PA MediaScotland will not get a “golden age of nuclear” while the SNP holds firm in its opposition to new nuclear power stations, Ed Miliband has said.
The energy secretary said Holyrood’s position “makes no sense”, as Labour MP Gregor Poynton claimed the policy had cost workers and taxpayers north of the border “billions of pounds of investment and thousands of high-skilled jobs”.
SNP MP Kirsty Blackman described the UK Government’s new £14.2 billion investment into Sizewell C in Suffolk as a “splurge”, when she pressed Miliband on whether the Government will back the Acorn carbon capture and storage project.
Miliband said the Sizewell development along East Anglia’s North Sea coastline will “power the equivalent of around six million homes with clean homegrown energy for 60 years, and it will be a jobs and growth engine for Britain, supporting 10,000 jobs in the peak construction and creating 1,500 apprenticeships”.
It is one of several nuclear projects which the Government has backed, which also include a prototype fusion plant at West Burton, Nottinghamshire, and a partnership between Rolls-Royce and Great British Energy – Nuclear to rollout small modular reactors.
Poynton, the MP for Livingston, told the Commons: “Scotland was once a pioneer in nuclear energy and should be again, but due to the SNP Scottish Government’s outdated, backward, quite frankly bizarre opposition to nuclear energy, turning away billions of pounds of investment and thousands of high-skilled jobs.
“So, does the secretary of state agree with me this is yet another way the SNP Scottish Government has lost their way?”
Miliband replied that Poynton was “so right”, and added: “People in Scotland will be looking at these announcements and saying, ‘well why isn’t it us that are benefitting from this? Why are we not even in the race?’”
The Scottish Government, led by SNP First Minister John Swinney, has a policy of opposing the building of new nuclear power stations.
Lillian Jones, the Labour MP for Kilmarnock and Loudoun, criticised the position as an “ideological block on nuclear power, blocking billions in investment, blocking thousands of well-paid, secure Scottish jobs, and blocking growth”.
In his response, Miliband said: “We can announce a golden age of nuclear with our investments but not in Scotland, because of the position of the SNP Government.
“It makes no sense.”
Aberdeen North MP Blackman had earlier said: “This £14 billion splurge on English nuclear power plants comes on top of £22 billion for English carbon capture and storage, while there’s nothing for Scotland’s Acorn project.
“With Grangemouth (oil refinery) allowed to close, with a fiscal regime that is ruining north-east energy jobs, this latest announcement shows that Scotland isn’t just an afterthought, it isn’t a thought at all.
“If nearly £40 billion can be found for English energy projects, why is it that money is never found for Scotland’s carbon capture project?”
Miliband replied: “Well look, I think maybe there is an SNP change in position coming. If she wants to have a conversation about Scottish nuclear power stations, then absolutely.
“We’re in favour of the Acorn project and we’ll be saying more about this in the coming weeks.
“But let me just say to her – on nuclear power, they’ve really got to think again.
“They are absolutely sticking their heads in the sand when it comes to this. This is about jobs, it’s about investment, it’s about clean energy, they should really rethink.”
In an earlier statement, Miliband said: “The Government is taking decisive steps today to usher in a new golden age of nuclear for Britain.”
He added: “For too long, our country has not made the crucial energy – or indeed other infrastructure investments – we need. A short-sighted failure to invest for which the British people have paid the price in lower living standards, insecurity and declining public services.
“This week’s announcements symbolise a decisive change in approach, to invest in the future – the right choice for energy security, the right choice for jobs, the right choice for climate and our children and grandchildren, the right choice for Britain, investment, not decline.
“This Government has made its choice.”
The energy secretary’s comments came as leaders of the GMB Scotland union urged the Scottish Government to rethink its opposition to new nuclear power stations north of the border.
The nuclear industry already supports almost 3,700 jobs in Scotland, adding £400 million to the economy, the union said.
But it said more could be achieved if SNP ministers would back the construction of new power stations.
Louise Gilmour, GMB Scotland secretary, said: “New nuclear can help provide a baseload of safe, clean and secure energy while creating thousands of skilled, well-paid, unionised jobs in Scotland.
“The Holyrood Government’s absolute refusal to seriously consider its potential is an abdication of responsibility and needs to change.
“It makes no sense if ministers want to achieve net-zero targets and it makes no sense if they want Scotland’s economy to grow again.”
But a Scottish Government spokesperson said that “our position is now changing”.
The Holyrood administration has been “tremendously successful in attracting renewables investment in Scotland”, the spokesperson said.
“That is because there has been a clear policy direction from the Scottish Government.”
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