ATOMIC POWER WORKS SITES

HL Deb 13 March 1957 vol 202 cc524-62

3.13 p.m.

LORD LAWSON rose to call attention to the siting of atomic power works, as well as matters arising from such siting; and to move for Papers. The noble Lord said: My Lords, in moving the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper, I want to make it clear, in view of some of the stronger things I may have to say during my speech, that I am second to none in appreciation of the work of the Atomic Energy Authority and of the men who have been called upon to act on the decision of the Government to apply atomic energy for peaceful purposes. I put down this Motion for discussion to-day because I have felt for some time that decisions were being taken by the Authority which made it look very much as though the servant of Parliament was in danger of becoming master. When I first heard of the decision taken to site atomic power stations in what are called the more remote areas of the country, I was surprised because some of the sites run counter to an Act of Parliament the National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act. I should like your Lordships to recall for a moment the conditions under which that Act was passed. There are those who think that anyone who raises the question of national parks is a faddist, but such people could not have been present, either in your Lordships' House or in another place, to see the spirit with which that Act was passed. It could be said that there was no Party in the State upon that occasion. Everyone made a contribution with an enthusiasm and a warmth of feeling that is not often seen.

I was also surprised to lied that the Authority had decided against siting any of the stations in what are known as built-up areas—by which I mean built-up industrial areas, such as those parts of the country where coal mining, heavy engineering and steel-making are concentrated. Until some other decision is taken, it means that those areas have to be ruled out so far as atomic power stations are concerned. That is a very serious decision. One of the new stations is to be sited in Somerset. It is usually assumed, in siting these stations in remote areas, that industry will riot gather around them. If that is the view, I cannot think that it is built upon the experience of industrial development in this country. For wherever these productive stations (excepting the experimental stations, of course) are built, roads have to be made and the whole layout of the area has to be altered; and such new roads will reach out to the existing main roads, to the sea and to the railways. In addition, following the re-rating of industry, roads will play an even more important part in the matter. I cannot see industrial organisations overlooking these new areas for the purpose of establishing industry.

I say that, and what I have said about built-up areas, because I happen to live in one of the areas which in a number of years might be affected by this decision. It is well known that in a few decades—it may be one or two—the coalfield in the West of Durham, which has been going for well over a century, will be depleted. It is well known, too, that usually more than half the men from closed mines do not go into other mines, because those other mines, as a rule, want only face men, the maintenance men being already there. I want to emphasise that fact, because it means that, if industrial growth is going to be affected by this decision, men will have to be moved in whole communities to another part of the country. I do not wish to over-emphasise that side of the matter, but I have lived long enough under conditions of unemployment and depression, and have seen the woe of it to such an extent, that I think I should be lacking in my duty if I did not point out to the Atomic Energy Authority the danger of the results of such a decision as they have taken. It was probably taken in innocence, but it must be obvious to your Lordships that a decision of this kind is side-tracking the Distribution of Industry Act. I hope the noble Lord, Lord Mills, will take particular note of that point.

In this matter, as with the National Parks Act, it seems to me that the Authority have taken decisions which, if they had given full thought to the results of their work, ought to have been considered by Parliament, since two outstanding Acts are affected, before any decision was taken. We are told that some of these sites for power have been chosen for the purpose of supplying electric power for the grid. When the noble Lord, Lord Mills, was reading out the statement containing the latest decision last week, I was so ignorant about these things (one reason why Parliament is hesitant about dealing with these matters is because atomic energy is a subject of its own, with term; of its own; and even those familiar with industry hesitate to handle a subject like this) that I nearly asked him what a megawatt was. I did not ask him, because I thought I might not understand it if he explained it—that is, if he could explain it.

These proposals, then, affect two outstanding Acts of Parliament. Your Lordships will remember that after the war, and following the grave state of affairs that lasted for many years, particularly in the coalfields, Parliament passed the Distribution of Industry Act which made it possible, to some extent, to direct industry into areas where it was needed, according to the requirements of the population. As a result of the passing of that Act, in some cases industry has been directed to industrial estates, with great advantage. I should have thought it quite impossible to turn some of the places in South-West Durham into such seemly looking places as they have become. Pit heaps have been levelled, and trees have been planted. In taking the decision they have taken, it seems to me that the Atomic Energy Authority have, of their own accord, by siting stations far in the South, taken steps to side-track the effects of that Act. I do not want to over-emphasise that, but it seems to me that that is going to be the effect of it.

When power stations are constructed for carrying electricity into the grid, one of the things that puzzles me—I may be wrong about this—is that electricity should be carried over endless miles of the country, over areas where there is no industry, almost making a new ceiling for the country, merely because it is going into the grid. It does seem that in some places the site might have been nearer to where the power was required. I feel that that is a matter worthy of consideration. I want to ask the noble Lord whether he will give an answer to these two questions. I want to ask him whether, in principle, national parks and areas of outstanding national beauty will be avoided when choosing sites for atomic energy generating stations; secondly, whether the Electricity Authority will consult with the National Parks Commission at the earliest stage of their exploration for sites, in view of the duty laid by Parliament upon the National Parks Commission to attend to the protection of the landscape, not only in national parks, but in the countryside generally.

I have described the spirit and temper in which this Act was passed. But there is a remarkable thing about this country which has struck me continually over the last few years. This country was the centre of the great world industrial revolution; we were the very core of that upheaval. It did things with the areas. One of the most impressive things I have read has been of people who have seen their districts built up become blackened and fouled. They have gone back looking for the fields where they used to play as boys and girls. One of the striking things about this country is that, in spite of two centuries of industrial revolution, we have areas left in the country which are still in a state of nature in which they have been for centuries. That is a very striking thing, and it is a good thing that the nation should have those places to which to resort after long months of work.

As a matter of fact, I never argue questions of the beauty of scenery as a matter of taste; I argue them as a necessity of the mind, because as one who was born within sight of sea and mountains, and spent years in beautiful country, I have never forgotten being taken into a great mining area, with long streets and grim outlook, remaining there for years and then, in middle life, leaving it and going to another area in another county where there were open spaces, green trees and all that was fine and beautiful. I have never forgotten the effect of that upon my own personality. I say that that is the standard. It is a good thing for this nation that it has places that have been saved and set apart. I hope that those areas will not be covered with endless wires, and that the sites of these stations are not going to become the scene of surrounding industries so that people who have suffered in the past will, because of decisions taken by the Authority, once more have to move en masse, breaking up great communities and destroying some of the finest communal spirits in the land. I beg to move for Papers.

3.35 p.m.

LORD REA

My Lords, the wording of this Motion makes it clear that, although the question of the siting of atomic plants can be covered in the debate which we are to have next week on the general development of the nuclear production system in general, the reverse does not apply, and we are to-day confined to the question of siting as such and must refrain from roaming over the wider and deeper subject of ethics and survival which, of course, are innate in any analysis of the general position at which we have now arrived in what I think used to be called civilisation. Yet it is the survival of our dwindling amenities in this country and the ethics of spiritual refreshment without which mankind cannot live, as the noble Lord has just pointed out, which are the essence of the matter before your Lordships to-day.

The fact that Her Majesty's Government are constantly assailed from this side of the House to give more sympathetic attention and more active implementation to saving the countryside from further spoliation, does not, of course, mean that Ministers are not, at heart, on the side of the angels. Angels, I believe, are notoriously non-Party; and whatever Government is in power it will always have the uneasy and the unenviable responsibility of trying to draw that difficult line between the rival claims of materialism and idealism, in the broad sense, or between prettiness and prosperity in the narrow sense. What "prosperity" is to-day I find it difficult to define. It seems to be attached almost entirely to money. I suppose it is trying to get £10 where our grandfathers got £1, and finding that we have got less value for it in the end.

Governments, as we know, are always wicked, but it is art least to the credit of recent Governments, and, if I may say so, to recent Oppositions, that modern legislation has produced such enlightened Acts as the Town and Country Planning Act, the National Parks Act, and others, all of which take a realistic grip of the problem of trying to meet the calls of commercial urgency while refusing—I thing "refusing" is the right word—to allow the community to commit aesthetic suicide. We have been fortunate in the Ministers who have filled responsible posts in these various places, and I hope I may be allowed to pay a passing compliment to the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, who is not in his place at the moment, for the fine example and standard he set for his successors in the Ministry of Town mid Country Planning. To-day, we have a new Minister of Power—in fact, the Ministry itself is new in that description—Lord Mills, who, if I may be allowed to say so, in his recent reception in your Lordships' House of various questions, suggestions and doubts has shown a remarkable, even an unusual, receptivity and sympathy in not just brushing aside our anxieties as the inevitable and irritating posturing of cranks and wild men of the hills. We are grateful to him for taking that attitude.

It is customary to disclose any interest in the matters we discuss in your Lordships' House. Mine is jot a financial interest, but I have in a sense an interest, because it so happens that my family have lived for a long time just above and below the position of the Yeoman Farmer, in the Western part of the Lake District near where Calder Hall atomic station has recently been built. With the advent of modern transport and of the tourist trade, which now so properly allows those hitherto cooped up in the industrial areas to visit and enjoy the natural beauties of our countryside, there has been developed in that part of the Lake District—more in the central and eastern areas—an exploitation of that part which is easy of access and certain parts are, in the summer time at least, given over to those characteristics which we think of in connection with Blackpool, Margate and Southend.

But there remained the remote fells and dales between the highest mountains and tile coast of the Irish Sea to the West, where the only link-up—tie cherished only link-up—was by stout boots and stout hearts, from the time of the Roman garrisons right up to to-day. That is where Calder Hall station has been erected. There are very few parts of our countryside left with their tradition and heritage, and to-day I think these are being rather disastrously impinged upon by the sprawling new atomic factories and the mushroom growth of villas and council houses and cinemas which inevitably must accompany them in the suburbia of what is called "development". As I have said, my interest in that area is a double one I have an interest in "the other side" which I know the noble Lord, Lord Lawson, will understand. It is not so long ago—it is well within living memory—that West Cumberland, particularly North-West Cumberland, which is definitely an industrial and mining district (I believe that is where the noble Lord, Lord Lawson, first saw the light of day) was one of the most desperately depressed areas in the whole of our kingdom. Thanks to a fine effort of organisation and planning, in which thy: noble Lord, Lord Adams, has taken a notable part, that now is in a most flourishing state, with a microscopic unemployment figure of which any area would be proud.

Has the advent of the Calder Hall station had any bearing on that? I think, quite frankly, that it has. But at the same time I cannot help feeling that if Calder Hall station had been sited in what was then the depressed area, the area of slag heaps arid of dying collieries and of bad slums ready to be cleared—an area only a few miles north of where it is now situated in the beauty area which it now defiles or ornaments, as you choose —if it had replaced an old ugliness instead of being a new trespass on natural beauty, then it would have been of far greater value to the future of our country.

The damage there—if your Lordships would agree with me that it is damage—has been done. But are we to accept without further protest the many proposals that there are—and I suppose there will be many more—for new sites in the few remaining coastal areas which still can offer us a degree of invaluable remoteness and the beauty of solitude? I feel convinced (this is rather a different point) that those in the Ministries and municipal bodies who have the responsibility of granting or withholding the necessary planning authority are very frequently, if not almost invariably, placed in a most difficult position, because I think that they find that the various aspects of the projects which have been put to them have been worked out rather in private, sub rosa, before they come before the Ministry officials. Possible objections have been anticipated and perhaps by private arrangement overruled or in some way removed or made impossible to sustain. The project is, therefore, submitted almost as a fait accompli so far as the permissive element is concerned; and the planning authority finds it very difficult at that stage to delay or to make arrangements for the proper hearing of such valid objections as there may be.

Meanwhile the amenity bodies, the local interests and sometimes even the actual owners of the property concerned, are totally ignorant of what has been going on until it is too late; until the secret and private plotting has achieved a momentum which makes the outcome inevitable. I do not like secret and private plotting. I do not like a position where the "little man"—because, after all, the objectors to urban development in the rural areas are almost invariably "little men"—is suddenly confronted with, and crushed by, a plot secretly contrived just to brush him aside. I am not for a moment accusing the Minister or any of his predecessors or any Department of being a party to this sort of thing, but I feel that somehow it does go on, even though it may not be approved of, and I am convinced that it should not be allowed to continue.

There is one aspect which I think is a little disturbing, and that is that the Atomic Energy Authority seems at times to be rather impervious to the natural resentment which is so often, and must be, engendered in the locality concerned with their planning. I have been told on good authority, and I believe, that when the Authority decided last summer to build a research station on Winfrith Heath in Dorset, they even suggested that Dorset should feel honoured and that the influx of hundreds of scientists would confer on the town of Dorchester something of the status of a university city. I make no comment on the validity of that rather curious argument, but those of your Lordships who happen to know Dorchester as it is—a country town of great character, charm and rusticity—will perhaps wonder why it should be expected to be pleased at completely changing its personality. And those of your Lordships who happen to know Winfrith Heath, the proposed site, as the "Egdon Heath" of Thomas Hardy's Return of the Native, are aware of its completely rural character and rural economy, adjoining as it does one of the most beautiful and cherished parts of the National Parks area. I believe that at the time the site was chosen there were available sites in Wales where labour was available and men were wanting employment. Wales wanted the station, Dorset did not want it, but, for some reason, the wishes of the people were ignored—perhaps for some good reason—and Dorset was chosen. I am sure the reason was a very good one if the noble Lord had anything to do with it.

THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY)

The noble Lord is wrong in saying that the wishes of the people were ignored. There was an enormous majority of the county council in favour of it

LORD REA

I am much obliged to the noble Marquess. I must have been misinformed. I think there is quite a large body of opinion of the reverse way of thought. The same sort of thing is happening again in the precincts of the historic 14th century Berkeley Castle, in Gloucestershire, and at Inkley Point, in Somerset, which is one of the rare stretches of our coast still at present left unspoilt. Is it really necessary to insist upon a site close to the sea or to a river estuary? There may be some technical necessity, but, if it is necessary, must such sites always be virgin unspoiled sites? Is it not quite natural and proper to imagine that these new sources of great power should be sited within the industrial areas which they are chiefly to serve? Of course, there may arise there the question of waste matter which, I am sure, is a problem still to be solved. I should say here, in parenthesis, that I hope that sonic international convention will get together about the very difficult problem of dealing with waste atomic matter, which is, I am sure, a grave problem.

Finally, there are just two questions I should like to put to the Minister. First, is it true, or is it not true, that a ponder-able element of risk exists and takes a high place in the list of considerations in selecting a site? In other words, is Calder Hall, for example, sited in a remote and very sparsely populated area—which, of course, derived its charm hitherto from being remote and sparsely populated—because there is the real risk of a disaster which might cause death or great harm over a wide surrounding area? Is that, in fact, why I and my few neighbours are selected for possible obliteration rather than the thickly populated industrial district a few miles north of the beauties of the Lake District? If so, the procedure is quite understandable and may be tenable. But we should all like to know, and I suggest that it is now time to make this disclosure without fear of causing any panic, what is the real element in the choice of site. We realise that we are now in a nuclear age and we have to take our risks.

Secondly, may I just repeat my request that the inevitable obsolescence of these great power stations should be borne well in mind? They are bound to become cut of date in time, in, I think, the not too distant future. I do not ask the Minister to gaze into any crystal ball about the future. But if we are going to put up these huge edifices, many of them admittedly of great architectural merit and of an impressiveness comparable with Blake's "Dark Satanic mills", can we not avoid placing them where they are quite out of character, where they change a country scene into an industrial scene, and where, in later years, when we have learned more about atomic and nuclear production, as we are learning daily, their crumbling corpses will mark nothing except one more robbery from the people of the places of spiritual refreshment and of natural beauty which are dwindling in number, one by one, towards a point when "England's green and pleasant land" will simply cease to exist?

3.51 p.m.

LORD HYLTON

My Lords, we are indebted to the noble Lord, Lord Lawson, for putting down this Motion to-day. The last time I met him on a public occasion was across a table, when we were discussing the merits and demerits of a certain national park. At the end of that discussion Lord Lawson said that I had disappointed him very much. I hope that he will not feel that I disappoint Aim so much at the end of this discussion today. I think the two points that he put to the Minister are quite material, and I look forward with interest to the reply which he will no doubt receive.

I should like to refer briefly to a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Rea. He made some play of the tact that the public—I take it he mean the general public—were rather ignored or brushed aside when these proposals for the siting of new atomic stations were made. During the last five months or so I have had the benefit of conferring on several occasions with the Central Electricity Authority on this particular question, the siting of a new atomic station—the nuclear reactor atomic station at Bridgwater Bay. I am bound to say that, to the best of their ability, the Central Electricity Authority have made public their proposals to all the local authorities in the area concerned, as well as to the county councils. It is true that conferring with local authorities is not conferring with the general public, and I believe that there is a stage when the general public should be directly brought into the picture. I propose to refer to that matter in a moment.

As I understand it, there are four factors—I do not wish to depart at all from the small or individual question of siting a power station—that condition the siting of these stations, and I think I should read them out. This information has been given to me personally, as chairman of a county planning committee, by the Central Electricity Authority. The first point is proximity to areas where there is a demand for electricity that is not already satisfied by local generation, and where generation from coal would be costly owing to the distance from the coal field. The second factor is that the foundations suitable for supporting unusually heavy weights and shields—that refers to the reactor itself—must be available. That is not the case everywhere. The third factor is access to large volumes of cold water for condenser cooling. The figure given to us is 25 million gallons of cold water per hour. This is abstracted from the sea or from the river estuary, and is returned to the sea or to the river heated to a temperature of 15 degrees above the normal sea temperature.

The final consideration, which is of course a point that gives rise to great difficulty, is that the area must have low population density. That is necessary because of the Government's policy to site these stations at a distance from centres of population until more experience of safe operation has been obtained. Of course, there is a proviso there, but it has no great efficiency: if the station has already been built you cannot take it down again if it is found subsequently that it is perfectly safe. Those are the four factors, and I think they have conditioned the siting of the Bradwell station in Essex, that at Berkeley, in Gloucestershire, and the proposed new station at Bridgwater Bay.

I should like now to say one thing about the size of these stations, because they are bigger than anything that has yet been seen, except in very small areas of the country. The main reactor stations are 150 feet high and their chimneys are 50 feet beyond that. The turbine houses are from 80 to 50 feet high, and in the case of the Bridgwater Bay station, which is of the Calder Hall type—that is to say, it consists of twin reactors, with a turbine house, switching gear and so on—it is estimated that if that station is built, and takes five years to build, and, furthermore, if it is duplicated at the end of five years (which is what understand now is likely to occur), the buildings themselves, with the necessary gaps between them, will occupy no less than one-third of a mile of the coast. That will be a continuous line of buildings with, as I say, the necessary gaps in between. Your Lordships must visualise one-third of a mile of coastline occupied by what is called a double Calder Hall installation.

I understand that at the present time there is no possibility of generating the power required by the country from smaller types of reactors. I think that was stated only as lately as yesterday, and has appeared in the Press to-day. So the Calder Hall type holds the field, and on that basis your Lordships will see that these stations will occupy great lengths of the coastline; they will be very high—from 150 feet high to 80 feet high—and, of course, utterly out of scale with anything yet erected in those districts. That may well be the price that will have to be paid for providing the extra power which indubitably is required by the nation at the end of 1965.

From the Government's statement, and from other sources, I think it is perfectly clear that the requirements of power are increasing, and will increase; and in the year 1965 they will represent a demand for no less than an additional 17 million tons of coal a year, which will not be forthcoming. That gap will have to be filled by the provision of atomic power, aided by a certain amount of power produced by oil-firing.

There are further additions to these stations, the most important of them being the transmission lines taking the power to the national grid. I understand that the pylons required are about 135 feet high and will cover great distances across what we now understand to be rural England. I believe that the greatest care on the part of the Central Electricity Authority will be required in siting these main transmission lines. Pylons 135 feet high are very considerable structures, and they may have to pass near, or through, areas of great beauty, not to speak of national parks and similar outstanding areas of national beauty. They will very likely have to pass close to great cities such as Oxford or Winchester. I believe that where such lines pass within sight of these cities and areas of country that Should be preserved there is a case to be made for taking them underground.

There are, of course, consequential developments, such as housing for employees and engineers working at the sites. This is a comparatively small item, because I understand that not more than 300 engineers are required to work each atomic station. Labour camps are required to house between 2,000 and 3,000 men for the construction of each individual atomic power station, and these will be in operation for five years in the case of a single power station. In addition to the extra cost that may be required to place certain sections of transmission lines underground, I believe that there is a case for expenditure in excess of that required for the construction of the station itself, in preserving or trying to preserve, or, at any rate, trying not to diminish, the local and natural beauties of the site itself.

We understand from the Central Electricity Authority that they are prepared to spend a certain amount of money in diminishing the effects of their development upon the natural scenery, but that may not go far enough, because in certain cases (I have in mind the case of Bridgwater Bay, in particular) it is possible, by moving the site itself slightly in one direction, to gain the cover from certain low ridges of hills, and thereby to conceal, to some extent, the, great bulk of the buildings. That would cost money, and I believe that in the particular case which I am quoting the cost would be between 2 per cent. and 3 per cent. of the total expenditure on a twin station. I understand that the cost of one station is somewhere about £40 million, and as two stations therefore would cost about £80 million, I believe that to move those installations slightly might cost up to about £2 million. That is no small sum.

It would be interesting to know who is going to advise the Minister on points of this kind: whether the Minister of Power will be the judge in the cause of the Central Electricity Authority on how much additional money can be spent on improving the siring of these stations; whether the Minister of Housing and Local Government will assist the Minister of Power in this rather difficult decision; or whether either or both Ministers will call to their assistance some outside body, perhaps the Council for the Preservation of Rural England or the National Parks Commission, or one of the other amenity societies who deal with these matters. I believe both points to be important, because, as has been said by the noble Lords, Lord Rea and Lord Lawson, these areas of isolated coastline and of rural districts are diminishing day by day. There is a diminishing amount of land not occupied by industry of one kind or another. One million visitors come to this country every year to see Great Britain. We may be doing ourselves great harm if vie allow the few remaining rural districts to be diminished in their attractions, not only to those who live in the district but to those who come to visit it.

Finally, may I say one thing about the general public in these matters. The point has already been referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Rea, and I believe is one of great importance. Under the procedure of the Town and Country Planning Act, 1947, every county in England, Scotland and Wales bad to produce a county development plan. All these plans have now been passed. Before transmission to the Minister of Housing and Local Government, a long and intricate public inquiry had to be held into the provisions of the plan, and at these inquiries any member of the public could raise objections and could cross-examine county planning officials and various urban and local authorities as to the provisions of the plan; they had a statutory right so to do. I hold that to be extremely important.

When it comes to the proposals by the Central Electricity Authority, which is a statutory body, we find a completely different picture. The Central Electricity Authority apply to the Minister of Power for permission to develop. The Minister grants it or does not grant it, subject to one thing, as I understand he matter—I am sure the Minister will correct me if I am wrong—that is, that the local planning authority have to make observations on a printed form to the Minister of Housing and Local Government as to the proposal. And the local planning authority are allowed to include in the observations they make to the Minister the conditions they wish to impose. I take it that the two Ministers then confer, and decide whether a local inquiry shall be held or not. But that is quite different from the procedure that ha; to be gone through when a county development plan is made.

I ask your Lordships to observe that these proposals for atomic power stations, so far as I can see, cut entirely across the provisions of the county development plans, because when the county development plans were made, these limited areas by the coast, or partly on the Severn river, were, to the best of my knowledge, in all cases designated as agricultural land. But here we have these tremendous deviations from the county development plans which in some cases have been approved by the Minister. Yet there is no right to have a public inquiry. A public inquiry can be held only if one or other, or both Ministers agree.

Many individuals may be adversely affected by the placing of an atomic reactor station on what may well be their doorsteps. Many retired people have bought small houses, and possibly also fields, in attractive and remote agricultural districts by the sea. Perhaps they intended to spend their retirement there in old age, or to educate their children, or, possibly, to carry out market gardening or farming operations of one sort or another. Suddenly, they find that an atomic power station is placed within a few hundred yards of these houses in these remote places which they have bought for their personal reasons. I believe that in all such cases it is essential that a public inquiry should be held. Then there are people who have bought small premises for tea-houses, or for recreational purposes, close to the seaside. It is, I am sure, well known to your Lordships that the seaside is occupied mainly by people who provide beds, teas and so on for visitors to the coast. All these people in the affected areas must suffer some depreciation of either their businesses or their property. Therefore I believe it is of vital importance that public inquiries shall be held to allay doubts and fears which they rightly have concerning these proposals.

There is one final point I should like to make. The public are genuinely disturbed about what many think is the danger of some of these installations. I am quite convinced that there is a very good answer, but that answer can be made to the public only at a public inquiry. The whole question of the remoteness of atomic power stations from centres of population arises on this one point. In Bridgwater Bay there are a number of flourishing seaside resorts within ten miles of the proposed station. Local planning authorities cannot resolve the doubts of the inhabitants in all these places because they have not the necessary technical knowledge. Only the Central Electricity Authority can do so, and unless they are prepared to send representatives to explain to the public in general at a public inquiry the reasons why their doubts are groundless, the doubts will remain. It is clear, I think, that great and profound thought is required from everyone who has to deal with the siting of these stations, and I am very much indebted to the noble Lord, Lord Lawson, for raising this matter to-day.

4.16 p.m.

VISCOUNT HALL

My Lords, it is not my intention to keep your Lordships for long, because what I have to say will take but a very few minutes. I, too, am grateful to my noble friend, Lord Lawson, for introducing this Motion. It was timely, and the speeches made by him and by the two noble Lords who followed him must. I think, have so impressed your Lordships with the strength of their case that there is nothing much I need add. I should, however, like to follow up just one point which was made by my noble friend, Lord Lawson. The conditions in West Durham which he described apply, of course, to every coalfield in the country. In my own South Wales and in Scotland some of the most lovely valleys and finest beauty spots in the country have been absolutely despoiled by these ugly tips. Indeed, the house in which I was born, and the house in which I lived for well over sixty years, was surrounded by four of them, so I was really brought up amongst the slag heaps of that valley.

I would impress upon the noble Lord, the Minister of Power, the importance of taking fully into consideration the points which have been submitted to him in connection with this matter. But I am sure we are knocking at an open door, and that he will devote much of his time to these matters. A point upon which I should like to touch is that whilst these huge stations cannot be built upon the coalfields or in the immediate area of the coalfields because of possible subsidence, some of them should be built as near to the coalfields as possible. The Plan for Coal which has been issued by the Coal Board indicates that when it is completed there is likely to be a reduction in the number of miners employed in the coal mines of this country between now and 1965, amounting to almost 100,000. We have seen the denuding of these coal areas of the country, and from the angle of providing, so far as possible, employment for these people in the places where they have lived and want to live, I suggest that some of these stations should be sited in the vicinity of coalfields, instead of their being taken out into the areas where it appears that sites have already been agreed upon for their building.

I was very much interested to hear what the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, said about transmission lines and about pylons. I am not so sure that it is impossible to put these lines underground. There may be some technical reason for overhead lines, but possibly the reason of cost is the more important. These transmission lines are not going to carry a small amount of electricity lout ten limes the amount which the existing transmission lines are carrying, and that is a very heavy load. No one would think for a moment of carrying water from Mid-Wales to Birmingham by overground pipes; whatever the cost, they are put underground. We are planning here not for a year or for two years or for five; we are not even planning for this generation, but for many generations to come. We are facing a new industrial revolution and, whatever the cost may be, I think we should consider safety and the amenities and the beauty of the countryside, and see that things are done thoroughly and not in a half-hearted way.

The cost of this nuclear power plan is to be £1,460 million and the extra cost of putting these transmission lines underground would add only a little to the total. I understand that most of the electricity produced by the nuclear power stations is going to be pumped into the grid—I may be wrong, but, so far as I know, there is little which will be transmitted direct to the consumer. Therefore, I would ask the noble Lord, Lord Mills, and the Central Electricity Authority to consider this whole question of transmission lines and pylons.

But the real reason why I rise to speak this afternoon is that there is a sense of grievance in Wales that in the siting of these nuclear power stations sufficient attention has not been paid to Wales. When we see from the plan that there are to be twelve stations in England, three in Scotland and one in Northern Ireland, we think that the Government have overlooked a place which has contributed greatly to the economic prosperity of Britain—a little country which can beat England at Rugby football if it cannot do anything else. Seriously, I would ask the noble Lord whether he cannot say something definite about this matter. We have heard rumours and reports, but if he could tell us that it is the intention to put one, two or three of these stations in Wales, then I am sure that it would give great satisfaction to the people of that country. There is nothing more that I would say other than that I hope the noble Lord, as I am sure he will, will take into consideration the impressive speeches of the noble Lords who have preceded me.

4.23 p.m.

LORD CHORLEY

My Lords, even at the risk of appearing to bring division into the benches on which it have the honour to sit I should like to inform my noble friend Lord flail that I have seen England beat Wales at Rugby—and oil more than one occasion. However, I did not intervene this afternoon in order to make that statement of fact, but to make some observations on this important problem which my noble friend Lord Lawson has brought before your Lordships. I am not sure whether I ought not to confess an interest in this matter as Honorary Secretary of the Council for the Preservation of Rural England, an organisation which, during the last year or two, has had this problem on its agenda sheet on almost every occasion on which its executive committee has met. Not only the C.P.R.E. but all other amenities organisations are in a state of extreme anxiety because of these proposed developments. In a striking comparison, which was taken up by the noble Viscount, Lord Hall, the noble Lord, Lord Lawson, referred to these developments as a new Industrial Revolution. That is an apposite comparison.

I do not envy the noble Lord who is now presiding over the new Ministry of Power the task which he has of trying to control this monster. It was not controlled in the first Industrial Revolution, and "England's green and pleasant land" still gapes with the sores which were then inflicted upon her. It may be that the new Industrial Revolution will inflict sores even more serious. It may be that the noble Lord, Lord Mills, and his Department will be finally tolling the death knell of "England's green and pleasant land" if this sort of thing is to go on in the way one fears it might.

We are dealing this afternoon with the positioning of a substantial number of new atomic power stations. The noble Lord, Lord Hylton, said that one of these, to be built on the coast of Somerset, would take up one-third of a mile of the coastline. That may not sound very serious, but when one considers the enormous height of these stations, and their extreme ugliness and obviousness, it is not just a third of a mile that is being ruined, but a great area of the countryside. The noble Lord, Lord Rea, who conies from the western part of the Lake District, in a very pleasing and beautiful speech, if I may say so, described that extraordinarily beautiful country from which he takes his origin. I have often had the pleasure of climbing the hills in Eastern Cumberland and of looking from the Wasdale Pike across the Irish Sea, as the sun was setting, and seeing it glow upon the Isle of Man in the distance. It is one of the most beautiful views in the world. I returned there recently, and found it completely ruined because of the new station at Calder Bridge. I would defy an engineer who deliberately set out to build the most ugly building to construct such an ugly one. I am sure that the engineers build to actual technical requirements, but do they require stations to be built in that way? It is the most ugly building I have ever seen in my life, and it completely ruins this superb view. And we are threatened with the repetition of this sort of thing round the coasts of the United Kingdom. That is a vital matter to everybody who has the beauty of the country at heart.

As my noble friend Lord Lawson has pointed out, the White Paper lays down that these stations are to be built away from built-up areas. One can understand what was in the mind of the author of the White Paper and the Minister responsible, because there must have been, particularly at the time of the beginning of this development, a very natural apprehension about the danger of the escape of these highly lethal forces. That anxiety, I think, has rather overpowered the responsible authorities, and the phrase "away from built-up areas" seems to have been equated with "as far removed as is physically possible from built-up areas", which I suggest is entirely wrong. The apprehension and nervousness on the part of the public, which was undoubtedly in the minds of those responsible for the White Paper, has, I think, been pushed to quite unnecessary extremes. I doubt very much, in spite of what the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, said, whether there is now anything like the same apprehensiveness.

The Council for the Preservation of Rural England have been represented at all the public inquiries which have so far been held, and I think those who have been there watching our interests have found that this was the last of the points made by the people who attended to give evidence. This feeling of anxiety, from the point of view of the danger of the stations, has been noteworthy by its absence. Almost every other point has been made, and made time and time again, and rubbed in: but this point has hardly been made at all. Indeed, there is a considerable anxiety on the part of local authorities, who are concerned with rateable values and with employment of their citizens, to have these stations built in their areas. It was interesting to note that the noble Viscount, Lord Hall, claimed that at least one should be erected in South Wales. If he and those for whom he speaks had been afraid of them, he would not have pressed for that in the way that he did.

Therefore I suggest to the Government, and particularly to the Minister, that it is time some substantial relaxation of this rule about having the stations away from built-up areas was introduced. I entirely agree with those who have suggested that there is really no reason why they should not be built in the general area where industrial expansion has taken place in the past, in so far as their products are needed in those places; and indeed, in many of them in the South of England, as the noble Lord, Lord Mills, said in his statement the other day, they are particularly required because the coal is absent in those districts.

This question of positioning, as the noble Lord is well aware, is not a new problem. I would suggest to him that he should seriously consider the reinforcement of the technical committee which I understand advises him in regard to these matters by the addition to it of some leading planning expert. We have in this country several men of outstanding ability in these matters. Our chairman at the Council for the Preservation of Rural England, Sir Patrick Abercrombie, whose name is well known, is sought after by almost every Government in the world to advise on planning problems. It is an interesting fact, and I think significant, that during the years before the last war, when we were faced with an enormous expansion of our Air Force, with the consequent development of airfields all over the country (I am not sure that it was not the noble Earl, Lord Swinton, who was in charge of the Air Ministry at the time), the Air Ministry decided that Professor Abercrombie (as he then was) was a suitable person to advise them on the siting and location of airfields, from the point of view of the protection of amenities. We who worked in the amenities movement at that time were grateful for that decision on the part of the Air Ministry, and, on the whole, we were satisfied with the way it worked. Undoubtedly, it led to a number of alterations after preliminary decisions had been taken, and in a number of cases proved to the great advantage alike of the Air Force and of the amenities movement.

I should he grateful, and I think we should, if the Minister would look at this matter. I appreciate that tie main problem in the allocation of these power stations is a technical one, but obviously it is not the only problem. The highly qualified technical men who are looking at this matter are not always competent to decide from the amenities point of view. It may well be, as one noble Lord suggested, that the National Parks Committee, which includes several field officers of great sensitivity and experience in these matters who are working on problems of this sort in connection with the national parks, could provide the necessary expertise to enable the problem to be effectively handled. I sympathise with what the noble Lord, Lord Hylton said, about the importance in these cases of having a public inquiry at which every point of view can be put forward in public. I believe that, so far, there have been public inquiries in most, if not all, of these cases, and I am sure that they have been of the greatest value. Even if the decision goes against us—as, unfortunately, it almost always does: we in the amenities movement are fighting a losing battle—we always receive tremendous sympathy. It is something to have had the opportunity of making one's position known and one's voice heard in regard to these matters.

Finally, I feel that not only is the actual positioning of these nuclear power stations of great importance but so also is the detailed problem of siting. When the position has been more or less decided, the actual siting, which has been referred to by more than one speaker this afternoon, is of no less importance. Here again, an experienced planning officer like Sir Patrick Abercrombie, or one of the others to whom I have referred, can often do a great deal to see that the buildings are so sited that, to some extent at any rate, the worst of the interference with the landscape is alleviated. If the Minister could see his way to relax the rule about built-up areas, and if he could see to it that he is advised by experts in regard to the positioning and siting, to some extent, at any rate, we should he relieved of our anxieties in regard to this important matter.

5.39 p.m.

LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH

My Lords, I am sure the whole House is indebted to my noble friend Lord Lawson, not only for tabling this Motion but for the attractive and persuasive manner in which he moved it. All noble Lords who have spoken since my noble friend moved the Motion have agreed with him that this is one of the most serious problems that we ha in to face. A my noble friend Lord Hall said, we are doing something now, in erecting these power stations, that is going to last for many years; they cannot be put up one minute and pulled down the next. If we have any sense at all—and in planning these things we have not shown a great deal of sense in the years gone by—at least, let us learn from the mistakes we have made. I intend to point out a few of them.

I should like to deal first with the siting of these new atomic power stations. I will try—I might net alto ether succeed—not to trespass upon the debate which is to take place in your Lordships' House later on, although the subject is very involved and the amenity and the economic aspects are difficult to separate. What puzzles me is the policy behind it all. Up to the present, before atomic energy stations were practicable the policy was to build orthodox generating stations at pithead to save the transport of coal, thereby disfiguring the countryside with a super grid. Now we are to have power stations situated as far away from the industrial areas as possible, and then, I suppose, transfer the atomic power from our rural areas over the super grid back to where the coal mines are.

The first question I wish to ask the noble Lord, the Minister, on this matter—and I am glad the noble Marquess who leads the House has graced us with his presence, because this subject is vital, and I think we must have an authoritative statement upon it—is this. Am I right or wrong in saying that it is Government policy still to site all these atomic power stations away from industrialised areas because of the risk attaching to them, because of a discharge risk, a radioactive infusion of the air? If that is right, it means that these atomic power stations are going to be sited in the South of England, south of a line drawn roughly from the source of the Severn to the Wash. Is it right that they must be by the sea? Is it right that they must be near water? As the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, has said, the coastline will be despoiled. What about our rivers? Or is that idea now a fallacy, and there is no risk of radioactive leakage? If that is so, then why not put these stations near the main centres for the usage of power, which are in the industrial areas? Either one must be right or the other.

When we come to the question of distributing the energy or power, I take it that the power from these 1,000-kilowatt power stations are going to be broken down by transformers, and that there will have to be a series of transforming stations to transfer this through the 275-kilovolt super grid. That means an extension of the super-grid. I should like to know whether I am right in that. I want the noble Lord to tell us roughly what will be the extension of the super-grid over our delightful countryside, because, at the present time, it is just about the worst eyesore we have in this country. Just think of some of the areas over which it is proposed to take these huge 275-kilovolt wires on 130 to 160 feet pylons: right across from Melksham, through part of Cleave Hill, one of the most delightful scenic vistas in the West of England, where in future, instead of seeing the distant sea, you will be able to see a wonderful row of 160-ft. high pylons, right across the Cotswolds, up the Evesham Valley to Birmingham.

The most amazing part is that when a thing like this is planned, it always has to go through the most delightful parts of the country. They never choose the drab and the scrub. I see the noble Lord, Lord Conesford, in his place. There is one which is going right over the Berkshire Ridgeway, skirting the Even-lode Valley. They have skirted Blenheim Palace, but I thought at one time it was going right through that. What are the extentions going to be? We have not seen the end of the existing plan of the 275-kilovolt super-grid, because if these power stations are going to be sited in the areas where I am afraid they will be, then we shall have the octopus tentacles spreading all over the best of our scenic country in the West and South of England. That is the first question I should like the noble Lord to answer.

Perhaps what I am most concerned about, if your Lordships will allow me to put this in the most friendly way, is the noble Lord's own position. It appears that the Minister of Power—in the old days, the Minister of Fuel and Power—in this question of planning has powers that are far superior to those of any other Minister, and there is grave public disquiet about the way the public are consulted. I have taken such an interest in this question that I have had reports from practically every public inquiry that has been held. I can assure the noble Lord that there is grave public disquiet that in these public inquiries the Minister is judge in his own case and the judgment is made before ever the public inquiry is held.

There is also the Minister's officer, generally an engineer—an estimable man, I expect, with no real value as a chairman of an alleged public inquiry; he is far from being independent—accompanied, I suppose, sometimes, by an official of the Ministry of Housing and Local Government to give the affair an air of respectability, but in no way trained in the system of evidence. I have yet to come across a case where the original proposals of the Central Electricity Authority have been varied above a few feet as a result of any public inquiry. I do not think that that is satisfactory. That is what has happened in the past.

I wish to ask the noble Lord seriously to consider whether we should not follow that very good British axiom, that not only must justice be done, but justice must appear to be done. I have not heard of one person—and I have discussed this matter with those who have been represented at these public inquiries—who says that he thought that it was ever worth while going and giving evidence. I am sure that that is not what the noble Lord wants. Some have gone to the great expense of briefing counsel to protest and lay their claim. It has been said that the only argument that the Central Electricity Authority appear to listen to is a monkey wrench or a shotgun. Logical argument does not appear to have any effect, and everybody holds the opinion that the decision has been made before the inquiry is held and that these inquiries are really a facade.

I want the Minister to make a serious attempt to carry the public with him. It may be that we are all to-day lighting a losing battle. It may be that tilts Government and successive Governments will say, "We have got to despoil the countryside. We cannot help it. We have to live in an era in future when we are deafened by aeroplanes day and night in the sacred name of defence, and we have not a good view to look at anywhere in the sacred name of progress." May be; but let us at least feel that our protests and cases have been given that attention that I think they deserve. My noble friend Lord Alexander of Hillsborough made a suggestion sonic time ago—the noble Lord will remember it—that there should be a legal authority, a barrister, as chairman, and not an engineer; that it should be a new type of court. I do not know whether there is any virtue in that suggestion. There is at the present rime a Committee sitting, presided over by Sir Oliver Franks, which is dealing with this matter. Perhaps that will be helpful. But I am certain that the noble Lord will never carry the public with him in this matter unless he can assure the public that their concern for the amenities of the villages and the rural areas in which they live is receiving proper attention.

I am fearful of the future. I do not know how many of your Lordships have read the Herbert Committee Report, but I would beg of you, before we debate this subject in its other aspects in your Lordships' House in about ten days' time, to read Parts V and VI, especially Part VI—" The Powers and Duties of the Minister ". I do not know whether the Minister himself has read it, but he is a super Minister dealing with a super-grid. This is what the Report says. I hope he will not take this too much to heart. I am quoting paragraph 497 on page 136: We have expressed the view that the less the principle of commercial operation is invaded the better it will be for the efficiency of the industry. Taking the long view we believe this to be of the greatest importance to the success of nationalisation. I do not know why one has to despoil the countryside to make nationalisation a success. The paragraph continues: But it mast be recognised that unless Parliament and the Government are prepared to deny themselves the power, always and in every particular, to require the industry to act on ether than purely economic considerations, the Minister must be armed with the necessary Authority. The next paragraph, paragraph 498, says: Against this background, we see the principal duties c f the Minister as fellows: (d) to give the industry precise instructions if and when it is requited to in some way different from what would be dictated by purely economic consideration. I do not know whether the Minister interprets that in this context to mean that the preservation of beauty must come second to strictly commercial considerations. I do not know; perhaps he will tell us. But this is a very dangerous doctrine, because that is hat has happened in the past that has been the trouble. There has never been any democratic process; and when at some of these public inquiries responsible citizens call the Central Electricity Authority officials "little Hitlers" and "damned liars" we have come to a serious gate of affairs, because good British citizens do not use language like that unless they are really moved, and they are moved. That is why I said, when I spoke in your Lordships' House last upon this subject, that these public inquiries are really deteriorating into public brawls. I have Press cuttings here where some of these things are stated. So I would ask the noble Lord to give this matter serious consideration.

I would make a suggestion, and I follow the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, in this because he is the chairman of a county council and chairman of a county planning committee. What has riled everybody from the county councils down to the parish councils is the behaviour of the Central Electricity Authority in the past. I do not blame them too much, because they inherited this Hitlerite system from the Electricity Board of a bygone age. It has been the system of "Divide and conquer; get one planning authority to agree on one side of the county, then miss one out and get the other one to agree on the other side of the county. When you have the fait accompli north and south, then you go to the middle one and say, ' You cannot really stop us from doing this now, because we have got agreement on that side and on the other '." That is happening every day.

Twelve months ago, the Central Electricity Authority told the Oxfordshire County Council, the planning authority—the noble Earl, Lord Munster, had all this sent to him in detail when he used to reply for the Minister's Department in this House—that they wanted to have the Oxfordshire County Council's agreement within fourteen days to this line through the county of Oxford—just like that—as it brooked no delay. Luckily, the Chairman of the Oxfordshire County Council, a Member of your Lordships' House, is a man of character, and the answer was that the Council could not agree to it until they had been told what the line was going to be in the north of the county. The Authority replied, "We have not made up our minds about that yet." That was twelve months ago. The delay still goes on. That is the kind of thing which is termed a Hitlerite method. Yet the authorities wonder that all these parish councils, who are jealous of the amenities, are up in arms about it!

I would beg the Minister to take this matter most seriously. If he is now going to face a barrage of public disfavour over his atomic power stations, it is going to make his life very hard. He has only just entered politics, but he knows that that is not the way to commercial success. One has sometimes to do something that pleases the customer. So I am going to suggest that he should do what his predecessor should have done: when he wants to put an atomic power station in a certain area, before ever a line is drawn on paper and when face has not to be saved—that, of course, is one of the most expensive things in any item of expenditure by Government departments—he should collect together all the planning authorities and preside as chairman over a discussion into the whole thing. In that way they will not be played the one against the other for ever after. If that had been done with the super-grid, opposition to that grid would not be nearly so strong as it is. I think that the then Minister would have seen a little sense and reason.

I beg the noble Lord to do that. That is the way to carry with him these local authorities. Do not present them with a fait accompli and then put up the facade of having a public inquiry, with the Minister judge in his own case. That cannot be right, and I feel certain that the Minister cannot agree with it. If the Minister is going to be the final authority—and very likely, in this imperfect form of government, he must be; there must be ministerial responsibility, and I do not suggest that the Cabinet should make the decision where every power station should be built—at least let him come to his decision after an impartial inquiry, with the facts for and against put before him, and not do it as it is done to-day.

I think my noble friend Lord Hall had a good point. It has been said that these lines cannot be put underground. Necessity was always the mother of invention, and I am not satisfied that the danger of putting these super-grids underground will be much against public interest. I do not know whether your Lordships have seen some of these super-grid lines. Owing to their weight, the cables on these 130 to 160 feet-high pylons loop down to within 25 to 30 feet of the ground. I am told that in certain weather conditions the leakage from those cables is highly dangerous to nearby drivers of farm machinery. If our agricultural land all over the West Country, from Bridgwater Bay, through Somersetshire, right through Gloucestershire, right up the Evesham Valley, cannot be utilised by farmers within yards of these looped cables, the eventual cost to the country is going to be far more than putting the cables under the ground. I do not believe it is impossible to put these cables underneath. Science has done a lot of marvellous things when science has had to do them. God forbid that we should ever have to experience another war before we find a way to put them underground! One thing that emerges from war is that we always learn during the war what we have not been sensible enough to learn in peace time. The reason why these hideous abominations—as these pylons are—are put overground is because sufficient public uproar has not been aroused, for the public knows nothing at all about them until the wretched things are up. I should hesitate to suggest that what we need are more Mr. Lewises and monkey wrenches, or more Mr. Granvilles and shotguns.

That is my contribution to this debate. I hope that the noble Lord will take it most seriously to heart. I have had the unfortunate task of studying this problem and the machinery. I think the machinery is defective. I do not know whether the Minister appreciates that he derives some of his powers from the Act of 1889; but by his powers under the 1947 Act he is responsible for all these pylons and the super-grid. The Minister had to give his overall authority for them to be erected; so he started the thing. Then, in the end, he is the judge as to whether what he said in the first place should ever be carried out. I do not think that, on consideration, he will agree that that is right.

My Lords, I have nothing more to say upon this subject, but I hope to make some contribution to the debate on the technicalities and the cost of all these things. I do beg the Minister to look at this question of amenity. I think it needs a great deal more thought. I want him to answer the two main questions I have asked. First, what is the Government's policy? Have these stations to be sited in the best of our scenic areas in the South of England because it would be dangerous to put them in built-up areas? Will he marry up that danger with the danger of running these huge cables of 275 kilovolts all over the country? If the answer to my first question is in the negative, that it is not publicly dangerous, then I think the Minister should have another think and put his atomic power stations where there is a demand for power—that is, in our already defiled industrial areas.

5.8 p.m.

THE MINISTER OF POWER (LORD MILLS)

My Lords, I will try to deal as adequately as possible with this important question raised by the noble Lord, Lord Lawson. I am sure your Lordships will be kind enough to bear with me here if, through lack of experience in replying to a debate such as this, I do not answer with that clarity to which your Lordships are normally accustomed. I have been most impressed by the intensity of feeling of noble Lords who have spoken in this debate. Like, I believe, all Britishers, I ant a lover of the countryside. I am sure we all love the beauties of these islands of ours. Therefore I approach this problem with an understanding of your Lordships' feeling, because on many occasions I have remarked upon the scars of the first Industrial Revolution which thought nothing about the amenities and paid no attention to the comfort and wellbeing of people. But I assume that we are all united in our desire to provide power to keep our industries effective and progressive; to develop our agriculture, and to ensure a high standard of life and comfort for the inhabitants of this country. That means many more power stations and transmission lines over the country.

As I said, when I made a statement in your Lordships' House on March 5 [OFEICIAL REPORT, Vol. 202 (No. 41), col. 185]: The programme will, moreover, involve the erection of new power stations and transmission lines in parts of the country which have not hitherto felt the impact of the nation's requirements for electricity. This is unfortunately inevitable because nuclear stations raise special siting problems. Her Majesty' Government and the Electricity Authorities are determined to carry through the programme with the least possible interference with the amenities of our countryside or with the rights of individuals. I ant sure that if we are (as I know we are) united and determined to supply the power which this country needs, we are also united in our desire and intention to preserve the amenities of this country and the rights of people, so far as that is possible.

That brings me to the problem of sites for power stations, and in dealing with the question of sites for nuclear power stations I shall also be answering certain of your Lordships' questions. I was asked to be specific about the reason for requiring that sites should be away from built-up areas. Her Majesty's Government have determined that, for the present, that must be so. It is not thought that these stations are in any way liable to accident, but they contain highly toxic materials and represent a new development which has not yet stood the test of operation on a large scale. Until we have more information I am afraid that will have to remain the position.

LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord for what he has said, and could not wish for anything more specific; but it is a very serious statement. Before he leaves that point, could the noble Lord go further and tell the House what is the risk factor? Does he not think the public should be told? Is the risk factor substantial? If so, over what area does the risk extend?—over a twenty or twenty-five mile radius? Does the noble Lord feel able to answer those questions? I do not want to press him if he does not.

LORD MILLS

My Lords, it is not so much that there is a risk, but that people think there is a risk, for we are dealing with highly toxic materials and with power stations of which we have not yet had long experience. That ought to be sufficient, I think, to make us very careful until another conclusion is reached. As I said when I made my statement in your Lordships' House last week, this is a flexible programme and we shall be guided by experience as we go along.

LORD HYLTON

My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Lord? He has said that the new stations will be built before experience is gained; therefore, if the experience is to the effect that those stations are not dangerous we shall still have them built in areas where probably they are inappropriate. That, as I see it, is the dilemma.

LORD MILLS

My Lords, I believe that it is a dilemma which will be dealt with with common sense, but it is not the only consideration. These stations have also to be located near centres of consumption, and the further they are away from such centres, the greater will be the cost. But that is not perhaps the most important thing: the further they are away from such centres, the more long transmission lines and pylons there will have to be. Thirdly, these stations do not use coal, and therefore the necessity of putting them on coalfields disappears. On the contrary, the further away they are from coalfields—that is, in places where coal is dearer—the better they are situated, from the economic point of view. Lastly, they must have great quantities of cooling water, as noble Lords have already said; therefore it looks as if they will have to be situated near estuaries or near the coast. All these considerations have to be taken into account, and these are some of the limitations within which the Electricity Authorities have to work. Nevertheless, the planners must have regard to amenities. The Electricity Authorities must earn public support, and if they earn public support then they deserve our support, too, in what they are doing.

I believe that there is a great deal of misunderstanding about the procedure adopted by the Electricity Authorities and by my Ministry in relation to this question of power station sites. It is really a matter of very painstaking and comprehensive consideration. I should like to attempt to give your Lordships, briefly, an account of the procedures which are followed. At the outset, the Electricity Authorities have available to them the county development plans, which show the areas that are built up, those that are designated as national parks, as areas of outstanding beauty, as nature reserves et cetera, or are already ear-marked by Government Departments or others for other purposes. And in this preliminary search the Authorities are aided by the Ministry of Housing and Local Government, who provide all the information in their possession, and by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, who advise them of possible agricultural or fishery objections. It is only on the basis of these consultations that the Authorities make a provisional selection—and I emphasise that it is quite provisional.

Thereafter, they consult the Air Ministry and the Ministry of Defence, to see what they have to say about the site. And then the Authorities get in touch with every Government Department that could conceivably have an interest in the matter. Simultaneously, they consult with appropriate bodies, such as the local planning authority, the National Parks Commission, the Nature Conservancy, the Royal Fine Art Commission, the river boards and the statutory water undertakings. It is only when all this has been done, and the Electricity Authorities are satisfied from these consultations that there is no serious objection to their proposals, that they make a formal submission to the Ministry of Power and an application to the local planning authority.

At that point, my Ministry give directions as to publicity; notice is also given to the local authority; a copy of the application is sent to the Minister of Works, and arrangements are made with the local authority for the deposition of plans and papers in a place open for public inspection. Then follows consultation by my Ministry with other Government Departments. The local planning authority carry out their statutory and other consultations. Now, after all this has been done, and after objections have been received, the Minister either grants consent, subject to such conditions as he thinks necessary, including such conditions the local planning authority want introduced, or he orders a public inquiry before coming to a decision.

I have well in mind what the noble Lord, Lord Lucas of Chilworth, had to say about those inquiries. But the situation is not quite as he says. There is a right for my right honourable friend the Minister of Housing and Local Government to intervene in an inquiry and to appoint his own inspector to sit with the inspector of the Ministry of Power. As your Lordships will understand, when a compulsory purchase order has to be confirmed, the case for such an order is heard at the public inquiry which is being held on the project; or, if no public inquiry is being held, then there can be a public hearing on the compulsory purchase order itself. All this takes an average time of nine months. In many cases the time is much more than that: there have been cases where it has been more than double. And, of course, that delay is costly and wasteful. I will refer to that matter a little later.

It has been said—the noble Lord, Lord Lucas of Chilworth, referred to it in particular—that the Minister is judge in his own case. Is that really so? The Minister is the spokesman for all the Government Departments who have been consulted on this matter, both at the beginning and at a later stage in the proceedings. Therefore I suggest: that the Minister is acting on his own behalf, and on behalf of his colleagues, only after there has been a very intensive search into whether the Electricity Authorities should or should not do the things they are trying to do.

LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH

Will the noble Lord forgive me for intervening? I am grateful to him and. I am not going to press him unduly. I have in mind what he said at the beginning of his speech. But it is the fact that the Minister is judge in his own case, because he originally authorises a line and then he sits at tin end to say whether he will confirm his first authorisation. There may be a collective responsibility at the end. But can the noble Lord tell me whether there has ever been a case in which a public inquiry has turned down the Minister's first proposal?

LORD MILLS

I am grateful to the noble Lord for his reference to what I said at the outset, and I am going to take advantage of his kindness to say that I am not informed on that subject. But I am not informed on the main point; aid that is Mat there is full consideration with everyone who has a right to be taken into consideration, with the Government Departments concerned, and it is only after the Minister has a chance of knowing of other objections that he then pronounces, on his own behalf and on behalf of his colleagues.

Now the procedure for way-leaves for transmission lines is generally in accordance with what I have said about the procedure in finding sites; but it is not quite so straightforward Here, the procedure is, first of all, to determine a line across which the Electricity Authorities wish their pylons to go. Obviously, at first sight it might be thought that a straight line would be the most economic. But it is not necessarily the right line, because at this planning s age there is taken into account—and there must be taken into account—such things as the contour of the country and the general nature of the land; and regard must also be paid to amenities. Finally, there is an application for the Minister's consent, and perhaps a public inquiry.

When consent has been given to the general route of the line, the authorities have to negotiate individual wayleaves, and that is what causes the difficulties and complexity in this matter. A vast number of these are agreed to voluntarily. It may interest your Lordships to know that up to a year ago, out of the 857 miles of the super-grid line, 835 were agreed to voluntarily. The real problem comes when somebody objects to a small section of the line, most of which has already been agreed, passing over his land. It is obvious that if we have to alter this small section of the line, the other sections are again affected, and new wayleaves have to be negotiated. So it does happen that one owner or one lessee, feeling bitter about his bit of land, cannot be accommodated, and the feeling gets around that his case is just brushed aside, when, if the Authority could do it reasonably, they would so do it. That is a sort of case that brings the Authority a lot of publicity which they do not desire.

Your Lordships will remember that in my statement of March 5 I said (col. 185): My right honourable friend the Paymaster General will accordingly be tabling amendments to existing legislation for inclusion in the Electricity Bill which is at present being considered in another place. Two Amendments have already been tabled. One deals with the limited right of entry, for purposes of survey, such as is already enjoyed by the North of Scotland Board, and the other reduces the delay which accompanies any intention to stop or divert a highway. But, apart from these proposals, we must speed up the administrative procedure. The time limits imposed by the Statute must be followed but should not be exceeded. The Electricity Authorities have been under great difficulty because of the practice that has grown up of taking a longer time over these matters than the Statute lays down.

I am sure that public relations are of vital importance to the Electricity Authorities, and they are also of vital importance to the ambitious programme which I announced in your Lordships' House on March 5. These plans have to do with our future prosperity. Without adequate power we shall be shackled and helpless to carry out the work which lies before this country in the future in order to bring about the higher standards for which we all hope. That there will be effects on the countryside is certain. It is part of the price we have to pay. But, given good will all round and a helpful attitude all round, as I am sure we have, those effects can be minimised directly. I am not sure that power stations are the ugly things which one might assume they are from this debate. To ensure that the general design and main architectural features are not incongruous in the landscape the Central Electricity Authority refer them to two distinguished architects, Sir William Halford and Mr. K. M. B. Cross, who have been appointed as consultants for projects in England, and Sir Percy Thomas, another distinguished architect, in Wales. In addition, the Authority consult the Royal Fine Art Commission on siting and design.

I know that I have left one or two questions unanswered. The noble Viscount, Lord Hall, asked about Wales. I thought that he was going to utter a plea that we should not put an atomic power station in Wales; but no, he voiced his anxiety for the well-being of Wales. I can assure him that the intention is to put one or more atomic power stations in Wales, on the assumption that suitable sites can be found. The noble Lord, Lord Lucas of Chilworth, asked about extensions of the super-grid. I hope that he will allow me to answer that question in our debate next week, because I am anxious to be quite accurate about it. I think that that is all I have to say, except to repeat that I am fully seized with the importance of the matter raised by the noble Lord, Lord Lawson. I am also fully seized with the need for power; and, so far as we can, we will marry up the provision of power stations with the necessity of preserving the beauties of our country.

LORD HYLTON

My Lords, before the Minister finally sits down, I wonder whether he could be a little more specific about the public inquiry. I gave him notice in writing that I was going to raise this question in to-day's debate and he has not really answered the point. Although public inquiries have to be held on a statutory basis on the making of a plan for a district, that can be abrogated without a public inquiry if the Minister of Power so thinks fit when approving the power station. Both processes cannot be right. If a public inquiry is necessary for planning a district, in unplanning a district surely the public inquiry again is necessary. It is just as simple as that. The noble Lord may not have the answer at his finger tips, and, if that is so, perhaps in the debate next week he will give a rather more specific reply than he has given to your Lordships this afternoon.

LORD MILLS

I will certainly deal with it in the debate next week, but as an interim reply to the noble Lord I would remind him that I stated that there was the fullest consultation with the planning authority and twice with the Ministry of Housing and Local Government. I should hesitate to say that in all cases we should have a public inquiry when in some cases it might be a waste of time and money because all the interested parties were agreed that it should go on.

LORD HYLTON

With respect—and I am not sure that I am in order in speaking again—that does not cover the general public. The Minister said that not covered the point of the humble all Ministers may be agreed, but he has member of the public who feels himself aggrieved. He is the man who must be looked after in some way. The way I suggest may not be the best way, but there must be a way of making this a statutory fact.

5.43 p.m.

LORD LAWSON

My Lords, your Lordships will appreciate that this is the maiden speech of the Minister, which is always something of an ordeal, and I should like to congratulate him on his speech, while not agreeing with everything he has said. We shall, of course, return to this subject again, and I believe that there is to be a debate on almost the same subject in a short time. I am sure the noble Lord would riot expect me to be delighted with what comfort he has given, but, as I say, I congratulate him on his maiden speech, and beg leave to withdraw the Motion.

Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

House adjourned at sixteen minutes before six o'clock.