In his 21 months in office, Brian Leishman, MP for Alloa and Grangemouth, describes life in the House of Commons as “the best job in the world.” But for the former golf professional, this is surprisingly high praise considering Brian has lived, shall we say, the ‘full Westminster experience’ already.
A large-scale issue of national importance with your constituency at the epicentre? Check. An uphill battle against members of your own party? Check. A suspension of the Labour Party whip due to what you’ve said about those things? Check. But his latest parliamentary milestone is not something every sitting MP can claim to have done: successfully pushing for a change so great that it has the potential to save hundreds of jobs, creating a legacy, whilst transforming our domestic net-zero targets? Check.
But let’s start at the beginning. The announcement of the closure of the UK’s oldest oil refinery at Grangemouth in April 2025 was nothing short of devastating for the constituents of Alloa and Grangemouth. 435 on-site workers and 2,822 wider supply chain workers lost their jobs. Working class families still living in the shadow of the miners’ strikes of the mid-80s, once again, have another skilled generation jobless.
“Scotland is a weaker nation from the Grangemouth refinery closing”.
“The truth is that all of my politics is based on class,” explains Leishman. “Everything that impacts your life, for me, is a class question and that is at the heart of the politics that I believe in.
“I was adamant and very clear, taking the fight down to parliament, that the government should’ve stepped in and kept operations going at the refinery and I stand by that, but what we have seen, going back to class politics, is that privatisation has been a huge ill for society.
“We have seen the economic devastation; we have seen the exodus of skills and talent of oil workers from Grangemouth having to leave the area to go and get work elsewhere. These were highly skilled, highly paid jobs – people having to leave”.
A year on from the closure of the refinery, with tensions rising in the Middle East and petrol prices rising by the day, this has become a talking point of an entirely different scale.
“Scotland not being energy-secure and producing our own oil is just fundamentally the wrong call. We should have stepped in. It is not a failure of the Labour Government as such. We should’ve done more, it was our problem that we inherited from the Tories and the SNP because nobody’s hands are clean.
“Scotland is a weaker nation from the Grangemouth refinery closing”.
“We stepped in and saved 500 jobs, that’s what a Labour Government should always be doing”.
Brain was suspended from the Labour party from July to November 2025 for ‘rebelling’ against the party line, but Brian believes he stood by the views of his constituents as a sitting MP should. He is now looking towards building a brighter future and making the best of a bad situation.
“Morale is low. We are talking about people often from the area,” he told me from his constituency office. “The workforce was very Grangemouth/ Falkirk orientated. Local people losing well paid skilled jobs.
“The refinery was a positive destination for so many young people to gain apprenticeships, to get the skills to then build and forge a career, to put down roots in the area and raise a family. It was a brilliant avenue, that positive social mobility has been taken away”.
Just before Christmas the Labour government stepped in to work alongside INEOS to invest £150 million to save the UK chemicals manufacturing industry, housed in Grangemouth.
“That was the kind of intervention that I wanted to see. We stepped in and saved 500 jobs, that’s what a Labour Government should always be doing”.
In February 2025, Keir Starmer announced £200 million in funding for ‘Project Willow’, a feasibility study created to explore the possibilities of an industrial future for Grangemouth. Over £6 million of that pot has been spent on two projects, MiAlgae and Celtic Renewables with hopes to bring hundreds of jobs back to Grangemouth.
“We have got a phenomenal opportunity as a Labour Government. We can build a green industrial revolution, and Grangemouth should be its base”.
On the run up to the Scottish Parliamentary election, Brian stressed how important it is for young people to get out and vote.
“Absolutely every facet of your life is involved in politics. Get involved”.
Grangemouth is a cautionary tale, but the transition to a renewable future workforce highlights how important it is that young people go out, vote and take control of their futures.
