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Energy Providers

The hon. Gentleman is quite right that we need to ensure that the credit crunch and problems in the financial markets do not prevent the long-term investments that we need in the North sea and off the coast of Scotland to ensure that we get the maximum benefit. There is still a lot of benefit to be obtained from the oil and gas that is still accessible. The need to ensure that some of the smaller companies—particularly some of the American companies, but others, too—can access the more difficult-to-access resources is enormously important. Of course, with the credit crunch problems there are likely to be some issues with the accessibility of finance. We want to use PILOT, as the hon. Gentleman suggests, and work through some of the issues with the companies to see whether we can maintain as much of that financial long-term investment as possible. We must remember that that investment is long term and that many of the companies will already have sorted out some of the finance. They may well produce some problems as a result of what has happened in the past month or so. If we can work through some of those issues with them, and see whether we can get some recognition that there is a stable, long-term Government interest in ensuring that the investment happens, we can provide some element of reassurance. I cannot promise that we will solve all the problems, but we are certainly very alive to them.