Talking Politics
Alan James and Graham Alexander recently attended meetings with the First Minister and Deputy First Minister to talk energy.
Graham was invited by Energy Transition Zone Ltd, in partnership with the Scottish Government and the Scottish Offshore Wind Energy Council (SOWEC) to attend the Offshore Wind Supply Chain Summit.
The summit was opened by Sir Ian Wood, Chairman of ETZ Ltd, chaired by Michael Matheson MSP, Cabinet Secretary for Energy, and include a keynote address by Nicola Sturgeon MSP, First Minster of Scotland.
As well as the summit itself, Graham was invited to a roundtable discussion with 14 other supply chain companies to meet and talk directly with Ms Sturgeon about the challenges and opportunities they face.
Alan, meanwhile, was one of 10 business leaders who got the chance to meet with John Swinney, Deputy First Minister.
The discussion centred around rising energy costs and as Alan explained, the rise in costs is a real issue for all businesses.
“There was one business who said they already have costs of £100K per year and have now been quoted £400K per year for a new contract. I put the point across that AJE and NEWCo also rely heavily on electricity in our manufacturing process and our costs are increasing. I also pointed out that our suppliers like British Steel are passing on significant increases due to energy costs and normally we cannot pass that cost on as we are usually on fixed price contracts. It was interesting to hear other businesses talking about the energy crisis and what it means for them.”
