Rally against Wylfa B

For those that didn't watch the launch of Sianel 62 on Sunday evening, this is an extract from one of the programmes about nuclear energy on Ynys Môn. It shows a rally held last month to oppose the construction of the proposed new power station:

     

There's no doubt that building a new nuclear power station will bring jobs to the area, but most of the jobs will not be for local people and the population influx is inevitably going to damage local communities and the Welsh language in those communities. That's why Cymdeithas yr Iaith played such a prominent part, alongside PAWB, in the protest.

I really doubt that those in favour of the plan to build this new nuclear power station have thought things through. At present some 600 or so people are being employed to decommission the nuclear power station at Trawsfynydd, which has long ceased to produce any electricity. So in terms of jobs, there will inevitably be plenty of work for many decades to come just decommissioning and making the existing Wylfa power station safe.

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Building a new power station will also have serious consequences in terms of independence, for it is clear that the provisions being made to get the operators of new nuclear power stations to set aside money for the future clean up are inadequate. As with so much else under the agenda being followed by successive governments in Westminster, it's fine for private companies to make their profits, but the risks end up being taken by the taxpayer. As Wales is on course to produce more than all the electricity we need from renewable sources, the electricity that a new Wylfa B will produce will be superfluous to our own needs and will have to be exported from Wales. While we remain part of the UK, we could expect the UK government to pay for the excess costs on decommissioning after Wylfa B stops producing electricity. But when we are independent, who will pay the excess on the costs for decommissioning? Are we naïve enough to expect the English government and English taxpayers to do that? Fat chance. We will be stuck with the liability of cleaning up the mess for something that was built primarily to benefit people in England.

So politicians like Dafydd Elis-Thomas, who have always been opposed to independence before now, are supporting the construction of a power station that will make independence that much more difficult to achieve. That sort of thinking could only make sense to someone who was opposed to independence.

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And as for the damage to the language, I don't think we should kid ourselves into thinking that someone like Dafydd is particularly concerned about that either. Just look at his track record in recent years as Llywydd. He was the one primarily responsible for changing the Cofnod (the Record of Proceedings) in the Senedd from something that was fully bilingual into something in which Welsh contributions were translated into English, but not vice versa.

Thankfully, that shameful decision has been reversed, but only now that Dafydd has stood down as Llywdd and been replaced by Rosemary Butler. So I would again warn people in Plaid Cymru to be very careful about him; so many of the policies he advocates simply make no sense for someone who purports to be a Welsh nationalist. I'll be the first to give him credit for some of the things he did in the early days of his political career, but he sold out on nationalism years ago.