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G8: 2006 Summit

My Lords, I thank the Minister for the Statement and her answers, and welcome the impetus given to the trade talks in Geneva. Will the Minister give an assurance that the British Government and, through them, the EU will at the right moment encourage Pascal Lamy to come forward with his own set of tie-breaking proposals? That is only too likely to be the only way of ensuring that there is not yet another deadlock. Given that the Director-General of the WTO does not have the power of initiative in this, as I am sure the noble Baroness knows, he needs encouragement. I noticed that the list that she gave of those who have given encouragement so far did not include the head of state of Monsieur Lamy’s own country. No doubt that was not fortuitous. My second question involves a matter not in the Statement but in the documents, for which I hope the noble Baroness will forgive me. I regard as a major step forward the effort that is now going on at the International Atomic Energy Agency to work up a scheme for guaranteed supply of enrichment and reprocessing services. We have gone from having a situation in which there were no proposals on the table to one in which there now appear to be three proposals, which is probably two too many. However, will the Government give a high priority to getting agreement at the IAEA on such a scheme, recognising that this is a crucial element—particularly in the light of the large amount of nuclear build that is likely to take place in the coming years—in ensuring that proliferation risks do not increase?