The Herald’s Martin Williams campaigns both for and against nuclear energy on the same day as Scotland’s last nuclear plant is revealed to have 585 cracks in a reactor core

Professor John Robertson OBA

Only 3 hours ago, the Herald’s Martin Williams had the above damning, newsworthy, piece but it hadn’t been in time for the front page, where he had this campaigning on behalf of the nuclear industry:

It’s by no means the first example of the Scottish corporate media acting on behalf of corporations.

The facts get no hearing in this debate.

Here they are again on Labour’s small modular reactors:

People of Scotland call on Sarwar to drop brainless support for ‘small’ nuclear power – more costly, less efficient, more polluting, more cancers-triggering and terrorism vulnerable
Research from USA reveals ‘eye-popping’ new costs for small nuclear reactors favoured by Labour
Scotland and nuclear power – Research suggests small modular reactors increase waste quantity by up to 30 times
Labour’s planned small modular reactors – inefficient, polluting and carcinogenic – will also be dependent on high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) from Putin’s Russia which has ‘complete monopoly’ to undermine our energy security
Telegraph – Economics of Labour’s Small Modular [Nuclear] Reactors could prove hard to justify
The higher burn-up and radioactivity of UK Labour’s preferred Small Modular Reactor spent fuel make it more difficult to handle, transport, and store, safely

On public opinion in Scotland:

In the last few months, we’ve seen the MSM in Scotland support the Labour Party’s plans, across the UK and in Scotland, to build new nuclear power stations. Coverage has largely ignored the international research pointing to massive real costs, increased waste and health risks, as well as Scotland’s zero need for nuclear power as new windfarms and battery farms have us on the brink of full sufficiency and security.

YouGov today, however, are headlining majority support for new nuclear at around 55% across England, 58% in the South of England. Looking closer, the figure for Scotland and Wales is only 48%.

The Scottish figure may have been over-stated if YouGov have employed their usual sampling methods to exaggerate Labour and reduce SNP support in the sample.

Source:

https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/survey-results/daily/2025/06/10/f09ce/1?utm_source=daily_question&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=daily%2F2025%2F06%2F10_question_1johnrobertson834Edit

On safety more widely:

Lesson for opponents of nuclear power in Scotland as researchers revisit study of Essex nuclear power station and breast cancer incidence among mature women nearby to find an even greater risk, only a short distance from new Sizewell C, and ‘establishment bias and cover-up’

3 thoughts on “The Herald’s Martin Williams campaigns both for and against nuclear energy on the same day as Scotland’s last nuclear plant is revealed to have 585 cracks in a reactor core”

  2. The ”nuclear option ” for the Scottish (sic) media is to talk up ANYTHING that Sarwar endorses – hopefully before he changes his mind because his boss has changed his !

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  3. Ah but… The “Nuclear industry says ScotGov green plans are ‘fraud’ with jobs for England” piece would have met the Herald’s editorial standards of both slamming SG and backing the SoS for Greggs…. https://archive.ph/7tEsw

    Martin’s spell-checking skills are only marginally worse than the asinine pitch from Greatrex of ” He said opponents of a Torness B propose that there is no new nuclear in Scotland, which he said would lead to an “invevitable” shortage of power that would have to be imported from south of the border which he said meant “jobs for England, not for Scotland”. ”

    Perhaps Tom believes it “invevitable”, as in a decade or two, Southern England will have ceased being an energy basket case and almost out of water and have transformed to export more than it consumes as Scotland is almost doing now ?

    Yet for Tom Greatrex, foot in mouth is easy when you are being paid for it, such as ” He said the anti-nuclear ideology would leave “Torness like Longannet coal station, the Ravenscraig steelworks, the Greenock dry dock, relics of an industrial past and a bitter reminders of a future foreclosed by a lack of vision” ” – Now take a wild assed guess at whose ‘lack of vision’ caused that Thomas ? Take a further guess at how many centuries it will be before Torness has been fully decommissioned, eh Thomas ?

    Hypocrisy on stilts, much as his mate Murray…

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