Oral Answers to Questions

David Mowat Excerpts

Thursday 7th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Amber Rudd]

I thank the hon. Lady for bringing up the National Infrastructure Commission. I have had a preliminary meeting with the head of it, and know that it will shortly be consulting on which projects to prioritise. The project that it has already said it will be looking at in our sector—interconnectors and systems operations—will be important for delivering on our decarbonising future, and will play an important role in achieving cross-party consensus on making the much-needed investment in infrastructure.

[David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)]

The Secretary of State will be aware that the legally binding UK commitment is about 30% to 40% faster than that signed up to by the rest of the EU in Paris. Indeed, some countries in the EU, such as Austria, have increased their emissions by something like 20% since 1990. What discussions does she plan to have with her colleagues in Europe on getting their processes up to the same level as those of the UK?

[Amber Rudd]

My hon. Friend raises an interesting point. The fact is that the UK is leading in this area in terms of not only our ambition through the Climate Change Act 2008, but the structure of the delivery of our decarbonising—the five-year review and the transparency of the regime. I will be having conversations with my colleagues in Europe to ensure that they too step up and participate in the important effort-sharing decision that will take place this year.

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[Andrea Leadsom]

Projects such as Gunfleet Sands, just off the coast of the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, provide enough clean electricity for over 100,000 homes following hundreds of millions of pounds invested by the developer, much of which was spent locally. I am sure he will have welcomed that. As we have made clear, however, we have to get the right balance between supporting newer technologies such as offshore wind and being tough on subsidies to keep bills as low as possible. We will always be working towards making technologies subsidy-free.

[David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)]

By far and away the dominant source globally of low-carbon electricity is nuclear power. In the EU, a third of electricity comes from that source and China has approximately 50 stations under construction. We also need small modular reactors. Will the Minister set out what her plans are in that regard and how the UK can provide leadership?

[Amber Rudd]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Nuclear is an incredibly important part of our energy future and I am very proud that we have signed the first new nuclear deal in over 20 years. We believe small modular reactors will have an important part to play. I am delighted to say we are using part of our substantial innovation funding to make sure we bring them on as early as possible, but that will not be at the expense of existing plans for nuclear reactors. We will be aiming for a mix of larger nuclear and smaller nuclear.