BP faces seven year ban on US drilling

Lucky Exxon Mobil, what a surprise, not.

Would that include the relief wells they are trying to drill at the moment, I wonder?

More Brit bashing from the Obama administration of BP

I suppose knowing Obama they will exclude the likes of American companies

Transocean, Haliburton and Anadarko who were partners or operators of the Gulf Rig that blew up

What a joke, when are the British government going to grow a pair and start looking after British interests in this saga ? Let us not forget that American companies own a 35% share in this well and that it was an American company that installed the BOP that failed.

Come on Cameron stop staring lovingly into Clegg's eyes for 5 mins and do your bloody job !

and the U.S. isnt dangerous to the environment ? , if it wasnt for their thirst for the black stuff we wouldnt be there in the 1st place. tossers

Will it include the other American companys with a share of the rights to drill ?

Lets applaud the Americans desire to have safety as a number 1 priority.

They could call it the Bopal Bill to illustrate the History of American companies failure in this area.

The rig that killed 11 employees was an American owned rig.

BP leased the rig-operated it under US jurisdiction & to US regs.

This Bill looks like window dressing to secure a second term in office.

Thick Dark Smelly Oilly spills need a clean up -Will they Cap the politicians

blatant electioneering or will they continue to gush vitriole and abuse at the "Foreign Devils" operating in their back yard ?

BP may be paying a heavy price for operating in an area where real perspective operates at a 1 mile below the surface of the US politicians FALSE smiles.

Presumably Halliburton will be caught by this aa well - or is thta too naive??

What a shower of idiots, they have oil on their own doorstep, but would rather invade another country and take theirs I suppose?

Agree with all the above.

BP must think they're in Russia all over again.

Get real, guys. This is not Brit bashing. This is BP bashing, and they richly deserve it.

The American hypocrisy is as hard to stomache as the oilslick which pervades their politics.

Good job we have the "special relationship" with the US! Is it too much to hope that when Cameron meets Obama shortly he will tell him to lay off BP because we are heartily sick of US blame shifting? It is high time our politicians remembered what they were elected for, namely first and foremost to look after UK interests, not play the international statesman. Learn a lesson from the French.

Stop whining!

US Senators are merely taking a leaf out of their leaders book . We have all discovered that the great new force in American politics is little more than an opportunist with a penchant for the camera and the autocue. He will not be re-elected for a second term as the US electorate have come to realise that they were sold a pup. BP is the whipping boy and will likel remain so until these turkeys have faced their electorate. As for Libya it is again obvious that the chumps do not realise that US companies have been active there for decades with a brief hyatus between 1985 and 90 I seem to recall. Libya came in from the cold when they gave up their nuclear ambitions and offred to help out with intelligence in the post 9/11 world. Obama and his media obsessed circus troop should tread very very carefully.

Funny thing, due to the ‘Halliburton Loophole’ firms involved in fracking operations associated with Shale-Gas extraction are specifically exempt from the Clean Air and Water acts (Energy Policy Act 2005). Isn’t that lucky? Otherwise you’d have thought many more firms would be impacted by this wonderful piece of legislation.

BP have had three major catastrophes in the last decade; the Texas refinery, the Alaskan pipeline and now Deepwater Horizon. All three occurred in the USA under the management of the US division of the business. It looks more and more like the British part of BP that has been operating for many years takes safety seriously whilst the Amoco part that was bought 10 years ago is a crowd of gung-ho Texans. It takes many, many years to change an organisation's culture and BP has not managed to do this with the Amoco bit.

And I agree with the sentiments above; Cameron is turning out to be completely spineless.

BP should down size and pull out of USA- Petrol/Desiel prices would hopefully go up so the Americans have to pay the going rate instead of cheap energy prices.

We should also look at the special relationship with USA - I firmly believe Britain wouldnt be as big a target with these terriost organisations if we freed up our relationship and got closet to Europe.

Ironic all the anti-American comments attacking them for being nationlistic. Utterly ironic.

If you haven't, check out BP Texas City Refinery Explosion - it's not like this is the first time BP has been involved in a disaster in the US.

Agreed Anon 6, BP should sever all connection with the US and concentrate on the rest of the world.

It wouldn't be long before the US discovered what a major blooper it had made.

In fact I'd like to see the rest of the world sever all connection with the US.

Special relationship to the Obama crew means you play ball with us and we will stick the bat up your arse. Anyone remeber Piper Alpha and Occidental? or would it be bad manners to mention that one?

Can someone remind me but wasn’t it the USA that sprayed millions of gallons of the herbicide Agent Orange on Vietnam and its people.

Wasn’t the USA the first to employ a concentration camp which they operated sadistically during their civil war, only to be copied by Adolf, and don’t they still maintain such a camp on the island of Cuba?

What provisions are they making to compensate farmers the worldwide for their perfectly safe genetically modified crops?

Contrast the Nelson Mandela’s reconciliation for all the atrocities committed in SA and the viciously vindictive Baraka Obama’s anti British stance in this relatively minor incident.

It’s a never-ending list.

Britain needs to realise that America will not be a top 5 superpower in the future. There is no point in sniffing their arses. We need to play hard ball with them to in every opportunity. When the going gets tough they have no problems in stabbing their own mothers in their backs to save their own arses. Britain should start defending ITS interests as the last time I checked we have pension black holes all over the place. Loosing a company this large for cheap to the yanks is in no ones interest.

The corrupt American Congress is full of rich people stuffing cash in the back pockets of congressmen and women. This is how they do business. I can't wait for the American car industry to go bust, and for the next American lead global financial meltdown. We should block all American banks from investing outside of the "Land of the stupid" and get real men or women in power running this country, as lets face it this LibCon gov is only trying to improve their own images so when it comes to election time in 4 years they have a better chance of securing the hot seat for themselves.

Plus how much did the prisoner exchange fiasco play into the possible 7 year drilling ban? They are just pissed they didn't think of it first I guess!!! There is always a hidden agenda with the yanks, they can't even be honest to their own people, like the victims of 9/11 who still don't know everything that happened on that day.

"Lucky Exxon Mobil, what a surprise, not" ... Exactly. We're approaching peak oil and there are those in the US trying to take advantage of the BP spill to secure it's licenses. The latest being off-shore Libya. It's a resource war, only at this time, it's being fought through politics and law.

Nobody is whining, what we have here is an understandable backlash against the obvious "let's bash BP until it really hurts" mentality that the Americans are operating under.

This is a disaster that as far as I know hasn't been fully explained yet. What would happen I wonder if it is found that some of the fault was due to the faulty kit or procedures that were under American control? Would BP get any compensation? Or is it a forgone conclusion that ALL the blame is going to be heaped on BP?

President Obama is a hypocrite of Olympic proportions, as are many of the American politicians.

Our very own Cameron is a wimp of the same class. I despise anyone who wont stand up for themselves, which in Camerons case is the British people. Why the man has no guts I cannot say. I can say though that if he doesn't start realising what the rest of us already know he is going to go down as the worst Prime Minister since Chamberlain, namely, that the Americans are no friends of ours. Never have been. Everything they do, are have ever done has a price!

I am sick to death of the lot of them.

@James ... It's called self-interest. Much like our own aristocracy that did not want to stand up to Germany and Jews that grew wealthy from sacrificing their own nationals. We haven't been invaded though and the enemy is less clear. When the country generally recognises the need to rebalance the economy away from banking and speculation, how should we regard the british banks and speculators that sell successfull British companies to make a fast profit? How far down the track will our dependance on oil take us?

I really find it hard to believe that Transocean who have lost about $750m worth of rig did not have a say in the decisions. I similarly find it astonishing that Anardarko could imply that they had no idea what was going on. They should be included if they are really serious in the admirable aim of protecting life and the environment. I wonder how many companies drilling exploratory bores at the moment use Transocean?

The next big question will be what happens to the exploration leases that BP already own. If they are not allowed to drill this area will they allowed to sell them at market rate - after all the area is obviously proven or will the next step be a forced sale?

BP may well be guilty of unnecessary risk taking but I find it increasingly hard to believe they will get anything remotely like a fair trial and that we will get to the real truth that will enable the industry to be made safer going forward.

Cameron costing us billions!

Why oh why does Cameron let himself be bullied into staying quiet on BP while Obama and others have a field day for political gain.

Cameron stays quiet while retroactive laws are passed against us.

Cameron stays quiet while BP is found guilty without an investigation/trial.

Cameron stays quiet while American companies involved go scot free.

Cameron stays quiet while pension funds (mine included) lose billions to the US.

To think I voted for this wimp and he has turned out so Camewrong.

Cameron by keeping relatively quiet is keeping his powder dry.

There may be worse to come in this BP Saga and I have no doubt that Cameron when the timing is right will stick up for theBP & British Companies.

We dont know what is being said behind the scenes- just be patient its a British Trait which is well worth preserving.

BP will come out of this mess as a profitable company but more care must be taken on deep sea under water drilling- and appointment of reliable trust worthy sub contractors

There is 13 other transocean rigs in GOM, . BP produces 40% of the

oil coming out of the GOM, I believe and that GOM is worth 30% of the US

requirement. One thing that will happen is OIL WILL go up before year end.

It is reasonable to think that wars are fought now over oil( government change)

why not sabotage a 50% UK owed co. is it such a strech ? Obama will loose more votes because of job losses in GOM. and higher oil prices.

You can almost smell the hypocracy of an element of the US establishment. Union Carbide killed 25000 people in Bhopal 25 years ago and there are many who live today, crippled by this disaster. The US senate and media desperately continue to cast around for more pressure to place on BP - it is the US ("the great polluter") itself, whose thirst for cheap energy, which has been the driving force behind this disaster.

It is time that we stopped our angst over the so called "special relationship" it works only one way - and not in our favour. We need our coalition to stand up please and support the UK's biggest company and thwart the torrent of anti Britsih sentiment currently growing.

Whilst you can't blame the US for being furious about the oil on their beaches, their stance is in sharp contrast to their arrogant refusal to act to limit their disproportionate contribution to air pollution and global warming and their greed in consuming the world's natural resources. Obvious pollution of the beaches unpleasant though it is, in the long run will do much less damage to the environment than their "consume now and to hell with the rest of the world" attitude.

Maybe, if the Obama administration is intent on making this whole BP saga reflect on us as a problem of pure British origin, then perhaps BP should snub the US by reminding them of the dual-nation interest in its economic fortunes by removing its share listing from the NYSE. That would save a few million a year in fees no doubt to help pay the fines.

It seems (Guardian Newspaper (Nigeria) Tues July 13) that the Nigeria Oil Spill response Agency is taking a keen interest in US action in the GoM. It seems to have some relevance to recent 'devastating oil spills by Exxon Mobil in Akwa Ibom State.

As noted ain other comments Bhopal and Piper Alpha also spring to mind.

Some of these Washington politicians need Blow-out preventers installed in their mouths

Well said Chris Shaw.

Lets show a little calm balance here folks. As I recall, some American big dealers let some big American bank who swindled HSBC of the hook by ignoring their existance. High time that HM Goverment made a few diplomatic and not too belicose noises (we tend to be little more delicate) while we provide HSBC with the best advice and legal support necessary. Let us do unto etc