To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change what information he has received on the operations of European Union anti-trust inspectors on the offices of Electricité de France (EDF) in Brussels on 11 March, in respect of EDF’s proposals to build nuclear power plants in the UK. (266136)

I have been asked to reply.

Ministers do not receive information on unannounced inspections by the European Commission, Directorate-General Competition, or, for that matter, by national competition authorities. The broad details of inspections are confirmed in official statements by the independent competition authority concerned. In this particular case we know from the European Commission’s statement of 11 March 2009 that:

‘on 10 March Commission officials carried out unannounced inspections at the premises of the electricity company EDF in France in respect of prices on the French wholesale electricity market’.