PARLIAMENTARY DEBATE
Saudi East-West Oil Pipeline - 15 September 2026 (Commons/Commons Chamber)

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero if she will make a statement on the implications of the closure of the Saudi east-west oil pipeline for UK energy security, fuel prices and global oil supply, and on the steps the Government are taking in response.

First, the United Kingdom strongly condemns the Houthis’ decision to resume conflict in Yemen and their recent attacks on Saudi Arabia, including the targeting of civilian and energy infrastructure. We offer our condolences to those injured and affected and stand with Saudi Arabia, the internationally recognised Government of Yemen and our partners in the region.

My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has spoken with his Saudi counterpart, as has the national security adviser. We are closely monitoring the situation as part of our overall response to the situation in the middle east and disruption to the strait of Hormuz. Saudi authorities confirmed over the weekend that the east-west oil pipeline is temporarily closed following an attack on 11 September. The Saudi Government have not yet provided further information on the duration of the closure.

The pipeline enables Saudi crude oil to bypass the strait of Hormuz. Since the start of the middle east conflict, it has been used to reroute a significant share of exports. This temporary pause comes at a time of rising prices, and I know that many in this House and the public will be worried about the potential impacts. Fuel supplies to the UK have remained resilient since the start of the conflict. As people across the country would expect, the Government will mitigate where possible the potential impacts on our economy and our domestic security. We will continue to work closely with industry and the devolved Governments on detailed contingency planning for all events. We are working tirelessly with our international partners to find a permanent solution to the conflict and to minimise the knock-on impact on households. We will keep looking at what more we can do to insulate families from the effect of rising energy bills.

I thank the Minister for his reply. Saudi’s closure of the 1,200 km east-west pipeline is a massive blow. The pipeline allowed Saudi Arabia to export millions of barrels of crude a day, and it has been the key alternative route to the strait of Hormuz since Donald Trump’s war led to its regular closure. The closure has predictably led to further increases in already high oil prices, which stand at $106 a barrel just today. We have reports that Saudi Arabia could exhaust crude available for export within days unless that pipeline resumes operation. The consequences are huge for my constituents and everybody else’s. We are already paying through the nose for fuel as a result of the war in Iran, and they are now being hit by even higher prices because of this closure. Rural communities relying on heating oil are especially vulnerable to shortages and price hikes. The impact on farmers and food production could do further damage to the UK’s food security. The tragic reality is that while the UK will struggle if the pipeline is not reopened, this could mean starvation for millions on the African continent.

The latest crisis puts a further spotlight on our failure as a country to be energy secure. Even those few people who are not yet convinced that climate change is real and needs tackling surely now understand that energy security really matters. Neither Houthi rebels nor Putin nor Iran nor Trump can turn off our waves, wind, sunshine or nuclear industry. It is time for siren voices to stop whining about wokery and start focusing on security. So I ask the Minister, what oil reserves does the United Kingdom have? Will the Government accelerate domestic energy generation? Will they implement a 10p temporary fuel duty cut, and cuts in bus and rail fares, so that people in Cumbria and across the country are not plunged into further hardship as a result of this crisis? What plans does the Minister have to accelerate the warm homes plan, which, sadly, has insulated only 0.3% of the expected homes this year—especially in communities such as mine, where a quarter of the housing stock was built before 1900 and is in need of more bespoke solutions? What will he do to introduce an energy price cap for heating oil, and what extra work is he doing with our allies in the middle east and NATO to ensure that the pipeline reopens as soon as possible?

I will endeavour to answer all the hon. Gentleman’s questions, but if there are any that I do not answer, I will follow up on them in writing.

Let me begin with the discussions that the Government have been having with the Saudi authorities. The Foreign Secretary spoke to the Saudi Foreign Minister on Sunday, and we will keep talking to the Saudi Arabian authorities to understand exactly what the impact of this might be and what the Saudi Arabian Government’s plans are. As the hon. Gentleman will know, we have a diverse and resilient supply of energy in this country, and we continue to stand by that. We are not, at this moment, concerned about the impact on supply for the UK.

The hon. Gentleman asked about heating oil. I think he will know, because we have had conversations about this, that the Government have already provided £53 million for local authorities to assist the people who were particularly hard hit in March, when the cost of heating oil increased significantly. As we go into autumn and the winter, we will, of course, look at what further support might be necessary, but in some local authority areas, the money is not yet anywhere near exhausted, and I encourage local authorities to use the funding that is available to them to support those using heating oil.

The hon. Gentleman made an important point about our reliance on foreign sources of oil and gas. Opposition Members fail to grasp the fact—although they used to grasp it when they were in government—that we need to move away as quickly as possible from the rollercoaster of fossil fuels, and to produce energy in this country, so that we can control the security and the supply.

The hon. Gentleman will know that we have committed £15 billion to the warm homes plan, and have been pushing for more of that funding to reach communities. We are already delivering that through the warm homes local grant and the warm homes social housing fund, and in the coming weeks we will introducing more schemes, enabling people throughout the country to take advantage of that plan.

May I echo the comments of the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) about heating oil, and express my concern for rural communities in my constituency? Does this not demonstrate the urgency of—as the Minister said—moving away from unstable oil from unstable parts of the world, and the need to double down on domestic production of renewables, not just to generate energy, but to increase our renewables production capacity? Will the Minister join me on a visit to Humshaugh Net Zero to see community energy projects in my constituency that already have widespread public support and are doing more to generate energy in Northumberland?

I should be happy to join my hon. Friend on a visit to his constituency in the future. He is right to say that we need to double down on clean power. We need to ensure that we have our own renewable sources of energy, and can control both the price and the supply. This event has shown us once again why that is the right course to pursue for the country’s energy security and for our national security.

I call the shadow Secretary of State.

The ongoing events in the middle east have rightly brought the state of Britain’s energy security back to the forefront. We are witnessing growing geopolitical instability, and it is having, and will continue to have, a direct impact on our energy security, supplies and, of course, bills. The attack on the Saudi east-west pipeline will exacerbate this; 4% of global oil supply flows through that pipeline, which is not insignificant.

Saudi Arabia is a key strategic friend and ally of this country. Our relationship is integral to the security of the region and our national interest. What discussions has the Minister, or the Secretary of State for Energy and Net Zero, had with their Saudi counterparts about security of supply, and have the UK Government offered any support in that regard? We do not know when the pipeline will once again be operational, and as we have already heard, Saudi oil stocks for export could be depleted within days. With the safety of navigation through the strait of Hormuz remaining uncertain, the continued squeeze on energy supplies will only become tighter. Brent crude reached $106 a barrel this morning, and that increase shows no sign of slowing.

It is exactly because of this situation that I cannot understand the Government’s actions. Ironically, today should have been the day on which the Government announced that they were finally going to approve the Jackdaw gasfield, but they bottled it and put it on ice, because they are too scared of Zack Polanski and the Green party in the Holborn and St Pancras by-election. We are talking today about national security, and the Government are putting party before country. Great Britain has become increasingly and dangerously over-reliant on supplies of oil from overseas. We could be reducing some of that reliance right now by drilling and making use of our own resources, be it oil from Rosebank or gas from Jackdaw.

This is a moment of great geopolitical uncertainty. It is a moment when all countries around the world are seeking to ensure and shore up their energy supplies. No other Government of any other nation would make such a brazenly craven decision to put chasing votes in a by-election ahead of their duty to defend their national and energy security. Given the seriousness of this moment—given the threats to our energy and, indeed, to our national security—will the Government change course, and change their position on the North sea?

Both the Foreign Secretary and the National Security Adviser have spoken to the Saudi Foreign Minister. The UK Government and the Government in Saudi Arabia will continue to engage on this issue, and officials across Government are collaborating on it. As for Jackdaw and Rosebank, the hon. Member would not expect me to comment on a quasi-judicial process. He stands at that Dispatch Box and throws the responsibility for this to the Government. We will make a decision on those consents in due course, but we are in this mess because the last Government did not conduct the process appropriately in the first instance, and we were then subject to a judicial review. We will not rush this process; we will do things properly in order to ensure the best outcome for people across the country, including workers in the North sea. The hon. Gentleman knows that oil and gas will be part of our energy mix for years to come. I have said this to him before from the Dispatch Box, and I will say it again: stop talking down our North sea oil and gas industry.

We live in an interconnected world, and the events in Saudi Arabia have a direct impact on my constituents in Harlow, who are concerned about the rising price of their energy bills. What is the Minister doing to ensure that we are not reliant on international fossil fuels? We have to accept that green energy is part of the solution. May I also ask the Minister to do as much as much as he can to help residents in my constituency of Harlow to bring their bills down?

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for his continued advocacy for his constituents in Harlow. He will know that we have a clean power mission, and the purpose of that mission is to ensure that we have renewable sources of generation, so that we control the supply and the price of energy. Obviously, we are looking into what support might be on offer to my hon. Friend’s constituents to help them with their energy bills over the winter, but the Prime Minister, in his first week, announced the removal of VAT from electricity bills from October. That, I think, will be welcome to my hon. Friend’s constituents, along with the £150 reduction in energy costs that was announced in the last Budget.

I call the Father of the House.

The hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) is a lovely man, but I just cannot follow his logic. He says that the solution is to pursue green energy, which is fair enough in the long term, and in the same breath—in the very next sentence—he asks what oil reserves we have. Surely it is not a zero sum game. It will be decades before we rely entirely on green energy. I am not asking the Minister to comment on Jackdaw and Rosebank and all that, but does he accept that we must pursue oil drilling in the North sea to become self-reliant, and to get ourselves out of this crisis?

I thank the Father of the House for his question. We are still extracting oil and gas from the North sea. We have a supply coming from the North sea every day. We have that energy mix, and oil and gas will continue to play a part in our energy mix for years to come. On that point and on the mix, I agree with the Father of the House, but we cannot lose sight of the fact that the North sea is a declining basin and has been for a very long time. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Andrew Bowie) is chuntering from a sedentary position. It was under his Government that we saw the number of people working in the North sea decline. We know it is a declining basin, and that we have to prepare for the transition. That is what any responsible Government would do, and that is why we are investing so much in renewables across the country.

Given the ongoing risk to our energy security illustrated by this latest incident, should the Government prioritise EN-6 sites, such as Oldbury in my constituency, supplying the grid, rather than private wire arrangements that do not support local industry?

The choice of sites is a national decision, involving the National Energy System Operator and Ofgem, in which we have a limited role. It is important that we have a diverse energy mix across the country, including renewables, so that we in this country have the most secure and resilient supply of energy.

The parties that are talking down the North sea oil and gas workers are the Labour Government here and the SNP Government in Holyrood. The Conservative party is standing up for the North sea oil and gas workers. When I quizzed the Prime Minister on approving Jackdaw and Rosebank, he said that he would “take a pragmatic approach”, and that we would see that in action soon, but we now hear that there are further delays because the Labour party wants to save face in a central London by-election. At a time when our energy security is at risk, will the Government put the national interest above the interests of the Labour party and approve Jackdaw and Rosebank as a matter of urgency?

Let me take that in two parts. First, this is obviously a decision that has to be taken carefully. The Secretary of State has to a make an assessment and a judgment. The hon. Member will know that the evidence has to come to the Secretary of State for her to make that judgment, and that is what she will do in due course. He will also know, as I said in response to an earlier question, that the North sea basin is a declining basin. We have to prepare for the transition. We are still extracting oil and gas from the North sea, and that will continue for decades to come.

Residents in rural parts of Yeovil continue to raise concerns with me about the rising cost of domestic heating oil due to conflicts abroad. Prices have sometimes hit as much as £1.10 a litre. As the nights draw in and winter comes around, what steps will the Government take to develop a price cap for heating oil? Just giving money to local authorities is not good enough; it does not support everyone.

The hon. Gentleman will, I am sure, have seen the Competition and Markets Authority report on heating oil, published before the recess, and its recommendations for the actions we should take. We are studying the recommendations and will have a Government response to them in due course. The CMA raised concerns, though, about the impact of a potential price cap. This market does not operate in the same way as the traditional gas and electricity market. We would need to carefully consider the perverse impacts that might result from a straightforward price cap. There are other recommendations in the CMA report that we are, as I said, looking at and closely studying to make sure that people who have been affected by heating oil price increases are protected. The previous Prime Minister was very clear that the heating oil market was not working as it should, and I agree. I look forward to publishing the Government response soon.

As the Minister seems to have run out of supportive Back Benchers, I shall endeavour to ask him a helpful and easy question. Accepting that it will be some years, to put it mildly, before we can eliminate our dependency on oil and gas, does he accept in principle that we are more secure if we exploit our own domestic oil and gas resources, rather than relying on imports from the middle east, which can so easily be blocked?

As I said in response to previous questions, we are exploiting the resources in the North sea; we are extracting oil and gas from it. We will make a decision on Rosebank and Jackdaw in due course, and we have a robust energy mix in this country. The right hon. Gentleman made the point himself about reliance on overseas sources of energy. We would still require production beyond oil and gas. That is why we are investing in renewables, be it wind or solar, all of which are helping to protect our energy security and our national security.

We are so lucky in this great country that we have enjoyed decades-worth of oil and gas—energy treasure—but we are so unlucky that we have an utterly clueless bunch of socialists not using this energy treasure. Will the Minister and the Government finally realise that the way to reduce our exposure to overseas fossil fuels is to use our own offshore, onshore and around the Falkland Islands? Let’s get some growth, let’s get some jobs and let’s grow the United Kingdom.

I always enjoy it when Reform use “socialist” like it is a bad word and not a badge of honour. As I have said in response to previous questions, we are using the resources from the North sea and extracting oil and gas on a daily basis. That is part of our energy mix and will be for years to come.

The Minister seems confused about why the word socialism would be used in a negative context. It has something to do with the fact that every country that socialism touches it destroys, and we have a prime example here. Perhaps the Minister will take his head out of the sand and look at my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South (Douglas Lumsden), who is sat on the Conservative Benches off the back of a stunning by-election win that was a referendum on the North sea oil and gas issue. That shows the complete lack of confidence the industry has in the SNP in Scotland and in Labour here. It is time to drill, baby, drill.

I was not expecting to have an ideological debate on a Tuesday afternoon. I have said, and I repeat again, that we are using the resources from North sea oil and gas and we will continue to use them for decades to come. But if the Conservative party wants to put all its eggs in one basket and reject the renewables generation that is coming from this country right now, that is a road to nowhere. This is about energy security and national security.

Residents in my constituency, such as my constituent Rhys, have contacted me worried about the impact of this situation on their bills. He shopped around, has a renewable-only tariff, insulated his home and bought an electric car. Although he welcomes the VAT cut to electricity, he says that the recently announced increase in the cap and the one he is now expecting in January will more than wipe it out. He says that throwing money at consumers does not deal with the huge profits or change supplier behaviour. Will the Minister accelerate plans to fully and quickly decouple electricity prices from the wholesale price of gas?

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. We took VAT off electricity bills from October and we took £150 out of costs last year. I encourage her and any of her constituents who are struggling with their energy bill to also make sure they are looking at the warm home discount, which is a further £150 off energy bills. We are looking at what more we can do to provide support through autumn and winter. We have already taken steps to start to decouple the price of energy from gas, as part of the previous Administration, and we will continue to look at what more we can do in that area.

The Houthis are not going away and it is likely that the crisis will get worse rather than better. On 16 March, I asked the current middle east Minister, the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty), who was previously in a different role in the Foreign Office, what UK naval assets could be, or were being, deployed to the region, given that it was pretty predictable that at some point Tehran would put pressure on the Houthis to assist it in its reign of terror in the region. I ask again: what naval and other military assets are being put in the region so that we can safeguard British, partner, allied and NATO shipping and ensure that the crisis is minimised as much as possible? Finally, three of our Five Eyes partners have proscribed the Houthis as a terrorist organisation. I do not expect the Minister to declare a proscription on the Floor of the House, but are the Government at least keeping that under review?

I said at the outset that we stand firmly with our friends and allies in Saudi Arabia and the internationally recognised Government of Yemen. I will not be drawn on questions of operational military activity, but we are already providing air defence support to Saudi Arabia through the defence partnership. We have a long and proud history of supporting the defence of our partners and allies. On the question of proscription, I commit to discussing that with Foreign Office officials and writing to the right hon. Gentleman.

Diolch, Madam Dirprwy Lefarydd. Rural communities in Wales are being hit hard at the pumps. While the average price of unleaded petrol across Wales is just over 162p per litre, the very cheapest in Caerfyrddin is 165.9p—166p per litre—with most forecourts charging more. Rural households do not have a choice but to drive, yet they are paying a premium simply because of where they live. The Government must surely step up and support those communities. Will the Minister extend the rural fuel duty relief scheme to Wales to support households in rural areas?

We have put in place fuel finder, which I am sure the hon. Lady is aware of, to provide transparency in fuel prices and ensure that people are able to shop around for the cheapest fuel in their area. It is our belief that that will help to drive down the cost of fuel. I also point to some of the other support we have offered to rural households. There is support in place for heating oil, which I am sure many of the hon. Lady’s constituents have already taken advantage of. On home heating, to allow people to decarbonise and move away from fossil fuel boilers, we have extended the boiler upgrade scheme in England and Wales, adding an additional £1,500—that is a £9,000 grant for those who want to move to a heat pump.

The Saudi closure of the east-west oil pipeline and the continuing disruption in the strait of Hormuz demonstrate how important it is that the UK Government issue new licences to drill in the North sea—in our own British oil and gas reserves—in order to provide national security and job security, and, most importantly, to reduce energy bills for hard-working families. Surely the Minister can understand that.

More extraction of oil and gas from the North sea will not reduce prices for consumers across the country, and it will keep us hooked on volatile fossil fuels. That is why we are moving to decarbonise our system with more renewables, more solar and more wind. As I have said in response to other Opposition Members, we will continue to have oil and gas as part of our energy mix for decades to come.

The National Security Adviser, Jonathan Powell, has said that Europe will experience real hardship this winter. We have repeatedly seen the UK exposed to energy shocks linked to volatile fossil fuel prices set on international markets: Russia and Ukraine, the strait of Hormuz, Bab al-Mandeb and now the Saudi east-west oil pipeline. Will the UK step up investment in clean, domestic renewable energy production, as well as in the grid to distribute it?

We have already had about £100 billion of investment into renewable energy in the UK since 2024. That is why it is so important; it is one of the fastest-growing sectors of our economy. The hon. Gentleman is right that we need to continue with that investment to ensure that we move away from foreign sources of energy. The comments from the National Security Adviser are stark, and we in this House will stand with Ukraine now and through the winter.

I thank the Minister for his answers. The recent hostile attack by the Iranian-backed Houthis on critical Saudi pipeline infrastructure represents a deeply concerning escalation that threatens not only regional stability but global energy policy—it is as serious as that. Will the Minister outline what specific steps the Government are taking with our international partners to bolster the maritime infrastructure of our allies in the Gulf, and say when countermeasures to destroy Iranian-backed Houthi terrorists and murderers will take place? The only thing that they understand is a strong response to stop state-sponsored aggression.

The hon. Gentleman will know that our priority is having free flow through the strait of Hormuz, and that is what we have been working on with our allies and partners globally. We will continue to do that to try to alleviate the situation. As I said in response to an earlier question, we are providing air defence support to the Saudi Government in the current situation. The hon. Gentleman would not expect me to comment on detailed operational military issues, but he can be reassured that we are providing air defence support and that we will continue our discussions with the Saudi Government.