Spiralling Cost Is Legacy Of Sellafield Nuclear Mismanagement Says Ritchie

South Down MP Margaret Ritchie (SDLP) has hit out at the British Government and the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority for their failure to properly manage the clean-up at Sellafield.

Ms Ritchie has been a strong opponent of the nuclear power plant and its potential risk to the South Down shoreline and reiterated her call for Sellafield to close and for the British Government to abandon plans for a new nuclear build, concentrating instead on renewable energies. Ms Ritchie said:xa0“The cost of cleaning up toxic nuclear sites has increased, most notably because of the British Government’s legacy of mishandling the clean-up of the Sellafield site in Cumbria and its incompetency in handling efforts to decommission its nuclear sites in the coming years. “According to latest figures the cost of the clean-up has increased by £6bn from an estimate of £63bn in 2011-12 to £69bn last year, with yet more increases expected along the way. This is clearly down to the British Government’s mismanagement of its legacy of toxic waste and plans for decommissioning, not least when it failed to intervene when a private sector consortium gained a lucrative five-year contract tasked with managing Sellafield. “The bottom line is that Sellafield must be closed and the British Government must abandon all plans for a new nuclear build, instead, investing its energies on renewable energies when people this side of the Irish Sea can be free of the concern of a mismanaged radioactive plant across the water,” added Ms Ritchie.