Speeches by Chope.

“But you speak as though this is an exact science—“Is a nuclear power plant in this particular area going to be safe?” These are matters of judgment, essentially, aren’t they? What is happening is that you have competing regulators exercising different areas of judgment at different stages in the process. Could it not a…”

“Don’t we know it! A good friend of mine—a Member of Parliament, actually—made a fortune out of being counsel to the Sizewell B inquiry, and he never looked back. I thought the whole idea was that we were going to try and simplify this process so that we can get these small nuclear reactors up and running in our lifetim…”

“But is it not possible to have one person in charge? If you are the chief executive of an applicant, in preparing your application, you are meant to have already taken into account all the issues around the environment, safety and so on. Why can we not have one individual appointed to decide these issues, instead of co…”

“So because you are not prescriptive, you are not validating these claims?”

“You say that it is difficult to evaluate claims that are made—that applicants will claim this, that and the other, and that you as regulators have got to try and see whether those claims are valid. Instead of second-guessing that, is it not possible instead to bring in conditions to cover? If the applicant says it is g…”

“Is not one of the key issues in regulation and licensing the need for applicants to have a one-stop shop? We are such a long way from that. What can you do, or what advice can you give the Government, to facilitate the creation of a one-stop shop? At the moment we have duplication and conflicting objectives. If I am an…”

“If it is not safe, you will not get a licence for it so there is no point in going through the planning processes. Surely, the person who makes the application is going to have to have satisfied themselves that they meet all these criteria, and they will have entered into pre-application discussions with all the regula…”

“Would it affect safety, for example, if we did not have EN-7, and a nuclear project instead had to rely solely on the generic aspects of EN-1?”

“May I ask some specific questions? Mitigation of seismic risk is a non-negotiable requirement for a site licence, yet it is being added into EN-7 as a planning consideration. Is that really helpful? What is the point of it?”

“Are you asking for this power?”

“I know that, but would you like to see the legislation or guidance changed?”

“Is that going to happen?”

“That is a bit of a cop-out. So you are saying that these individual licensing authorities have to agree to do it? Do you think that is a satisfactory state of affairs, bearing in mind the problems?”

“I agree absolutely. If someone has suffered serious adverse effects from a covid-19 vaccine, it is not much consolation to them, their loved ones or those whose confidence we are trying to build to be told that because they are only 30% disabled they are not entitled to a penny. Someone who is 59% disabled is not entit…”

“The Minister says she cannot give us an exact timeline. Could she give us an approximate time? Is this going to be finished before the end of this year, for example? That is not an exact timeline, but it would be an indicative timeline. And when she talks about various options, can she not explain which of those option…”

“Obviously, the Minister has a brief that has been given to her by officials on behalf of the Minister with responsibility for public health, the hon. Member for West Lancashire (Ashley Dalton), who is not able to be here. Can this Minister give me some assurance that I, together with my colleagues who have participated…”

“I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend. I hope that the Minister listened to her and will have direct answers to the questions that she raised. Having spent so much time badgering my right hon. Friend, when she was a Minister in the Cabinet Office, to get something done on this issue, I perhaps need to take the opp…”

“My right hon. and learned Friend is absolutely right. I have before me the answer that he received from the Secretary of State when he raised the matter at Health questions on 17 June: “I reassure the right hon. and learned Gentleman, the constituents of his I have met and other campaigners that I am having discussions…”

“I beg to move, That this House has considered Government support for people harmed following covid-19 vaccinations. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Lewell. This is a hot topic. The Secretary of State told my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright) in…”

“One way of dealing with that would be for the Government to prohibit the import of solar panels and insist that, as a condition of such solar farms, panels must be produced within the United Kingdom. Would that not be a sensible policy?”