URANIUM DEPOSITS AND MINERAL RIGHTS (Hansard, 2 July 1973)

§ LORD KENNET
My Lords, I beg leave to ask the second Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.

§ THE MINISTER WITHOUT PORTFOLIO (LORD DRUMALBYN)
My Lords, the Government have no intention of 5 extending the public ownership of mineral rights. The noble Lord no doubt has in mind the recent reports of the work carried out by the Institute of Geological Sciences for the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority between 1968 and 1972. Reports of this work were published as the programme progressed, and occurrences of uranium in the North of Scotland were first announced in 1970. I understand that these deposits could not be economically exploited at to-day's world prices. I am grateful to the noble Lord for giving me the opportunity to put this matter into perspective.

§ LORD KENNET
My Lords, whatever may be one's opinion about allowing landowners to profit from the sheer chance of happening to sit on minerals, does it not become an absurd, if not dangerous, matter when those minerals include uranium, which is going to become the very sinew of our industry in the future, to say nothing about the defence position?

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
My Lords, I do not think so. The reason why successive Governments have taken this line is that they want to encourage the exploitation of the mineral resources of the country, and this is the best way to do it.

§ LORD ARWYN
My Lords, is the Minister aware that 24 years ago the Mineral Development Committee sat and considered this subject and came to the conclusion, after two and a half years' work, that the nationalisation of minerals was absolutely necessary before a thorough geological survey of this country could be made?

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
My Lords, when the Party opposite were in power they came to the conclusion that they did not intend to use their powers to deprive mining companies of the opportunity of working any uranium which they might find and for which they might obtain planning consent. That was in 1970.

§ LORD WYNNE-JONES
My Lords, since the Government introduced a Bill, which became an Act, concerning nuclear fuel, is it not right that uranium is now regarded by Her Majesty's Government as a fuel? Is it not therefore appropriate that this should be nationalised in exactly the same way as coal?

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
My Lords, it is a question of prospecting for and getting the mineral. So far as that is concerned, it seems to Her Majesty's Government, as it seemed to our predecessors, that the best way of doing this is to leave it to the mining companies.

§ LORD KENNET
My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that my Question did not refer to prospecting and getting the minerals? My Question did not refer to taking that into public ownership, but to taking mineral rights into public ownership; namely, the rights belonging to the landowner who happened to be sitting on a mineral—in this case uranium.

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
My Lords, first of all you have to prospect to find out whether there are minerals below the surface. I do not think there is any particular case for saying that this should be taken into public ownership; and the more so as at the moment they cannot be economically extracted.

LORD SHINMELL
My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that he is not too well informed on this subject? Is he aware that when a Labour Government were in office—and I happened to be responsible for this matter of mineral rights—they accepted the principle that the minerals that were discovered should belong to the State, although at the same time they accepted a decision that the exploitation of those minerals should be left in private hands?

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
My Lords, I am aware of the fact that the last Government intended to legislate on this matter, and so do we; but my right honourable friend has said in another place that the Parliamentary timetable could not accommodate legislation during the present Session, and probably not in the next Session, either.

§ LORD BESWICK
My Lords, is it not a fact that this was carried out not by the Labour Government of 1959 to 1964, but by the immediate post-war Government? An Amendment was accepted, as my noble friend said, to the Atomic Energy Act. Are we to understand that this was later rescinded by a succeeding Government.

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
No, my Lords. Section 7 of the Atomic Energy Act 1946 empowers the Government to acquire compulsorily the exclusive right to work radioactive substances without paying compensation. It was on this that the right honourable gentleman Mr. Anthony Benn said: I do not intend to use my powers to deprive mining companies of the opportunity of working any uranium which they may find and for which they may obtain planning consent.

§ LORD SHINWELL
My Lords, does the noble Lord object to the principle that minerals, of whatever kind—uranium, lead, tin or copper—which happen to be located on private land but which were not placed there by the owner, and which the owner probably never knew about, should belong to the State? What possible objection can noble Lords opposite—particularly on the Government Front Bench—have to a principle of that kind being accepted?

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
My Lords, this would be an entirely new departure in principle from present legislation. The existing minerals which are not privately owned are coal, oil, gas, gold and silver. But, apart from that, mineral rights in Great Britain are privately owned and always have been. The Government are saying that they regard it as better that this should be so rather than that mineral rights should be taken away, especially as nobody knows whether they are there or not.

§ VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD
My Lords, would my noble friend not agree that if minerals were found on the estate of a private landowner and any profits accrued, nearly all those profits would go back to the State in taxation and that the whole question is therefore completely academic?

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
My Lords, I agree that a large part of it would go back to the State.

§ THE EARL OF LAUDERDALE
My Lords, would my noble friend agree that nationalisation might prove a disincentive to exploration?

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
My Lords, this is the view of the Government. The point is arguable both ways, but this is the Government's view.

§ LORD BROCKWAY
My Lords, the noble Lord has not replied to the point of principle raised by my noble friend Lord Shinwell. Can the Minister justify that a mineral of devastating power which over the centuries has grown under the land, should by accident be the private property of the owner of that particular piece of land?

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
My Lords, in a sense it is by accident, but as a matter of law, he is the owner of it. What the noble Lord is proposing to do is to take away that ownership.

§ BARONESS GAITSKELL
My Lords, will the Minister say what is wrong with a new departure in this technological age?

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
My Lords, it does not follow merely because the age is technological, that it is necessary to change the law on the ownership of property.

§ LORD KENNET
My Lords, is not the noble Lord convicted of complete confusion by his own words in saying that there was no ground for doing something unprecedented and then giving three excellent precedents: coal being nationalised, oil being nationalised and gas being nationalised, these three things being fuel and uranium being a fuel?

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
My Lords, the noble Lord has given a parallel, but these things were nationalised when they were being exploited in many parts of the country. The uranium has not been exploited and it does not look like being exploited at the moment. How far one extends the existing principle is a matter for argument and decision. All I have said is that the Government have no intention of extending mineral rights at the present time.

§ LORD KENNET
My Lords, is it really the case that natural gas was nationalised when it was already being exploited?

§ LORD DRUMALBYN
My Lords, gas had been nationalised, and natural gas was gas.