Nuclear Safeguards Bill

Debate between Alan Whitehead and Trudy Harrison

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 23rd January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Dr Whitehead]

I repeat my suggestion that, because the Bill is about process as much as content, it is important that it is guided by the sort of considerations we want to take place in order to achieve, as we are all agreed, the best outcome—[Interruption.] Indeed, yes, the best outcome. We must make sure that the negotiations not only proceed with the best outcome in mind, but cover the fact that it may be the case—again, this is out of our control—that if we stick to a position, with the provisions of the Bill, in which everything essentially stops in March 2019, that would be just catastrophic for our nuclear industry and our international nuclear safeguarding obligations. We must get this right, and we must have continuity of arrangements inside or outside Euratom. It is in those circumstances that a transition period is suggested.

The arrangements for the founding of Euratom and its articles suggest that a period of transition for negotiating our way out of Euratom may not be identical to the period for the arrangements for negotiating our way out of the EU as a whole. It is quite possible to conceive the circumstances in which we do not have a transition period beyond March 2019 for negotiating our general withdrawal from the EU, but we do have a transition period for negotiating our way out of Euratom. It is at the least strongly arguable that that may be the case in the future, and it is another reason why such a provision should be in the Bill.

[Trudy Harrison (Copeland) (Con)]

I feel I must pull up the hon. Gentleman because he has twice referred to Euratom having been around for 40 years, but it began in 1957. It was born out of the civil nuclear industry that began in my constituency of Copeland when Calder Hall was first constructed. I thought that I should make it clear that this was from Britain and by Britain back in 1957. We have actually had it for 70 years, although there was the merger in 1967.

[Dr Whitehead]

I was referring to the length of time that we have been a member of Euratom, not the length of time that Euratom has been around. Indeed, the hon. Lady will know that when Euratom was founded, the UK was not a member of it. I am sure she will also know that the founders of Euratom, particularly one of them—Mr Spaak—wrote a substantial report at the time of the founding of Euratom that strongly envisaged, setting out in chapter and verse, how an associate relationship of Euratom with the UK could come about. The arrangements that Mr Spaak considered in the report for associate membership are identical to those that exist today. I thank the hon. Lady for reminding us that Euratom has been around a lot longer than the period during which the UK’s relationship with Euratom has existed, but I am sure she will agree that even at the outset of Euratom, an association with the UK was envisaged before the UK joined to facilitate nuclear exchange, nuclear development and—although the nuclear non-proliferation treaty was not around at the time—joint endeavours in civil and defence nuclear work.

I fear, Madam Deputy Speaker, that I have tested the patience of the House, particularly, given the number of interventions I have taken, because of the necessity of ensuring that I responded to them fully. I will end by telling the House that we need to remember that this Bill covers just one aspect of our relationship with Euratom over the period during which we have been a member of it. Our relationship with Euratom also includes participation in nuclear research, the transportation of nuclear materials, the development of nuclear arrangements, the trading of nuclear materials and a number of other arrangements, all of which will lapse on our exit from participation in Euratom and all of which will need to be secured for the future. They are not the subject of the Bill, but they will have to be dealt with at some stage if we are not to have a close association with Euratom after Brexit. Amendment 7 would provide for at least an understanding that we will move forward to secure working arrangements for a future outside Euratom, not just making provision for our treaty obligations concerning nuclear safeguarding.

The Opposition think that the suite of connected amendments to the Bill will strengthen it enormously so that it is a fully fit-for-purpose contingency arrangement. I therefore commend these new clauses and amendments to the House.

Nuclear Safeguards Bill (Fourth sitting)

Debate between Alan Whitehead and Trudy Harrison

Committee Debate: 4th sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 2nd November 2017 Public Bill Committees

[Trudy Harrison (Copeland) (Con)]

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the current safeguarding inspectors are members of the Prospect union? I have had sight of the job specification for our new nuclear safeguards workers. They require a degree, knowledge of nuclear material and potentially developed vetting clearance. Much of that is already present among the staff at Sellafield and across the 17 Nuclear Decommissioning Authority sites. They are already compliant.

[Dr Whitehead]

Indeed. My point was that, if we had to train nuclear inspectors from scratch, that would take about five years. As the hon. Lady rightly says, a number of people are already familiar with the necessary areas in order to get a position as a nuclear safeguard inspector, but those people have not all had experience of nuclear safeguarding issues; they have not had to because Euratom has carried out that role.

I asked Dr Golshan whether we could steal Euratom inspectors who might want to remain in this country, assuming they were allowed to do so, when the Euratom inspection regime comes to an end and ours starts. The answer was, “Maybe, that depends.” We cannot rely on that, so we have to get inspectors from somewhere else. It may well be that we can shorten the training period considerably by converting to nuclear safeguarding people who already work in the nuclear industry and are well versed in a number of general areas, but we should not underestimate the time that that would take to get right. It is not just a simple question of going along and saying, “You’ll do, you’ll do, you’ll do. There you are. You are now nuclear safeguarding inspectors.” As I am sure the hon. Lady is aware, that is not going to work. There will be a lot of work involved in getting the inspectors in place.

Sue Ferns said that there are specific aspects of an inspector’s role to be considered:

“This is a warranted role; this is not just working in the industry. It is not just about knowledge, but experience and commanding the confidence of the companies and the organisations that you deal with, so there are very specific aspects to that role.”––[Official Report, Nuclear Safeguards Public Bill Committee, 31 October 2017; c. 35, Q69.]

She also alluded to the relatively small pool in which we are fishing. We have not just to fish in the pool; we have to fish very accurately and attract a good proportion of the people in the pool, in order to suddenly fill the gap. Consequently, she put a considerable question mark against whether it was possible for the ONR to be as ready as we would like for the tasks that we are going to give it.

I sincerely hope, as I am sure we all do, that those matters can be resolved. It may be a question of making sure that the ONR is funded to the extent that it can properly undertake the activity of fishing in a small pool, perhaps with pound notes attached to the end of the fishing line. There may be a number of other factors relating to nuclear inspection coming in. Euratom may be prepared as part of an associate agreement to lend the UK safeguarding inspectors. A number of different courses could be pursued. There is, nevertheless, a big question mark against the capacity and ability of the ONR, even with all best endeavours in place, to be properly ready in time, given its present circumstances, its possible future circumstances and how it will address those.

For that reason, it is important at the appropriate time to have a sign-off from the Secretary of State that we really have not just a regime in place, but the resources available to carry out that regime in the new circumstances it will bring up. That appropriate time would be when all the different possibilities have been explored and the different ways of doing it have been looked at. Amendment 4 essentially requires the Secretary of State to lay a statement before Parliament that he or she is satisfied at that point—not a hope that it is going to be all right, but a statement saying, “Yes, it looks like it is all right now and we can safely proceed on the basis that we know we have not only the powers in place, but the people to subsequently carry out those powers.”

Amendments 12 and 13 are associated with amendment 4. They deal with the consultations that the Bill sets out will take place and are in respect of those activities, nuclear safeguarding in general and payments towards compliance costs. I have mentioned that the Secretary of State provides some money for ONR and that some money for ONR comes from the levies it places on the nuclear industry. The Bill makes provision for the Secretary of State, by regulation, to authorise and require the ONR to make payments towards compliance costs. It states that compliance costs mean

“costs of complying with nuclear safeguards regulations or with specified provisions of nuclear safeguards regulations.”

To make those payments, the ONR must obviously get the money from somewhere, either from grants or from a levy. As the clause says, there will be consultation on that, but the clause does not say that any of those consultations should be published. Therefore, we may not know what the consultations are about, what they say or when they are completed. The amendments are both minor, but they tie the process up properly with a little bit of ribbon, to ensure that those consultations are published and in the public domain. Then we will know what has happened in those consultations, which are potentially very important, given everything that we have said about ONR’s readiness for its purpose. The amendments ensure that the consultations are in the public domain and are properly reported and discussed.

I believe that these amendments are helpful in terms of what we know is the task in front of us, and how certain we want to be in this Committee that we are able to do what we want to do. I will go beyond calling them helpful and say that it would be irresponsible to proceed to the end of this legislation without some method of ensuring that we can deliver on what this House will have decided. I think that all hon. Members would agree that it would not be the first occasion on which this House legislated on something without securing the means to ensure it happened. In this instance it is not just a money resolution at the end of the legislation, but ensuring that an industry is equipped to do the different things that we want it to do and that it previously was not carrying out.

Again, we are in new territory, and we need particular measures in this legislation to reflect that fact. We also need to be sure, in making our way through that new territory, that we are doing so as safely and securely as possible.

Nuclear Safeguards Bill (First sitting)

Debate between Alan Whitehead and Trudy Harrison

Committee Debate: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 31st October 2017 Public Bill Committees

[Dr Whitehead]

And those discussions, I understand, are proceeding at the moment but have by no means reached any conclusion. Are you confident that in terms of replicating the UK’s safeguarding function, the basic structure you have outlined to us this morning that needs to be in place will be able to fulfil its functions and, in particular, assure and satisfy the IAEA that it can safely proceed with new treaty arrangements with the UK?

Dr Golshan: Yes is the short answer. We do not have to have a regime equivalent to Euratom in order to be able to proceed with concluding those agreements and negotiations, so what the IAEA needs the UK to have in place is a domestic safeguards regime that meets its international obligations under the non-proliferation treaty and others. So although there are risks here for us to complete the work we are doing, I think it is a much more achievable objective for us to aim for, rather than replicating Euratom in the first instance. I should again emphasise that having a regime that is equivalent to Euratom is not a prerequisite to complete those agreements and negotiations.

[Trudy Harrison]

Q Assuming that the Bill goes ahead as written, what will be possible on day one and what will not be possible, and how will that impact on our 17 nuclear sites? I ask with specific regard to my constituency of Copeland, which has Sellafield, the low level waste repository and the national nuclear laboratory.

Dr Golshan: The Bill is an enabling Bill. It gives us the broad powers in parallel with nuclear safety and security. It gives the Secretary of State the powers to make nuclear safeguards regulations. That is the secondary legislation that I referred to. In relation to what is possible at our nuclear sites—

--- Later in debate ---

[Trudy Harrison]

Q Which will then give us the opportunity to progress those bilateral agreements.

Rupert Cowan: Correct, and nothing that we are saying suggests that this Bill should not go forward, save for the amendment we suggested, which would make those negotiations more straightforward.

[Dr Whitehead]

Q You mentioned that the Bill is first a contingency Bill and secondly an enabling Bill, and that the main work will be putting in place secondary legislation to get us to a basic safeguarding regime that by March 2019 will operate pretty much as Euratom does at the moment. How realistic do you think that process is, in respect not of the Bill but of what needs to be done to get to that position, on the basis of the Bill?

Jonathan Leech: May I first go back to the point about the Bill being a contingency? It is very important that the Bill is no sense a contingency.

Nuclear Safeguards Bill (Second sitting)

Debate between Alan Whitehead and Trudy Harrison

Committee Debate: 2nd sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 31st October 2017 Public Bill Committees

[Dr Whitehead]

Q I want to get a better understanding of the duties and responsibilities—and, indeed, appointment and placement—of inspectors when we exit the EU. What view might the IAEA take about the readiness or otherwise of the regime when it considers the voluntary agreement that we will have to make with the IAEA when we exit Euratom? Is it your understanding that one of the things that the IAEA will consider is whether we are genuinely ready to undertake the additional work and reporting back to the IAEA rather than Euratom that the voluntary agreement would entail? The IAEA will either come to an agreement based on the fact that we look ready or, alternatively, say that more work is needed before we can come to an agreement. Presumably, however, an agreement will have to be reached by the time we exit the EU.

Sue Ferns: My understanding is that the IAEA will require certain standards to have been met before anything else can happen. What I understand, though, is that during the Second Reading debate on the Bill, there was a lot of talk about replicating the Euratom powers. My understanding is that that is not necessarily the IAEA hurdle, because I think the IAEA hurdle is slightly lower than replicating the Euratom powers. Certainly, there will be a requirement to meet IAEA standards.

[Trudy Harrison]

Q Just changing tone slightly, I notice, Kevin, that you have a reference to concern around radioactive isotopes. I do not share that concern. I do not understand why you think this is relevant to Euratom, because they are not fissile material. I have not heard of anyone using plutonium or uranium in medical practice. I wonder, if they have not been risk-assessed by the IAEA, why you would feel there is a concern about their falling under the realms of Euratom.

Kevin Coyne: I think that is an area which is of serious consequence. I think it is generally not well known—the fact that Euratom covers the transportation of materials—or that isotopes that are used in the NHS, for instance, come from Holland and other countries. We do not have the reactors in this country to produce them. I understand what you say about the registration. We highlighted that as a concern because there is a two-day, three-day shelf-life; this comes from us as a union that operates within the NHS at quite an extensive level. In terms of the delivery and transportation of that, there are sometimes delays. So our point is that the change of regimes and the difference in what might occur may cause that to be delayed even further and therefore impact upon the NHS itself. We make no stronger point than that we ought to look at the impact upon isotopes in hospitals.