Commenting on the publication of the Weightman Report today, Green MP Caroline lucas said:

"The Government's Weightman report, rushed out today in a Written Statement offering little chance for Parliamentary scrutiny, will do little to reassure the British public that the nuclear industry can be trusted to power our energy future.

"The status of our nuclear facilities is a crucial national security issue, yet the Government has concluded that nothing needs to change in the light of the Japanese disaster - the largest nuclear accident since Chernobyl - even before it has submitted the UK's assessment of our facilities to the EU's ‘stress test' process, due in November.

"There has been a continuous failure to properly interrogate the environmental and economic viability of nuclear and the huge risks involved, both in further expansion and in dealing with the UK's scandalous decommissioning legacy.

"Indeed, the revelations about the shady collusion between Coalition officials and industry to create a pro-nuclear public information campaign in the days after Fukushima proved that not even a large scale nuclear incident can halt this Government's ideological obsession with new nuclear.

"Fukushima was a stark reminder of the inherent risks in nuclear technology, and led to a phase out of nuclear power in countries such as Germany, Switzerland, Italy, and now potentially Taiwan, Venezuela and Israel.

"Even in France, which gets over 80% of its power from nuclear, 77 percent of the public would now back some kind of phase out (1).

"But here in the UK, the Government is doing all it can to rig the energy market in nuclear's favour, for example with the policies included in the Electricity Market Reform process."

ENDS

1) Institut Français d'Opinion Publique in May, published in Le Journal du Dimanche