Lord Roper
Main Page: Lord Roper (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Lord O'Neill of Clackmannan
I have some sympathy with the remarks that have been made, which sets me at variance with my noble friend. When I was chairing the Trade and Industry Select Committee in the late 1990s, we went to Dounreay, which has been the subject of many investigations and problems. Had other colleagues been here, I am sure they would have be able to embellish this far more than I can. At Dounreay, there had quite clearly been a failure to scrutinise the safety arrangements on the part of what was then the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate. It is fair to say that that part of the inspectorate had pretty well gone native. Dounreay is in a very isolated part of the UK. You cannot go very much further north without getting wet. It is natural that everybody was living and working together, playing golf on the same golf courses, probably drinking in the same pubs and what have you. They came together.
An independent report had to be carried out. It was carried out and, as the Select Committee, we wanted to see it. We were told by the DTI Minister at the time, who I think was John Battle, that it would not be appropriate for a Select Committee to see it. The DTI was the sponsoring ministry. The Nuclear Installations Inspectorate was in those days, as it is now, sponsored by the equivalent of the DWP. It took the Secretary of State for Scotland, who had environmental responsibility for the area, to step in and say, “Publish and be damned”, so we got access to the report. In fact, it was not anything like as damning as people had anticipated, but it was essential that it was produced.
There is a danger in establishing this umbilical link between the sponsoring department and the functions. We have seen it in agriculture and food safety in the past. And we have taken strenuous steps to correct it, but there are still problems. In my experience, the nature of the nuclear industry is such that it is a secretive industry. It grew out of the production of weapons-grade material for nuclear weapons. While it is now under commercial control in a number of respects, it nevertheless still has a culture of understandable secrecy, partly because of what would be regarded as security but also because it is so damn dangerous. The truth is that because of the way in which in the industry is handled, the dangers are minimal.
The culture of the industry is determined not only by security but by safety. At times, there is a sense in which the industry is covering its own back as well as trying to protect people. That is natural. Even today nuclear installations are for the most part in relatively isolated, secluded areas. It is common knowledge that Sellafield was chosen during the war because it was most unlikely that German bombers would ever be able to find the place because it is shrouded in mist and it is likely to be raining all the time, hence the Lake District. In those days, it was just a weapons store.
The industry has a security culture and a culture that is understandably and correctly preoccupied with safety, but it is also at times unduly linked to matters of secrecy where safety can be jeopardised. In my limited experience, I confronted a situation where there had been regrettable failures at Dounreay, which have now been corrected. The report on that was nothing like as condemnatory as people thought it would be but there was reluctance to have it published. It took an independent agency, the Scottish Office, and the late Donald Dewar as Secretary of State—who made it quite clear that he saw no reason why we should not have access to it—for us to get the report. I remember that we got a faxed copy of it as we got off the plane in Caithness. The clerk had summarised it by the time we got to Dounreay and we were able to make use of it when we were questioning officials.
There is a danger in creating too close a link between the ministry and this function. It is important that we discuss it and have it aired but I would like to think that we do not go any further with it because there are too many examples of departments looking after their own too carefully. The ONR took a long time to come about. It should really have been in the previous Energy Bill but in those days the DWP and DECC were arm wrestling over it. It was a turf war. The compromise was that they would let it go as long as they had a control over it. The DWP conceded a bit and held a bit and we just have to accept that that is the way in which the matter was agreed. For the reasons I have given, it would be desirable for us to leave it to the DWP rather than having a sponsoring department that might take an overprotective view of what could be at stake here, which could be very serious.
Lord Roper
My Lords, when I heard the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, introduce this amendment I had a good deal of sympathy with it. It seemed strange that we should be losing contact with something of such importance but having heard the last three speeches, I see the strength of the points made by my noble friends Lord Jenkin and Lord Deben and by the noble Lord, Lord O’Neill. I hope that on this occasion the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, will think carefully about this amendment.
Lord Whitty
My Lords, before the Minister replies, perhaps I might point out that most of this debate has been about a sponsoring department. I regret making what was a throw-away remark as a background to this, because none of my amendments attempt to or could reassign sponsorship responsibility from one department to another. It is entirely a matter for the Prime Minister. It is not a matter for regulation. I hope the Minister will deal with the amendments on their merits because there is clearly an overwhelming view in this Room on the matter of sponsorship. I am certainly not pursuing that today.
Lord Roper
I welcome what the Minister said about considering between now and Report the Delegated Powers Committee report on how these regulations are made for the first time. It is important that that is done and I hope she will give us some indication—perhaps in the reply which the Government will make to the committee’s report—of what is to be done on that matter. We will otherwise need to come back to this matter on Report.
Lord Whitty
My Lords, I join the noble Lord in welcoming what the Minister said. It is important that the Government give a clear response before Report to the Delegated Powers Committee’s recommendations, which affect powers under three important clauses in this section.
I appreciate the Minister’s reassurances and that she is going to give me a picture of how all this operates and who relates to whom. I should have started with that before I began drafting amendments for this complex part of the Bill. I thank noble Lords who have spoken and who, by and large, were not in support of writing much into the Bill.
I have largely dealt with the issue of relations with DECC on sponsorship. However, for the sake of historical accuracy I should say that the Health and Safety Executive and its predecessor bodies, such as the nuclear inspectorate and the Safety in Mind organisation, have frequently been in the same department as the sponsoring department for all or part of their activities. That may be tidied up by banging it into a department which has little responsibility for the industry, and that may be the right place. However, I reiterate that my amendments do not seek to change the sponsorship role but to create an important relationship between ONR and DECC. The two points at which I have inserted them relate to the nuclear security and nuclear safeguards areas, which are also covered by international obligations—and the department negotiating on international obligations, along with the FCO, will be DECC.
Clearly, the Committee’s view is that we should accept the status quo, and I will withdraw any implication that I or the Labour Party will not stick with the status quo. Without wishing to upset the general sponsorship arrangements, there is an issue of whether the legislation should at least at some point reflect the relationship with DECC as well. This is not to compromise the independence of the ONR, which is clearly set out in the early parts of this section of the Bill. I would not want to do anything to jeopardise that for the reasons that the noble Lord, Lord Deben, and others have spelled out.
As to the other regulatory bodies, I will look at the map or picture and see whether I need to come back on any specifics. However, Clause 84 refers to the co-operation between ONR and the HSE, for obvious reasons. Will the Minister look at that clause—she has no obligation to respond to this—and consider whether there should be a general requirement to co-operate with the other bodies operating within the nuclear area, without going through the specifics of my individual amendments? With that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Baroness Verma
My Lords, I am extremely grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, for allowing me an opportunity to clarify some of the points he has just raised. Amendment 38R, when read with Amendment 38Q, as the noble Lord rightly said, seeks to limit the indicative list in Schedule 6 so that it can make reference only to nuclear regulations, including provision to restrict employment on the basis of qualifications or experience. The reason that broader provision has been included in the Schedule is that nuclear regulations may need to specify situations where individuals cannot do certain jobs—for example, pregnant women working at greater risk from ionising radiations, or restrictions on employment for certain types of person for security-critical posts. While Schedule 6 is only an indicative list, it would be a retrograde step to remove the examples in paragraphs 10(a) and (b).
Amendment 38V in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, seeks to remove the explicit provision in the Bill stating that the ONR is not a Crown body and that its property is not property of the Crown. The decision to include specific provision in the Bill to establish the ONR as a body outside the Crown was not made lightly. It is, however, integral to the policy of creating a more independent, flexible and efficient regulator. Most notably, the position of the ONR outside the Crown enables its staff not to be classified as civil servants. Recruiting and retaining skilled specialists is crucial for the ongoing effectiveness of ONR and Civil Service restrictions on pay and recruitment pose a serious risk to this.
Clause 76 includes a power for ONR to provide training which relates to its purposes. For example, if new regulations were brought in, it might be appropriate for ONR to provide training to duty holders on new requirements. Alternatively, if ONR has access to certain safety or security expertise of limited supply on the open market, it might be appropriate to make best use of this by offering training to up-skill the regulated community. Amendment 40H seeks to make this power a duty. While the provision of training by the ONR might be a useful and effective tool to promote safety or security, it is not a core function of the ONR. By making this a duty, it could divert valuable resource away from its core regulatory functions. Amendment 40J seeks to ensure that the ONR carries out only appropriate and relevant training. The ONR’s power to provide training is already limited to its purposes; therefore, I am confident that the Bill already focuses sufficiently on the ONR’s role in this area.
Finally, Amendment 40P seeks to protect ONR staff’s continuous service should they move in and out of the Civil Service. I reassure the noble Lord that pension rights of ONR staff will be preserved under existing provisions in the Bill, and I refer him to paragraph 15 of Schedule 7. As for preserving their seniority, I am reliably informed that civil servants are appointed on their skills and experience and that an official record of their continuous service is not retained for this purpose.
I hope that the noble Lord has found my explanation helpful and will accordingly agree to withdraw his amendments.
Lord Roper
My Lords, could the Minister give assurances that, on the references in Clauses 68, 80 and 104, the reports of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee will be looked at very carefully by the department and that she will be able to give us some assurance fairly soon? Otherwise, those are matters to which we will want to come back on Report.
Baroness Verma
My Lords, as I said earlier, of course, I am doing my level best to ensure that the Committee gets the information. We are considering very carefully what the committee laid out.