Union leaders raise concerns over nuclear industry

With due respect to Gary Smith and Mike Clancy, nuclear energy cannot play a key role in achieving net zero. While nuclear cannot be deployed in time to make that contribution, there are many other objections, including huge cost. I dispute that it provides 'good, clean jobs' - but, given the shroud of secrecy that envelopes such facilities, there isn't publicly available comprehensive data that could be interrogated to assess the truth. But surely they are aware of the radiation loads currently endured by their members working at Sellafield, say? However, I share their concern about the funding for the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority and the consequences for the nuclear estate. The danger is to all of us from the latter. We need to ask whether we are prepared to have vast areas of food production rendered radioactive for thousands of years, to have our people and workers exposed to the undoubted risks to our lives and livelihood. Remembering Chernobyl, Fukushima and the rest, residents and especially the rural communities of Ynys Mons and the Trawsfynydd area need to be aware of their responsibilities to the rest of Cymru and world. We must close the nuclear industry down, from highly expensive electricity generation to bomb-making. Of course, provision for health and small-scale industrial applications would need to continue. Provided that a 'green industrial strategy' is truly green, small to medium scale, low in its energy demands and employment-intensive, I also agree with Smith and Clancy that it should be a major focus. In fact, we may have no choice. I suspect that data centres fall outside these criteria, given their massive energy demands and the consequences for our environment in meeting them. Finally, the cost of establishing a permanent full-time job in the nuclear industry runs into millions of pounds. Not many of them will be created. The backbone of employment in Cymru has always been small and medium-size industries, with costs from hundreds up to tens of thousands per job. They offer sustainability and flexibility, they broaden skillsets, they service real needs and they provide high levels of workplace safety if properly regulated. They are our future.

May I beg to differ. Nuclear is not needed for peaceful purposes. It is too expensive and the impact will be felt next century. It will not create local jobs, it will offer nothing to the community and economically has never made ends meet