Wireline Issue 48 - Summer 2020

“The industry-wide work on mental health wellbeing is a really welcome development. It’s been fascinating to see how well it has been received at all levels.”

I n the five years since Wireline profiled the role of UK oil and gas chaplain Reverend Gordon Craig, the purpose of the chaplaincy has not altered, but the industry which it serves has. Much strategic change has been seen across industry, especially following the prolonged downturn during 2015- 16 — and the COVID-19 pandemic, combined with the plunging oil price, has had a fundamental impact in recent months. Numerous mergers and acquisitions across the operator and contractor communities, the emergence of new players, the development of the decommissioning agenda, the rapid growth in energy transition work — all amid a new economic landscape — had already served to reshape the North Sea industry before the pandemic took hold. Gordon assumed the role of oil and gas chaplain in 2012 after a long career in the military, where he spent more than 20 years as a chaplain with the Royal Air Force, stationed in a variety of international locations as well as in the UK. “Having spent most of my previous career in the military, where you typically moved around every two years or so, I guess my initial expectation in this role was that things in UK oil and gas were pretty much set in place,” he says.

“That hasn’t been the case at all in recent times. So much has changed, and in some ways our role has changed with it.” Working on wellbeing The industry’s collective decision to prioritise mental health wellbeing in the workforce, as well as to invest in sources of support, has been one of the key developments Gordon has witnessed over the past two years. It’s also a topic that has increasingly become an area of focus for the chaplaincy. Gordon has been regularly involved in supporting mental health training offshore, focusing in part on how people can help colleagues who may be experiencing difficult times. “The industry-wide work on mental health wellbeing is a really welcome development,” he says. “It’s been fascinating to see how well it has been received at all levels — I was a little sceptical initially about whether that would be the case, but it’s had a very positive reception.” The issue, inevitably, is assuming an ever-greater profile in the industry as the dual challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and the low oil price take a toll on people offshore and onshore. “The one word I’d use to describe the prevailing

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