§ 2. Joan Ruddock (Lewisham, Deptford)If she will make a statement on the energy review published by the performance and innovation unit. [37994]
§ The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Margaret Beckett)I welcome the review as a valuable contribution to the debate on how best to help the UK move towards a low-carbon economy in response to our internationally agreed climate change goals. It is too early for the Government to have reached a view on all the review's many recommendations, but we will consider them very carefully. As has been announced by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, we will hold a full public consultation leading to the publication of a White Paper later this year.
§ Joan RuddockI thank my right hon. Friend for her reply. As Government investment in renewables is running at about £100 million a year and in energy conservation at about £200 million year, and as her estimates of the costs of cleaning up nuclear waste from the nuclear programme suggest that they will be £85 billion, will she tell her colleagues in the Department of Trade and Industry that greater political will and more investment in energy conservation and renewables could enable us to meet any perceived energy gap, and that the environmental imperative is to say no to any new nuclear capacity?
§ Margaret BeckettAs my hon. Friend rightly says, the Government are committed to making much more substantial investment in renewables than in the past and to investment in energy conservation. We fully recognise the enormous contribution that those steps can make towards helping us to meet our climate change obligations. My Department has instigated a thorough consultation on the handling and treatment of radioactive waste. The Government are alive to the importance of these difficult and different issues and keen to stimulate public consultation and debate.
§ Mr. Michael Jack (Fylde)The Secretary of State will be aware of the potential benefits to UK agriculture of renewable energy crops, but the problem is that power stations capable of using those crops are few and far between. What negotiations is her Department conducting with generators to increase the number of those units, and 403 what input is she having into the rewriting of electricity trading arrangements to favour electricity generation from such sources?
§ Margaret BeckettElectricity trading arrangements are the subject of wider discussions with my colleagues in the Department of Trade and Industry. Fuel crops offer considerable potential and they will be considered as part of the Government's discussions on our forward strategy for agriculture as a whole.
§ Dr. Jack Cunningham (Copeland)Is not it odd that on the very day that the Government's chief scientific adviser has called for a nuclear power building programme, and given that the Government are not only failing to meet their CO2 reduction objectives under Kyoto, but will have no chance of doing so if we remove the contribution to electricity generation that is made by nuclear power—
§ Joan RuddockI am not suggesting removing existing nuclear power.
§ Dr. CunninghamWill my hon. Friend stop making sedentary interventions and keep quiet for a moment?
As the performance and innovation unit report makes it clear that we should keep the nuclear option open, does my right hon. Friend accept that it is about time we faced the reality that however big the renewables programme—I support a big programme—we will not be able to provide the electricity for an advanced industrial economy without a contribution from nuclear power?
§ Margaret BeckettMy right hon. Friend is correct to say that the review suggests that we should keep open the option on nuclear power, although it did not make concrete proposals about the steps that we should take. The Government are carefully considering the recommendations in the review and will make proposals for consultation in the near future.
§ Mr. Peter Ainsworth (East Surrey)Will the Secretary of State answer the question put by the right hon. Member for Copeland (Dr. Cunningham)? Does she agree with Professor David King that the UK needs to reinvest in nuclear power, with the backing of a substantial Government financial package?
§ Margaret BeckettI have not had the opportunity to study what Professor King is reported to have said, and I would wish to do so before I commented on it. All I can say is that the review recommended that the Government keep an open mind on the future use of nuclear power. As chief scientific adviser, Professor King is of course free to make his views known.
§ Mr. Bob Blizzard (Waveney)If we are fully to develop renewable sources of energy, will my right hon. Friend tell the environmental and other groups that come to see her not to oppose offshore wind farms? Although they want renewable energy, many of those groups have blocked wind farms in the countryside. As the windiest 404 country in Europe, it would be a disaster if our huge potential for developing offshore wind power were to be thwarted by the activities of those groups.
§ Margaret BeckettI know that my hon. Friend shares the view of many in the House that many of those groups make a useful contribution to the debate, but he is also right to say that there can be a worrying tendency to a degree of inconsistency among them when it comes to concrete proposals. Everyone who wishes to see the greater development of a programme for renewables—I think that includes most hon. Members—must recognise that none of these issues is problem free.