European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

Lord Redesdale Excerpts

Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 1st March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer (LD)]

My Lords, the nuclear industry has been widely mentioned this evening and I should briefly point out that under Euratom and as a nuclear power we have special responsibilities and obligations. The nuclear non-proliferation treaty and the original Euratom treaty are very closely intertwined. It is not just a question of the nuclear industry. At a point where we are considering building the new generation of Trident, it behoves the Government to give answers on this issue, too.

[Lord Redesdale (LD)]

My Lords, from these Benches, I was the Lib Dem spokesman on energy for 10 years and was often the lone Peer who was attacking atomic energy as something we should be relying on. Our problem at the moment is that 20.9% of our power—I checked with UK Energy five minutes ago—came from nuclear energy. It is coming from an aged nuclear fleet that is almost past its sell-by date and will be decommissioned. If we are to keep the lights on, we probably will need nuclear power stations. I know that the noble Lord, Lord O’Neill, thought that he would never hear me say that.

The Minister will come up with an extremely cogent and persuasive argument for why we should leave the Euratom treaty and how everything will work well. I will ask one question, though. Considering that our new power plants will be designed and built by the French, Chinese, Americans and Japanese, we will need some standards—and, of course, Euratom provides them. The Minister will say, however, that we need to move into the new age and will look at this. Can he say—because work must have been done on this—how much the new standards body will cost to run and set up? I very much hope that he can give me a figure, or perhaps write to me on this issue—or maybe not. If he cannot give me that figure off the top of his head, can he say which department will be responsible for setting up this new body? Will it be BEIS—because DECC has gone the way of many great organisations in the past? If it is BEIS, what new funding will be made available to it to meet its new obligations?

[Lord Bradshaw (LD)]

My Lords, I live in the shadow of Culham. Like the noble Lord, Lord Hayward, I am well aware of the problems that this debate is already causing. I met a number of people from Culham last Thursday. A number are already discussing the opportunities that exist outside this country to move away, because they are uncertain. Many are married to EU nationals who do not know what their position is.

Also, from my association with Oxford University, I can assure noble Lords that not only are we in danger of losing some of the best scientists in medical science, energy and technology, but applications for post-doctoral fellowships for PhDs are declining because people are afraid of what is going to happen. Reference was made to our shortage of nuclear technologists: if those who are there at present were to go away, we would be even shorter—almost bereft—of them.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Keen of Elie]

I fully appreciate the noble Lord’s point. That is why we will engage with Euratom and its members in order to determine continuity. Whether it will be by associate membership or by means of some additional agreement has yet to be determined.

A number of points were raised about whether we can maintain trade and standards. We trade, we have safety standards and we intend to maintain them. We had the opportunity to secure mutual recognition of our standards and trade by means of international nuclear co-operation agreements.

I have been asked by a number of noble Lords about the question of strategy and consultation. Let me be clear: we are at the beginning of this process, not at the end of it. We appreciate the need to develop a clear strategy in order to implement our desire for continuing co-operation with Euratom going forward.

A number of particular questions were posed with regard to where we were on certain issues of strategy and relationships with other international nuclear partners and how we intended to demonstrate the development of our forward strategy for nuclear research and development. The noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, raised the question of how important this was in the context of the proportion of our energy that is actually provided by nuclear installations. I understand that the figure is 17%, rather than the figure he quoted.

[Lord Redesdale]

If you look at Energy UK, which gives it by the half-hour, it is about 17% at the moment, but it goes up to about 22% and down to about 14%.

[Lord Keen of Elie]

I am most obliged for that clarification. It will elide the need for me to write any letters.

BEIS has a very direct interest in how its strategy is going to be developed, and here I commit not myself but my noble friend Lord Prior, because, going forward, he would be pleased to meet with any of your Lordships who have particular issues that they want to raise in the context of developing strategy and consultation on this point. At this stage, however, I do not consider that it would be appropriate for me to become engaged in that detail.

However, we have come to the very firm conclusion that, if we are to give an Article 50 notice that is effective going forward and that reflects the will of the people of the United Kingdom as expressed in a referendum, it must involve us withdrawing from the institutions of the European Union. Given the inextricable link between the European Union, as properly defined in some quarters, and Euratom, so far as those institutions are concerned, it will be necessary that that notice applies both to the EU as it is generically termed, and to Euratom itself, as defined as part of the EU, pursuant to Section 3(2) of the 2008 Act.

I hope that in these circumstances, the noble Lord will consider it appropriate to withdraw the amendment.