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Nigel Griffiths: My hon. Friend the Minister for Energy, E-Commerce and Postal Services dealt extensively and clearly with section 63 of the Scotland Act this morning and spelled out the division in responsibilities. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Vale of York for giving me the opportunity to answer her questions.
The distinction between licensable sites and other principal nuclear sites is to reflect the extent of the devolution settlement, which reserved matters relating to licensed nuclear sites. The Bill uses the concept of a principal nuclear site to ensure that sites requiring substantive decommissioning and clean-up work, but for which a nuclear site licence was not required—the fusion reactor at Culham in England is the only present example—are covered by the full range of duties and powers of the operator and the NDA. Only the operation of licensed sites is a reserved matter.
Our colleagues in the Scottish Executive find the arrangements acceptable. Clause 9 has been the subject of extensive discussion with the Executive to ensure that it properly reflects the devolved responsibilities of Scottish Ministers and the Scottish Parliament. Scottish Ministers are consulted, but that does not amount to a right to veto, although the process allows for the concerns of Scottish Ministers to be taken into account.
Scottish Ministers will have powers of joint decision and approval when the activities of the NDA relate to a devolved matter. If the activity relates to a devolved but also reserved matter, such as the non-processing, treatment and storage of radioactive waste on licensed or Crown sites, Scottish Ministers will have a right to be consulted. They will also be consulted on appointments by the Secretary of State to the NDA under clause 5.
The Bill reflects discussions between the UK Government and the Scottish Executive on the appropriate level of involvement of Scottish Ministers. The complicated nature of the provisions results from the way in which the various responsibilities of the NDA will be handled under the devolved settlement. In principle, sites that are licensable under the Nuclear Installations Act 1965 and Crown sites are reserved. Environmental protection and the regulation of the disposal of radioactive waste are, in principle, devolved.
Miss McIntosh: I am listening to the Under-Secretary extremely carefully, but I am becoming more confused. I fear that an action will be brought against one of the decisions taken under the clause. Have the Department or the Under-Secretary thought about
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which jurisdiction would hear the case? He talks of not wanting regulation and scrutiny of directions to hold up matters in the House, but a court case would take substantially longer than getting it right in Committee.
Nigel Griffiths: I am advised that if the hypothetical became reality and there were to be such a court case, the dialogue between the Scottish and English courts would ensure that the authority with jurisdiction over the matter would respond robustly. There is a good dialogue between the legal authorities of the Scottish Executive and those in Whitehall. I am advised that this issue, which hon. Members have rightly highlighted, is not the problem they believe it to be.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 9 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 10
Supplemental functions
Norman Baker (Lewes) (LD): I beg to move amendment No. 88, in
clause 10, page 8, line 4, at end insert
'except that no monies shall be passed to those responsible for generating radioactive material'.
I am happy to say that this is another probing amendment, which should gladden the heart of the hon. Member for South-West Hertfordshire. I seek to unravel the financial relationship between the NDA and the private sector of the nuclear industry. I hope to get a fuller answer from the Under-Secretary than with my previous probing amendment. I must say that having one's probing amendments responded to in that way does not encourage one to table any more.
The amendment would amend the provision giving the NDA the function, so far as it thinks it appropriate, to promote
''the carrying out of research by others into those matters''—
those matters being the ''decommissioning of nuclear installations'', the ''cleaning-up of nuclear sites'' and so on. I seek to clarify whether the Government envisage a situation in which the NDA would pass money to British Energy or another private sector operator pursuant to that function.
If, as the Under-Secretary has stated, British Energy is responsible for its own clean-up operations, it ought to be dealing with such matters itself rather than relying on the NDA to fund its research. Will private sector operators fund their own responsibilities, or will that be another subsidy from the taxpayer to the private sector in the nuclear industry? If so, what are the constraints and rules? Is it simply a matter for the NDA's discretion?
Will the Under-Secretary admit that there is a need to clarify financial propriety between the NDA and the private sector? How does he intend to deal with that? What method will be deployed to ensure that public money is not spent improperly, that there is proper accountability for that money, and that we have the opportunity to follow such matters in the House of Commons and to raise matters of concern?
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Any arrangement whereby billions of pounds of taxpayers' money is out of our jurisdiction due to commercial confidentiality because contracts have been signed would be intolerable.The hon. Member for Tewkesbury raised a similar issue earlier about billions of pounds that he wanted to be subject to scrutiny, which he rightly put to a vote.
This is another example of a situation in which taxpayers' moneys may be handed over to the private sector through the NDA, but in which we may have no way of following what the NDA is doing, or its reason for doing so.
Will the Under-Secretary clarify the relationship between the NDA and the private sector in terms of financial propriety, and tell us whether he envisages that the NDA will be empowered to subsidise British Energy for what is its responsibility—the carrying out of research for its own sites for which it has financial responsibility? If he does not clarify this point, I will raise it again in debate on a later clause.
5 pm
Nigel Griffiths: This is not a probing amendment. It is a wrecking amendment that would severely restrict the NDA's ability to spend money on promoting research carried out by others that is related to its functions.
I am interested in the hon. Gentleman's view of the world. On the one hand, he picks on an evil group of people who are running every nuclear facility and believes that they should not receive a penny for that, despite the fact that we have to ensure that the products of the nuclear industry are clean and made safe. On the other, he sees a group of academics or researchers—perhaps again found at the jobcentre—who would help to carry out the research that the NDA requires. It is simply not like that, and the amendment reflects that caricature fairly accurately.
Mr. Page: I hesitate to intervene on the Minister. Now that I am on his Christmas card list I do not want to be deleted. The hon. Member for Lewes says that this is a probing amendment, from which one gathers that he will not press it to a vote. He would love to know what relationship the NDA is expected to adopt with the other private companies. To what extent will they be commissioned to do various works and how will money pass from one side to the other? Everyone agrees that they have to do this task and that work has to be undertaken and payment made. No one is against that. That gives the Minister a golden opportunity to explain how he sees this operating in practice.
Nigel Griffiths: I welcome that intervention. The hon. Gentleman has clarified a good point that was put by the hon. Member for Lewes, which I will come to shortly.
The amendment would make it hard for the NDA to promote any research that could help it to do its job more effectively. It would rule out the possibility of the NDA funding research by most current operators and those involved in the nuclear industry, such as BNFL, British Energy and others. That is one of the reasons why we cannot accept the amendment.
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The Committee is entitled to know how much information would be made public and how that would be done. The Bill already commits the NDA to a published strategy, an annual plan and an annual report. They will all involve extensive consultation, ministerial approval and publication. The budget will be disclosed to Parliament and be available for scrutiny there. No hon. Member or interested party outside will be hampered in scrutinising what is happening.
That openness will leave us open to the press releases from the Liberal Democrats and others saying, ''Shock, horror—the NDA has gone to some expert in the industry to help to promote research.'' Well, we heard it here first. I hope that will not come as a shock and nor should it when we are simply ensuring, by resisting amendment No. 88, that the NDA is not hamstrung in its function of promoting research. Nor should Parliament be denied the opportunity, through the annual report and other mechanisms, to see what research is being funded. All that is in the public interest. I hope, with that assurance, that the hon. Gentleman will withdraw the amendment.
Norman Baker: As I said, this is a probing amendment. There is no such thing as a wrecking amendment from the Opposition because in this Parliament one would never get through. Such amendments could not possibly wreck anything, even if that was what they were designed to do. Amendments are either probing or making a point that, were the proposal agreed to, would achieve a beneficial effect.
The Minister is also wrong to represent me as characterising the nuclear industry as a collection of Dr. Nos—he does himself no service there. However, there is a need, to which I shall return, for financial clarity, particularly in this odd arrangement. In many respects, the nuclear industry is like no other. Inevitably, there is a close relationship between the NDA and the nuclear generators, whether they are in the private or the public sector. However, because of that relationship, and because of how the industry is constructed as well as its historical path to the point where it is now, it is particularly important that there should be financial probity, financial clarity and transparency. The Minister was good enough to agree with that point.
Earlier amendments that would have created some distance in terms of appointments to the NDA were rejected. It is possible that the NDA will pick up functions from the private sector and that it will hand over money for research to BNFL or British Energy. Such things might be justified individually, and the expertise in the industry should not be neglected—it might be useful in the decommissioning process. Nobody would argue with that. However, we should add those factors together and look at the overall picture in the context of an industry that is peculiar in that there is nothing in this country with which it can be compared. Also, it has an incestuous relationship
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with the putative NDA and the generators. We should then check what measures are in place to ensure that public money is not improperly committed.
The NDA cannot be kept distant from the nuclear generators in the way that, say, the banking ombudsman can from the banking sector. I accept that such relationships are not possible in this case. Given those circumstances, what safeguards are in place? The Minister has spoken of an annual report and other such matters. Those are worth while and unexceptionable, but they do not meet the need. I have drawn attention to the points that I want to make, but the Committee should return to the matter of financial transparency and how it can best be achieved, and to the point about ensuring that moneys allocated for nuclear decommissioning are not spent on propping up the nuclear industry and further generation. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
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