Morning Session Liberal Democrats Conference

Good morning, conference. Wdlcome to the emergency motion for today,

which is the one on nuclear power at Hinkley Point. If you haven't seen

the text, you can get it from the stewards. There is no amendlent to

this, we don't take amendments on emergency motions. Tomorrow morning

at nine o'clock, we will be doing the emergency motion on loc`l

communities welcoming refugdes. You will find the motion, as I said on

page five, and also Conference Extra on page 22. So I am going to call

Martin Hall, who is moving the motion. And Woody Gideon Amos please

stand by? Good morning, conference. Good morning, conference. Good

morning. Feeling nostalgic for the coalition yet? Go on, you are! Never

mind equal marriage and tax cuts, on energy and the environment, we

achieved the biggest carbon reduction ever and launched the

first Green Investment Bank unlocked investment in low carbon endrgy

through the energy act, cre`ted 200,000 green jobs and planted

million trees and more than doubled renewable energy in the UK.

They sent powerful signals to investors that took us to the top

ten places in the world to hnvest in renewables. We promised, we

delivered and we should be proud of our green record. On nuclear, both

Liberal Democrat and coalithon policy was garted. The -- gtarded.

The deal was nuclear could be part of low carbon mix, but only

alongside investment, energx efficiency and storage and

crucially, without public stbsidy. What has happened since the Tories

took power on their own has been heart breaking for Liberal

Democrats, bad for the environment and potentially disastrous for

Energy Bill pairs. They've ditched the Green Deal without repl`cing it,

cut solar subsidies early and encouraged local opposition to

windfarms while stamping on local opposition to fracking. Just the

kind of policy inconsistencx, contradictory approach, mixdd

messages a recent Select Colmittee report said had damaged invdstor

confidence and taken us out of the top ten places in the world to

invest in renewables. In thd last ten days, the same Select Committee

says we're now on course to miss our renewable energy target. Th`t's half

the deal on nuclear broken that we backed renewables too. What about

the other half the deal? No public subsidy for nuclear? There's

mounting evidence things ard going wrong. National Audit Officd report

earlier this year spelled ott the bill for British bill pairs just for

Hinckley C, ?6 million in 2013, nearly 30 billion projected now The

problem is the contract for difference, a guaranteed endrgy

price designed to help the new, innovative and competitive renewable

ind Troy viability and lower prices and renewable costs have fallen

faster than anyone imagined and there's more innovation comhng in

wind, solar, geothermal, wave, Bayeux gas, ocean, thermal

conversion, tidal flow turbhnes and more. Because their contracts for

difference are shorter, bill payers will benefit from the falling costs

in time. The contract for Hhnckley by contrast, was awarded to

electricity de France on a staggering 35-year time scale. We're

going to be paying this state-owned French energy company and its state

owned Chinese partner for a generation. The final bill could

reach ?40 billion. It will burden our children and grandchildren with

higher Energy Bills for dec`des quite possibly tipping some into

fuel poverty. You see the ntclear industry is not new, innovative or

competitive. In 60 years thdre has never been a single Nuclear Power

Station built anywhere in the world on time, on budget and without

public subsidy. And the Hinckley C model of an EPR reactor hasn't been

built at all. France and Finland in progress, are billions over budget

and years behind schedule. The contract for difference wasn't

enough for EDF. Astonishingly the Tories have obliged them. In a foot

note to a statement last October, they officially dropped the

coalition's pledge to no public subsidy. Just the previous day,

energy ministers Andrea Ledsom, remember her? She said it w`sifiedal

energy companies stood on their own two feet. She was justifying cutting

renewable subsidies. For Hinckley, the cheque book was open. Gdorge

Osborne announced a Governmdnt loan guarantee estimated at ?2 bhllion

now but likely to rise. The Hinckley deal already included a funded

decommissioning deal that promised future taxpayers would foot the bill

if the cost of closing it down and cleaning it up overran as wdll.

George Osborne will be history by then. The recent report says energy

efficiency and storage and interconnection with other countries

would save the UK ?1 billion a year while keeping the light on `nd

meeting climate targets. Fotr new large windfarms would bring us much

electricity into the grid as Hinckley. Conference, as thd motion

says, Hinckley C is a bad ddal. We need a UK energy policy basdd on

energy efficiency, renewabld energy, storage and interconnection. Please

live up to that proud, green record in Government and support this

motion. Thank you very much. APPLAUSE

Thank you. Martin is hoping and we all hope he will regain that seat

for us. Could counsellor Jaxne Lock stand by. I call Gideon Amos.

Conference, this time last xear I stood before you as a former member

of the now shamefully abandoned UK's zero carbon homes taskforce. I'm

here this year because I want to talk to you about carbon reduction

and how one of our most important carbon reduction proinjects in this

country, Hinckley, cannot bd completely opposed and attelpted to

be stopped by Liberal Democrats My suggestion to you is today hn this

short, half hour, emergency motion debate is not the way to ch`nge our

long standing policy that this party has debated at great length. For

many of us, for many environmentalists like James

Lovelock, for our party, we have come to recognise the importance of

nuclear in our energy mix, `s a way first and foremost of achieving the

low carbon road that we havd to go down, achieving the 80% redtction in

emissions by 2050. That is ` target that is apparently being ab`ndoned

by the Conservatives. It is not a target that this party should be

willing to abandon. It's essential not just for our carbon emissions

targets and vierltal targets, this is essential for the communhties

around the world who will stffer most from carbon emissions `nd

climate change and they are, of course, the poorest countrids, the

countries like Bangladesh and other countries which will suffer most if

we fail to achieve global c`rbon emissions reductions targets. I

welcome the opportunity to debate this and am grateful to the local

party for bringing this mothon forward and much of what it has to

say is valuable. But to simply oppose the Hinckley project as is

stated in lines 24 to 26, I would suggest a separate vote shotld be

taken on those if possible, is not a realistic policy to be made on the

basis of the evidence. It is not correct to say that the project is

entirely dependent on public subsidy. It has a huge amount of

private investment. It is not the case to say, it's not true to say

it's unconstructible. There are two in China nearing completion at the

moment. I could go on. But the most important point for me is that we

need a transformation in our energy provision in this country. We need

to see a transformation which was indeed led by Ed Davey, our

brilliant Secretary of Statd, who tripled renewable energy in this

country, who brought about the beginning of the kans formation we

need to see, more renewables, more low carbon energy and backed up by

base load that nuclear, cle`n, safe nuclear power can provide. The one

irony of this motion, if it was passed, we would end up as ` party

more antagonistic to the pe`ceful use of nuclear power than wd would

be to the use of nuclear we`pons. Let us get our priorities rhght

conference, and let us back the low-carbon agenda, by all mdans we

must criticise the policies coming out of the Government and the way

they've been handled. But complete opposition to this policy, project,

instead of an agenda about transforming our energy mix and

basing that on a zero, low carbon energy supply is the route we have

to go down. Thank you. APPLAUSE

Thank you. Our PPC for Taunton Dean. I should just point out we can't

take a request for a separate vote at this stage, I'm afraid they have

to be submitted in writing the day before, sorry about that. Could I

ask John Shoe smith to stand by I now call counsellor Jayne Lock, the

leader of Somerset County Council. Good morning conference. Slhght

correction to that, you're pre-empting it by a few months. I

will be leader of Somerset County Council next May.

APPLAUSE I was first elected as a Liberal

Democrat counsellor in 1987 and in that election we were fighthng the

development of Hinckley C. @s the Liberal Democrats we were stccessful

then. I'm now leader of the Liberal Democrat group in opposition on

Somerset County Council and here we are 30 years later, building a

Nuclear Power Station, using the same technology as then. Th`t is why

I am supporting the motion to conference to oppose the

construction of Hinckley C. The construction of similar powdr

stations in France and Finl`nd are years behind schedule and

substantially over budget and clearly, are not working. On the

very reasonable assumption that these issues will apply to the

proposed Hinckley Point powdr station, it seems un-Lukely it -

unlikely it will be operational until at least 2030 and cost far

more than the current budget, the estimated final cost is 25 billion,

the cost of the Severn Barr`ge less tan 20 billion. Hence Hinckley C

will not contribute to solvhng the need for base load electrichty

generation in the 2020s and any electricity it generates will be far

more expensive than solar and wind generation when it becomes

operational. By 2030, smart management of electricity stpply and

demand will enable a far higher contribution of intermittent

renewables to be relied upon than at present. The power plant will be out

of date before it is ever ttrned on. Another consideration is th`t of the

safety of this plant, one of the last tsunamis to hit the UK was in

Bridgwater bay, the very site of Hinckley. A daily newspaper reported

only yesterday that another tsunami of this scale could hit in the next

few years. I think it depends on part of one of the Canary Islands

dropping off, but hey. When Somerset County Council was asked about their

preparations for a tsunami, the council informed me there wdre a

number of places where effective barriers have been constructed. One

of the examples given to me was the nuclear power plant at Fukushima in

Japan. Clearly, no local authority nor central government can know how

big the next tsunami will bd. My experience working in close quarters

with the Tories is that thex are completely unprepared for the impact

of this project as always, they know the cost of everything and the value

of nothing. Finally, we must question how many of the 25,000 jobs

will be filled by the local workforce. Somerset does not have

the people now and with our impending exit from the European

Union, where will these skilled workers come from? Too many

unanswered and unconsidered questions about this project, we

cannot allow it to be the ndxt white elephant in the UK. But let me make

it clear - when we do retakd control in Somerset in May '17, we will work

with the decision taken by Government and in the best hnterests

of the people for Somerset, because we have to. Thank you.

APPLAUSE Thank you, Jayne. As corrected our

Group Leader of Somerset Cotnty Council. Could I ask Becky Forest to

please stand by. I call John Shoesmith from mid-Derbyshire. Good

morning. I'd like to explain in the next three minutes why Hinckley

Point is essential to your future and essential moreover to your

children's future, more importantly I should say to your childrdn's

future. It is. I'd like to start off by looking at energy. Our ctrrent

energy use is perhaps there. Over the next 30 years we face a

desperate struggle to bring down that level of energy use by

insulating all our buildings, by electrifying those things that are

currently operated by fossil fuel. That is a huge task, not chdap. Over

here I'd like it talk about energy supply. The current level of

renewable energy supply is way below that. Over the next 30 years, we

need to put in a desperate dffort to bring up that level of renewable

energy supply to try to match the level of demand. There have been

lots of studies done of that over the past few years and mostly, they

end up with a bit of a gap to fill and the crucial political issue for

us to address is how that g`p is filled. There are two ways to do it.

The first, is to bring down the level of demand by asking pdople to

make lifestyle changes, to cycle, to walk, to turn down their hole

heating, to eat less meat. Those are fine, a few people do them. I do

them myself. But asking the whole country to do them is virtu`lly

impossible in a democracy. The other way to fill that gap is by the use

of nuclear power. Even if wd put renewables everywhere we sensibly

can, there's still a gap for nuclear power to be filled and nucldar power

is the only sensible way to do it. So when you look at Hincklex,

consider this: If you kill that project, then your children have

little option, have a very difficult task to do to bring our energy into

balance and to reduce ourselves to a zero carbon state. If we fahl to do

that, by 2050, they'll know they've missed it and they will facd runaway

climate change. That is an `wful prospect. I urge you, in considering

how to vote on this, to rejdct it, because Hinckley Point, oncd it s

gone, will be very difficult to bring back. We'll' face virtually

certainly a no nuclear future and that is very, very difficult thing

to live with. I urge you ag`in, please reject this motion. Thanks.

Thank you, John shoesmith from adoption. Could I ask David to stand

by? I call Becky Forrest from Bolton. Good morning, conference and

thank you for the opportunity to speak. I only joined the party on

June 25 so this is my first time speaking at conference. . I speak to

you today having expected to oppose this motion. I am in favour of an

interim use of nuclear power until such time as we can develop

affordable and economically viable renewable energy that everybody can

access. Until Theresa May ptt it on hold, I had not paid much attention

to Hinkley Point C so the fhrst isolation of the new Prime Linister,

read a couple of articles around it to -- the first decision. As I

understood it, there would be no government or taxpayer subshdies, it

was funded by foreign private investment and my first instinct was

to wonder why she was jeopardising a project that provided vital

infrastructure at potentially no public cost. Based on this, I was

ready to oppose the motion. However, as a teacher and a science teacher,

I like evidence and experts. So I looked into the matter further. I

was astonished that in real terms in the contract, consumers and

taxpayers would effectively end up funding this project. The fhxed

wholesale energy costs negotiated and guaranteed by the Tory

government is much more than today's market price. This means th`t if

Hinkley Point C does not get that price from its consumers, the tax

payer will up the differencd. Worse still, that price is fixed for 5

years of energy provision. Hn retrospect, I believe Theresa May

was right to review Hinkley C but in failing to take a brave dechsion to

now withdraw from that contract she is once again playing an active part

in a Tory government which hs once again letting the public down. In my

naivete, I believed Hinkley C was subsidy free in such a fundhng

arrangement would allow us to benefit from the supply of

electricity without the rel`ted expense of the infrastructure.

However, this is clearly not true. We will gain the expense without any

of the control and as such, I ask you to support this motion that

Hinkley C be opposed in its current form. Thank you. APPLAUSE.

Thank you, Becky. Could I ask Fiona Hall to stand by? The last three

speakers have all been first-time speakers at conference. I c`n assure

you the next not. So I call Ed Davey. I spent nearly

three years of my life lookhng at this deal. But I promise yot if you

vote for this motion, and whll not take it personally. I want to

convince you to vote against this motion. The motion and many speakers

and commentators said the price of Hinkley Point C is very expdnsive

and will involve public subsidy Having looked at many more lodels of

future prices linked to this decision, more than I think the

National Audit Office did, H am always astonished people can assert

with such certainty that thdy know it is very expensive or good value

for money. Why? Because to know that, you have to know the price of

electricity between 2025 and 20 0. If you know that, you reallx clever.

Because guessing the price of electricity next year is a lock s

game. You also have the Nobdl Prize of carbon between 2025 and 2060

Carbon markets are not workhng very well unfortunately -- you h`ve to

know the price. This is the problem, uncertainty, we do not know the

future prices, technology, but we have to make decisions about things

that have to be tackled. Clhmate change. I am sure climate change is

happening and we have to take measures to do that and Hinkley

Point C does that.