tish poverty. Nearly a quarter of Scotland's population are living in poverty or just above the poverty line. Unemployment continues permanently above Southern levels-above all in the black spots of Clydeside and Tayside. And more ominous still, the new employment resulting from oil-related industry does not policy. The most damning indictment of this defence is found in the Scottish Council Research Institute Report on Economic Development and Devolution, quoted in the Glasgow Herald (12/8/74): "The report points to the failure of British regional policy despite the fact that in the last decade Scotis much smaller.
Architects Journal (June 1974): North Sea oil has not only meant huge profits for the monopolies, but also immense social disruption in Scotland, huge despoliation of areas of natural beauty, no guarantees of any permanent changes in industry leading to an increase in secure jobs, and a very big threat of massive redundancy when rig and pipeline construction tails off in the late 1970s.
The central reason for this is the process of oil development. During the initial stages, great expenditure on rig-construction and pipelines takes place to create a system for getting the oil out and ashore. But once this stage comes to an end, the labour required to maintain production and transportation What happens is that a massive, displaced, migrant labour force is created which has absolutely no job security, atrocious social conditions, and which will have its livelihood taken away as fast as it was given when rig construction ends. The sort of thing which is occurring is well-described in the All might have been well there at Nigg Bay, had the American developer kept the promises on which planning permission was awarded. But within eighteen months the workforce had risen from the stated ceiling of 600, who were to be "local people, to an incredible total of nearly 3,000 coming from all over the UK, Spain and Italy. Ross and Cromarty County ... can now boast a massive immigrant workforce. This includes 800 men who exist on two battered old Greek liners anchored offshore, and 200 female welders putting in continuous 12-hour shifts in working conditions which have created a massive turnover of workers."
And later, speaking of the same area widely halled as Scotland's new 20th Century "Europort"), it wrote that 'still no long-term industry independent of oil has established itself.?
The oil monopolies are not in the game to build industry or a social structure in Scotland. They are in it.to get the oil out-as fast, as cheaply, and as profitably as possible.