INVERCLYDE’S Labour MP Martin McCluskey has insisted no decisions have been made about where to site the headquarters of his party’s flagship energy generation firm – after Greenock was reportedly snubbed as a potential location.

In an article published earlier this week by The Times Scotland, it was reported that Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow are the three options identified for Great British Energy to be headquartered at.

It was claimed energy secretary Ed Miliband had chosen to narrow the list of candidates to Scotland’s three largest cities, despite calls from figures such as Inverclyde Council leader Stephen McCabe for the local district to be considered.

READ MORE: Martin McCluskey pledges to fight for green investment in Inverclyde

But Inverclyde and Renfrewshire West MP Martin McCluskey pushed back on the claim and told Telegraph he was continuing to call for green investment locally.

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He said: “No decisions have been made about the location of the GB Energy Headquarters.

“But wherever it is headquartered, the important thing is what it does and how it invests in communities across our country.

“GB Energy is an exciting opportunity for the whole country.

“A publicly owned energy generation company headquartered in Scotland and delivering investment in the jobs and technologies of the future.

“My priority is for our area to gets its share of the investment and to bring a new generation of industrial jobs to our area.

“I’ve been in this job for three weeks, but in that time I have already spoken with Ed Miliband and energy minister Michael Shanks about our plans and my first question in Parliament was on investment in our ports and GB Energy’s role in making that happen.

“I will continue to push on this.

“The government is moving at pace to deliver the change that we promised people during the election campaign.”

Council leader Stephen McCabe, who has made several pleas on social media for Inverclyde to be considered as a potential HQ, confirmed he had asked council officials to enquire about whether there would be a formal bidding process.

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He said: “The report in the Times Scotland would appear to be pure speculation as there is no attributable source. I don’t normally comment on speculation.

“I don’t have any insight currently into the process that the UK Government is adopting to determine the location of the GB Energy HQ.

“I have asked our officials to engage with the government to establish if there will be a formal bidding process and to make them aware that we would be interested in bidding if there is.

“It will always be difficult for smaller areas like Inverclyde to compete with the bigger cities for headquarter locations as we saw with the Scottish Government’s decision to locate the main offices of Social Security Scotland in Glasgow and Dundee. 

“The recent decisions of BT/EE and IBM to relocate their call centres to Glasgow also shows how difficult it is for areas like Inverclyde to compete with the cities for private sector jobs.

“That’s why it is critical that both the UK and Scottish Governments adopt economic strategies that benefit the whole country, not just the cities.

“We are continuing to work through the Inverclyde Taskforce to make the case to both Governments for investment in Inverclyde.

“We have invited the new UK Government to nominate a Minister to join the Taskforce and Scottish Government Minister Tom Arthur is due to visit Inverclyde next month to hear our case for investment.

“I am sure our new MP and our constituency and regional MSPs will support us in these endeavours.”

A Department for Energy Security and Net Zero spokesperson said: “We will confirm the exact location in Scotland for GB Energy’s headquarters in due course. 

“Great British Energy will help make Britain a clean energy superpower, accelerating our journey to net zero through homegrown cheap energy that will bring down bills and boost energy independence for our country.

“It will be owned by the British people, for the British people, creating jobs and building supply chains across the UK, and working with industry and trade unions to deliver clean power.”