My Lords, this amendment deals with relatively bread-and-butter matters and with the effects of the transfer of responsibility of non-nuclear health and safety functions on nuclear sites from the HSE to the ONR. In various ways, we seek to ensure that there is continued protection for the workers on those sites, even though the ONR and not the HSE is now the appropriate regulator and enforcer, and that the provisions of the health and safety Act of 1974 would continue to apply.
Amendment 38E states unambiguously, for clarity’s sake, that the workers on ONR sites still have the rights provided under Section 2 of the 1974 Act. I was involved in the discussions on the 1974 Act. I cannot go back quite as far as the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, did—to 1965—although, within three years of that Act being passed, I worked on one of the nuclear sites that it applied to. However, Section 2 of the 1974 act provides the basic health and safety rights: to information, to representation through safety reps and to consultation. I am concerned here mainly with non-nuclear matters on nuclear sites, but I want it made clear that that provision will still apply to those workers in relation to both nuclear and non-nuclear matters.
I will jump to Amendment 38U, which is perhaps a bit esoteric. It deals with existing compensation schemes for workers on nuclear sites where there is the issue of existing schemes, particularly in relation to radiation damage, and where collective arrangements were established 20 or so years ago. The change of regulations and the change in responsibility should not alter the ability of workers on nuclear sites to receive the compensation provided under those schemes, which avoid lengthy and complex legal proceedings. The Minister is looking puzzled at this. I am happy to talk to her officials outside but it is important that that is retained.
More controversially, Amendment 38T would delete the application to this sector of a change that was made under the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act a few weeks ago. It was pretty controversial in this House and I suspect that even those who voted for it here did not expect it to apply on nuclear sites. Writing
the implications of that Act into this Bill means that on nuclear sites, whether for non-nuclear issues or for nuclear issues that are not specifically provided for in the regulations, there is no ability for a worker to seek compensation for a breach of statutory duty. Taking the economy as a whole, “breach of statutory duty” can cover a wide range of things—we had that debate the other week. However, that a breach of statutory duty on a nuclear site, for whatever reason, should not allow the worker to sue for that breach is not what the public would expect.
There is a particular sensitivity about this change applying to nuclear sites, whatever the merits of a general change. Your Lordships can imagine the situation arising where workers had been affected as a result of a breach of statutory duty by the management or the contractors on a nuclear site. If those workers were unable to sue for that breach of statutory duty, there would be outrage in every newspaper from the Daily Mail to the Morning Star. The department and the ONR need to be conscious of that and at least modify these clauses a little to ensure that that eventuality could not arise. I beg to move.
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