Michael Shanks MP: speeches

Speeches

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  I was expecting every question today to be, “Could an SMR be built in my constituency?” but my hon. Friend is the first to ask, so he wins the prize for that. I will not labour the point, but as he says, we had a lot of promises and a lot of big talk from the Conservative Government on nuclear, but very little actually delivered. The truth is that no money was put forward for any of those things. It is easy to sign and say, “We want to deliver something,” but without putting any money forward, nothing will happen. We have committed almost £20 billion in funding to make Britain’s new golden age of nuclear a reality, which will deliver jobs in my hon. Friend’s constituency and across the country. We are ambitious about the future of SMRs. They can be sited in a great many more places than traditional nuclear facilities. We have asked Great British Energy Nuclear to look at the range of sites across the United Kingdom that are possible, not just the sites that were traditionally designated for nuclear projects. That opens up huge opportunity for the energy mix of the future, and for jobs, investment and training throughout supply chains as well.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  Of course I agree with my hon. Friend. Much of SNP policy defies logic, but this one does in particular. His constituents in Glasgow and constituents across Scotland will benefit from supply chain jobs from the SMR project and from the work we are doing at Hinkley Point C and Sizewell C. However, they are not benefiting anywhere near as much as they would, were we building those projects in Scotland. It is an economically stupid idea to ideologically block new nuclear in Scotland, but it is also a real challenge to Scotland’s energy security. For more than half of the past few weeks, nuclear has been providing electricity in Scotland. Renewables are hugely important, but they have to be balanced with storage and with nuclear. Only when we get that balance right do we deliver secure, clean, home-grown power. We need both parts of it, and the SNP is missing half of it and missing in action as usual.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman is right to say how important this next generation of nuclear is—but alongside other technologies. The Government have been really clear that our clean power mission is about wind, solar and storage, but it is also about nuclear. That combination is how we deliver our energy security and get away from the volatility of fossil fuels, and it is how we create thousands of jobs across the country. We need all of that. The hon. Member is right to highlight Oldbury, which is a hugely important nuclear site that is owned by Great British Energy Nuclear. We continue to look at the future potential for Oldbury and other sites. This is not the limit of the Government’s ambition on nuclear; it is the next stage of that ambition. Wylfa was judged as the best possible site for the SMR programme and it is right that we put our flagship programme on the best possible site, but we are ambitious about the future of nuclear and Great British Energy Nuclear is looking at a range of sites across the UK—including both Oldbury and sites in Scotland—for potential future projects.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right to say that the SNP’s policy on nuclear is immature. Nuclear has been an important part of Scotland’s energy mix for decades. As a result, tens of thousands of people have had good well-paid jobs in his constituency, across Ayrshire and across the other nuclear sites in Scotland. After almost two decades in power, perhaps the SNP is beyond an explanation about this and so many other things, and the only answer for Scotland is change.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right to point out the wider impact that investment has in not just the nuclear supply chains, but the local communities that that drives forward. Nuclear tends to have much more sustainable, well-paid and trade-unionised jobs than other parts of our energy system, which means that there are wider economic benefits for those who work in the nuclear industry. We want to see a great many more jobs in nuclear right across the country. We should be hugely proud that Rolls-Royce is taking forward this project in the UK; it is hugely innovative. The UK is at the forefront of this new technology, which will change the future energy system for the UK and across the world, and we are really proud that it will be built in Britain.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is a huge champion of the nuclear industry, and I have learned a huge amount from her in my time in this post. I am sure the whole nuclear industry is grateful for her work on the all-party group on nuclear energy, and in other activities throughout the House to ensure that these issues are always top of the agenda. Great British Energy Nuclear has been charged with driving forward our ambition for nuclear, and the SMR programme is a key part of that, as are Hinkley Point C and Sizewell C, and we are also looking at what future potential we need. Our country’s energy needs will clearly only increase in the coming years, and we will be looking at the future of that energy mix, and the mix of renewables with nuclear. The Secretary of State has charged Great British Energy Nuclear to look at what more projects there will be. I take my hon. Friend’s point about a road map to give some certainty to that, and I am sure that the Minister for Science, Innovation, Research and Nuclear, Lord Vallance, will have heard that comment, as well as Great British Energy Nuclear, and I am sure they will work with her on that.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend rightly highlights the huge economic advantage of nuclear. I grew up in Ayrshire, next to Hunterston, so I know how important nuclear power stations are for the communities that grow up around them. We are considering existing sites. This is not, of course, the end of our nuclear ambitions; we have been clear that we see nuclear as a hugely important part of our energy mix now and in future. Our work to consider the regulatory regime will report in due course to ensure that we have a robust process that rightly recognises the importance of nuclear safety but is also flexible enough to take advantage of the opportunities of nuclear.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  That is a hugely important question. This is a significant moment for British innovation, because we are now moving forward quickly to ensure that we are at the forefront of this innovation, so that other countries that are already looking to the Rolls-Royce designs can benefit from them as well, but made in Britain. The aim of SMRs that is different from gigascale nuclear is to get to a point where their replicability means that we can produce the SMR technology for export market as well as for ourselves. That is important for our allies across the world who want nuclear to be part of their energy mix, and it is a hugely important economic opportunity for this country as well.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  Well, let me start at the end, because it is nice when we have a rare moment of consensus in this place now and again. I would add our friends in the Scottish National party to the last question, although I am not quite sure about Plaid Cymru—some of its members support nuclear and some do not, even though we are building in Wales. The right hon. Lady is right to say that nuclear must be the bedrock of our clean power system. It is also an economic opportunity, as we all know. I welcome that brief bit of consensus. The right hon. Member says “build, build, build,” but all the Opposition did was consult, consult, consult. She talks about signing off new nuclear, but none of it has been built. It is easy to sign things off, but the previous Government committed no money—not a penny of funding. On one of the biggest days for our domestic nuclear industry in a very long time, it was remarkable to hear Opposition spokespeople last week talk down the sector. They talked big for 14 years, but built very little. Not a single new nuclear project was completed in their entire time in office, and that is because they did not put any funding into delivering it. We have committed almost £20 billion of real money to build real projects, because we are ambitious about our nuclear future, about Sizewell C and about this SMR programme. We have not ruled out any future giga-scale projects, but our ambition is matched by funding to actually deliver them. Wylfa was the absolute best site on offer, which is why we chose it to host this most important, flagship project for the United Kingdom. We are delivering jobs and investment in Wales, and we are delivering the next generation of nuclear after many, many years of disappointment by the Conservatives.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  I welcome the hon. Lady’s commitment to securing a new nuclear project in her constituency. She and I have had a number of discussions about nuclear power and other energy projects. Nuclear energy provides the stable low-carbon baseload we need to keep the lights on and to support our economy. It is central to our clean power mission. That is why we have launched a new golden age of nuclear, committing £17 billion to the most ambitious programme of new nuclear for a generation. Our small modular reactor—SMR—programme, led by Great British Energy Nuclear, is an example of British innovation at its best. These mini reactors are smaller and quicker to build than traditional nuclear power stations, and we have been considering which is the best site to kick off the SMR programme now that we have reached that decision. Last week, we announced that Wylfa on the north coast of Anglesey—Ynys Môn—is our chosen site for GBE Nuclear’s first SMR project. A written ministerial statement on the matter was made on Thursday. The initial project will see, subject to contracts, the construction of up to three Rolls-Royce SMR units. The site could host as many as eight, subject to future policy and funding decisions. That will deliver the largest industrial investment in north Wales for a generation. It will provide 3,000 good jobs on the site at peak construction. GBE Nuclear already looks forward to working with Welsh communities on the project, with work due to start on the site as early as next year. We will be progressing the SMR project across this Parliament, working towards final investment decision. Meanwhile, large-scale nuclear power stations will also continue to make a vital contribution to our home-grown clean energy mix, complementing these SMRs. We will continue to act decisively, to invest ambitiously and to work with communities, investors and allies to deliver this golden age for new nuclear.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  The right hon. Gentleman asks a typically important question. We take the security of our nuclear fleet in all its forms extremely seriously, and SMRs are a new part of that. The security arrangements will take into account the existing nuclear constabulary, which will look at security as soon as construction starts to ramp up on site. Across Government, we have been looking at the broader question of how we ensure our critical national infrastructure is protected in an increasingly hostile world, not just from physical attack and sabotage, as the right hon. Gentleman points out, but from cyber-attack, which is becoming more of a priority. My Department and the Cabinet Office are working together to come up with a more detailed plan to ensure that we do that, but the security of all our energy infrastructure is a top priority.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Power Station: Wylfa · Hansard source

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  I am grateful for a genuine question in the House of Commons—always appreciated. As I said earlier, the decision was made that Wylfa was the best possible site for SMRs. This is a hugely important project for us, starting with three SMR units, but with potential at Wylfa to increase that, which is a huge opportunity. The right hon. Gentleman is right to say that Wylfa would also have hosted at gigascale, but after a great many years of Wylfa being promised lots of things, the option on the table was either a project with funding now, and a clear pathway to delivery on an important site that will deliver the outcomes we need as a country, or a potential wait for another spending review where we might make a decision about future nuclear. We are ambitious about what the future of gigascale nuclear would look like, but right now funding has been confirmed for SMRs. It was right that Wylfa, which is a significant site and has a skilled workforce, takes advantage of that after a significant amount of time of things being promised but not delivered. As I said, we have not set that as the limit of our nuclear ambitions, and we will say more in due course about what future sites might look like. Great British Energy Nuclear is looking at those now.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Energy · Hansard source

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  I thank all right hon. and hon. Members across the House for their contributions in this short but punchy debate this afternoon. This issue of how we build an energy system for the future has rightly become a huge political topic—a conversation not just in this House but much more in the public domain than it has been for some time. Energy is hugely important, and that is why it is even more important that we rise to the occasion to plan a future energy system that works for everyone in this country and that is based on a credible long-term plan, not on what we saw from the Conservatives today. It has been an interesting debate, not least because quite a lot of it seemed to contain the echoes of the Tory party of late debating with itself. We had mentions of Boris Johnson and Baroness May, and I think we have doubled the number of visitors to the shadow Minister’s website just in the past half hour. Of course, there are plenty of quotes to go around. We do not need to go right back to the dim and distant Boris Johnson days. We can go back just to 2023, when the then Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for East Surrey (Claire Coutinho), said that “the climate transition presents huge opportunities for this country and the people of this country when it comes to jobs, investment and improving our energy security.” She apparently does not believe in any of that now. She said in the same speech: “We are not rolling back from our targets at all” —[ Official Report , 16 October 2023; Vol. 738, c. 114-115.] However, she stands here today and proudly seems to dismiss all those targets. I was particularly pleased to hear from the right hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Graham Stuart) earlier. He seems to be the only person left in the Conservative party who is willing to defend 14 years of investment in renewables. Everybody else in the party wants to turn their back on that investment, but I am delighted that he is here, in this debate and in many others, to remind us of his contribution.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Energy · Hansard source

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  Sorry, I will not. I have a great respect for the hon. Gentleman, but I have four minutes to sum up this debate. For a long time in our post-war history, there was consensus. It was fuelled first by the transformative discovery of gas in the North sea, but also by a protracted period of us not worrying about whether, when we flicked on a switch, the electrons would flow. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine threw all that consensus away, and it threw into stark reality our dependence on gas power. By 2022, astronomic energy prices, which many of our constituents still face, shattered the complacent idea that continuing with the system we have known for a long time would work. The answer is to build a system fit for the future. That will not be easy. Too often in this House and in our public discourse, we have come to believe that we can achieve difficult things by giving simplistic answers. This issue is complicated, and only by tackling the root causes of our dependence on gas, and the failure to build grids and the infrastructure of the future that we need, can we deliver not only long-term bill discounts for our constituents, but the energy security that we badly need. Most of our electricity grid was built in the 1960s and has not been upgraded since. It is holding back economic growth, but it is also failing to get cheaper power to people’s homes across the country. The country faces two paths. From the Conservatives today, we have heard the status quo—the idea that we carry on as we have done, hoping that the volatility of fossil fuels will give us cheaper prices for a little while, until we get to the next spike and fail to protect our consumers. We have seen that time and again. In the past 50 years, half of the recessions in this country have been caused by our exposure to fossil fuels. We will not do the same thing again. We will not build an expensive monument to how we used to do things—to a system that let people down. We will deliver change and build an energy system for the future. That is why we are delivering our clean power mission. I turn to the contributions on the North sea, which is a hugely important subject. I am afraid that I do not have quite as much time to sum up as I thought I might. It is important to recognise that the North sea has been in transition for a long time. Failing to recognise that does not help the workers in the North sea now. The status quo has led to a third of those workers losing their jobs in the past 10 years, and it has let down workers and communities. The failure to have a plan has let them down, but we will not do that. The status quo cannot be sustained, either economically or practically, so we will set out our future for energy in the North sea in the coming weeks. It will recognise the importance of creating new jobs and driving forward investment in renewables, carbon capture and hydrogen. We will not talk down those industries, but we also recognise that oil and gas will be with us for decades to come. The workers who have powered our country for more than half a century will continue to have a hugely important part to play in our energy system and economy. There are two paths ahead of us: ambition for our country, or the barely managed decline that we have all faced in the past 14 years; hope that we can build something better, or defeatism that says we should not tackle the climate crisis or build new infrastructure because it might be too difficult; building for the future, or the yellow brick road of nostalgia, which has let so many of our constituents down. All of us in this House want energy security, economic growth, cheaper bills and to improve people’s lives. What divides us in this place is our ambition. We are ambitious for the future of the country, for what we can achieve, and about tackling the climate emergency. We will get on with that. The Conservatives need to learn the lessons of their 14 years of failure. Question put (Standing Order No. 31(2)) , That the original words stand part of the Question.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Energy · Hansard source

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  I am glad that the right hon. Gentleman was able to have another opportunity to speak positively about the Conservative party’s record on renewables when no one else in his party seems to want to talk about that at all. A number of hon. Members said that the reason we are still subject to the volatility of gas prices is that it still sets the price far too often. The only way that we will bring down prices in the long term is by removing gas as the price setter. That means that we need to build more renewables, but another key point that the Conservatives have missed is that they built lots of those projects while not building the grid to connect them. They talk about constraint payments, but that is the legacy of a party that for 14 years failed to build the grid that would bring significantly cheaper power to homes and businesses across the country.

• 12 Nov 2025 · Energy · Hansard source

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  I would say that it is significantly cheaper to generate electricity from renewables, but I might not go quite as far as the hon. Lady does. There is a false argument that because the wholesale price of gas is cheaper, we should simply rely on gas more. That completely ignores the fact that we have an ageing gas fleet in this country, and would have to build significant numbers of new gas power stations to take advantage of that price. The figure the Conservatives frequently throw around compares the construction costs of renewables with the cost of gas, not the cost of building gas power stations, whereas renewables have extremely cheap ongoing costs in the long run.

• 27 Oct 2025 · North Sea Oil and Gas Industry · Hansard source

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  I rightly expect to be challenged in the House on the Government’s policies. A strong back-and-forth exchange is important. In this one instance, however, and separate from any view that Members might have on the wider policies of this Government, it is important that we come together where we can and say that this is a strong, successful, growing company. It is in all our interests across the House to talk up the importance of that company’s continuing to be successful so that a buyer or another commercial resolution is found and those jobs can be maintained. That is surely in all our interests.

• 27 Oct 2025 · North Sea Oil and Gas Industry · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right to highlight that this is a huge opportunity, which the previous Government talked about a lot but did not actually move forward on delivering. In the spending review, there were significant amounts of investment to move forward with the carbon capture clusters, and we have followed that up with specific investments over the past few months. I have been privileged to visit some of the sites and see the potential for maintaining existing jobs in industry while building the jobs of the future in carbon capture. We are hugely positive about the future vision for carbon capture across the country, as a way to tackle our emissions, help us get to net zero, and create good industrial jobs.

• 27 Oct 2025 · North Sea Oil and Gas Industry · Hansard source

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  The right hon. Member asks a serious question, and I am trying to give him an answer, if he would but listen for a few moments. We take the issue of job losses seriously—of course we do—but we have to recognise that over 70,000 jobs have been lost over the past 10 years because there has not been a credible plan on the future of the North sea. We are going to deliver that alongside new jobs in the energy future. I also say to the right hon. Member that I am somewhat confused what the SNP’s policy is on this because, as far as I understood it, it is exactly the same as this Government’s policy, which is to look at the licensing position. If he is telling us now that the SNP’s position has changed, that is news to me and, I suspect, to the House, but of course, the SNP has not published the draft energy strategy, which has been in draft form for two years, so it is hard for anyone to know.

• 27 Oct 2025 · North Sea Oil and Gas Industry · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Gentleman for his tone and I accept the point that he makes. As I have said, we can be clear that there is a viable future for those 2,000 workers and we should be positive about that—it is important that we talk up the future potential of the company—but I recognise that that does nothing for those who might be worrying. We accept that the EPL will come to an end. We have consulted with industry on what the future of that looks like. We want to ensure that the Treasury gains value from price spikes, a point on which his party and mine agree, and that is a matter for the Chancellor to take forward. If he is in favour of a tax cut for oil and gas, it is important that he says where that significant amount of revenue will come from to fund the public services on which he and I rely.

• 27 Oct 2025 · North Sea Oil and Gas Industry · Hansard source

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  I reject the hon. Member’s assertion that this Government are somehow following a course without looking at the evidence. Clearly, oil and gas is a crucial part of our energy mix and will be for decades to come—we have been clear on that—but so too is building up what comes next. That means investing in the supply chains that were so often not part of the building of infrastructure that we have in our waters. We towed things in and switched them on, but had none of the jobs that went with them. We are determined to change that, but that comes with having a credible industrial strategy and a long-term plan for the future of the North sea, which we did not have under 14 years of the previous Government.

• 27 Oct 2025 · North Sea Oil and Gas Industry · Hansard source

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  The House will understand that I will not be drawn on applications that are currently awaiting decision, so I will not comment on that specific application. On my hon. Friend’s broader point, as has already been said, the net zero economy is growing three times faster than the economy at large, and it is our economic future. I recently attended the G20 in South Africa, where Ministers from across the world were talking about the opportunities offered by the clean power transition in their own countries. It is the economic opportunity of the 21st century, as well as how we deliver on climate leadership: contrary to what Opposition Members might now think, that still matters. It is only right that we deliver a genuinely just transition for the workers who have powered our country for the past 60 years. We have seen where transitions have not been done well. The previous Government failed to put in place any kind of plan, but we will deliver a plan that delivers a just transition and our economic future.

• 27 Oct 2025 · North Sea Oil and Gas Industry · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is absolutely right that huge opportunities are coming. I have said that we should be proud of the history of oil and gas, and we should also be really proud of what the industry is doing to transition into the future. We need to do much more to ensure that jobs are delivered now, but certainty and confidence that the plan is not going to change overnight is critical for how we get private sector investment into the UK to deliver on those jobs. That is also why it is so important that we look at skills in the round. I have to say that, despite the outbursts today, the SNP in Holyrood and the UK Government are working closely on ensuring that the skills opportunities are delivered. Would I like that to go further? Of course I would, and I hope we will have a change of Government and can make that happen. This only works if we have a serious approach to recognising the challenges, building the jobs of the future and ensuring that people can take advantage of the opportunities right across Scotland.

• 27 Oct 2025 · North Sea Oil and Gas Industry · Hansard source

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  I am not sure that there was a hugely coherent argument there. The hon. Gentleman seems to say that the future might be in clean energy jobs, but he says, “They might not be delivered fast enough, so we should not bother doing it.” We think there is an important long-term future in delivering clean energy, including in his constituency, where many supply chain jobs will be delivered, and he is against that economic investment. He should explain to his constituents and to the wider country why Reform wants to make this country more energy-dependent, not less energy-dependent, and why it is against the economic opportunities that our proposals bring. Even if we disagree on the climate crisis—which I find staggering, given all the evidence; I accept that he might be burying his head in the sand—we should at least agree that there is a huge economic opportunity, and an opportunity to maintain our energy security.

• 27 Oct 2025 · North Sea Oil and Gas Industry · Hansard source

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  First, can I just say what a contrast it is when someone rightly responds to this concerning issue in a serious way and does not talk down the industry? This is where the House should stand taller and recognise that that company is doing good work and that there are 2,000 workers out in the North sea right now carrying out their duties. We want to ensure that there is a viable future for the company, and we are doing everything that we can in that space. All the signs are that it is a growing, successful business, and we should recognise that and talk it up, not talk it down, as the Conservative party seems hellbent on doing. On the hon. Lady’s wider point, she is right to say that the future of clean energy involves tens of thousands of jobs across Scotland and hundreds of thousands across the UK, but that we need to ramp those jobs up as quickly as possible and ensure that people can achieve those jobs. We are doing what we can around looking at the skills framework, but we also ensuring that, through the investments we are making through Great British Energy, those jobs come forward much faster and that people are supported to move from jobs in oil and gas into jobs that have a real correlation in skills. We are picking this work up after the failure of the previous Government to have any plan. We are moving as fast as we can, and we will see more on that North sea plan in the coming weeks.