The UK is “nowhere near” having to impose emergency powers to restrict fuel supplies to essential users, the government insisted on Sunday, despite a strike forcing the closure of a pipeline that carries nearly half of Britain’s North Sea oil.

Gordon Brown is resisting industry pleas to intervene directly to halt the industrial action by 1,200 workers at the Grangemouth refinery near Edinburgh. The two-day strike, the first to close a British refinery in more than 70 years, has already caused sporadic fuel shortages throughout Scotland and northern England.