Unfortunate Reactions

A cross-party committee of MPs has endorsed a report by Unlock Democracy and the Association for the Conservation of Energy which says that ministers' claims about the wonders of nuclear power are about as true as one would expect. Both the present rabble and the government in which the Upper (then Lower) Miliband had the honour to serve as Minister for Greenwashing have generally taken a faith-based approach to nuclear power: instead of assessing needs and then working out requirements, the Government took a less pedestrian route and commissioned research which took as its starting point the assumption that ten new reactors would be built. The completed research was then presented as evidence in favour of the original premise.

Such feats of logic are nothing new, of course. The Government wanted to raise tuition fees; the Government claims to want to help students; therefore raising tuition fees helps students. The Government wants to cut benefits; the Government does not want to be seen to increase poverty; therefore taking money away from poor people does not make them poorer. A certain Professor David Mackay has "made the case" that wind farms and other low-carbon sources cannot satisfy demand, and that therefore (since any attempt to lower demand would be an unthinkable blasphemy against the markets) it will be necessary to invest in nuclear. Doubtless by coincidence, Professor David Mackay is now chief scientific advisor to the Department for Energising Climate Catastrophe. There is room for doubt as to whether nuclear is any more capable of making up the shortfall than wind, solar and biomass; but at least with nuclear we can be reasonably sure that the appropriate palms will be crossed, the correct pockets lined and the deserving nests feathered.