A NEW generation of nuclear power stations will be built with enough capacity to generate at least as much electricity as Britain’s nuclear industry does today, Tony Blair told MPs.

Mr Blair’s pledge, his firmest yet on the Government’s plans for nuclear power, came in the Commons yesterday as he poured scorn on David Cameron for not saying what his own nuclear policy was.

During the Queen’s Speech debate in the Commons, Mr Blair told the Tory leader that government energy policy was dictated not just by the need to tackle climate change but by reducing risks from future reliance on imported gas as North Sea oil runs out.

Mr Blair said: “In common with countries around the world, we need to put nuclear power back on the agenda and at least replace the nuclear energy we will lose.

“Without it we will not be able to meet any of our objectives on climate change or our objectives on energy security.”

Britain’s nuclear industry currently provides 80 billion kWh of electricity a year, meeting almost 20 per cent of demand for energy, a figure that Mr Blair is committed to matching as the minimum output of the next generation of nuclear plants.

He challenged Mr Cameron to say whether or not he would back nuclear power, accusing the Conservative leader of giving vague and even contradictory statements on the issue.

Quoting an interview in which Mr Cameron suggested that he would contemplate nuclear power only as a last resort if other renewable sources of energy were unable to meet demand, Mr Blair asked what he would do if the Cabinet Secretary came to tell him such an approach was not generating enough power.

“What’s he going to say? Rustle me up a nuclear power station?” Mr Blair asked. “When over the next few years our nuclear power stations are closed, are we at least going to replace them? I say yes. What does he say? We don’t know.”

The Prime Minister was responding to an attack by Mr Cameron on the Government’s new programme of Bills, which he called repetitive and hollow and claimed was constructed to make short-term political points rather than secure lasting improvements.

The Tory leader accused Mr Blair, in presenting his final Queen’s Speech to Parliament, of having failed to live up to voters’ expectations but said that Gordon Brown, his most likely successor, was guilty of just the same errors.

Mr Cameron told MPs: “Three massive majorities, a decade in power, ten gracious speeches, 370 pieces of legislation and the question they’ve got to answer is: why has so little been achieved? “It’s because they’ve put headlines above delivery, they believe in centralised power not social responsibility and all too often they just pass laws to make political points rather than deliver real change.”

He welcomed some of the new Bills, on restoring the link between the basic state pension and average earnings, providing independent Government statistics and setting legal targets to cut carbon emissions.

But he said that these were Tory policies and he called for annual carbon reduction targets. He said more legislation, particularly on crime and the National Health Service, were set against a background of soaring violent crime and hospitals closing saying the Government had repeatedly promised improvements but failed to deliver them.

Sir Menzies Campbell, the Liberal Democrat leader, accused Mr Blair of being too ready to rush forward with Bills that failed to meet their objectives, and called for less legislation and more careful consideration when new laws were proposed. Sir Menzies said: “After nearly ten years in office, the Government and the Prime Minister are still chasing the same elusive goals and the same elusive headlines. There is a rush from judgement towards legislation.”

He called instead for a shift in focus in which Parliament would spend more time looking at ways of repealing legislation that no longer served a purpose, instead of passing yet more new laws.

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