Modular Nuclear Programme

Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts

Wednesday 15th October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)]

I will write to the noble Lord on that question. As I said, we want to ensure that 70% of the supply chain is in the UK. We have designed the nuclear plan for skills, which is highly important. We have already 4,000 early career starts entering in 2024-25 and we want to ensure that we have the right skills set to do that. I will write to him on that issue. I will continue to say that we are at the beginning of a golden age for nuclear in this country and are putting down the foundations for that. We want to make sure that we fulfil what we are setting out to do in the years to come.

[Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)]

My Lords, wind turbines are modular—they are manufactured in factories and built on site—and modular reactors will be the same. We do not want to make the same mistake with modular reactors that was made over decades with wind turbines. There are 11,000 wind turbines on these islands, nearly 5,000 of them in Scotland. Not one of them was manufactured in Scotland and very few were manufactured elsewhere in the United Kingdom—I cannot find any evidence of any being manufactured here. These are key jobs. Are we going to build manufacturing plants—that is, factories—that will make the modular parts of these reactors? Is that the deal we made with the US?