Civil Nuclear Road Map

Geoffrey Clifton-Brown Excerpts

Thursday 11th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Bowie]

Building up the UK’s supply chain is essential. One of the huge benefits that will be accrued through this biggest-in-70-years investment in new nuclear is the ability to build up our manufacturing base in the United Kingdom, creating those high-wage, high-skilled jobs that we want to see in more communities around the entire country. Of course, lessons will be learned from previous projects. We are always looking at value for money for the British taxpayer, which is why, for example, we are using the regulated asset base model for funding Sizewell C.

[Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con)]

I warmly welcome my hon. Friend’s announcement today, because when the advanced gas-cooled reactors are decommissioned by 2030, we will have a dip in nuclear production. The Public Accounts Committee, of which I have the honour to be deputy chair, has done a lot of work on this. We recently had a follow-up visit to Sellafield. I agree with my hon. Friend that they do fantastic work there, but it is our largest single project, with a minimum cost of £200 billion over the next 100 years. Will he undertake to renew our efforts to get a better handle on the decommissioning costs, so that they can be properly allocated and we can have a true estimate of what nuclear generation costs?

[Andrew Bowie]

I agree with my hon. Friend on the amazing work being conducted at Sellafield in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Copeland (Trudy Harrison). The lessons being learned through the decommissioning process at Sellafield will yield benefits. We are leading the way across the world on the decommissioning of sites and are very happy to be advising other countries on their decommissioning efforts. We need to ensure that any projects run by the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority are proved to be value for money, and that we learn from the lessons of the past.