The major project had been expected to be approved as soon as Tuesday, but Whitehall sources said it had now been delayed until the late autumn, The Telegraph reported.
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It means the announcement is now expected after the Oct 8 contest to replace Sir Keir Starmer as the MP for Holborn and St Pancras. It is expected to be a two-horse race between Zack Polanski, the Green Party leader, and Sagal Abdi-Wali, the Labour leader of Camden council.
The delay comes despite warnings of looming gas shortages facing Britain this winter. Jackdaw bosses have previously said the field could be needed to avert a “gas supply emergency”.
Pushing back the plans would allow Mr Burnham to avoid awkward confrontations at the looming Labour Party conference in Liverpool at the end of September.
Approval for Jackdaw and its sister project, the Rosebank oil field off Shetland, is bitterly opposed by a significant number of Left-wing Labour MPs.
However Andrew Bowie, the shadow energy secretary, said delays in approving Jackdaw would push the offshore work needed to get gas flowing deeper into winter, when bad weather would increase the risks to offshore workers.
In a letter to Mr Burnham, seen by The Telegraph, Mr Bowie asked him to confirm “suggestions that you are about to delay the decision on the Jackdaw gas field until after the conference recess and Holborn and St Pancras by-election”.
He added: “If this is the case, it would be nothing short of you placing the interests of the Labour Party before the interests of Great Britain.”
Mr Bowie has also tabled a set of parliamentary questions designed to bring Miatta Fahnbulleh, the Energy Secretary, or Michael Shanks, the energy minister, to the Commons before Parliament goes into recess on Tuesday.
The formal decisions on Jackdaw and Rosebank lie with Ms Fahnbulleh. A Department of Energy Security and Net Zero spokesman rebuffed suggestions of a delay, saying there was no agreed timing for a decision on Jackdaw.
