Great British Energy chief executive Dan McGrail has said the publicly owned firm is recruiting “about two people a week” and expects to employ 300 people at its Aberdeen headquarters by the middle of next year.
Speaking on BBC Radio Scotland’s Breakfast programme, Mr McGrail said the firm was “recruiting at pace” and that the 300 figure was the total in the strategic workforce plan, adding: “We’re halfway through recruiting that at the moment.”
Investment and job creation targets
Mr McGrail pledged that Great British Energy would invest in projects that could create 10,000 additional jobs, vowing that the “huge majority” of these would be in Scotland.
He said the firm plans to “crowd in £15 billion of additional investment as a result of our activities”, with projects delivering 15 gigawatts of electricity.
“We want to, as a result of that investment, create 10,000 additional jobs in the UK, the huge majority of those will be in Scotland,” Mr McGrail said. “They’re the measures, writ large in our strategic plan, that I want to be held accountable for because they are absolutely what we believe we can deliver.”
Royal visit and political reaction
The comments came in the wake of the King’s visit to the firm’s Aberdeen headquarters earlier this week. Mr McGrail said the royal visit was about “saying we’re very much open for business”.
Conservative MP for Aberdeen South Douglas Lumsden said that if GB Energy is “only adding two employees a week, it raises serious questions about how the government expects to reach its stated target of 300 staff in any reasonable timeframe”.
“Labour promised Great British Energy would deliver hundreds of jobs and boost confidence in the North East,” the Tory stated. “But this admission suggests progress is falling so far short of the expectations they created.”
