Kemi Badenoch clashed with Andy Burnham at Prime Minister's Questions, accusing him of counting revenue from the Rosebank oil field in the Budget even though it has not been approved. The Tory leader said the Chancellor had already banked the revenue from the field, despite ministers not giving it the green light.
Mrs Badenoch also mocked the Prime Minister for hiring management consultants to help write his 10-year plan for Britain, saying: "I'm not surprised he has asked management consultants to help write his plan – he needs all the help he can get."
Budget row over unapproved oil field
Turning to the Budget, Mrs Badenoch said: "There was one worthwhile thing in the Budget, the Rosebank oil field – the Chancellor has already banked the revenue – but there's just one problem: it has not been approved. If it has not been approved, why was it in the Budget?"
Official forecasts published alongside John Healey's Budget factored in oil and gas tax revenue from potential new projects, including Rosebank.
Burnham confuses gas and oil fields
Mr Burnham insisted Rosebank was a "quasi-legal decision", before claiming: "But we did approve the Jackdaw oil field." Jackdaw is a gas field.
Mrs Badenoch hit back, insisting the delays were down to personal political decisions of his government, not legal points. She said: "It's a political decision. Why else did it take the Labour Government two years to approve Jackdaw when the Foreign Secretary was in charge, and now he's gone it just happened like that? That's the real reason they didn't do it, the Foreign Secretary [...] thought it was climate vandalism."
Ed Miliband, now Foreign Secretary, previously oversaw energy policy and once branded Rosebank "climate vandalism".
Energy policy shift
The Conservative Party has made cheaper domestically produced energy a major part of its promise to the British public. Labour insists that enabling drilling on the Jackdaw field will improve people's standards of living by reducing costs.
It marks a considerable change in position, as the previous Labour Government appeared hostile to such drilling.
