Nuclear Safeguards Bill

Gareth Johnson Excerpts

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

[Rebecca Long Bailey]

I earlier urged the Secretary of State to display a little bit of patience. If the right hon. Member for Wokingham (John Redwood) did the same, he might hear some of the answers he requires in the remainder of my contribution.

Subject to legal debate, it certainly may have been possible—had the Prime Minister not taken the unnecessary step of specifically including Euratom in her letter to the Commission—to retain the UK’s membership of Euratom. At worst, we could have secured a close association with Euratom that was good enough to allow the continuation of nuclear safeguarding within that amended framework.

The Opposition believe that continued membership of Euratom or a close associated status with it is possible and necessary for the efficient, continued working of a whole raft of procedures relating to the nuclear industry, not just safeguarding. We see this procedure of starting to set up identical but separate processes, instead of a relationship with Euratom, very much as a last resort or a back-up measure. We are frankly disappointed that the Government seem to be putting rather more effort into this than into seeking to maintain an arrangement with a body that does all this perfectly well, although the effort put into this Bill is also questionable. I will come to that in due course.

[Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con)]

Is the hon. Lady aware that the European Commission itself has said that no country that leaves the EU can continue being a member of Euratom? Is the Commission wrong?

[Rebecca Long Bailey]

The hon. Gentleman would do well to keep up. I have mentioned several times that there is a current legal discourse regarding this very issue. Perhaps he should refer to that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Alex Chalk), and before him my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare), who looks like he is about to leave the Chamber. It is always a pleasure to follow the latter, but although he has many qualities, brevity is perhaps not one of them.

The Bill is important, and I very much hope that its Second Reading will be unopposed. It is a crucial part of the Brexit process and I believe it will be able to operate with or without an EU deal. That flexibility is provided in the middle section of the Bill. Despite what was said by some of the Labour Back Benchers who were present earlier, it is absolutely clear that a country cannot remain a member of Euratom if it is outside the EU. It is not just the UK Government who make that point; the EU Commission makes that point. If someone says to the Government, “Let’s see your legal advice, because we don’t believe you. We have no faith in that opinion”, they should also say that to the EU Commission and ask it why it is putting out that opinion and saying that it is absolutely correct that a country cannot be in Euratom if it is outside the EU. Nevertheless, our current safeguards relate to our being members of Euratom, so it is right that we have a Bill that will enable those safeguards to be replaced when we leave the EU.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

It seems to me that the Bill is not only a contingency plan but a crucial building block for our negotiation. Our negotiation requires legislation such as this Bill, so that we can get everything else sorted and get a decent agreement with Euratom.

[Gareth Johnson]

The Government have been absolutely clear that they must prepare for all eventualities, and that is precisely what is currently happening.

I congratulate the Minister on putting resources into the country’s nuclear industry. It is essential to ensure that British nuclear fusion research continues when we leave Euratom. We have invested a huge amount of time, resources and effort in becoming a world leader in this field, and we must not allow our status to diminish. The Culham Centre has been mentioned a few times. It is not the only centre that specialises in such work, but it is crucial and it employs many people. It is essential that the Government do all they can to protect its valuable work and keep its workers in place.

I am pleased that the Minister has found some funding for the JET project, which has massive potential in the nuclear fusion industry. It is hard to overstate just what advances can be achieved if we ensure that the investment in that project continues not just in the UK, but across the world.

All too often we are a little too apologetic about our work in this industry when, in fact, successive Governments can be incredibly proud of our work on nuclear safeguards. We have a proven track record as a nuclear weapon state; we have signed the non-proliferation treaty; we have worked at the heart of the IAEA since its inception and we will continue to work with it and uphold our international obligations. That is something about which we can hold our head high. We can be very proud of the fact that, right from the beginning, we have been one of the few countries that has said that non-nuclear countries should remain so without any assistance from nuclear countries. That is vital.

We have also worked very well with the EU over safeguarding, and can continue to do so in the future, but we will need this Bill to enable that to happen. The Bill will ensure that safeguards can continue uninterrupted and that collaboration with the EU can continue. The expertise that we have heard a lot about from both sides of the Chamber today can be shared between nations and with the EU and around the world. It is clear that the European Union and the UK have a strong mutual interest in ensuring that this close co-operation continues in the future. That was set out very clearly in the position paper of the Department for Exiting the European Union—the Government’s nuclear materials and safeguards paper—that was published in July. We have been very open in our positioning papers about our stance in negotiations, and in July we gave a clear indication of where we wanted to go with this particular issue.

There is no reason why we cannot have a safe, pioneering, co-operative and responsible nuclear industry after Brexit. Yes, decisions will have to be made and agreements reached on issues such as the ownership of property at Culham. My understanding is that Euratom owns some of the property at our centres and that there will have to be some negotiations over who should continue to own that property once Brexit takes place, but, like so many other things involving Brexit, that can be resolved through negotiation.

In conclusion, this Bill will provide continuity, reassurance, protections and safeguards for the whole of this country and the whole of the industry and therefore should be given its Second Reading today.

[Several hon. Members rose—]