Nuclear Safeguards Bill

Debate between Chris Green and Layla Moran

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

[Chris Green]

We are very early on in the negotiations, and I am sure the Minister for Climate Change and Industry and the Department for Exiting the European Union will look at that.

The extraordinary aspect of this debate is that some people are saying we will go off a cliff edge and valuable radioactive isotopes will no longer be available. What does that suggest about our friends in the European Union—that they will no longer sell these products, or that they will choose not to allow those products to be sent over to the United Kingdom? It is extraordinary to suggest that such sales will cease.

[Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that is not about the EU wanting to give us radioisotopes, but about half-lives? The radioisotopes we are talking about have extremely short half-lives, so any delay at all at the border means fewer patients will be able to benefit from them.

[Chris Green]

Yes, I understand that some half-lives can be as short as six hours, so the efficacy of the isotopes will diminish in an incredibly short period. However, to say that the European Union and the British Government are not fully aware of that and that getting such materials from Europe over to the United Kingdom cannot or will not happen is extraordinary.