5. 2. Business Statement and Announcement

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 2:55 pm on 28 March 2017.

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Photo of Mr Simon Thomas Mr Simon Thomas Plaid Cymru 2:55, 28 March 2017

Can I raise two issues, please, with the business manager, first of all to welcome the fact that the debate for today, later on, on landscapes has been withdrawn? Had it not been withdrawn, I would have certainly have argued that it was out of order, as our Standing Orders say very clearly that any debate that relates to a report should have the report with that debate, and the constituents who have been contacting me over the last two or three days were clear in their minds that this debate related to the report that the Lord Elis-Thomas is preparing on future landscapes on behalf of the Welsh Government. Of course, we haven’t seen that report, it’s not been published, though my constituents have been very keen to send me draft copies of the report, together with their criticism of the report, which would have meant for a very interesting, but, I don’t think, a very constructive debate in this Chamber. Can I ask for an assurance, therefore, that there won’t be an attempt by the Welsh Government to treat us in this way again and that we won’t debate this issue until we have seen the report, fully published, and have had a decent amount of time to study the report and, of course, to contact and listen to our constituents’ concerns on the elements of that report?

The second issue I’d like to raise with the business manager is to ask for a statement from the Welsh Government, in the fullness of time, in response to the decision of the UK Government and the UK Nuclear Decommissioning Authority to change the contract around the decommissioning of the old Magnox nuclear reactors in Wales and throughout the United Kingdom. It affects, particularly, of course, Trawsfynydd in my region, and also Wylfa. These are huge contracts for which the UK Government has been found to have gone through a false and faulty procurement process, has had to pay out taxpayers’ money to American companies to get out of legal challenge, and looks like now, with changing the contract with the company that did win the contract within the next couple of years, all told, it is costing about £100 million, which I think is a figure to bear in mind when UK Government tells us that renewable energy is expensive. We may have an opportunity here to review what’s needed in terms of decommissioning in Trawsfynydd and Wylfa, and there may indeed be different changes to what happens there, but I’d like to know whether Welsh Government is yet in a position to tell us what that might be. It could be that there’s more intensive work needed, it could be there’s less work needed—we don’t know. But a statement from the Welsh Government saying that they’ve been in discussion with the authority and the UK Government and these are the implications for employment, going forward, around the two old Magnox sites would, I think, be valuable to the Assembly.