My Lords, I commend the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, for this amendment. I also commend his sub-committee, which has done excellent work.
I looked with great interest at some pieces of evidence submitted to the committee, particularly that from Energy UK, which made the point that,
“Overall, the energy industry’s workforce is made of between one and five percent of EU/EEA employees”.
That is not a huge percentage, but Energy UK makes the point that,
“Although there are not a proportionately large number of non-UK nationals employed within the energy industry, the majority are employed in skilled roles which are difficult to fill from the UK resident workforce”.
The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, has already cited the evidence of EDF and referred to steel fixers. Interestingly, EDF examined the impact of restrictions on freedom of movement on its current workforce when thinking about what challenges might arise in the future. EDF said:
“For EDF Energy direct employees, … the majority of our current employees would meet the existing UK Points Based System requirements. The same cannot be said for our supply chain workforce, most of whom would not meet the current entrance criteria”.
This is a very important issue because, if freedom of movement is restricted, there is currently no route of entry for semi-skilled workers, such as construction workers, to enter the UK under the existing points system. I find it surprising that steel fixers are not classed as skilled workers, but the fact is they are not, so they would not be able to come in under the points-based system. Yet we have heard from EDF that we simply cannot meet the demands of constructing Hinkley C nuclear power station and other civil engineering demands with the number of steel fixers that we have.
The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, ended his remarks with an interesting question about the backbone of the Minister’s department. I do not think it has had a particularly easy ride. I know that it has done its best
on visas for overseas students but has come up against an obdurate brick wall in the shape of the Prime Minister. But can we hope that there will be a positive response on this issue, as it is so crucial to our future industrial strategy?