Labour Party News

Esgian reports that offshore drilling contractors secured additional backlog in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, Egypt, Nigeria, and Brazil and operators confirmed new discoveries in Indonesia, Côte d’Ivoire, and China in its Week 10 Rig Analytics Market Roundup.ContractsDiamond Offshore has executed a two-year contract extension with a subsidiary of bp in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico for the 12,000-ft drillship Ocean BlackHornet.Shelf Drilling’s 250-ft jackup Rig 141 has secured a two-year…

Britain has approved plans to turn away boats illegally carrying migrants to its shores, deepening a rift with France over how to deal with a surge of people risking their lives by trying to cross the Channel in small dinghies.Hundreds of small boats have attempted the journey from France to England this year, across one of the world's busiest shipping lanes.Border officials will be trained to force boats away from British waters but will deploy the new tactic only when they deem it safe…

New Zealand on Friday said it had introduced new requirements for the safe transport of livestock, after a cattle ship capsized in the East China Sea last month, killing almost all its crew and thousands of cows.Only two of the 43 crew members and more than 6,000 cattle onboard the Gulf Carrier 1, which was heading from New Zealand to China, survived, prompting authorities to suspend live cattle exports and launch a review.The suspension expires on October 23, but a conditional ban is in place until November 30…

Two crew members from a tugboat involved in cleaning up an oil spill off Mauritius were killed late on Monday when their vessel collided with a barge in bad weather, a local lawmaker said.Four other members of the crew were rescued by helicopter and two were still missing, Mahend Gungerpersad, a member of parliament for the opposition Labour Party, told Reuters on Tuesday."This incident is going to add to the prevailing anger," he said, referring to weekend protests over the handling…

Britain's navy will accompany UK-flagged ships through the Strait of Hormuz to provide protection after the U.S. killing of Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani inflamed tensions in the region.Britain's defence minister, Ben Wallace, ordered the HMS Montrose and HMS Defender to prepare to return to escort duties in the major oil shipping route as Prime Minister Boris Johnson came in for criticism for his silence over the killing.Media reports have said Johnson is on holiday in the Caribbean."The government will take all necessary steps to protect our ships and citizens at this time…

Britain's opposition Labour Party on Monday criticized the government for awarding a 14 million pound ($18 million) contract to a ferry company with no ships to provide backup freight cover in the event of a no-deal Brexit.Labour's transport spokesman, Andy McDonald, said the transport ministry had failed to carry out proper checks on the company, Seaborne Freight."The Department for Transport's claim that it carried out due diligence is increasingly incredible given the mounting evidence of a lack of relevant expertise or experience," McDonald said."Our economy depends on these trading routes continuing to function yet [Transport Secretary] Chris Grayling is prepared to rely on amateurs in the event of a no deal…

Work began on Thursday to extend a small British port that could serve as a back-up if the UK leaves the European Union with no trade deal, providing the government some respite after days of criticism.Less than three months before Britain leaves the EU on March 29, the transport minister has been forced to defend awarding a 14 million pound ($18 million) contract for shipping goods to a new ferry company that has no ships.On Thursday the company, Seaborne Freight, came in for further criticism when its business terms and conditions showed references to placing "any meal/order"…

For much of the last week, the U.S. aircraft carrier Carl Vinson has been patrolling the South China Sea. It is just the kind of display of Washington’s power and global reach that the U.S. Navy excels at – both to reassure allies and, in this case, send a message to potential foes. How much longer Washington will be able to perform such operations unchallenged, however, is an increasingly open question. Some military experts project that within a little more than a decade, China’s People’s Liberation Army Navy may have more warships than Washington under its command.

Britain's first shale gas delivery from the United States sailed into a heated European political debate on fracking on Tuesday and immediately ran into its first practical problem - the Scottish weather. The huge "Ineos Insight" tanker had entered the Firth of Forth at sunrise, a lone Scots piper playing on its bow, as it headed for the Grangemouth refinery, west of Edinburgh. But gusty squalls prevented it from unloading its controversial cargo before an assembled crowd of dignitaries. "The Insight vessel was unable to dock at the port due to high winds," said a spokesman for Zurich-based chemicals giant Ineos. It would arrive at the port as soon as wind died down, he added. Ship tracking data on Reuters showed the vessel had turned back into deeper waters.

Senior Dutch government officials are discussing a plan to ferry refugees arriving in Greece back to Turkey to stem the flow of migrants seeking refuge in Europe, Labour Party leader Diederik Samsom said on Thursday. Samsom said in an interview with the daily Volkskrant that European countries would have to agree in exchange to take several hundred thousand refugees each year out nearly 2 million currently in Turkey. He also told Reuters that the plan was close to becoming government policy and that the Netherlands, which currently holds the European Union's rotating presidency, would seek to push for Europe-wide agreement on the proposal.

A historic 52 million people are fleeing conflict worldwide, a trend that will intensify over the next two decades because of climate change, International Rescue Committee chief David Miliband said on Friday. "One of the drivers of displacement and potential conflict over the next 10 to 20 years will be climate (change) - resource scarcity," said Miliband, a former United Kingdom foreign minister. Miliband said there were 16 million refugees and 36 million people displaced in their own countries, typically by civil war. That is the largest number of people fleeing persecution since World War Two, he said during a Reuters Newsmaker event in New York. "Do I think the current level is a blip or a trend?" Miliband said.

Britain said on Monday it would ban fracking in national parks, reversing a policy announced last year, in a concession to the opposition Labour Party which had called for tighter controls to be written into law. "We have agreed an outright ban on fracking in national parks, sites of special interest and areas of natural beauty," said junior energy minister Amber Rudd during a debate on new laws regulating the extraction process. Last year the government said fracking -- extracting gas and oil by pumping chemicals, sand and water at high pressure into underground rocks -- would be possible within national parks in exceptional circumstances. The government also accepted a Labour proposal to tighten several other rules governing when and where fracking would be permitted.

Oil & Gas Regulators Respond to Recent Pollution Incidents by Reviewing their Regulatory Regimes. In response to the spate of significant pollution incidents involving oil & gas exploration, production and transportation that have hit the headlines in recent years, a number of national and international regulators have taken the opportunity to review their regulatory regimes. This article provides an update on the new Community-wide regulations that have been proposed by the European Commission, the regulatory reform that has occurred in Australia and the possible reforms in New Zealand.

VT plans to combine its shipbuilding business with that of BAE Systems PLC in line with UK government plans to make the industry more efficient and to prevent peaks and troughs in demand, AFX News reported. Delays by the Ministry of Defense (MoD) in giving the O.K. for work on a 3.5-3.9 bln stg contract to build two new aircraft carriers for the Royal Navy, which would form the bulk of the JV's future work, have put back an announcement. The MoD had been due to approve the start of manufacturing before the May local elections, but there is now speculation that it will not make an announcement until the new Prime Minister and leader of the Labour Party is decided at the end of next month.