Scottish Labour’s Finance spokesperson, Jackie Baillie MSP, has repeated her call for the Scottish Government to hold an urgent inquiry into the effects of the plummeting oil price.

With the current price of Brent Crude hovering around the $60 a barrel mark – the price at which many North Sea oilfields begin to become uneconomic – Ms Baillie said it was time for the SNP Ministers to show some leadership.

She also strongly criticised the Scottish Government for their failure to publish an updated oil and gas bulletin.

Jackie Baillie said: “While oil firms announce plans to either cut their workforce numbers or the pay levels of employees and sub-contractors the SNP are sitting on their hands. They’re not listening to what the oil companies are telling them. Now we learn that they’ve confirmed they have no plans to update their Oil and Gas Bulletin. This document was established during the referendum campaign and published on three separate occasions. The fact they’re now refusing to update what was said to be an official document, at a time of crisis such as this, only serves to heighten suspicion about the reason for issuing it in the first place.

“The SNP built an entire economic case for an independent Scotland on an oil price of $110. It is now almost half that and still SNP Ministers are trying to shift the response to the UK Government while there’s action they could be taking themselves.

“Scottish Labour has called for an urgent inquiry into the effects of the falling price on the North Sea oil industry, a call we repeat tod