today but there's all this wonderful work for the next generation that's coming up so as they move through school and go to university you know by the time they come out all of that will have been in place and they'll be well prepared for whatever the workforce looks at that stage but in terms of the role for employers or companies I suppose there's always that thing around we're also focusing on our internal employees and their retraining and repurposing so within our just transition strategy that I've made mention of earlier one of the focuses on kind of prioritising retraining and redeployment so I suppose for companies that are out there and where they are transitioning and whether it be around the repurposing of the assets that they had and being able to ensure that there's kind of the access to the retraining piece so that employees can be brought along on this change to net zero so that would be kind of a crucial part I suppose of from the company perspective as we say there's a lot out there kind of in terms of the educational sphere and with some of the agencies as well but maybe some of the responsibility in terms of companies when they're putting together a strategy around their just transition to be able to ensure that that is in there and what does that training look like again with some of that it's kind of on a small scale and it's like how do we kind of ensure that that the momentum is there to allow this kind of to be built out be quick with my answer I guess my view just on the sort of making it clear side of things is two things I think it's everyone's favourite word in the sector is collaboration across Scotland and across the UK skills development in one area or in one technology will affect and have a knock-on effect on technologies in other areas so for example we talked about offshore wind but there's a lot of current opportunity in onshore wind and there's a huge pipeline of onshore wind as well and skills development within that technology will have a knock-on effect on skills development and other technologies preparing for sort of the future pipeline and I think you know there's going to be floating offshore wind projects in Scotland Scotland has the biggest pipeline of floating offshore wind projects in the world but there is also floating offshore wind projects in the Celtic Sea so collaboration across the skills for floating across the whole of the UK is important so collaboration there and I think the other the other thing is is a communication and I think the people in the panel live and breathe renewable energy we can see the opportunity that is coming but I think sometimes some people or people in Scotland maybe don't have an awareness of the skills that are required and the opportunity that is there in front of them so I think communicating that opportunity to the people of Scotland and letting them know the opportunities that are out there is really key so that's my two things I'll be even quicker there's no clear actual path for somebody actually moving in renewables that's across the board we've been getting asked this from members probably for the last four or five years because there's a lot of interesting renewables and there's a lot of potential there but it's what that actual path is how does somebody actually get there from A to B and that's what's missing at the moment and I think that's what will be missing for schools in that as well if they're teaching actual future renewables engineers how do you go from where you are now to get to that actual job and it just has to be something that path A to B it doesn't seem particularly hard if it's brief yeah that's good yes John you hit on a good point there because what is the path but how is it accessible as well and who is it accessible to so I think that that's something that probably has to be looked at going forward that's nice thank you Colin Beattie's before by Brian Whittle thank you very much I'd like to touch on one or two issues around skills and so on and expand a little bit on what's been discussed so far I mean there's always been an assumption that there'll be this very smooth transition from the energy sector into the renewable sector and yet evidence that we've taken this committee before indicate that that is not really happening at the pace that was anticipated but it leaves us then other industries other sectors are needing to develop skills for example the construction industry for retrofit in the built environment and just looking at that the construction industry training board estimates that to meet net zero targets there's a need for an additional 4600 project managers as well as 4300 plumbers in HVAC workers by 2028 in Scotland that's a lot of bodies and looking at the other sectors within industry they are all showing huge deficits in terms of the number of bodies that they can recruit versus the number that they need so there's really a two-part question here one is the skills pipeline that's been set up to deliver these wider skills requirements across the different sectors is it is it working is it is it up to is it up to the quality that's needed and where are these workers going to come from given the acute shortage of workers particularly skilled workers right across the economy John maybe I can ask you first on that um it's a good question because I can't answer where they're going to come from because we're even seeing in oil and gas there's acute shortages within certain actual disciplines and there's a time lag between training people up and even if you started training people up now they're not going to be there I think the also the other thing is there's got to be a reality between what jobs are going to be created and renewables and long-term jobs and what jobs are actually could be lost in oil and gas I mean if you take an example I was kind of looking at you've got sea green it's just came on which has got I think it's roughly around about 80 full-time individuals that will be there but you compare that to a large oil platform which could have up to 500 people full-time there so I think the reality is you said originally that renewables is going to replace all the oil and gas jobs it's not going to do that no in your opinion not unless there's additional areas looked at like actually construction in that as well the construction industry and I think there needs to be a more of a link up but where we're even finding difficulties between people moving between offshore oil and gas and offshore wind there's difficulties between people moving between offshore oil and gas and onshore construction because again there's different certifications there's different requirements there there's different costs for people actually doing that as well and it's again how you break doing a lot of these actual barriers so that it's much easier if you've got an electrician offshore an electrician can work onshore I'm an electrician to trade and I've worked in many different actual categories from manufacturing to NHS to actual local authority you can work on all these it's just working on a different piece of equipment but the standard bodies in that make it much more difficult to actually do that you spoke about electricians there and one thing that's been at the back of my mind is how transferrable actually are all the jobs that are available in the oil and gas sector and elsewhere in terms of coming into the renewables there's a lot of transferability I mean like I said I can only go back on my own experience and actually working in that and working in different industries you've moved into a different industry you need training on the specific equipment you're working on you don't need to retrain as in the basics which you actually get when you do an apprenticeship of that as well so there is a lot of similarities between I would say renewables and oil and gas where there's actually trades there there will be some upskilling that's required because of the different equipment is there but there is a small workforce small skilled workforce that is very good at what they actually do across the UK and we've got to find better ways of actually using them across all sectors Emma, can I maybe turn to you? I think I might just kind of add on to John's point there around the supply chain and the businesses in the area I mean there's a huge wealth of expertise within you know the subsea environment and things like that in the northeast and many of the offshore in Scotland developers have committed to supporting the education and skills to sort of fill those gaps as part of their supply chain development process and their supply chain development statements as part of the scotland leasing round and they've made commitments to things like engaging with the local skills schools collaborating with colleges to provide apprenticeships and promoting diversity and supporting accreditation but there's also a lot of work going on at the sort of grassroots levels the boots on the ground within the supply chain there's companies in the northeast like Ace Aquatec who are a marine mammal protection innovator and they're based in Dundee and because of a result of the growth that they've seen from renewable energy their team has gone from five people to 35 people and that includes graduates and modern apprentices and they're really keen on supporting skills development there's also a company called Gib Group who are based in Aberdein and they're a PPE specialist they've seen their workforce grow by over 30 people and that growth has come from a result of the demand they're seeing from renewable energy and they've created an apprenticeship programme to engage with local colleges and support that sort of skills gap there it's also happening at our ports in the port of Montrose they carry out lots of engagement with schools in partnership with SSC who have the sea green on-en base at their facility so there's lots of work going on in the supply chain and in those businesses there's a huge amount of supply chain businesses across Scotland that have a lot of skillsets that are transferable and many of them are pivoting already like those companies I mentioned and some others include Balmoral who offer subsea protection and they have routes from as far back as 1980s and further and they started out in oil and gas and are now growing hugely because of renewables so a lot of the impact and the jobs that are being created is coming from the supply chain businesses themselves. Are there physically enough bodies out there to fill these posts I mean when I look at the construction industry talking about 4,600 project managers I mean that's a huge number to train up and have skilled by 2028 4,300 plumber you try and phone for a plumber at the moment and see how quickly he comes I mean are there physically enough resources human resources out there to fill all these posts that are being that are being touted? It's a good question it's a tricky one that I wouldn't be able to answer in terms of the statistics and the numbers but you know I can say that the industry is doing a lot to try and you know overcome that challenge but in terms of numbers it's it's not something I can give. I mean is it a case that you know we've got the we may have to import some of the skills if we can because everybody's competing for them and then there's a question of pricing around scarce skills so you know for the right people the the the costs could be quite substantial. You know I know some members that were within Scottish Noobles are finding it you know they are having challenges in this space but not something I have the detail on but some of our members are facing that as a challenge to find the right people and that's why they're implementing these apprenticeship programmes and investing in the skills development because they can see that this is a challenge. May I have you got a view on this? Thank you I suppose going back to your question of how transferable are these skills if we look back again at that Robert Gordon report then making the switch that identified the 45,000 that were working in the oil and gas industry in the northeast and that 40 40,000 of them were in oil and gas and 45 in the energy sector as a whole both recognizing that 90% of their skills were transferable and I suppose the the figures that I pointed to earlier in terms of our internal surveys it would it would show that people are transferring over you know at this moment in time people are coming to us and that transition is happening at a pace when you look at renewables with 40% being from high carbon industry and transmission similarly would see a lot of people transitioning over as well so at this moment in time people are coming there there isn't that that barrier to them being able to transfer but as more projects come on stream as bigger projects are built there will definitely be need for more people and but I think that figure alone is quite important to show that out of that 40 you know 45,000 40,000 are transferable so if we look at the numbers in oil and gas at the moment and you took that you could probably say that a lot of their skills would transfer over and in terms of again with the the infrastructure that's being looking to build out Emma had kindly mentioned earlier around our transmission side of the business and the 10 billion that's being invested in that but that's looking at a potential of 9,000 jobs that will be required over the lifetime of the pathway to 2030 projects so there is great opportunity for for jobs on mass scale over the coming years and as you rightly say it's to ensure that as we move forward and which is the purpose of us all being here is that you know we're prepared and that there is the pathways for people to be able to to transition because the opportunities will be there and it's just ensuring that the the the speeds at which they're needed will match the the training of these employees kind of to be able to transition making that transition as as easy and accessible as possible really and that's true the various ways that people had mentioned earlier around the skills mapping piece the stem all of all of those combined to allow for that to happen otherwise there will be those missed opportunities thank you if you get any thoughts on this just a final point the national energy skills accelerator that's a partnership between et said limited nescal university of Aberdeen rgu and and a p2 in skills development scotland and that's very much been about focused about understanding what industry need is and then ensuring that the university and colleges can then respond appropriately to industry needs so so that really strong relationship is i think really important to continue so that the the plumbers or electricians or whatever is that we need that for example the college can respond appropriately and quickly of course does need funding so back to the point about you know our colleges et cetera do need funding to be able to train the people that the industry needs for the for the future I guess the other part just to build on what hasn't been mentioned is where it's possible for example high value manufacturing for some of the offshore is about robotics and automation and where there's investment through our universities and into industry about what types of roles can be more suited to automation and you know there's a balance there obviously to be struck but we have got some good capability around the national manufacturing institute for scotland to look at where that can also play a role so there's definitely a tight labour market but without a doubt and it needs quite a joined up approach between academia government industry to really work out what what that plan needs to look out look like so that we don't miss opportunities as everyone has said thank you Brian Whittle to be followed by Gordon MacDonald thank you good morning to the panel I just want to kind of tease out a few of the points that have been made earlier I think you know there's a sense here of obviously there's significant opportunities in renewable technologies for Scotland going forward one of the the you know we want a green economy we think we're very far advanced we're well advanced in things like onshore offshore wind we seem to do particularly well in that maybe behind the curve a bit and other things like hydrogen but in the practicalities of what we're talking about today in terms of just transition you know that we've already heard that there's a mismatch or not quite matching the the growth in the the so the green the green economy is not it's not matching the you know the decline in the the oil and gas gas jobs and in terms of just transition that's where we need to be so I think it is how do we create the sector for people to transition into and are we supporting innovation enough to make sure we're creating that commercial success that then gives the confidence for those who want to transition to move into that I'll start start with you Maggie if I could thank you no so there's there's a lot to be done to accelerate the opportunities in green energy and low carbon energy so for example the the offshore wind projects in around the planning and consenting and and how quickly all of that can happen for the companies then to be able to progress the project so there's definitely a need for a more joined up approach by Scottish Government and UK Government so that there is a plan around how we accelerate the scotland projects and that you know that's a cohesive plan and about actions about what actions does UK government need to take what action does Scottish government need to take what action does industry need to take so that we can make progress there because the longer these projects you know go out and it's 20 27 20 28 and then it's 20 28 29 and so it goes on so we need to do what we can to make the conditions right to accelerate the scotland projects the intog projects that are going ahead they're really important they're about decarbonisation in terms of oil and gas and about floating wind so it's again it's really important that they're that they're supported and that the process to get them from the licence to actually up and running is as streamlined as possible and that both governments and industry are working closely to do that in terms of innovation we mentioned about floating offshore wind that's a massive opportunity for Scotland it's got about a third of the global pipeline for floating offshore wind out of the Scottish projects there's great capability because of our subsea oil and gas expertise built up over the last few decades and so it's how do we provide the right environment for those floating wind projects to get the costs down and the scale up and that's about innovation and r&d support we've got lots of great supply chain companies who have got innovative ideas about how this can become more efficient so have they got access to the right funding to help them progress their ideas and quickly enough it's you know any energy project offshore is really costly and high risk so there's there's a definite market failure there that needs government support to get behind that to reduce the risk one of the first projects as 80s limited that we've done has been to work with ore catapult to create the national floating wind innovation centre and that's about helping companies to do joint industry projects and collaborate so we can try and get the costs down and the scale up so those types of projects are really important and important that they continue to be supported either at a UK level through anivate UK or a Scottish level through through Scottish enterprise and others okay thank you we again a lot of the answers are coming what we talk about offshore wind and floating wind platforms but we've heard and I'm a big supporter of of the potential of green hydrogen to the Scottish economy but for me we are very far behind the curve on that and it takes significant investment to develop a green hydrogen economy so from your perspective you know where do we need to go with that to to to get sort of technologies like the green hydrogen technology economy to catch up with where we are with wind I suppose in terms of kind of looking at the specific opportunities for the northeast so if we look at Peterhead which would be our major terminal plant and looking to develop that out as a carbon capture power station and that would be the first one in Scotland and that would pay a massive role in the decarbonisation of Scotland alone and also present huge opportunities so again looking at kind of an investment over two billion over the lifetime of the project but not only that but also the opportunities that would be there for for workers in that and then also in terms of meeting Scotland's net zero targets it would play a huge part to that and as both Emma and Maggie have just mentioned in terms of the floating wind technology and also transmission's critical deployment and again you know the the investment that's there but also the workforce that's needed for that too if we look at sea green of the coast of Montrose you're talking about 500 jobs that are there alone and of course looking at newer kind of technologies so alongside the carbon capture of Peterhead looking at the potential for hydrogen there as well and and the network's playing a critical role in this you know it's all right to generate all of this energy but how do we get it you know to the grid and how do we do get it out so that it can actually be used so there's there's huge opportunities as you say not just the offshore that I suppose that's the one that is very visible and people kind of know about but there's a lot of new technologies and things things are always advancing and constantly moving forward so it's being able to ensure for Scotland and the northeast region in particular that those opportunities are grasped and taken on and in order to do that as Maggie had mentioned earlier you need again the correct infrastructure around that so the planning consenting piece you know all of these if we look at kind of the timescale for any of these large infrastructure projects you know from start to to end it can be up to 12 years for example you know when you're looking at kind of a wind farm being built out and particularly year-long the transmission networks as well the timescale around those so again when we're looking at all of all of these pieces so we need the people to be trained and ready we need the projects to be able to be up and running and all of this needs to happen in order for us to meet the targets that have been set within a certain timescale so it's looking at all of the components and creating the right environment for I suppose all of this come together at the right time to ensure that it all happens and it takes all of the various parties and players in that whether it's government whether it's local authority whether it's companies communities all of those needing to be within those conversations to ensure that this happens I think we talked about you know to deliver on innovation it strikes me you can't have people working in the oil and gas sector and working in obviously in the in the green energy sector so so we need to be we need to have an influx of new talent to come into into the sector so you know I mean we've talked about STEM again and we've talked about STEM for it's since ever I came into this place and we still are sitting at a very very low uptake in women into STEM so in terms of you know that to me that's where the you know the biggest innovation has to happen and how do we over the group we're talking about 2045 so we that in that timescale Emma how do we practically deliver that that that STEM training into into that innovation encouragement into schools to deliver our 2045 targets I think that's I mentioned collaboration earlier I think that's where the collaboration comes in between to have industry and government to ensure that the STEM programmes it's looking at both sides of the coin it's looking at you know what skills do we need and what are available and then using that information to map out where to direct investment in training facilities in the right areas but working closely together across the sector and government around you know that local school engagement but even at colleges and a higher education I think one thing that's just not being picked up on in terms of skills development and maximising the economic benefit from renewable energy projects is the ports and the supply chain and I think ports can can create skills hubs and offer lots of green jobs and I think investment in ports is crucial for maximising the economic benefit from renewable energy. They are the linchpin to delivering whether the offshore wind or green hydrogen projects and you know lots of the ports themselves already across Scotland and the northeast are investing you know we've seen investment in the the new south harbour at the port of Aberdeen which will create new clean green jobs there and we've seen investment in the port of Nygg and sort of across the onn embases as well and Montrose and iMouth and Bucky so I think the ports are really key there and supporting them as green skills hubs will help to you know move that dial forward in terms of skills development and a lot of those ports as I mentioned the ports of Montrose they're delivering their own stem activity so it's a collective effort of all of those supply chain businesses as well as the developer community and the Scottish Government coming together you know and implementing all of those stem activities getting the skills involved getting the colleges involved and also the SME community they're hugely important here as I mentioned you know a lot of them are you know starting their apprenticeship schemes and they're getting young young people into the workforce and skilling them up and and other technologies as well we've got lots of SMEs in the heat space and heat pumps are very new and a lot of them are launching apprenticeships for low-carbon heat pumps and offering that skill set I think is key as well so the SME community are really important in terms of that upscaling piece as well so it's a collective effort I guess in summary across the sector this SME community supports the developer community and and government at Scottish and UK level Have I got time to be in just to bring Mr Bowland in? Briefly yeah if you could be in just a moment One of the things that I wanted to go back to what you said Mr Bowland was around you know an electrical engineer in the oil and gas sector compared to the renewable sector it could be the difference could be as much as £20,000 and that would be you know specifically because oil and gas sector is very highly paid jobs over and above what you would expect potentially for that a very light engineer how on earth do we square that circle if we're talking about a just transition when to move from one sector to another will indicate a big drop in salary I mean I think uh whether the highway paid I suppose would be a dubious thing because again you're looking at the working conditions and that as well so that's a lot of that takes out on board and that's why we had this somewhat problem previous where we oil gas industry been able to attract people and that's what created the actual wages and that that are actually the end out but this week I looked at some of the adverts that were there and that was like for renewables and particularly like offshore wind and you're looking at that and a lot of the actual salaries that have been advertised and where they have been advertised are very somewhat of what's on onshore but they're looking for people to actually work offshore on rotations so I would find it they're going to find it difficult to actually recruit people into these roles it's certainly no going to be something it's going to encourage somebody from an offshore industry to actually move to that and I think there needs to be a realisation that was realised in the oil and gas industry if you are going to be working 14 days 21 days 12 hours shifts offshore away from your family there's got to be a degree of compensation for actually doing that that I don't think it's in the renewable industry at the moment and that's our opinion on that how you sir how you round that up I think actually the market will do it themselves because as we spoke earlier there is a small pool of actually skilled people there and the skilled people generally in my experience will go where the money is and if the money's not there then industries and will find that there is a skill shortage and the only option they're going to have is to actually compete with the other industries that are actually paying higher wages thank you thank you gordon mcdonald's before by my director my apologies for being late to the committee this morning due to traffic much of what I was going to ask has been touched upon but I wanted to ask a couple of specific questions first to you john you've mentioned a couple of times about the need for this universal training passport so that people can come from oil and gas industry into predominantly wind at the moment can you give us an idea of what the cost is for somebody who is trying to do that transition without the universal training passport it would be approximately £2000 because at the moment they're having to go through their separate survivals now there is elements that are different we accept that but a lot of it is very somewhere and what we've been calling on this for a number of years because there is people interested in offshore wind but even if they're with an existing employer in offshore oil and gas they're not going to pay for them to do this navigation to move someplace else so they're going to have to actually fund that themselves and £2000 is a lot of money for somebody to fund to go in our industry if they don't know if they're going to get a job plus also if you have got people that have been made redundant of that then it's even a bigger burden from them and there is no actual support for actually get that training to actually do that as well okay thanks very much you know during this transition period which will go on for a reasonable long length of time especially since the UK government has put out more licenses for oil and gas we have to juggle the fact that we need workers in the oil and gas industry for the next 10 20 years we need workers for offshore wind and that's proven to be pretty successful the moment we generate a surplus of electricity in Scotland which we use set in south of the border and there is huge scope for hydrogen so you know Colin Beattie already touched upon the fact that we have difficulty in maybe attracting enough workers so i'm aware that only 36 percent of people in the oil and gas industry in the UK are in Scotland what is the UK government doing to try and tackle this problem given that only 36 percent of oil and gas workers are in the UK are in Scotland our estimates are around a mere 50% actually split between Scotland and England mainly predominantly in Scotland in the north east and some in the actual southern west as well but in England it's usually the north east and north west of England as well where there is sorry could you repeat the question just basically wanting to know you know the call has been upon what the Scottish Government should do but what i'm saying is the oil and gas industry in the UK whether you should own figure of 50 50 or whether it's the oil and gas UK's figure of 36 percent a lot of the workers that are working in oil and gas are not coming from Scotland they're coming from elsewhere so what is the UK government doing to attract to tackle some of the problems that is facing the industry the energy industry in my view very little i mean there needs to be this is as you say this workforce comes from across the whole of the UK so obviously it's a big issue for Scotland because oil and gas is off the shoreline in Scotland but it's a big issue for the whole UK as well because if these jobs go it will affect communities across the whole of the UK and we've seen that previously in previous downturns so yes it needs to actually the UK government's input to actually support that and support things moving forward as i say they are involved in the skills passport discussions in that as well um but i feel there needs to be a wee bit more drive in that in my opinion when i think where we've seen real success has been where there've been joints UK and Scottish government so the Aberdeen city region deal would be a good example of that where that led to the establishment of the oil and gas technology centre as it was called then it's now called a net zero technology centre and you know that's delivered a huge amount in terms of technology development for for net zero as well as for oil and gas and the investment zone status for the north east of scotland again joint working between scotish and UK government and from my own perspective the energy transition zone we're involved in has both got UK and Scottish government funding so i do think where there's a combined effort recognising what outcomes actually we're all looking to deliver and and therefore how we can best utilise different levers to deliver those outcomes can can really make an impact okay anybody else want to come in no i just so my second point is you know oil and gas workers have transferable skills in that if they don't have work in the UK they can go to the Gabon they can go to Venezuela they can go all over the world and vice versa people can come here so you know again oil and gas UK report highlighted that in recent years 27 percent of EU workers in the north sea have left and 54 percent of non-EU workers have left around about 3 000 jobs in total what needs to change in the UK immigration system in order to attract workers so that we can juggle the three balls of offshore wind oil and gas and hydrogen i wouldn't be able to speak to the immigration system on that one so but is there a need for foreign workers in terms of going back to again the the figures i'd presented earlier for SSE so just speaking specifically for SSE at the moment people are transitioning to us so we're you know the roles that are needed are being are being filled for now i don't have figures on those people's immigration status that are taking up roles with us so there could be people that are from outside of Scotland i'm sure there is amongst them um but i don't know but i suppose in terms of that point that's what i would say that for now looking at that rather than at a national level and maybe what the situation would be in that instance but speaking to SSE's experience for now the transition is happening at a pace which which is great for now i mean the the north sea oil and gas industry has been a global industry and we've seen you know the benefit to Scotland because so many people have have spent their time all over the world brought that knowledge and expertise back and vice versa our university sector hears the benefit from that so in terms of income from from students coming to study and because they recognise that scotland has got real really strong credentials in offshore energy in particular that brings real benefit in in terms of the student experience and both and their universities so what we'd like to get to for renewables is it becomes successful globally as we've seen oil and gas has been for scotland so success would look like floating offshore wind and all the knowledge and capability and know how we've built up in scotland can be exported around the world so it stands to reason that that having that sort of mobile and global outlook is really important for the success of the industries okay thanks so much thank you myrtle phraser to be followed by Maggie Chapman thank you thank you community good morning to the the panel i'd just like to change direction a little bit and ask about the just transition fund and we took some evidence last week we heard from some community groups who benefited from from the fund we also heard different views on the way the fund was being administered by the Scottish national investment bank so i suppose i'd like to start by asking you do you have any particular view on the just transition fund in the generality do you think it's appropriate that it's being handled by the Scottish national investment bank as opposed to any other body and do you think there's enough transparency around the fund on the way that it is being administered John it's no area my expertise only involvement if it just transition fund has been regarding skills passport where i think there was five million from the just transition fund but into that which obviously has helped to actually try and move that forward if it comes into place then i would say it would be a good example of good success it's just i suppose my question would be what checks and balances are done by the Scottish government to ensure that money is being used and they're getting the value for that okay thank you well well we've been delivering just transition fund projects so if i can give a perspective from from there so we successfully bid for supply chain pathway and challenge fund and that is really to help supply chain companies and talking mainly about small to medium size companies to understand the nature and scale of opportunities coming for an offshore wind green hydrogen etc and then to help them think about what investments they need to make to make sure that that they can go after those opportunities so what investment do they need to make in capital equipment and building and infrastructure etc so the challenge fund part of that has been grant funding has supported 11 companies for the first pilot and i've went just about to announce another 14 companies who've benefited from that so that's been about three million in grant funding that has levered another five million in private sector funding and most importantly of course is delivering and maintaining jobs and also reduction in emissions which will all be monitored and evaluated and that's we believe that's delivering impact and we were fortunate that that was given as a three-year project so we have been able to employ someone to deliver the supply chain pathway and challenge fund and make sure that it's delivering benefit to the supply chain and therefore into jobs as well so having that multi-year view has been really helpful the other project has been the energy transition skills hub that's been 4.5 million from the just transition fund additional funding from scolish government etf fund and as i said 1.8 million from shell and nescal operating that so that's going to be a physical infrastructure and energy transition skills hub to make sure we're able to provide skills for the future so we feel they're really tangible examples of how the just transition fund is being used very positively and there's also been funding for the national energy skills accelerator which touched on already so there they would be real practical examples i think the SNP funding and financial transactions is helpful for certain scale of company looking to do things what i'd really ask is that we can think about what's the future of the just transition fund because for any of us involved in bidding for it we need to know what that looks like over the next three to five years so that we can plan accordingly get the right projects in place it's very difficult if it's annual funding and often the actual projects don't start until october and we've got until the end of march to deliver and that brings with it a whole raft of pressures so being able to have a line of sight to what the just transition funding looks like for it to be multi-year for it to be a mix of grant and financial transactions financial transactions have a place but they don't always work in particularly not if we're trying to encourage more innovation and rnd amongst small to medium-sized companies i think the grant funding is really important there i think there have been challenges around the ip and where that resides and i think if we really want to again make an impact with funding the ip has to be with the ip or originator so i think it's been so i would concur it's been really helpful it's delivering impact but we now need to know where it's going and what the future looks like for it to then be able to collectively really make sure that we're delivering impact from it okay thank you that that's a very helpful and comprehensive answer in terms of innovation and new technologies being developed do you think that there's enough awareness from companies in the sector around the just transition funding how how easy is it for people to access that funding do you mean from the Scottish National Investment Bank so the recent tranche i think it's mixed i'd say it's mixed i mean i think there's a wider issue for small to medium-sized companies that they do and the Aberdeen Grampian Chamber of Commerce survey that was just tonight yesterday i think reiterates this it's quite difficult for small to medium-sized companies to to know and have the time to work out where all the different funding streams are and and that's a real challenge so there's definitely something for helping easier for small to medium-sized companies to understand what the different funding options are are that are available to them and how they go and access them so for example we've discussed with SNP to be put on a roadshow for for supply chain companies to come and find out what the Scottish Enterprise offer but a SNP offer etc etc so i think it's more about the visibility of the funding and helping make it easy for companies to understand what's available okay thank you that's really helpful somebody else want to add Emma yeah just adding on the SME point i agree with everything Maggie said i think the fund has been impactful and some of the things that's delivered have been really positive but i think in terms of future and where it's directed i think it's that SME community and supporting them i mean mentioned before SMEs are the backbone of the supply chain particularly in renewable energy and i guess there's two areas to supporting them there's there's a sort of scaling up enabling them to grow and increase their competitiveness and invest in their facilities and in skills and in the equipment that they may need so there's a grant funding side to that but there's also a support for supply chain in terms of scaling up in terms of business improvement there are some great initiatives on going and Maggie mentioned enterprise agencies and things like that but through the offshore wind growth partnership there is a great holistic business improvement programme and i think supporting businesses in that effect to grow their businesses and establishing a offshore wind supply chain development scheme to help them go through programmes like that and scale up is really important so yeah i think in terms of future for the fund and supporting SMEs it's really key to have those two sides of the going the funding and then the support thank you just very briefly um we're very supportive of the fund and its ambitions and to date we haven't interacted with the fund um but we would encourage government maybe to look at the role of enabling infrastructure such as the ports that Emma had mentioned earlier that are so crucial to ongoing operations so just being able to look at that or a new offshore wind supply chain fund um to focus on kind of port upgrades as well so maybe incorporating that into the the shape or the frame of it going forward okay all right thank you very much thank you make each other thanks thanks very much okay and good morning to the panel thank you for for your comments so far um i want to just extend the conversation around the just transition fund and then i've also got a couple of questions on supply chain well extend supply chain discussion and on community engagement um on the the JTF i'm wondering when we talk about the wider supply chain and Emma you've just talked there about the importance of SMEs in the in the energy supply chains how how targeted do you think we should be thinking of the just transition fund in terms of supply chain support specifically in in this yeah it should be very targeted towards supporting those businesses because i mentioned i think you know those businesses are where the green jobs are created so SMEs are huge and may i just mentioned the ports as well um there's a lot of work going on in the sector about ports and investment and you know through the SNAP and the strategic investment model but as i said earlier ports are the linch pin of our offshore renewables activity and supporting them is hugely key because the growth of ports will have a knock-on effect on the wider supply chains that the ports use so um using them to to maximise the economic benefits from renewables is is really important so yeah i think it should be very targeted towards SMEs in supply chain and i suppose if we think about the the supply chain of the broader economy but you talked about and you highlighted some companies that are already doing this do you think there needs to be an understanding that actually they should be seen as part of this broader the broader remit of the fund as well so we're not just focused on the energy economy we focused on everything that supports that as well yeah so i mean many businesses that are in the supply chain are not just working in renewables they'll be working in rail they'll be working in the defence sector they'll be working in the food and drink i mean you know there's so many businesses that have actually transitioned from food and drink into oil and gas and now into renewables so it is a whole holistic thing you know more skills in other areas and more capabilities and in fabrication and perhaps oil and gas is is development within renewables as well so yeah i agree with you there that it is a sort of holistic approach on the supply chain okay thanks Mia if i can come to you in a similar question that around how we can support or what the barriers to for the renewable supply chain that that you see where are the barriers and other than the JTF what are the kinds of um either incentives or or or things that the government needs to be looking at to to support supply chain development not as well as supply chain activity to support renewables to support renewables i suppose in terms of i think Emma has kind of covered very well a lot of the the work that's being done um but it's in terms of being able to i suppose encourage them like that to be able to access where there is various funds that maybe would support the work they're doing and being able to kind of give guidance um i suppose one of the things we would be looking at in terms are you are you saying in terms of there sorry could you yeah no i suppose we hear we hear quite a lot about challenges in the supply chain and and understanding where those challenges come from what the barriers are and how how we can unpick them but there's also you know that there's there's money obviously is one thing but do we actually understand the broader strategic landscape of Scotland's supply chain thinking you know in in broad terms of our renewables industry not so not just not just the very very specific link links but that's kind of broader strategic yeah picture so in terms of i suppose the kind of the project pipeline so for the supply chain to be involved being able to have certainty about the the pipeline and what is coming down the tracks in terms of them being able to kind of plan out so looking at streamlined planning and consenting processes to support that strategic funding you've made mention of the just transition fund there but looking at other areas where where supports for kind of new innovation and new technologies within the supply chain can be supported and and also looking at kind of circularity would be one as well so work with the industry to establish a circular approach for replacing onshore and offshore wind components and wider than that as well as you say if it isn't just within the the core kind of areas and being able to establish targets potentially around kind of the reuse and refurbishing and remanufacturing and and within this being able to kind of support that that wider workforce growth in terms of kind of that new industry around the circularity piece and and then again going back to the the ports piece in terms of being able to support the supply chain so enabling the infrastructure so scottish ports again playing a crucial role in delivering that zero and being able to unlock unlock that supply chain so the investment around the upgrading of any of those infrastructures as well remanufacturing do we support actual primary manufacturing enough in in scotland to to have not only the jobs that are associated with that but also maybe make make those supply chains more reliable more resilient and more adaptable if if they are locally locally controlled yeah i suppose in the the first instance that would be the key priority but then again as we move out being able to kind of look at that circularity piece and being able to really kind of i suppose build build an infrastructure around that so at the moment it is quite exploratory in certain areas you know things are very at initial stage and kind of very much pre-development almost so being able to again when we look at where we are with the skills shortage and we're now doing the things in stem and the schools in order to have people kind of you know ready and prepared for 10 years time being able to look now at what is needed around that circularity piece to to ensure that there's more development and more growth in that area okay thanks john if i can come come to you similar question around um trade union engagement with or discussions with with your your colleagues around how where where support is needed to to secure supply chains to make them resilient to make them sort of long term do you have any comments on on that i mean supply chains are obviously vital because the people at the actual employee i think so many things have been touched on around about the visibility of work which is a problem for supply chains and seeing what the actual work is going to actually be there but again as i say from our point of view a big movement would be the actual manufacturing of that manufacturing base within scotland i think we'd actually create work for the supply chains it would create jobs that would be more in the near term as to the longer term and would hopefully fall some of the gaps that we're seeing at the moment and do you see that as being you know you said it's create jobs and secure jobs you see that being across different industries in different sectors as well not not just focused on on energy yes yeah i think it would it would that's why this has been said before the supply chain works in various different sectors so actually having that manufacturing base would support all these sectors as well thanks Maggie if i can come to you nice to say hello to another Maggie again similar question around supply chains and from ETC's point of view where are the barriers in ensuring that we we have the support for manufacturing the support for the the running through of of supply chains across your your activities so yeah so supply chains first of all a lot of the indigenous supply chain companies who have predominantly built up their expertise around oil and gas one of the challenges they face is that if they do want to make new investment to be ready for offshore wind or other green energy opportunities they often don't have the actual contract for that work in place because the scotland projects for example are still going through their own final investment decisions so therefore there is a risk that there'll be a bit of a gap because the supply chain companies can't get the funding because they don't have confirmed contracts so therefore can't make the investment that's needed now but then are expected to be ready in 2026 27 when the contracts come from the developers for example so that is the real issue that i think if there's some way that that government can try and maybe get their heads around that and see if there's anything that can be done because i do think there's a worry that some supply chain companies can't put in the investment they know they need to do to get ready for example offshore wind but by the time they get the confirmed orders they're not going to be then ready for the developer so that there's something to try and unpick that that bit is quite difficult now that's to an extent where the just transition challenge fund that i mentioned earlier where it's grant funding has helped to unlock that a little bit to a bit but you know it can only do so much so that that is the challenge we then look at inward investment so john mentioned about gaps so where there are gaps in the supply chain i think that is well understood now and so it's ensuring we've got a coordinated effort which we do have with the Scottish Development International and Department of Business and Trade about where there are opportunities which sort of companies we should be attracting and where the best locations are for those companies depending on what sort of requirements they have in terms of scale or workforce so having that very coordinated effort around inward investment to attract new investment into Scotland is an important part of of the supply chain so both how do we grow our indigenous supply chain as we're transitioning and how do we attract new investment as well okay thank you that that's really helpful if i can move on to my my secondary of questions around community engagement um it was interesting right at the start of this conversation this morning when we were talking about what what the definition of of just transition was and the role of of businesses of companies of communities and of workers the just transition lab in a based at Aberdeen university talks very very clearly about the role of equality and wellbeing of democratic participation and of community empowerment revitalisation as as being integral not something that's a nice add-on extra but being fundamental and integral to the the just bit of of just transition and Maggie if i can stay with you that we at our community engagement session last week and we've had conversations about at sinfotex park before you know that there's a very very clear sense of injustice uh old tori was cleared for oil for the oil and gas industries in in the 70s tori has has the incinerator Aberdeen sewage works it's just lost its beach to the south harbour development where how do you see um your role with etz edd and and the community engagement focusing particularly on the community justice point of view of of etz edd's operations so we see very clearly our role as etz edd limited is about how we both support the business to be successful but how we support the community around about that to be successful so particularly the tori community as you've said so we have got in place a a raft of suggestions of projects to do because this is really important that the community wants those projects and that they're not imposed we've got a range of mitigation measures in place we're also working on a community fund so again it's about supporting the community and and projects that community want to see there's a jobs and skills plan in place and we can circulate that round to the committee if that would be helpful but that sets out very clearly um how we can ensure that for example if there's an inward investor coming in how we'd ensure that a lot of those jobs and those benefits would go back into the local community so that would be about specifically about apprenticeships about a guaranteed interview scheme that Aberdeen City council runs already um we have got a community lead and she her role is to work directly with with communities at very individual level understanding what issues are important we're also working to look at the whole landscape vision of the whole area for the energy transition zone so it's how the the need for green spaces the need for biodiversity the need for active travel sits firmly alongside supporting what the community wants but also what we need to attract an industry and a workforce around that so it's it's looking at this in a holistic way but ensuring that we listen to industry community concerns that we listen to industry needs and that we we try and work that together to get a to deliver the right outcome for everybody which is understanding what the community wants but also understanding how we deliver jobs and sustainable jobs for the future and also don't miss out on these big economic opportunities for Aberdeen and the region as well so there's a there's a balance in in all of that okay can you talk about you talked about mitigations and and the balance i suppose the argument that Summing Tory would make is that they they've already been compromised you know for 50 years losing losing houses losing losing community facilities and there isn't really a mitigation to losing the last remaining green space you know there isn't that once it's gone it's gone you know the wetlands that there as well and given the importance of if if we are genuine about our our intention of a just transition we know that life expectancy in Tory is can be up to 10 years lower than just across across the river loss of that green space is more than just you know trees and and grass it and wetlands it's about genuinely healthy community supporting that so i suppose how do you see those mitigations actually making up for the potential destruction of the last remaining green space so the proposal is not to destroy the last remaining green space the proposal is the local development plan was approved by Scottish government and the Aberdeen city council and we've worked very hard to look at how we can minimise the use of the green space but to maximise the economic impact from it so it's proposing to use um just under a third of the st phytyx park and the area next to the water wastewater treatment works it's not about losing the wetlands it's about retaining the burn and the wetlands and in fact improving the wetlands and improving the water quality it's about approving the accessibility to the park and also importantly it's about putting in place a maintenance so that the park can be maintained because there's great work done by the community around the wetlands but it's not maintained well and there's a lot of invasive species etc so how do we put in place a plan that actually looks about the maintenance and improvement of the green space that will remain there and do that in a way that's very much what the community wants to see so therefore it's about improving the quality of the green space and it's also looking at how we can improve accessibility to the neighbouring green spaces so for example talus woods is a great lung in the heart of the city um but at the moment it's it's optically safe it's not well lit you'll get you'll get lost so there's very clear things that can be done to improve paths networks um and signposting lighting safety improve how the historic church yard is maintained etc so what we really have done is engaged extensively with the community to understand the concerns and there are many concerns and how best we can help mitigate and or put in place a long-term plan that will look to to overall make improvements overall okay thanks and one final short short it's very brief i'll still have Kevin Stewart to ask the question okay thanks thanks coming back to you john it's on this community engagement piece um do you think that there's been enough conversation with engagement with and actually listening to workers and the communities that they come from and and and support in in the the just transition in the round uh no if you want a simple answer because probably if you ask most workers regarding a just transition they struggle to tell you what it is and we had that kind of discussion right at the very start trying to define what a just transition is so what workers are interested in is having the security or job that's what they see and if that's what just transition is then they'll be happy with that thanks and Kevin Stewart the Jewish too yeah please um thank you convener and uh there's been quite a lot of talk today around about collaboration um and we've just touched upon communication and that's what i want to concentrate on today collaboration and communication so let's start with um collaboration because i think it's in all of our interest to ensure that the northeast doesn't just survive but that it continues to thrive and i think that most folk from our area would agree that that should be the case in order to get to that point we all have to collaborate and you have talked today particularly ms harrick around about the collaboration that exists across the industry is there enough collaboration so between governments, scotish, uk industry, academia communities in order for us to get this right and let me give you an example because ms mccarthy said that it took sometimes 12 years to get a major project all the way through from planning to consent and we recognise that we don't have a huge amount of time in terms of this transition what do we need to do in terms of that collaboration to get governments all of the rest industry communities to understand that we need to do this a little bit more speedily than we're currently doing and be a little bit more flexible as we move forward and maybe ms mccinlay would like to answer first thank you so i agree collaboration is absolutely critical and you know i think there's good levels of collaboration and i mean i can i can name lots lots of examples and i'd say particularly northeast the regional economic strategy which really provides the framework against which the just transition funding and everything else should should be looked at as an example of collaboration and practice amongst all private and public sector i agree i feel we need the shared sense of what outcomes are we looking to deliver for the scotish economy and therefore how do we all play to our strengths to deliver against those outcomes so what's the role of scotish government UK government role of industry role of organisations like ourselves public sector etc because i think if we had that shared plan then that really helps to focus minds and make sure that we can all play to our strengths so i think collectively we all know what needs to be done to unlock the low carbon and green energy opportunity but for some reason there's just you know i don't think there's a clear action plan about what what action is everyone taking so that we can all play to our strengths and deliver against that okay does anyone else want to come in on that miss harrick please i agree with baggy that there's you know a good collaboration going on i think one of the good examples is the strategic investment model that i mentioned which is around port investment and that's bringing together the developers of scotland as well as the scotish government to see how we can progress investment in ports so you know that's a really important step there but i think expanding that further to you know the financial community to unlock investment through guarantee schemes and things like that is really important but also just to pick up on Maggie's point about setting the direction you know the industry welcome to the draft energy strategy and just transition plan is a sort of potentially transformative piece of work which was due in spring 2022 so you know that's a delay of more than two years so i think setting out that plan getting that published to set the direction is really key so just picking up on on Maggie's point there about that plan and that direction but yeah absolutely agree that that collaboration is key but i think it starts at that that plan stage okay you know a number of you have talked today about port infrastructure and you know that is extremely important as we move forward but you know some of these changes to ports are quite controversial south harbour in Aberdeen did not get by without a wee bit of controversy but i think now the vast majority of people would agree that it was the right thing to do not only for Aberdeen but for the whole of the north east as we move forward and we can already see business transferring to Aberdeen that would not have come there before so how do we get around these often controversial projects how do we explain to communities the necessity of some of these changes in order that we get to the stage of not only surviving but thriving i don't know who wants to answer that because i think business has got a big part to play in that communication with communities i think in terms of the um that engagement piece and you say how do we explain to communities i think it kind of needs to take a step back and in terms of the the initial engagement that takes place Maggie Maggie Ms Tappen you had mentioned around um the Aberdeen University and their research and we're involved in a collaboration at the moment in Aberdeen which involves Aberdeen University as well as others um but very much key to all of that is having that representation from from community to be able to lend their voice to the discussions because as you've said historically you go back to the 70s 80s and 90s in particular parts of Aberdeen city itself and the surrounding areas people have felt kind of put upon and are not engaged in the process of of the transformation or transition um so you can have all these great ideas what would be lovely for a community but if you don't actually go and speak to the people and present your ideas you know you can be doing completely the opposite of what they need but also recognising I suppose that within a community a community is very diverse and made up of many different thoughts and you know people and backgrounds and all the rest of it and sometimes it's those who shout loudest that maybe their voices are heard and others who should be heard aren't heard so it's it's um it's a intricate process um but that needs to be worked through very carefully to ensure that nobody gets left behind and to ensure that maybe those voices that aren't being amplified are heard but also at the end of all of this there is certain for business there is certain remits that we have to work in so whether that is around the planning and consenting process from an authority so you know we will set out to to engage and to include and to collaborate and all of that but there there is of course always these external um frameworks that also set what it is ultimately that you might need to do on something but I think from the outset it is that having everybody's voice at the table and and that might sound a bit twee and that's it you know but it is actually true because in order for us to be able to operate the way we do and to be able to build out the infrastructure that we do we need to have the the public support you know on board um and there will always be there will always be things that arise but it's how how we're kind of open and transparent and can engage with people that ensures that the process goes through. Thank you Mr Balland. Yeah I mean if you want the public support then they need to see how it's going to benefit them and how it's going to directly benefit them and I mean we were speaking about in the early days of oil and gas in Aberdeen but if you take another area Shetland for example and how they dealt with that and the benefits that that done to their actual local community where you have leisure facilities in every village in that which was actually funded from the common good fund that they actually set up through that so there is ways that actually doing things and it brings actual communities with you because they see that overall there's a benefit to their community and as you said at the very beginning this in order to have thriving communities you've got to have jobs. I want to move to certainty which is difficult when you're in a change phase but when governments themselves change tack at various points as we have seen with the UK government in terms of its climate change ambitions being diluted what does that do to industry in particular that lack of certainty what does that do in terms of investment in terms of confidence amongst industry members themselves Emma do you want to go first in that please yeah I mean I think just starting off with some positives and you know the Scottish Government have a cabinet secretary for net zero and just transition you know which signals a clear message there and then the just transition fund itself shows you know action but further policy certainty is required I mean if there is uncertainty there that investor confidence is challenged and we have seen some disappointing announcements with Vattenfall Snorferc Boryas project and things like that sort of falling out of the pipeline because of that uncertainty so as I mentioned earlier the energy strategy and just transition plan is key in having that plan to support that direction there and we also look forward to seeing the green industrial strategy that was announced as part of the programme for government from the First Minister so policy pieces like that will go towards supporting that confidence and clarity but coming from a supply chain point that uncertainty challenges that investment piece we're talking about Maggie mentioned earlier the gap between investing in ports and investing in your skills and capabilities if you don't have a clear pipeline then justifying that investment is much harder accessing private investment is much harder so we need to ensure that that pipeline is certain and to do that that comes with addressing some of the challenges we've mentioned and some of the key ones is grid and also the route to market at the UK level through the CFD and making sure there's investor confidence there and that the economic model is there so you know without projects there is no supply chain there is no job so it's making sure that that pipeline is there anyone else wants to come in on that Maggie please the certainty and confidence is absolutely critical for investors for companies who are looking to invest but also for the workforce and we've we've talked to go back about the challenges of of encouraging people into the the energy industry and that doesn't help help those people either if they're looking to for career choices I think the other thing is there's huge competition from what the States what US is doing in terms of renewables and also in Europe and this is a global market and we are competing in a global market for supply chain for people and for the investment so the certainty from UK and Scottish government is really critical to make sure that that bit about this being a managed transition it's not either or oil and gas renewables it's both and it's a managed transition that is so critical if we're going to be successful here or else everything we've talked about we won't reap the opportunities John I think wants to come in I would just agree with what's been said and uncertainty doesn't help from a workforce point of view because if it's a non oil and gas uncertainty could lead to a quicker end to some of the actual jobs that are there and uncertainty in renewables will stop projects going ahead so in both elements then you're going to actually lost jobs convener just one final point we are very pressed for time I'll be very very brief obviously Aberdeen in the northeast has been a real global global player in terms of oil and gas top of the tree and I'm sure that we all want to see the same in terms of renewables in the future there are lots and lots of other questions that I could ask around about planning and consenting and I just wonder convener if the witnesses could do us the obligement of actually writing to us in terms of where they see planning and consenting could change to be beneficial for that just transition and thank you convener thank you we did hear some evidence earlier on planning if there's anything that the witnesses would like to give us in addition to what's already been said on the record we'd happily received that I would like to thank the witnesses for their giving us their time this morning you've been very generous with the time and I'll suspend very briefly for change over witnesses thank you I now welcome our second panel of witnesses Professor Paul Dileo who is director at the Robert Gordon university's energy transition institute Gordon McGinnis director of industry and network skill development Scotland and Suzanne Sosna director of economic opportunities and climate with Scottish Enterprise welcome this morning I'll start with the question I've posed to the first panel which was around definitions of a just transition that's an area that the committee is interested in as part of the inquiry and if I come to you first Paul and what we're interested in is whether do you think there's a shared understanding in the northeastern muddy of what the just transition is and should we be measuring it and how will we know it's being delivered great question I think the answer is no I mean again there's a little people working and living of course in the air and they all have a different flavour of just transitionism but I've talked about it specifically around the workforce and again you've probably heard some things already from the first panel and previous sessions we on our estimates 150, 160,000 people work in the industry and they all have a slightly different flavour because they know what the end point is isn't at zero but they don't know they have a different starting point so everybody's journey from from the workforce is different everybody living in the area has a slightly different perspective so I think maybe what thing will be really helpful is clarifying what is the destination and how can we help people as their journeys as they go through it because people have a different starting point they need clarity and there's some great work done again here in Scotland around here to this transition planning framework but to put some really nice bullets around it but I think we need a bit of Google translation to make it real for people because they're lovely statements but it's not really clear why a person in the street, a person in the job or work somewhere felt actually going to meet with them individually so I think we need to help people on their journey towards a common destination because a lot of the discussion this morning was around skills transition it was with people who were in employment in the oil and gas sector moving over to renewable sector but what does it mean to call it a just transition is there different areas or different you know what should be measured in what makes it not just a transition from one sector to the other but makes it a just transition yeah I think I'm just building on what I said changes hard because it means we need to change our lifestyle how we're going to do something and people need to make different choices some people already live in a well insulated home others like myself do not so therefore you need a kind of it's a different journey so I think we need to say what is just unfair mean but I think that need also need a few more words managed and coordinated probably needs to add to the definition because actually this needs to be a very thoughtful managed transition and again when I look at the definitions of the national just transition outcomes actually the eight definitions work for me I can see that's a real a pretty good way to describe it but remember everybody's journey is different so but a just transition just transition means something different to you that it will do it means to me I think we need to help people but actually how we translate and what is what is fair looks like and I've come to you and Suzanne so this because Paul's kind of described the transition has been is it maybe been difficult to find a shared understanding because everybody's starting point is different but what does that mean for you know policy makers or deliver you know agencies like yourselves if there's not a common understanding of what it is that we're trying to deliver and what it is we're trying to measure I think I would absolutely concur on the point you make about managed about managed transition I think in our view there is a very good collective understanding about the end goal I think we can all see what's happened in the past and that we understand that we don't want what's happened in the past we want a new future where people are not damaged and badly affected by change so we want to manage that change in order to mitigate the risks and reduce the possibility of that happening to people and to communities I think from our perspective as well a just transition is about the individual but it's also about the collective and it's also about the environment so it's about the collective in the sense it's about communities of course but it's also about companies so it's a just transition for companies and if we think about it in those terms so a company that's a supply chain company in the oil and gas sector what is a just transition for them how do they maintain or grow their turnover their profitability how do they retain their profitability retain their staff grow their skills so it's a just transition for the for the company as well and then for the sector for the energy sector and and increasingly we talk about the energy transition sector as to be inclusive of all the different component parts of that and so we think about the just transition for the whole sector from a dependency on fossil fuels through to the new multifaceted energy sector I think we'll have it will not be what you talked a lot about offshore wind talked a bit about hydrogen there'll be lots of components of that some more important in Scotland than others but it won't just be one solution it'll be different solutions for different applications so it's thinking about it in the whole and I really concur that and we heard that from the first panel as well having an end goal is great but we need to have a road map and that's what we all need to do together is pull that road map together as to how we're going to get from here to there and of course there'll be all sorts of little journeys in that but we need we need the plan to get to that end point I think then go we have a lot of agreement around and it's enough being done to set out a route map or to bring together the people who need to be speaking to each other to create that route map for worry in the northeast I think a lot has been done I sometimes have the impression that in every meeting room in a building I'm in people are having these kind of conversations I think there is a vast amount of collaborations a recognition from industry that there's enough in this for us all in terms of you know market share that there are many many opportunities and therefore there's more ready collaboration than perhaps before I don't know if we're quite there yet in terms of having that road map though because that if we all have a consistent picture of how we're going to get there obviously it'll change as soon as you're right a plan it'll change but we can all then get behind the same thing so yes there's a lot of collaboration I think more than ever before I think somebody in the committee talked earlier about timelines they took 50 more than 50 years to build the oil and gas sector we've been tremendously successful in that in the northeast it's been game changing for Scotland and it's hugely important we recognise that we don't have 50 years this is a globally competitive environment we're in and we just don't have the luxury of time so I think there is a question of making planned but steady progress in that planning process as well because you know we can't take too long about it. Gordon if I come to you around a definition of a just transition do you think that's a shared understand and how do you think we measure if we're successful or not? I think I asked the man in the street then probably not I'm comfortable with a just transition commission's definition in terms of the equitable journey in particular for those whose livelihoods are impacted I think we only need to look back at the cold field the closure mines and impact that I had across community is brought up in Colburnie so we suffered the same when it was steel work closures so that's that's how not to do it I think in the northeast we're very fortunate we've got a well-paying industry that is going into a managed decline and a fresh green industry that is growing and that's a unique position to be in for the scale of employment I've done a lot of stuff with and pace over the years so it's always good if you've got the company closing that something else is starting up but we can see this on a regional level I think there's a lot of optimism timing is a challenge and I guess for some of the new companies coming they are coming to Scotland new so things like apprenticeships it's a four-year programme so there's a challenge in terms of when they will arrive and when they think or commit to start recruiting and developing certainly the young workforce and that gap period in between that's when people at Scottish Enterprise, SDI and ourselves will have to be working hard around other labour market interventions that we can bring and support the companies the stuff that Suzanne and her team will do with supply chain development Paul if I can just come back to you before I move to Colin Smyth you know do you think I know you've said it's kind of down to or it can be different things for different people or different sectors but do you think there's enough being done to create a route map or you know recognise progress points or do you think we need that kind of framework we all know what the end point is but do you think there needs to be more done to set out how we get there we yeah we had the pleasure of writing a report last year called making the switch which was particularly focused around the energy transition in the northeast of Scotland actually written for the Scottish government and we have outlined four scenarios for the region anywhere from a global energy hub you know whatever we do an oil and gas now we do for renewables and steroids to something what we call regional decline not a similar to a call or steel town what Gordon was talking about earlier on so you have a huge range of outcomes and there's a there's a real shift happening and the reason why I say that maybe I'll add a few words around that if you look at the workforce in the northeast of Scotland and this is between Aberdeenshire roughly one in five of the people who work there either work or support your gas industry and the offshore energy industry if you do the induced jobs it's one in three so the energy industry doesn't work the region moment doesn't work so we wrote this report and saying is what are the outcomes between the best case which is the global energy hub and the worst case which is kind of regional decline and again they are very stark outcomes one is around currently around one in five 45 000 people plus a minus a bit work in the offshore energy industry if we get it right collectively we end up with 20 more people if we get it wrong we lose 40% of the people by 2030 this is a hugely clear kind of cut outcome and so do we have back to your question Gylfiad you have a route map I don't think we have a route map clear enough to get us to the winning outcome I think we have a very good route map to get us not the winning outcome is called to stop investing and we're not investing enough in the oil and gas industry or in the renewables industry to get the outcome we want so is it more work to be done yes is a good outcome for the region absolutely but doesn't require kind of effort from all parties involved to get us there yeah we certainly see that and that's what we made very clear in our report last year and again if it hasn't been circulated I would be delighted to get up to the committee after this. Thank you. Thank you very much convener and good morning to the panel can I kick off with some specific questions around the issue and the challenge of skill shortages there was pretty much universal agreement from the energy sector and trade union representatives we heard from this morning that we already face skill shortages within the energy sector so maybe start with yourself Gordon SDS and in your submission state that the SDS and partners have developed a good understanding of the emerging picture but could you say a bit more about what that actual emerging picture is where are those current and emerging shortages that are a threat to delivering that just transition I think for us that the shortages are not just in oil and gas aerospace and precipate 450 vacancies shipbuilding marine sector in the Clyde we've got large numbers of foreign nationals working there at additional cost so that's a challenge and it's right across Scotland Hinkley point get 22,000 people working on it just now lots of scots down there in contracts so these are big draws and it's called a labour market for a reason and it performs as a labour market so oil and gas pay a premium and that's why you heard from John there's a reluctance from some people to move across into other into renewable sectors we've done so far we've worked with the Peto and Opelge we've done analysis it builds on the work that Paul and the team at RGU have done and we've got teams just now working through data from all week the offshore wind industry council and that's in conjunction with the Scottish offshore wind energy council so that's now good developers plans so there's now timelines in for when these things will happen to that it's based on consenting processes and when plans will be approved it's been