UofG Centre for Public Policy

29 July 2026: Molly Coyle, Research Assistant at the Centre for Public Policy writes the Scottish Government faces significant challenges in moving the 'Just Transition' forward, from political division in parliament, to the scale of the shift to renewable energy and global impact on workers and communities. She writes Just Transition plans are a climate imperative but must include a commitment to fairness for workers and communities globally.

Blog by Molly Coyle, Research Assistant at the Centre for Public Policy and PGR student

A changing landscape

Scotland was once recognised as world-leading in its approach to a Just Transition, becoming the first country to commit to a Just Transition Planning Framework and establishing the Just Transition Commission. Yet, the most recent Commission concluded that progress “has fallen short of what is needed”. Combined with its earlier warning that “the cost‑of‑living emergency means that ensuring fairness in the delivery of decarbonisation is more urgent than ever”, the next Scottish Government faces a significant challenge in moving forward.

This challenge is not limited to stalled progress or a worsening cost‑of‑living crisis shaped by volatile global energy prices. There are also political battles being waged along the lines of a Just Transition. With 17 Reform UK (Scotland) and 12 Scottish Conservatives MSPs, the SNP will face sustained opposition to its Just Transition agenda. Reform’s manifesto calls for an end to what it describes as the SNP’s “ideological” Net Zero commitments, while the Conservatives propose an “Affordable Transition Fund” rather than a Just Transition Fund. Across both parties, a Just Transition is framed as expensive, ideological, and “anti-worker”, weaponising a narrative that a Just Transition threatens workers and living standards.

SNP Manifesto Analysis

However, the SNP’s own 2026 Holyrood manifesto offers limited concrete commitments on delivering a Just Transition. While the manifesto states it will: “Support people into new jobs and industries as the world changes, and we will work with communities, trade unions and businesses to deliver this”. There is a notable absence of any detail on what this may look like in practice, beyond some funding commitments (such as a £500m Just Transition Fund). There are also mentions of some place‑specific commitments, notably 500 additional jobs in the Grangemouth industrial cluster and £9m in support for workers and the community at Mossmorran, but these sit uneasily alongside the scale of disruption facing both areas.

At Grangemouth, the proposed 1,100 jobs fall far short of the estimated 4,600 jobs at risk across the refinery’s supply chain following the closure of the refinery itself, which directly cost 400 jobs. At Mossmorran, 400 jobs were at riskafter ExxonMobil announced the closure of the plastics plant. While the £9m support package will help families withstand the immediate shock, survival should not be the best‑case scenario. A promised just transition plan for Mossmorran, announced in April 2024, was never delivered, a notable omission in the SNP’s current discussions. The impact on Grangemouth was compounded by the failings of the UK Labour Government to provide the £200 million which was promised in early 2025 to invest in its future.

These cases illustrate what Scotland may continue to see under current approaches: reactive, place‑specific and insufficient actions that do not match the scale of structural change. With employment in offshore oil and gas projected to fall from 115,000 in 2024 to just 33,000 by 2035, the stakes are high. A shift to renewable energy is essential for meeting Net Zero and reducing reliance on oil and gas, but it cannot come at the expense of workers and communities across Scotland.

Global Just Transition considerations

Beyond Scotland, longstanding calls for a global perspective on Just Transition raise further questions. The extractivist nature of renewable energy development, driven by demand for Clean Energy Technology Materials (CETMs), highlights the international justice implications of Scotland’s transition.

For example, both the SNP and Scottish Liberal Democrats support accelerating the shift to electric vehicles (EVs). Yet, EVs rely on nickel for lithium-ion batteries, with nickel demand predicted to increase nineteen-fold between 2020 and 2040. Nickel mining is concentrated in the Global South, particularly Indonesia with extraction being linked to biodiversity loss, water pollution, habitat destruction and air pollution. Scotland’s transition therefore has direct implications for communities far beyond its borders.

Another highly relevant consideration is the dependence of solar panel and wind turbine construction on the “exploitation of cheap labour and unregulated mineral extraction across the Global South”. With the SNP, Scottish Labour, Scottish Liberal Democrats and Scottish Greens supporting the expansion of wind energy in Scotland in their manifestos but with no discussion of material supply chains, we must consider if the any of the parties can truly claim an agenda for a ‘Just’ Transition.

Challenges for the next Scottish Government

Although the SNP remains the largest party in Holyrood, its lack of a majority, the rise of Reform in Scottish politics, and a turbulent energy landscape mean it will face significant obstacles in advancing a Just Transition agenda. Yet even where progress is made, there are significant gaps in the SNP’s Just Transition plans. The experiences of Grangemouth, Mossmorran, and the wider energy workforce demonstrate the disastrous effects the current approaches by both the UK and Scottish Governments can have on workers in Scotland.  For the next parliamentary term, the Scottish Government must place a Just Transition at the heart of its agenda, not only as a climate imperative, but as a commitment to fairness for workers and communities across the world.

Author

Molly Coyle is a postgraduate research student at the University of Glasgow, and a Research Assistant at the University's Centre for Public Policy.

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^{Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash}

First published: 29 July 2026