Vol. 399 No. 2
8 Mr. Quinn asked the Minister for Energy if he will make a statement on the recent comments of the British Secretary of State for the Environment to the effect that the issue of Sellafield has never been raised with him; the number of times he has raised this issue with British Ministers; the names of the Ministers involved; the response he has received; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
41 Mr. McCartan asked the Minister for Energy the number of occasions since taking office on which he has drawn the attention of the British authorities to Irish dissatisfaction at the continued operation of the Sellafield nuclear reprocessing centre; the responses which he received on each occasion; if he has ever raised this matter at meetings of the Council of Ministers; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
51 Mr. T. O'Sullivan asked the Minister for Energy the representations, if any, which he has made at diplomatic or ministerial level, in light of the recent revelations linking Sellafield to leukaemia.
70 Mr. O'Brien asked the Minister for Energy if he or any other member of the Government conveyed Ireland's opposition to operations at Sellafield to the UK Minister for the Environment; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
I propose to take Questions Nos. 8, 41, 51 and 70 together.
I have taken every opportunity to press the Government's position on the closure of Sellafield. At ministerial level, such protests would be made to the UK Secretary of State for Energy, who is responsible for the nuclear industry, and not to the Secretary of State for the Environment. Successive Secretaries of State for Energy have been informed directly of the Government's views. In fact, only last Friday I met with Mr. John Wakeham, the present Secretary of State for Energy and raised with him our serious concerns about nuclear power in general and Sellafield in particular. I can assure the Deputy that the British Government are left in no doubt about Ireland's view on Sellafield.
Within the EC, Irish concerns about nuclear safety have been raised at every opportunity. At the EC Council of Energy Ministers on Monday, following a long discussion on energy and the environment, we succeeded in getting the Council's agreement for the first time to welcome the Commission's view that a discussion on nuclear energy and environmental issues including safety, transport and waste — including waste from the decommissioning process — should be pursued. In the course of the discussion, the Council were informed trenchantly of Ireland's views on nuclear safety and related issues. In particular our continued opposition to reprocessing at the Sellafield plant was reiterated and Ireland asserted that discharges into the environment must cease through closure of the plant.
As regards the Gardner report, it has been examined in my Department, and it indicates a possible link between high levels of radiation to which Sellafield workers can be exposed and leukaemia. It also states that no link between increased leukaemia incidence and environmental radioactivity was found. The Irish public, of course, would be exposed to radioactivity from Sellafield through the environment. I understand that further work based on Professor Gardner's report is now being carried out in the UK, and any additional findings will be scrutinised by my Department.
Did the Minister know in advance of the proposed contract to reprocess German waste fuel in Sellafield thus expanding their existing operations? Did the Minister communicate his strong objections to this when he first learned of it?
Last July, I became aware of this and I arranged that the Irish Government would protest to the British Government and to the German Government and that our views would be conveyed to them. Recently, on the conclusion of that contract I expressed our serious concern at the developments that were taking place, which we consider to be of very grave import as far as this country is concerned. Unfortunately for us it will result in shipments of nuclear waste being transported on the high seas from around the world. Shipments of nuclear waste are already being made from Japan and Germany for disposal at Sellafield. This company's activities are considered by the Government to be a serious threat to the future safety of the people living on this island. We are seeking to exercise our influence within the European Community to have an inspectorate established and to make our fears known on these matters. We are also directly trying to get the British authorities to respond to the genuine fears that are held by the Government and by all the people living in this island.
The Minister has made it clear that he is concerned about this matter and I am glad to note the number of occasions on which it has been raised at the Council of Ministers. I presume that will be ongoing. In view of the fact that little progress will be made on the issue in the short-term, may I ask the Minister if he still maintains the option of going to the European Court as a last resort?
This is a matter that I had carefully examined when I took up office in the Department of Energy. The legal advice made available to previous Ministers has been confirmed to me as being correct — in that we cannot establish a case at present under existing law with which we would have any possibility of success. I said this publicly in the House a month ago and I was criticised for being frank in the matter. I think it is only right that I should say it as it is.
Previously, the Minister said that we did not have a cast iron case.
There is no case at present. The law needs to be strengthened and in my view it would be an appropriate move for us to start advocating changes in the Euratom Treaty which was drawn up many years ago before many of the dangers associated with nuclear energy were known. Of course, we still do not know all the dangers associated with the use of nuclear energy. I am considering the position at present and I am considering whether Ireland should be taking an initiative to have the Euratom Treaty revised and strengthened to enable action to be taken. I have had discussions with Greenpeace, who had presented a legal case to my predecessors which both parties accepted would not have stood up. I have agreed with them to arrange a meeting with our Attorney General and the legal representatives of the Greenpeace organisation because if we can find some way in which a case could be taken with any degree of success, I would be very pleased to ask the Government to take it. I wish to let the House know that this is the strong position I am taking on this matter.
On a previous occasion, when he raised the matter, I made the offer to Deputy Bruton that if he had any suggestion as to how we could bring a successful case against the British Authorities over the operation of the Sellafield plant or any other nuclear installation in any country, I would be pleased to take them on board.
The Minister has been very frank and realistic on this issue in the past. I ask him to focus his argument at EC level on the issue of the transport of nuclear waste. In doing so, I ask the Minister to be aware that in addition to the reprocessing of spent domestic nuclear fuel in the United Kingdom that several countries, as he said himself, Japan and Germany and other countries such as Italy, Switzerland, and the Netherlands send their radiological waste to Sellafield. If there was an accident with any of these shipments of nuclear waste on the Irish Sea the reprecussions for this country would be worse than Chernobyl. Quite frankly this is a matter of life and death.
I appreciate the Minister has been realistic about the matter and I am asking him to use our Irish Presidency to focus on the issue of the transportation of nuclear waste.
I think the Deputy has made his point.
The Minister is a very determined individual and I ask him to use that determination at EC level to fight this case to the bitter end.
I indicated during the course of an earlier reply that transport of nuclear waste is now on the agenda for future discussion at Energy Council meetings, following our initiative on Monday of this week.
I agree with the Deputy, although I do not want to frighten people unnecessarily that there is a serious threat and this is the reason we are taking such a serious approach to it. The volume of nuclear waste being stored at Sellafield could be greatly in excess of what the Deputy has estimated.
I accept totally what the Minister has said about the number of times he has made representations. Would the Minister tell the House whether he has repudiated the comments of the British Secretary of State for the Environment which are mischievous and misleading to a number of people and whether he took action when those comments were published?
What comments?
The comments referred to in Deputy Quinn's question No. 8. Those comments are misleading and mischievous to say the least.
The Deputy is referring to a comment made by the Secretary of State for the Environment. As I have explained in my reply, all our representations in this matter would not have been made to the Minister for the Environment in the UK but to the Minister for Energy. The Minister for the Environment would not necessarily have had any communication about the matter. We have communicated Government to Government, ambassador to ambassador and Minister for Energy to Minister for Energy, and that is the way the representations have been made.
The Minister will agree that it is misleading for the Secretary of State for the Environment to say that no representations have been made.
Certainly if that is what he was implying it would have been entirely misleading and false, but in fairness to him, I think he was saying that representations had not been made directly to him. In our view he is not the appropriate Minister to whom the representations should have been made.
