National Policy Statements (Energy)

Damian Collins Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Charles Hendry]

I could sense that my hon. Friend was going to intervene even before she had risen to her feet, because she has been such an assiduous campaigner on these issues. That work is being taken forward. We want very robust evidence about the alternative costs, and I hope that she is reassured by my words about the need to consider alternatives.

The sixth NPS is on new nuclear power stations. It sets out the issues to be considered as part of the planning process where new nuclear power stations are proposed; a number of other matters are, of course, considered under other regimes. It also identifies the eight sites that we have concluded are potentially suitable for new nuclear development. That provides an important degree of clarity for industry and communities over the next few years. However, any application to build a nuclear plant on those sites still needs to go through the same rigorous processes as any other proposal under the Planning Act. The nuclear NPS also clarifies how the IPC should consider any issues regarding waste during its examination of an application and the role of the regulators and their relationship with the IPC. In addition, we have set out how applications for non-listed sites are treated by the IPC.

[Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)]

My hon. Friend knows that my constituents are disappointed that Dungeness was not included on the list of eight sites approved in the NPS. If there were problems with one or a number of those eight sites, would there be scope for allowing a site such as Dungeness to come back into play?

[Charles Hendry]

We were not limited to eight sites in the process that we went through. We decided that eight of the sites that developers had proposed to us were appropriate and could realistically be developed by 2025. Our concerns about Dungeness related to the special area of conservation, which is protected by law, and we were not persuaded that we could comply in that regard if the site was being developed. We have said that in every other respect Dungeness fulfilled the criteria, so if the special area of conservation issues can be satisfactorily resolved there is no reason why Dungeness could then not come forward separately.