G20 Summit

Lord Howell of Guildford Excerpts

Wednesday 7th September 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

My Lords, as I think was clear from the Statement, we will not be providing a running commentary on what is happening. We want to get the best deal, and in order to get the best deal, as many noble Lords will know from their careers in business, you do not show your negotiating hand. What I have said is that the priority is to regain more control over the numbers of people coming here from Europe and, as the noble Baroness rightly said, to allow British companies to trade with the single market in goods and services.

[Lord Howell of Guildford (Con)]

My Lords, I do not think I heard the words “Hinkley Point C” mentioned in the Statement; perhaps I missed them. While I personally deplore some of the overhyped fears about Chinese security and threat—there is always a question, but it has been exaggerated—will my noble friend remind her Cabinet colleagues that there are ways forward with this particularly difficult project which will continue to combine the input of the Chinese, whose good will and technology we need, with the needs of the French and of EDF, which is a company in some difficulty, without saddling ourselves with the present prospect of a project of the wrong design at the wrong time that will load our industries and consumers for many years ahead with unnecessarily high energy costs?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

My noble friend is right: there was no reference to Hinkley in the Statement but, as the Prime Minister has said, there is more to our relationship with China than Hinkley. She spoke to President Xi about the fact that we are reviewing the Hinkley deal because it is a complex, large-scale infrastructure project. It is only right that we look at the detail and consider all its component parts. The Prime Minister assured President Xi that a decision will be made in a timely manner.