Nuclear Safeguards Bill

Ben Bradley Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Monday 16th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Ben Bradley (Mansfield) (Con)]

It is, perhaps, less pleasurable than it should be to follow so many of my colleagues, because it means that no one on the Opposition Benches is bothering to speak, which is very disappointing. [Hon. Members: “There are some Scottish National party Members here.”] You guys are very committed: well done.

It is absolutely understandable that there is concern about the approach that the United Kingdom will take to nuclear safeguarding when we leave the European Union and Euratom in 2019. That is why the Bill is so important. It is about ensuring that we maintain our current high standard of safeguarding, and ensuring that the Government are able to develop any future obligations that are placed on the UK by the international community.

The hysteria with which the Bill has been met by Opposition Members is bemusing. They seem adamant and convinced that the Government plan to rip up all their international obligations post-Brexit, although what is on paper in the Bill is the exact opposite: it represents a commitment to continuity, and is vital to our wider negotiating position in Europe. As for the concerns raised about the industry itself, there is absolutely no reason why new and possibly more favourable trade agreements cannot be struck with the countries that supply the UK once we leave the EU. In talks with the Government, many of those nations have been effusive about establishing post-Brexit trade deals. This summer the Prime Minister secured a pledge from Japan, which currently supplies Oldbury nuclear power station, to commit itself to a trade deal when Britain leaves the EU.

Given those positive soundings, I think that the move away from the EU has the potential to spawn more fruitful international relationships for the UK nuclear industry. My hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse) made it clear that the EU’s interest in nuclear power is waning. Countries are rowing back on their nuclear commitments, setting time limits on when they want to get out of nuclear power, so perhaps we are better off out of it.

It cannot be denied that the EU’s support for research and development in this field has been instrumental in driving innovation. As Opposition Members have been keen to point out, we have received money and support from the EU, but they often forget that it does not come free of charge, and that we pay for our membership of that club.

[Chris Green]

Does my hon. Friend agree that as we look towards moving from Horizon 2020 to framework programme 9, there is a strong possibility that the European Union will emphasise a move away from cutting-edge research to capacity building? Will that not cause us a problem?

[Ben Bradley]

I entirely agree. It is vital for us to be able to safeguard our national interests and the skills that we have in great numbers, so that we can support the industry and continue to go from strength to strength in the UK, regardless of what the Germans tell us we should be doing.

The Joint European Torus programme in Oxfordshire is a key example of the positive support that we have received. The Government have pledged to underwrite the UK’s share of the cost of the project until 2020 to meet our international obligations and ensure the success of the project. The same applies to Horizon 2020. That willingness to participate in such projects is a clear indication that the UK will not turn its back on commitments with the EU at the expense of scientific progress. The desire to support the sciences domestically will also filter down into immigration policy. The Government have already made it clear that they are keen for the brightest and best people from the world of science to continue to come and work in the UK, and that is not going to change.

The simple fact is that the UK is leaving the EU and, necessarily, Euratom. The European Commission has made that pretty clear. There can be no watered-down half-membership, as Euratom comes with commitments to the European courts and free movement that my constituents would never go for. While the Bill does raise questions about the future of the nuclear industry—all things are uncertain when it comes to a huge negotiation on the scale of Brexit—it is clear that its intention is to promote continuity and ensure that Britain’s high standards of nuclear safeguarding are maintained after we leave. It is a vital contingency plan to ensure that if we do end up with no deal—which no one wants, blah blah blah—[Laughter]—we are ready for that eventuality. That was not meant as a “filler”, but there is no point in going over the same old argument again.

As many of my colleagues have said over many months, we are leaving the EU. That is right and necessary, and it has to be a clean break, but we are not leaving Europe, and we want to continue to co-operate on many aspects that are beneficial to the UK.

It appears that the Opposition are not even going to vote against the Bill. They are playing a dangerous political game with an important decision—talking about the nuclear Armageddon that will inevitably come from the passing of the Bill yet not bothering to vote against it. I am not quite sure where they are coming from. It seemed clear even from the opening statement from the shadow Front Bench that this is not about the content of the Bill; it is an attempt to refight the referendum over and over again, and to talk about how they did not want to leave the EU at all.

The scaremongering about how this might affect medical isotopes or safety and numerous other aspects during the lengthy discussion of this Bill bears no resemblance to what is down on paper. The Bill is about delivering continuity for the industry in the UK and giving us the opportunity to forge ahead in this field in the future.

Nuclear Safeguards Bill (First sitting)

Ben Bradley Excerpts

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

[Alex Norris (Nottingham North) (Lab/Co-op)]

Q Dr Golshan, you have mentioned the sort of headcount you will need for inspectors. What is your current total establishment, and by how much do you think you will need to grow?

Dr Golshan: We have a small project team that helps us deliver this function. I have a project manager and a project lead, and we have interactions with our human resources department and our IT department, which in itself is a small group. We need to grow this project team in the first instance to enable the project to deliver and go forward. All in all, we have five key people in the project team—project manager, delivery lead, policy lead, myself and a subject matter expert—and the team overall has links with the HR department and so on, as I described. We will need to grow this project team to help us deliver when we come to 29 March 2019, and we are in the process of doing so.

[Ben Bradley (Mansfield) (Con)]

Q Can you tell us a bit about the ONR’s track record of delivering new regulation previously? Do you feel that you have the right relationships within the industry to deliver this new programme?

Dr Golshan: It is fair to say that this is unprecedented territory for us as far as the size of the job is concerned. In the past we have not had to establish a new function from afresh to this extent, but we have got experience of setting out and working with officials from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy—and previously the Department for Energy and Climate Change—to bring forward new regulation.

We are working closely with officials at the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and we have engaged with the industry—I have had a number of meetings with the industry. We are explaining what we are doing, how far we have gone down this route and what there is left to do. We are working with all our stakeholders to make a success of this.

[Paul Blomfield]

Q May I follow up on your earlier answer, Dr Golshan? You have been clear and helpful. From what I understood, you said that you were recruiting an additional 10 to 12 inspectors now, with the potential of a further 20. Is that the whole size of the establishment you might be looking for? I might be wrong, but I understand that Euratom employs about 40 people on nuclear safeguarding in relation to UK establishments.

Dr Golshan: Let me break it into two bits. Our intention is to start recruiting in the new year for the additional 10 to 12 people we will require. The reason is that we were waiting for the Second Reading of the Bill to give us some certainty in relation to the people we are going to take on permanently. That process will start. In relation to your next question, on Euratom’s numbers, for its own purposes, Euratom carries out activities in the UK that, as a state delivering an equivalent regime, we would not need to deliver. The order of 20 to 25 is not far from what we need to staff ourselves to deliver this function.

Nuclear Safeguards Bill

Ben Bradley Excerpts

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

[Albert Owen]

Yes, there is. We need to negotiate from a position of clarity and strength, and I do not see us doing so. Without the proposed commitment in the Bill, I do not see the Government saying that they intend to go for third-party or associate membership of Euratom. We have not even seen the legal opinion that the Government were given about the need to leave Euratom in the first place. I support the need for nuclear safeguarding, and I will support the Bill on Third Reading, but new clause 1 is sensible, because it suggests that the Government should approach Euratom members and ask for associate membership, to give us the continuity and certainty that we want.

[Ben Bradley (Mansfield) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman says that he wants continuity and certainty, but can he not understand the difficulty involved in writing into the Bill the outcome of negotiations that have not yet happened? How can Parliament effectively write into law that we are going to have a transitional period when the negotiations have not yet happened?

[Albert Owen]

The Government say that we need a transitional period for EU withdrawal, and it is obvious to me that we also need one for Euratom. The Government have said that we need to leave Euratom at the same time as we leave the European Union, but I stress again—I hope that the Minister will clarify the position—that nobody other than the Government has seen the legal advice that tells us that we need to exit Euratom. My hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test (Dr Whitehead) was absolutely right to say that there is universal support for the idea of our having associate membership. I have not met anyone who works in the industry who says that we should move away from Euratom. If we do, they—the workers; Prospect, the union; many of the experts who gave evidence to us; and the Nuclear Industry Association, which is the umbrella body—feel that we should have associate membership. The new clause therefore speaks on behalf of the industry in the first instance, and we as legislators should listen to what the industry is saying; we should not listen to the Government’s ideological grounds. The only reason why the Government want to leave Euratom is that they do not want to be under the European Court of Justice—that is the crux of it.

--- Later in debate ---

The amendments and new clauses would allow us to look for an opportunity to maintain some kind of associate membership of Euratom. We are talking about doing something with which I completely disagree, but this is a new venture that has never been done before, so we have the opportunity to do new things and to strike new agreements. We could look at an arrangement like the one we had with Ukraine to see whether we could have the same with Euratom. If we are going to make this foolish decision to come out of the EU and Euratom and to leave all these things up to chance, it is incumbent on the UK Government to seek the associations that are required in order to keep things moving. The amendments and new clauses should be taken by the Minister and embraced by those on the Government Benches.

[Ben Bradley]

I am again a bit disappointed to hear wildly misleading statements from those on the Opposition Benches, including the hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Drew Hendry), about medical isotopes, which are nothing to do with this Bill.

[Stephen Kerr]

The hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Drew Hendry) accused Government Members, and Scottish Conservatives in particular, of seeking to find a happy place. Does my hon. Friend agree that that could never be said of the hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey? He is more inclined to find a depressing place, which I do not recognise in my native land of Scotland.

[Ben Bradley]

I thank my hon. Friend, who will know much more than me about SNP Members and their outlook on life.

Our relationship with Euratom is a subject for negotiation. The Government have been clear that they will seek continuity, and they obviously want standards to remain as high as possible. How that connects directly with Euratom is not for this Bill; it is for negotiation directly with the EU. The exact nature of the relationship will of course be closely connected to trade, customs and countless other arrangements.

In Committee, we saw Labour’s attempts to get either a commitment to Euratom, which cannot be given in this Bill, or associate membership, which does not exist and this Bill cannot create. We need to build our own framework so that we are prepared to incorporate whatever kind of relationship with Euratom results from the negotiation. The Government have been clear that that is the most helpful and connected relationship that we can have, so we cannot lay out in this forum what that will look like. We need certainty and structure and to have our own plans in place—not just on paper, but well developed and physically in place—so that we can have continuity regardless of what happens further down the line, meaning that we need to crack on with things now to be ready in time. We heard evidence in Committee about the time needed to put things in place, so we need to crack on now.

I do not understand where the hon. Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen) was coming from in his speech. While very eloquent, he did not seem to grasp that we cannot write into the Bill things that have not yet happened or are not yet agreed. We cannot include a transitional period, and the Government cannot accept an amendment that foresees a future negotiation with another party, the result of which we just do not know. We need to be ready on exit day. We need to ensure that we cannot be taken by surprise and that continuity is ensured.

[Albert Owen]

I understand that the hon. Gentleman is on message, but the message is wrong. The words that I used in my contribution, which was echoed by SNP Members, were not mine, but those of the industry and the experts within it. For once, will the Government start listening to those who understand the industry, rather than bantering about who on which side of the House might be wrong?

[Ben Bradley]

I am sure the Minister will agree that we need to support the industry and that we need to do what the industry asks. My point is nothing other than that. My point is that we cannot make that decision in this Bill. It is for the negotiation to decide at a later date.

New clause 1 neglects to recognise that an implementation period is subject to negotiation and must be agreed directly with the EU—we cannot do it unilaterally. The idea of implementation before withdrawal also does not fit with broader plans and discussions that have been mooted for transition out of the EU after withdrawal in March 2019. It simply does not fit. The Government clearly cannot include in a Bill the outcome of a discussion that has not happened.

We need to decide the basic framework now and act accordingly.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

We understand that there are certain things the Government cannot say about the negotiations, but ultimately we want to know the outcome of those negotiations before withdrawal so that Parliament can have a view on it, rather than the Government operating a Henry VIII clause.

[Ben Bradley]

I do not know the hon. Gentleman’s background, but I guess, by the sounds of it, it probably is not business.

We cannot fix the plan for withdrawal and implementation in stone now. The Labour party wants to build into the Bill a clause saying that the Bill is contingency only. Our relationship with Euratom is subject to negotiation. No one has written anything off. We want a positive relationship, but we might have to develop and rely on our own framework, and the work to put it in place needs to happen now. An amendment to say that the Bill is merely a contingency would achieve the opposite of its intention by reducing impetus and leading to delays in the process of getting our safeguards in place, which is only bad for the industry and for all the things the hon. Member for Southampton, Test (Dr Whitehead) tried to raise.

That is why I oppose new clause 1, and I hope to speak later about my support for the Bill more broadly.

[Alex Norris]

I enjoyed serving on the Public Bill Committee, and I rise to speak in support of new clauses 1 and 2, and amendment 3.

On new clause 1, while I have slightly buried the lead by referencing this earlier, it needs full consideration in this place. Members need to know the judgment of Dr Golshan, who is responsible at the ONR for recreating Euratom in this country:

“Our aim, currently, is to have a system in place that enables the UK to fulfil its international obligations by March 2019, which is when we intend to leave Euratom. I have been very clear in the past—I will repeat it here—that we will not be able to replicate Euratom standards on day one.”––[Official Report, Nuclear Safeguards Public Bill Committee, 31 October 2017; c. 7, Q9.]

Members should reflect on that, whatever the political knockabout, because it makes a compelling case for a transition period. Otherwise we will be saying that our nuclear safeguards regime should not be as good as it is today, and I have not heard anyone suggesting that—I do not believe that it would be tolerable.

A week is a long time in politics, and three months is a lifetime in the Brexit process—perhaps it just feels like that—but over that period we have seen the Government move on this point. Conservative Members asked how we can talk about this hypothetical idea. Well, the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy himself said less than two weeks ago that the Government want Euratom to be involved in the implementation period. Now is the time to make good on that.

In a similar vein, on new clause 2, if I had £1 for every time someone mentioned in Committee that this is a contingency Bill, I would be able to meet the Foreign Secretary’s new financial commitment to the NHS. The Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the hon. Member for Watford (Richard Harrington), would be a particularly significant donor, having mentioned that many times.

If this is a contingency Bill, we really should say what it is contingent on, and we should say that in the Bill. Otherwise it is not a contingency Bill, but a Bill that will be law until the Minister decides on the 19.52 train home that it is not law any more. That is not a satisfactory way to legislate.

Finally, on amendment 3, one issue that has developed since Second Reading is whether we actually have to do any of this. Ministers clearly said on Second Reading that leaving Euratom is legally necessary as part of leaving the EU. We tested that in Committee. I asked two senior lawyers in this area, Jonathan Leech and Rupert Cowan from Prospect Law, whether triggering article 50 necessitates leaving Euratom and if they would have advised the Government to follow this path. To the first question they answered “No” and “Absolutely not” respectively. Jonathan Leech’s answer to the second question was:

“The advice would be that you do not have to accept this and it may not be in your interests to do so.”––[Official Report, Nuclear Safeguards Public Bill Committee, 31 October 2017; c. 12, Q23.]

That is significant, and it is a departure from where we were on Second Reading.

I represent a leave constituency, and I am always mindful of that when dealing with anything relating to Brexit. I have spent a lot of time knocking on doors and have heard every conceivable argument for remaining or leaving. Funnily enough, I never heard the argument—I suspect no one in this Chamber did—that our membership of Euratom is undesirable, or that there is a desire for a diminution of our nuclear safeguards regime. There is not much of a case for doing this if we do not have to. If we are doing it only because of an arbitrary red line drawn up in Downing Street that we could cross while still delivering Brexit, we are fools to do so. Either way, as amendment 3 states, Ministers ought to come to this place to justify their approach, because once again this is not a decision for the 19.52 train.

Lots of work has gone into the Bill and I have enjoyed participating in its consideration. I believe that we should all support the Opposition proposals, because they would make the Bill better and then we might not need it at all.

Nuclear Safeguards Bill

Ben Bradley Excerpts

Ping Pong: House of Commons
Tuesday 8th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Dr Whitehead]

The hon. Lady makes the important point that to have the full protection of staying in Euratom would be the best thing to do, not just on nuclear safeguarding but on a range of other civil nuclear activities, until we are absolutely certain that we have ticked every box and ensured that we have alternatives that are as good as what we have under Euratom. That, very largely, is what Lords amendment 3 seeks to do. It seeks to ensure that there is recourse to the full covering arrangements of Euratom if those boxes have not been ticked.

After waiting until the very last moment to tell us that Lords amendment 3 is not needed and will be opposed, the Government have finally come up with an amendment in lieu of their own that suggests that perhaps a fall-back plan is needed after all. Its wording is, in many respects, very similar to Lords amendment 3. It places the signing of these treaties as the essential element in securing the transition to a full nuclear safeguarding role without Euratom, and specifies, as amendment 3 does, what they are. That in itself is a considerable victory for those who counselled for this over a period of time, and is a substantial turnaround from the Government’s previous position. But, at the last, the amendment falls short. It places the option to decide not on whether principal agreements have been signed—for that will be evident, or not, at the time of departure—but on what one might call an interim stage on a fall-back which provides for circumstances where, at the beginning of a period of 28 days prior to exit, agreements may not have been signed and completed, but will in the Secretary of State’s opinion have been so signed before that 28-day period is up. In other words, there is a very abbreviated, but nevertheless significant, period during which the Secretary of State will decide whether treaties are going to be signed. That will, in effect, be putting off the relevant request to the European Council for an extension of the time during which Euratom provisions hold, because the Secretary of State thinks it is, after all, going to be all right. That is a far shorter period than under the original general provisions that the Secretary of State said he would try to organise and get right in time for exit from the EU, but we are still back to that assumption that it will be “all right on the night” with no complete plan B in place. I accept that the amendment in lieu proposed by the Government comes a very long way, and that it has taken a considerable amount of U-turning, if we want to call it that, to put in place these arrangements, but in reality it is not quite far enough.

[Ben Bradley (Mansfield) (Con)]

It was a pleasure to serve with the hon. Gentleman on the Bill Committee. Does he agree that the Government’s new approach offering more flexibility and the ability to take a common-sense approach based on the circumstances at the time is a better approach than an inflexible decision taken now which might not fit the circumstances next year?