§ Mr. HargreavesTo ask the President of the Board of Trade what changes have been made under the statutory security provisions for sites occupied by the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority or which require permits under section 2 of the Nuclear Installations Act 1965.
§ Mr. EggarSites belonging to the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority and those where enrichment or reprocessing operations take place are subject to special statutory security provisions. These are designed principally:
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- (a)to protect information about and restrict access to enrichment technology, which could be misused for the purposes of nuclear weapons proliferation. The House recognised the importance of this last year in passing the Official Secrets Act 1989 (Prescription) (Amendment) Order 1993; and
- (b)to protect information about and restrict access to facilities, where this is desirable for the safekeeping of plutonium and other fissile materials.
Under the Nuclear Installations Act 1965 as amended, sites, other than those of the UKAEA, require a permit for reprocessing or enrichment. Sites to which permits apply and those of the UKAEA can be made prohibited places for the purposes of the Official Secrets Act 1911.
Work undertaken last year identified that the current list of nuclear prohibited places ought to be updated generally, including to align with current site boundaries. New permits have been issued for Sellafield and Capenhurst and my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary yesterday made a new prohibited places order.
This order significantly reduces the number of places that are prohibited. Current or past UKAEA sites at Risley and Culcheth, and in London at Rex house and 11 Charles II street have been dropped. The small part of the Sellafield site managed by the UKAEA, which had been omitted from the previous order, has been added to the Sellafield prohibited place. Land has also been added as a result of aligning the permit with the current Sellafield site boundary. The UKAEA sites at Harwell and Dounreay remain prohibited places in the latter case under a separate order.
The new arrangements will ensure that at Sellafield and Capenhurst, the entire site within the security fence is a prohibited place and that this will remain the case following any transfers of land between British Nuclear Fuels plc and UKAEA at Sellafield or BNFL and Urenco (Capenhurst) Ltd. at Capenhurst. The areas of land affected are defined by the permits; copies of these, together with proof copies of the prohibited places order, have been placed in the Library of the House.