I am extremely grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, and I hope that I will be able to allay his fears. In fact, I think my noble friends Lord Deben and Lord Jenkin and the noble Lord, Lord O’Neill, have explained far more eloquently than I could why it is important that the DWP should remain the main sponsor body. I am extremely pleased to hear that the noble Lord, Lord Roper, has been convinced by argument and has changed his mind. That is the benefit of your Lordships’ House: we can have these detailed debates which highlight how things can be illustrated far better by people with far more experience than I have.
I assure the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, that DECC will still have appropriate statutory levers to ensure the effective delivery of policy areas for which DECC Ministers are accountable to Parliament. Such independence is a requirement of the European nuclear safety directive, which has been implemented by the UK.
I will now address the other amendments in the group, which have not had as much of an airing as the noble Lord would perhaps have liked. Amendments 38K, 38L and 38P allow for changes to how nuclear regulations are made, in particular that they could confer powers on other bodies. The Bill is deliberately focused solely on the ONR and the functions and remit that it needs to be an effective regulator. It would be a significant change of focus to make provision for conferring functions and responsibilities on other regulators and would require changes to many aspects of the Bill. In addition, any regulations made that covered the remit of another organisation could be made jointly with them, using the Bill and another more appropriate legislative vehicle. To that extent, I take the view that these amendments are unnecessary.
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Amendments 38M, 38N and 40M allow for general agreements and co-operation between ONR and other bodies. We have already made adequate arrangements for the statutory ONR to enter into agreements, such as agency co-operation agreements and memorandums of understanding, as my noble friend Lord Jenkin pointed out. It is not necessary for all those relationships to be laid out in the Bill.
It is also inappropriate for co-operation agreements to be a primary function of the ONR, as would be the case under Amendment 40E. The ONR’s principal functions delineate its remit as a regulator, and I do not agree that they should be diluted by agreements that can already be made under the Bill without the need for amendment.
I cannot accept Amendment 38Q, as it unnecessarily limits the type of persons who can be prohibited from working with ionising radiations. Our intent is that this might include categories of person, such as pregnant women, and should not be limited only to those who are not a specialist appointed to fulfil a certain role within the organisation.
I am grateful to the noble Lord for Amendment 38S, which would have the effect of allowing the creation of nuclear regulations that could be enforced by others. I appreciate the noble Lord’s intention behind this amendment, but I hope to reassure him that it is not necessary. First, the clause to which the amendment pertains applies to regulations, which can be made only in matters within the purposes of the ONR. These are matters within the particular expertise of the ONR, and it is unlikely that any other regulator would have similar expertise. Clearly, it would not be appropriate for non-experts to be taking on such a role. Secondly, were the Secretary of State to agree that some of the ONR’s functions could be better carried out on its behalf by another body, there is a power in Clause 83 for the ONR to make the necessary arrangements for this to happen. Finally, were the Secretary of State to need to make regulations that spanned more widely than the nuclear regulations allow, a hybrid of two or more legislative vehicles could be used to allow other bodies to enforce those aspects which fall outside the scope of the ONR’s purposes.
I also note that my colleagues in the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee have recommended that the regulation-making powers in Clause 63 follow the affirmative route the first time that they are used. As I said earlier, I will consider the recommendations with a view to tabling amendments at Report. I hope that that adequately responds to the noble Lord’s concerns, and that he will agree not to press the amendment.
Amendment 40F is also not needed, as the ONR will already have the power to appoint any inspectors jointly with any other regulator. The Bill provides that appointments of such inspectors will be based on their skill set, not who they work for. Amendment 40L expands the ONR’s role with respect to compliance with nuclear safeguards obligations to include facilitating compliance by the Department of Energy and Climate Change with any safeguards obligations of the department. I assure the noble Lord that the department does not enter into any nuclear safeguards agreements acting independently of Ministers, and therefore the department itself does not and will not have any nuclear safeguards obligations that are not obligations of Ministers of the Crown. This amendment is therefore also unnecessary.
Finally, Amendment 40Q is added to allow for responsibility for enforcing the duties under HSWA to be transferred by regulations to the Environment Agency or another public body. This is not an appropriate amendment. The current policy is that provision would only be made for transfer between ONR and bodies which already have responsibility for enforcing health and safety legislation.
On that note, I hope that the noble Lord will have found my explanations to his amendments reassuring. The noble Lord asked whether I would provide him and the Committee with a diagram of the way in which the regulators are laid out and I am quite happy to do so. I hope the noble Lord will withdraw his amendment.