Mark Tami
Main Page: Mark Tami (Labour - Alyn and Deeside)(11 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Mike Weatherley (Hove) (Con)
As someone who has witnessed first hand the long-lasting devastation of a nuclear accident at Chernobyl, where signs of contamination remain to this day—even affecting Cumbria, when the disaster struck 25 years ago and 1,200 miles away—I believe that nuclear should be an option of last resort on risk and environmental grounds alone. The debate is not about environmental risk but about price and the coalition commitment not to subsidise any new nuclear.
The set price under negotiation would guarantee income levels for companies generating electricity. In other words, should the market price fall below the set price, taxpayers will be responsible for footing the bill. The contracts envisaged are expected to last up to 35 years, so nuclear power companies would be immune to future changes in the market demand for their products.
EDF’s recent statement that it, like Centrica, might abandon its nuclear reactor construction plans if the Government fail to pledge an adequate minimum electricity price demonstrates the extent to which future nuclear plants will rely on taxpayer funding. That subsidy by any other name shifts the notoriously high economic risk from nuclear corporations to the consumer and will be presented to Parliament as a non-reviewable contract that is likely to be binding for decades. That outrageous deal, forged behind closed doors, directly contravenes our coalition commitment and wholly pre-empts the energy market reform legislation and the proper democratic process of parliamentary scrutiny.
I am a committed free marketeer as I believe that the free market is far and away the best method by which to allocate resources efficiently. Consumers should have the ultimate say on how products are delivered and at what price. I accept that the utopian free market ideal is sometimes not possible, especially when considering high-cost barriers to entry.
Mark Tami (Alyn and Deeside) (Lab)
The logic of the hon. Gentleman’s argument means that, if we leave it entirely to the free market, all we will build over the coming years will be gas turbines.
Mike Weatherley
The hon. Gentleman is entirely wrong, and I shall come on to the reasons for that later. Many alternatives from emerging markets must be considered, rather than the obsolete and declining markets.
We should try to keep as close to a free market as possible, whenever possible, rather than take the easy state intervention option. Indeed, my political hero, Sir Keith Joseph, emphasised that by saying that market competition
“contains within it the source of constant improvement”.
Any new subsidy to this mature market is an affront to that principle and will artificially restrict the growth and innovation of the sector in an age of feasible new green and renewable energy.
Paul Flynn
My hon. Friend, like my hon. Friend the Member for Hartlepool (Mr Wright), has a point of view. They have nuclear power stations and nuclear jobs in their constituencies, and naturally they have to fight for their constituents. One can understand the distortions of view that inevitably result from that.
The history of nuclear power has been a story of false dawns all my life. I can remember as a schoolboy going to an exhibition in Cardiff called “Atoms for Peace”. I remember ZETA, a fusion reactor that was going to produce electricity that was too cheap to warrant a meter. We had the steam-generating heavy water reactor, one of the worst civil investment decisions since the building of the pyramids—huge investment that produced nothing of value. Margaret Thatcher had plans to build 10 nuclear power stations, but only one was actually built. My party was seduced by the pied piper of nuclear power fairly recently.
Mark Tami
Let me put it on record that I do not have a nuclear power station in my area. Is it not the logic of my hon. Friend’s argument that instead of building a great new green generation of stations, this country will import electricity from abroad, probably from French nuclear power stations?
Paul Flynn
That is a very limited view of the history of the matter, which I will come to. As recently as 2007, however, my party took the view that nuclear was economically unattractive. That was in one of our manifestos. But an event took place in Downing street where there was a PowerPoint presentation to the then Prime Minister that said, “Mr Blair, there’s going to be a gap in our electricity supply because the advanced gas-cooled reactors are going to become obsolete and that will create a problem in a number of years that will have to be solved.” Within a year of the Labour Government changing their policy on nuclear power, having decided that what had been economically unattractive was okay, the life of the AGRs was lengthened and the gap had disappeared. The spin had taken place, and we were seduced into the view that nuclear was inevitable.
All parties, I believe, went into the last election with the promise that nuclear was acceptable if there were no subsidies, but where are we now? There are enormous subsidies. In 2008, I heard a debate in this House about the insurance costs for the Government of nuclear power. The most recent figure that we have for the cost of a nuclear accident is £200 billion for Chernobyl, and the taxpayer would have to pay that.
Dr Coffey
I will make more progress, but I will give way to the hon. Gentleman if I have time later.
In my view, despite those claims, support for new nuclear is not about subsidy, but about stability. A stable and open regulatory regime is vital to unlocking the potential benefits that energy investment, and particularly nuclear, can bring.
The first-round consultation for Sizewell C closed yesterday in my constituency. If it goes ahead, it will be immensely important for the local economy. It is estimated that new nuclear projects such as Sizewell C could boost our gross domestic product by up to £5 billion and create more than 30,000 jobs. Those will be highly skilled, well paid and high-value jobs. For example, an electrician working in the nuclear industry can probably earn the best part of £40,000 to £50,000, if not £60,000. That is not too different from MPs’ salaries.
Dr Coffey
The skills are transferable, even if people need specialist additions. The general investment in energy skills we are making is important, but the skills are transferable from renewable to nuclear, oil and gas. However, I recognise the hon. Gentleman’s point. The critical mass of employees needed for the construction and operation of the plants is vital to ensuring those high-value earnings.
New nuclear will be a global asset for this country. It could be an export market, whereas we currently import. It is therefore good that the Government are backing the nuclear sector, which is a major driver of growth in many ways. It is absolutely right that they are committed to making the UK the most attractive country in the world for nuclear investment. Hitachi has not signed a cheque yet, but has indicated its decision to invest £700 million in this country. Unfortunately, the inactivity in the UK under the previous Government means that a nuclear plant has not been completed in recent times, and we desperately need one.
There are many other advantages to new nuclear. For example, nuclear power is already a highly cost-effective option for energy projects. The annual report submitted to the Select Committee on Energy and Climate Change inquiry stated that nuclear power is the cheapest available generating technology over the lifetime of a plant, at an average of £74 per MWh. The Department of Energy and Climate Change estimates that projects starting in 2018 will generate energy for £64 per MWh. The range of possible costs is also the smallest for any generation type.
As I have said, the advantages of nuclear will be more than just economic—other advantages include the stability and security of supply. We will not be dependent on the wind or the sun, and nor will we need to rely on overseas places that might turn off the supply of oil, coal or gas. On the point eloquently made by my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South, carbon emissions are low for nuclear power plants—they emit 18 times less carbon over their lifetimes than coal-fired plants.
The hon. Member for Cheltenham referred to projects in France and Finland, but he should congratulate the Office for Nuclear Regulation on its thorough work on the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority. I understand that in France the design was not completely nailed down and permission was given more quickly than would have happened in this country. I am confident that there will be less opportunity for things to go wrong here. We have reduced the risk of the construction price, even if it has taken longer to get to this point. Hon. Members have discussed Centrica. I am not surprised, because the matter was trailed some time ago. It is a passive investor in the project, so I am not surprised that funds are being used elsewhere.
I am sure hon. Members from Cumbria share my disappointment that the county council overrode the district councils’ views, which supported the site. However, community benefits are important—rightly, because communities put up with disruption during the construction of nuclear power plants. I will not go into all the details of potential benefits for my constituency. There will be jobs, but there will also be significant disruption. It is important that my constituents are catered for and that the disruption is minimised, which is difficult. I am sure many hon. Members would agree with the idea of giving free electricity to people within a certain range of the nuclear power station, as happens in France. I am sure such a measure would be popular in parts of Suffolk.
There is a lot going for new nuclear. We have not rushed; no one can say we rushed the negotiations, which are ongoing. There would be more hon. Members in the Chamber, but the Energy Bill Committee is sitting. It is right that the Government are taking their time to ensure that the deal with EDF and other energy suppliers is balanced so that the taxpayer is not saddled with an unfair deal.
I commend the Government for the scrutiny they have proposed for contracts for difference. I mentioned the Bill and the parliamentary process. The Government have committed to putting the contracts to the House before and after Royal Assent. They will commission an external, independent view of the contracts and publish a summary of the report, plus a value-for-money assessment and a fairness opinion. The process is not rushed or opaque. I recommend that Members oppose the motion, but I will not press it to a Division.
Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)
I am very glad to have a few minutes to make a contribution to the debate. I apologise to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and to hon. Members because I could not be here at the beginning of the debate. I had made a prior commitment to a constituency engagement in a primary school ahead of Chinese new year.
I was brought up on the Welsh side of my family in north Wales. In the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s, nuclear power became popular in north Wales, because there was a power station to be built, which produced jobs in Meirionnydd that would not otherwise have existed. The power station gave both construction and nuclear power employment. I therefore understand why colleagues who have nuclear power stations in or near their constituencies become advocates for the cause. The hon. Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) made that case adequately.
I also understand the scientific appeal of modern nuclear technology. I looked around Sizewell before it was finished—it was the last reactor to be built. It was fantastically interesting, and I am excited by such modern technology. However, since I have been a Member of the House, every time the Liberal party and the Liberal Democrats reviewed energy policy, we have consistently concluded that there are very strong reasons for not going down the nuclear road. That is not for theological reasons but for rational reasons, which, in my view, are as strong now as ever.
Simon Hughes
I do not accept that. I was the Liberal Democrat shadow Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change in the previous Parliament—the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint) is now the Labour shadow Secretary of State. I therefore did not just speak in debates in the House but went round the country to look at offshore and onshore wind sites, the nuclear industry and so on. I am very clear that the Liberal Democrats have been enthusiastic supporters of both onshore and offshore wind power, and of tidal and solar power. The reality is that if we had had an integrated EU energy policy a long time ago that harnessed hydroelectric power from Scandinavia, solar power from the Mediterranean and other power sources—not least from countries such as Ireland and our own with fantastic wind and wave power—we would probably not be having this debate, because there would have been no question of going down the nuclear road as we would have our own energy sources shared around the continent. However, because we are not there, we import energy from abroad. We are having a debate about how to become self-reliant, and nuclear energy is back on the table.
The arguments for not going down the nuclear road are that it is hugely expensive and whatever the future might hold the past shows that nuclear power programmes have not been delivered on time or on budget around the world. Secondly, it has never been proved that we can deal with the waste in a secure and safe way indefinitely. There may be adequate, secure ways of holding waste in the short term, but there is no scientific evidence that there is a permanent way to ensure that waste can be held and then disposed of. One reason why the debate in Cumbria the other day went the way it did was that people have not been persuaded, even in areas where it brings a lot of jobs, that this is the sort of industry they want.
Mark Tami
I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman has been to Finland, but it has a waste solution that works. The problem is that those who are opposed to new nuclear build cling to the idea that there is no solution on waste, because they know that if they lose that argument, their case is lost.
Simon Hughes
I have been to Finland, though not to look at the waste issue. When I was party spokesperson, I went to Sellafield and had tours of the site. I am very happy to go to Finland again.
I was making the point that there are three strong arguments. I have made the arguments that on cost and on safety in the long term, nuclear does not work. Thirdly, it is the most depersonalised form of power in the world—there is no community control. It becomes the plaything and business of the few, rather than the energy of the many. It is not something that a community, village, town, city, region or country can control, but something that is developed and run internationally. We need to have control of our power sources, and the best way to achieve that is through renewables and energy that we produce and control ourselves.
The debate is about what we do now and what we ask the Government to do. The Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, who has been a friend of mine for many years, has an important responsibility. Our party kept its anti-nuclear position right up to the general election, and it was in our manifesto. When we negotiated the coalition agreement with the Tory party, which is pro-nuclear, with a few dissenters, obviously we had to come to a deal. We would have had to have the same conversation in negotiations with the Labour party, because it is overwhelmingly pro-nuclear too. It would not have been any different; it would have been the same. I guess that we would have had the same outcome and retained our anti-nuclear position as a party. The deal we were willing to do in Government was that we would let it go ahead if it was needed, provided there was no subsidy. When we voted on the plan there was, as my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Martin Horwood) said, an opt-out clause for Liberal Democrats and we did not vote in favour of the plan that included nuclear. The big question therefore remains: what is a subsidy?