Business leaders have called for Aberdeen to follow Houston and spread its economic reach across the north.
Key figures from across the banking, oil and gas and law sectors joined Energy Minister Fergus Ewing at OTC yesterday for a debate on the Granite City’s future as a global oil and gas player.
The event, organised by Burness Paull and the Press and Journal, triggered calls for Aberdeen to mirror the sprawling Texan city as it tackles the oil skills gap.
Hugh Fraser, managing partner of law firm Andrews Kurth, said Aberdeen faced a major challenge to find and accommodate the 120,000 extra people needed over the next decade and that it needs to look to the rest of Scotland for help.
“I would like to see Aberdeen spreading out the way that Houston has,” he said.
“There is an Inverness corridor, there is a Dundee corridor, really we should be creating an infrastructure where you can live in these cities but work in Aberdeen, in the same way that Houston spreads out.
“I think Aberdeen sells itself very well, but it is the infrastructure that is a challenge.”
Jeff Corray, head of private equity at Simmons and Company, also said using infrastructure to better link Aberdeen with neighbouring cities was crucial.
“Aberdeen should be viewed as a centre of excellence. We have a huge opportunity,” he said.
“Houston has six million people, but Aberdeen has just 300,000, and Scotland has five million.
“Why are we not using that greater pool of talent across the whole country? We need to think bigger – we are in a global arena and 300,000 people is not enough.”
Aberdeen City Council leader Barney Crockett said the future for Inverness and Dundee “was the Aberdeen economy”.
The panel also debated concerns over rising costs facing the sector, saying that it too was a problem which could be solved with infrastructure. Chartered accountant Bill Main, a finance director in the oil and gas industry, said: “One of the issues we face is rising costs. Aberdeen has the highest rates for rooms outside London. There’s a shortage of skilled staff and a shortage of engineers.
“Aberdeen is growing very fast and if we are going to retain our position we need to be able to grow.
“The city needs to grow and it needs better infrastructure.
“We need to invest in its success. Otherwise what will happen is we will continue to compete for the same resource and we’ll price ourselves out of the market.”
Mr Ewing said the Scottish Government was pumping a huge amount of capital into north-east infrastructure projects, including the Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route and dualling of the A96 trunk road between Aberdeen and Inverness.