Unite’s Derek Simpson joins the PM at Sellafield
Derek Simpson, the joint leader of Unite, will join Gordon Brown at Sellafield today (23rd January), where he will welcome the PM’s announcement to push ahead with the nuclear re-build programme to reduce Britain’s household bills, create jobs and end our reliance on oil and gas from countries like Russia.
Mr Simpson will welcome the Government’s commitment to nuclear energy as a key part of its low carbon and secure energy policy. Mr Simpson will also meet with workers at Sellafield and pledge the union’s support for their skills. The union will be urging that the workers at Sellafield are given every opportunity to develop.
Unite’s Joint General Secretary, Derek Simpson will say:
“Pushing ahead with Britain’s nuclear new build addresses the real concerns of real life people. They want cheaper household bills.
“Building a new generation of nuclear power stations will create thousands of jobs in manufacturing in the UK. Nuclear energy can reduce our reliance on foreign gas and oil, and start to reduce household bills by 2015. It won’t be popular with the Russians, or the French or the even the Greens but they don’t vote Labour.
We welcome today’s announcement from the Prime minister. Unite has been proud to campaign for the workers at Sellafield and for the people of Cumbria. The union will continue to campaign for a repository to be based at Sellafield. This will secure thousands more skilled jobs in the area.”
Unite is also campaigning to ensure the UK’s manufacturing industry carries out the majority of the work associated with any new nuclear reactors to be built in the UK. The union fears that the UK’s dependency on imported oil and gas from Russia will be replaced by a dependency on France to supply our nuclear technology.
Mr Simpson will meet with workers at Sellafield, he said :
“The workers at Sellafield are highly skilled. These are the sorts of jobs that we need to nurture in the UK. We must encourage our young people into engineering disciplines and also offer adults who may have missed an opportunity earlier in their lives to come into engineering and undertake apprenticeship training.”
“The Tory policies of the eighties sought to make British manufacturing a relic of the industrial revolution with a horrendous human cost. In this post-credit crunch world we can see just how wrong they were. The North West is a hub of excellence for manufacturing. It’s high time for the resurgence of British manufacturing.”
The union supports clean coal and carbon capture technologies and is calling for financial support in terms of research and development. Again, the UK manufacturing industry in the UK must be fully involved in this work programme.
The Government’s support for a new generation of nuclear power stations and the increasing significance of renewable technology means there will be huge demands for people with craft and technical engineering skills. There are major projects taking place over the next 20 years starting with the refurbishment of Aldermaston, the building of clean coal power stations and carbon capture projects and nuclear decommissioning at Sellafield and Dounreay.
Unite backed the government’s recent announcement to expand apprenticeships with an extra £140 million being made available to fund an expansion of 35,000 apprenticeship places in 2009-10.
ENDS
Contact Ciaran Naidoo on 07768 931 315 or Richard O’Brien on 07768 931 320 to arrange an interview with Mr Simpson.
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