Civil Nuclear Road Map

Debate between Liz Saville Roberts and Andrew Bowie

Thursday 11th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Bowie]

I agree with my hon. Friend on the amazing work being conducted at Sellafield in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Copeland (Trudy Harrison). The lessons being learned through the decommissioning process at Sellafield will yield benefits. We are leading the way across the world on the decommissioning of sites and are very happy to be advising other countries on their decommissioning efforts. We need to ensure that any projects run by the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority are proved to be value for money, and that we learn from the lessons of the past.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

My party’s policy is to support the development of the present nuclear sites in Wales, one of which is Trawsfynydd in my constituency. The Welsh Government have funded Cwmni Egino to develop Trawsfynydd, and £20 million was allocated only last autumn for that purpose by the north Wales growth deal to enable critical development and planning, prior to the final investment decision to be made anon. Given the strategic developments and investments in Wales, can the Minister confirm that the entirely publicly owned Trawsfynydd, with its potential 550 jobs, remains a possible location for an SMR in the near future? Will he please visit Trawsfynydd?

[Andrew Bowie]

I would be delighted to visit the right hon. Lady’s constituency. Trawsfynydd has exciting potential as a site for an SMR, and for other nuclear licensed activities. It and many others are potential sites for the deployment of these new technologies in the years ahead.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Liz Saville Roberts and Andrew Bowie

Tuesday 18th April 2023 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero (Andrew Bowie)]

Grid-scale lithium-ion battery energy storage systems are covered by a robust regulatory framework, which requires manufacturers to ensure that products are safe before they are placed on the market, that they are installed correctly and that any safety issues found after products are on the market are dealt with. I am meeting my right hon. Friend this week to discuss this in more detail and I look forward to that very much.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

T9. The Minister must surely recognise that fuel poverty cannot be solved by threatening to send vulnerable people to court or imposing the installation of smart meters. When will he stop passing the blame to Ofgem? When will he really start to support vulnerable people who are facing fuel poverty?

Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Liz Saville Roberts and Andrew Bowie

Report stage & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 30th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

Diolch yn fawr iawn, Mr Dirprwy Lefarydd.

I rise to speak to new clause 11 in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Arfon (Hywel Williams), and to support the amendments in the names of the right hon. Members for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) and for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper), and of the hon. Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald).

Immigrants have always played an integral part in the vitality of our communities, but we have been told, of course, that covid-19 changes everything. That prompts the question: does it change how we handle immigration as much as it does our approach to health and the economy? There has been some interesting mention of the value of the high-skilled jobs that we will expect from this immigration policy, but it is worth taking a step back and considering how things have changed under covid. I understand that 70% of people believe that the crisis has shown the key role of immigrants in running our essential services—the essential services that we have been clapping on the streets for many Thursdays; I think there is another clap here on Sunday—while 64% of people say that they now value so-called low-skilled overseas workers. We are now looking at who provides our services, and how, in a different way.

Surely what we have here is a hostile, inhumane immigration environment, and that is exactly what we should be questioning. Does such an immigration policy reflect the sort of society that we hope to be after covid-19? Plaid Cymru’s proposal in new clause 11 challenges how this Bill presents a radical change in UK immigration policy without allowing a thorough debate about the details of its replacement or the implications—although, as can be seen from the nature of the amendments, there is much concern about those implications. Before we legislate, we should have a proper comprehension of the following: the impact of discriminatory “no recourse to public funds” conditions; the impact of NHS charging; the merits of removing all fees for visas and citizenship applications; and the merits of devolving powers over immigration to our nations, recognising the different needs of the different nations.

Finally—crucially, in the current context—our new clause calls on the Government to investigate the possibility of granting citizenship to all health and social care workers who have given so much during this crisis. A former Government did the right thing and granted citizenship to the Gurkhas. Health and social care immigrant workers have been fighting heroically on two fronts. They have fought on our behalf against the virus; they are now facing having to fight a hostile environment in the Government’s immigration policy. The new clause would be a means to right that wrong; it would reflect the public mood, and I beg the Government to consider adopting it.

[Andrew Bowie (West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine) (Con)]

I support the Bill, which I believe will make our immigration system better, and fairer. Some hon. Members—today, and before today—have bemoaned the fact that the new points-based system will end freedom of movement. I heard the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Brendan O'Hara) say so earlier this afternoon. In fact, there was no such thing as freedom of movement; the concept was an illusion, a chimera, apart from for those who were fortunate enough to live on the continent of Europe.

I benefited from the system—my wife is from Sweden, and for a while I lived and worked in Belgium—but it is a bad system, an outdated model, a discriminatory model, a system that works for Europeans but against the rest of the world. It is unfair. It discriminates against people who want to come here—people whom we want to welcome, people who help us build, run and support our country, who add value to our communities, contribute to our national debate and bring talent, expertise and drive, but who struggle to get entry purely because they are not from Europe. I am glad that we seek to replace that system today.

To those who are already here from Europe in this country, that have made it your home, that have raised families, invested, worked, lived and contributed to our society , we must repeat and repeat that they will always be welcome here.