Paul Dorfman on Bonfire of Red Tape - (Fingleton)

commissioned by UK prime minister Keir Starmer published its final report
at the end of November, calling for a “radical reset of overly complex
nuclear regulatory system”. Perhaps unfortunately, the taskforce’s
announcement seems to have pre-empted its own findings, stating that it
will “speed up the approval of new reactor designs and streamline how
developers engage with regulators” without providing any evidence that
regulation is responsible for huge delays and ballooning costs rather than
the incompetence of the builders and the issues with designs. So, the
possibility that regulation takes as long as it does because that was how
long it took to do the job to the required standard was discounted from the
get-go. The taskforce, made up of three nuclear industry proponents, and
economist and a lawyer, makes 47 new recommendations “to unleash a golden
era of nuclear technology and innovation” – including the proposal that
new nuclear reactors should be built closer to urban areas and should be
allowed to harm the local environment. Following the taskforce’s interim
report in August, a coalition of 25 civil society groups involved in formal
discussions with government warned of the dangers of cutting nuclear safety
regulations, stating that the proposals “lacked credibility and
rigour”. Their moderating voices have gone unheard.

 New Civil Engineer 10th Dec 2025

 https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest/de-facto-nuclear-deregulation-10-12-2025/

The economist John Fingleton has published his recommendations to
streamline planning laws for the development of UK nuclear power – and they
could have implications far beyond the nuclear industry. The prime minister
Sir Keir Starmer has endorsed all of Fingleton’s recommendations and in a
speech last week, and promised to go further citing “well-intentioned,
but fundamentally misguided, environmental regulations” as derailing the
country’s infrastructure growth plans. On this week’s podcast, ECO Chamber
host, James Agyepong-Parsons, and ENDS Report deputy editor, Tess Colley,
speak with Georgia Dent, the chief executive officer at the Somerset
Wildlife Trust to find out what it means for environmentalists. The team
also discusses the implications and potential impact of the Office for
Environmental Protection’s latest report on the regulation governing
England’s protected nature sites.

ENDS 10th Dec 2025

https://www.endsreport.com/article/1942658/starmer-goes-nuclear-fundamentally-misguided-environmental-regulations

If adopted, the Nuclear Taskforce’s recommendations could well lead to the
biggest divergence from retained EU habitat and environment law since
Brexit. Changes could be made to the habitats directive, which Britain
helped write when we were in the EU, and which protect rare species and the
places they live. The government could also make it more costly for
individuals and charities to take judicial reviews against infrastructure
projects. Fingleton thinks his review should also be applied to railways,
reservoirs and other infrastructure to make it easier to build – which
means there would be intense, widespread deregulation. So does Starmer, who
said in his speech about the document that there are “well-intentioned,
but fundamentally misguided, environmental regulations” and the review
should be implemented “right across our economy”. Legal advice is that
removing these rules for nuclear power will inevitably lead for other
infrastructure projects to be subject to the same, weaker regulatory
system. Expert planning lawyer Alexa Culver said: “It’s a clever move to
sneak broadbrush environmental deregulation, as the government can point to
‘net zero’ as being the ultimate driver. In reality, though, if you don’t
protect ecosystems while reducing emissions, you’ve lost the battle. We’re
gone anyway.”

Guardian 11th Dec 2025

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/series/down-to-earth