CALLS from Trump-backing business leaders for “full-throated support” for new North Sea oil and gas have been slammed as “out of step” by campaigners. 

The call from Aberdeen and Grampian Chamber of Commerce (AGCC) comes two years after the SNP Scottish government announced a presumption against any new offshore developments, and just six months after Labour won Westminster power promising no new oil and gas licences.

Echoing US President-elect Donald Trump’s calls for Britain to “open up” the North Sea and ditch “windmills,” AGCC chief executive Russell Borthwick branded the presumption against new production as “disconnected from reality.”