Yes, I know—it’s boring hearing the facts, isn’t it? I apologise for not catching the noble Baroness’s eye earlier but I want to contribute briefly to this debate with just a couple of historical facts that might help.
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Howell, for his words about the Liberal Democrats in the coalition. As one of the four people from the Liberal Democrat side who contributed to the agreement with the Conservatives, my recollection on that is that, as I am sure he will remember, nuclear power was to be at no cost to the public purse. That was very much the coalition’s starting and finishing point; I hope that it will continue to be so.
I have done most of the things that the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, invited us to do to apprise ourselves of the facts. Indeed, back in 2001, with the active co-operation of BNFL—British Nuclear Fuels Ltd—I produced a short report, Cleaning Up the Mess, which looked specifically at what would be the best way to deal with nuclear waste; at that time, it was much more prominent in the headlines than it is now
and just as intractable. We looked at some of the conditions needed. One is stable geology but the other, which the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, mentioned, is stable politics. If you look at Europe, only two countries —England and Sweden—have had even 350 years of political stability. Of course, the events in eastern Europe at the moment are a reminder of that.