Amicus, the British trade union, accused such world?s energy giants Shell, BP, Total and ExxonMobil of preventing smaller oil and gas companies from developing. These companies jointly control almost half of all North Sea assets.
It said that these giants are ?sitting dormant on large oil fields, causing investment to suffer throughout the region?.
It proposed to inflict higher taxes on the companies (the union named it ?inactivity tax?).
But UKOOA, the representative body for oil companies large and small, attacked the idea as "out-dated" and "a recipe for North Sea decline".
It said that investors had been hit hard by the previous tax rise, and were only now feeling confident enough to spend more on the region.
