Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how much was spent on the civil nuclear police force last year, and what is the budgeted expenditure on the force for each of the next four years.

The Civil Nuclear Constabulary is mostly funded by industry through arrangements for it to charge nuclear sites for provision of service to those sites, as set out in the Energy Act 2004.

The table below set out how much was spent on the force last year, via this mechanism:

The budgeted expenditure for future years is set out in the Civil Nuclear Police Authority’s Strategy and Business Plan 2016-2019 (copy attached).

Figures for 2019/20 are not provided because this is not yet forecast, given the current extent of the Civil Nuclear Police Authority’s business planning.

Some costs that are not for provision of service to nuclear sites cannot be charged to industry, and are covered by the Department of Energy and Climate Change. In 2015/16 that amount was £213,000. It is difficult to predict in advance which costs might not be rechargeable, therefore we do not have a forecast for costs for future years.

Similar information was provided in January 2016 in response to a House of Commons named day parliamentary question (reference: 22582), which asked what expenditure has been allocated to the Civil Nuclear Constabulary in (a) 2015-16, (b) 2016-17, (c) 2017-18, (d) 2018-19 and (e) 2019-20.

The figures given in answer to that question and the figures given and referred to here, show some variation. The reason for this variation is partly that the previous figures were based on indicative budgets whereas the figures given here are final budgets as approved by the Civil Nuclear Police Authority Board.