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This item was published during the term of a previous administration that ended in April 2007

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Appointments to CoRWM

19/11/2003

Appointments to the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management (CoRWM) were confirmed today. The Committee has been established to review options for the long-term management of radioactive waste.

Katharine Bryan was appointed in July to chair CoRWM and to help select the remaining Members.

The members are listed below, with brief biographical details, including other public appointments held (either current or which have ended in 2003), as well as any political activity undertaken in the last five years:

·Mary Allan, Ross-shire -Lecturer,SchoolofBusiness, The North Highland College, no other public appointment held, no political activity within the last five years;

·Professor David Ball,Norfolk- Professor of Risk Management,MiddlesexUniversity,no other public appointment held, no political activity within the last five years;

·Fred Barker,West Yorkshire- nuclear policy analyst, Member Radioactive Waste Management Advisory Committee (appointed by DEFRA, £5,000 per year remuneration),no political activity within the last five years;

·Dr Keith Baverstock, Finland - former Head of Radiation Protection Division, World Health Organisation, no other public appointment held, no political activity within the last five years;

·Professor Andrew Blowers OBE, Bedfordshire - Professor of Social Sciences at the Open University, Member, Radioactive Waste Management Advisory Committee (appointed by DEFRA, £5,000 a year remuneration), Board Member, UK Nirex Ltd (not a Ministerial appointment), obtained office as a local councillor within the last 5 years and canvassed on behalf of a party (Labour) or helped at elections;

·Professor Brian Drummond Clark, Aberdeen - former Professor of Environmental Management & Planning, Board Member of the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA) (appointed by the Scottish Ministers receives £5,909 per year remuneration); Chair, SEPA North Board (not a Ministerial appointment), no political activity within the last five years;

·Dr Wynne Davies, Buckinghamshire - Vice President, Group Health, Safety and Environment, Amersham plc, Member, Radioactive Waste Management Advisory Committee (appointed by DEFRA receives £3-4000 per year remuneration), Nuclear Safety Advisory Committee (appointed by Health & Safety Commission),no political activity within the last five years;

·Dr Mark Dutton, Cheshire - physicist and nuclear decommissioning expert, NNC, no other public appointment held, no political activity within the last five years;

·Dr Gordon MacKerron, Brighton - economist and energy policy consultant, Associate Director, NERA, no other public appointment held, no political activity within the last five years;

·Professor Lynda Warren, Powys - zoologist and Emeritus Professor of Environmental Law at the University of Wales, Board Member, Environment Agency (appointed by DEFRA, £25,000 a year remuneration), Member, Countryside Council for Wales (appointed by National Assembly for Wales, £11,000 a year remuneration), Member, Radioactive Waste Management Advisory Committee (appointed by DEFRA, £5,000 a year remuneration), no political activity within the last five years;

·Jennifer Watson, London - Commissioner, Women's National Commission and former Chair, Nirex Independent Transparency Panel, Deputy Chair, Equal Opportunities Commission (appointed by Dept for Education & Skills £16,835 remuneration per year) canvassed on behalf of a party (Labour) or helped at elections; and

·Pete Wilkinson, Suffolk - Director of Wilkinson Environmental Consultancy, former Chair of Greenpeace and co-founder of Friends of the Earth (UK),no other public appointment held,stood as a candidate for local councillor, MP, MEP, spoke on behalf of a party (Labour) or candidate, canvassed on behalf of a party (Labour) or helped at elections.

CoRWM's terms of reference require it, among other things, to aim to make its recommendations in 2005. The Committee is to prepare a work programme; to agree this with allUKadministrations at an early stage; to meet every six months; and to make an annual progress report which will be placed before the Scottish Parliament.

CoRWM's review of options will be carried out in an open, transparent and inclusive manner, to inspire public confidence in the way in which it works.

The CoRWM appointments are part-time. The Chair, Katharine Bryan, who will probably spend about 75 days per year on the work, will receive a daily rate of £450 for her duties. She is also Chair of the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (appointed by DEFRA), for which she receives £34,765 a year.

Other Members will receive a daily rate of £300 and will probably spend around 50 days a year on CoRWM business. One Member will be appointed Deputy Chair and will receive a daily rate of £380. All Members will also be paid reasonable costs of travel, meals and accommodation while attending meetings or visits organised by the Committee. Over 400 applications were received. Two members of the Committee, Mary Allan and Brian Drummond Clarke are resident in Scotland

The UK currently has over 20,000 tonnes of solid, long-lived radioactive waste in storage, awaiting a decision on its long-term future, and this will rise to half a million tonnes over the next century as nuclear reactors and other facilities come to the end of their lives. CoRWM will review the options for safely managing this waste and recommend a strategy to the Scottish Executive, the UK Government and the devolved administrations forWalesandNorthern Ireland.

Following a consultation exercise Managing Radioactive WasteSafely which ran from September 2001 to March 2002, Allan Wilson, Deputy Minister for Environment and Rural Development, announced on 29 July 2002 that the Scottish Executive, the UK Government and the other devolved administrations would set up a new independent body to oversee the review.

Ministers have emphasised that the new body must win public confidence and operate in an open, transparent and inclusive manner. The review must engage with interested stakeholders and the public. The first step of the review will be to set the framework for debate by establishing broad agreement on the wastes to be considered, the range of management options for each of them, and the criteria against which these options should be assessed. The second step will be to assess options including commissioning any new research required. The final step would draw up recommendations for Ministers to consider.

This is a further step in the programme for dealing with theUK's 'nuclear legacy'. CoRWM will have the task of recommending to Ministers how intermediate and high-level radioactive wastes are best managed in the longer term. On 4 July 2002the UK Government published its White Paper Managing the nuclear legacy, including its plans to set up a new authority to manage theUK's publicly owned civil nuclear liabilities. These include wastes that are currently the responsibility of British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL), which owns Chapelcross and Hunterston A and the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA), which operates Dounreay. The draft Nuclear Sites and Radioactive Substances Bill was published on 24 June 2003. This provides for the establishment of the new authority - the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) - which will take responsibility for the nuclear clean-up programme.

These Ministerial Public Appointments were made in accordance with the Code of Practice issued by the Office of the Commissioner for Public Appointments (OCPA). All candidates were asked to fill in a questionnaire on political activity and we have indicated which categories they ticked. Unless otherwise indicated, Members ticked the "none of the above activities" category