This week I had the great pleasure to visit Glacier Energy Services at Ross Offshore based in my constituency in Dalgety Bay where I met with management and two first year apprentices Ellis Duncan and Jordan Devlin.
It was interesting to speak to them both about the level of support and encouragement they had received at school to steer them towards an apprenticeship in engineering as this is one area where I feel more needs to be done. It is also still the case that not many girls think of a career as an engineer yet the option offers a great career move, great prospects and a good future as Ellis clearly recognised.
Glacier provide specialist services for energy infrastructure, delivered onsite and from its workshops. They make heat exchangers, coolers, and radiators for the oil and gas industry and many of their workface as well as being based at Dalgety Bay will travel to the rigs and do work there.
When they moved to Dalgety Bay it was reported at that time that: “A Scottish oil services firm has completed its second major investment in Fife this year with the establishment of a new £1 million workshop and warehousing facility.
“Glacier Energy Services, which is headquartered in Glasgow but operates its oil and gas services business out of Aberdeen, said it was creating 10 jobs initially at its new 15,000ft2 unit at St David’s Business Park in Dalgety Bay.
“The firm said the new facility — which will house three Glacier Energy businesses — brought the capabilities of its offshore divisions closer to clients carrying out new construction contracts and working on existing refurbishment and maintenance contracts in the area, and had already lined up £1m of supply chain work.
“The new investment comes just months after Glacier moved to snap up Methil-based non-destructive testing specialist PTS in a deal understood to be worth £5m”.
This company is a great example of how Fife can benefit from the oil and gas sector in terms of jobs and giving young people skills. The same is true of the renewables sector and I am pushing all concerned to make sure we are doing all we can to take advantage of these sectors and to support people get skills.
The knock on effect is more spend in the local community which in itself creates more jobs and opportunities for people locally.
The key tool for creating a more fair and more just society is to drive up aspiration and skills supporting people into well paid jobs.