Prime Minister Theresa May has declined to meet with Copeland MP Trudy Harrison to discuss the future of Moorside.

During Prime Minister's Questions in the Houses of Parliament, in a session before the vote of the confidence in the Government, Mrs Harrison asked if Mrs May would consider meeting a delegation of nuclear workers to understand the importance of securing a nuclear new-build power station in West Cumbria.

But Mrs May said it "might be helpful" if a minister from the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy meet the group instead.

Mrs Harrison created the Moorside Strategic Partnership in the wake of Toshiba pulling the plug on its NuGen-led project to create a £15 billion nuclear power station on the site next to Sellafield in November.

The forum was created to keep Moorside on the political agenda.

It met on Friday and after the private session, Mrs Harrison, other Cumbrian MPs and council leaders pledged to lobby the Government over Moorside and to encourage another nuclear developer to take it on.

In Parliament yesterday, Mrs Harrison said: "My Right Honourable Friend will remember from her visits to Copeland just how capable our nuclear community is and how proud we are of our nuclear heritage.

"Will she consider meeting me and a small delegation of Cumbrian nuclear workers to understand how important Moorside is to Copeland, and will she bear in mind the solutions that the Centre of Nuclear Excellence can provide to its challenges?"

Mrs May replied: "When I have visited Copeland, I have seen very clearly not only its population’s expertise and skills in the nuclear industry but the importance of that industry.

"The Moorside site will revert to the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, and we are considering options for its future.

"The site remains eligible for nuclear new build, and we are committed to seeing new nuclear as part of our future energy mix. It might be helpful if the relevant minister from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy met her and that group to explore this issue further."

Toshiba, which owned NuGen, took the decision to wind it up after failing to make sufficient progress on securing a buyer.

Toshiba announced it was taking the drastic step 18 months after it was left as the sole owner of NuGen.

The project would have created thousands of jobs during the construction and operation stage and generated around seven per cent of the UK’s energy needs.

Toshiba had previously said it wanted to offload NuGen by the end of the financial year, as it looked to divest completely from nuclear activity, but would make the decision earlier if it was not convinced a deal was achievable.

The company said the wind-up process would start by January 31 and it expected to incur losses before taxes of around £100.6 million.

Last month, a top figure at China General Nuclear Power Group described Moorside as “a very smart site”, fuelling speculation that the company could revive Cumbria’s hopes for a new nuclear power station.

Rob Davies, chief operating officer at CGN UK, revealed his admiration after being asked by in-Cumbria if the company was still interested in developing a power station in Cumbria, having missed out to Kepco as preferred bidder for original Moorside developer NuGen just over a year ago.

Revealing an ambition to build a fleet of power stations in the UK, Mr Davies told the Nuclear Industry Association Nuclear 2018 conference held in London that CGN wanted to play a role in the country’s nuclear renaissance.

Soon after Prime Minister's Questions, Mrs May survived an attempt to oust her as Prime Minister, as MPs rejected Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn's motion of no confidence in the Government by a margin of 325 to 306.

The Prime Minister's 19-vote victory came less than 24 hours after the crushing defeat of her EU Withdrawal Agreement in the House of Commons, and clears the way for her to start cross-party talks on a Brexit Plan B.

Last night, Labour demanded Mrs May kill off a no-deal Brexit as the price of talks with Mr Corbyn about finding a way out of the crisis that has paralysed Westminster politics.

After seeing off the no-confidence vote, the Prime Minister announced she would invite party leaders in the Commons and other MPs in for discussions to get a Parliamentary consensus over Brexit.

But she appears to face an uphill struggle after all the opposition party leaders demanded scrapping the possibility of no-deal as a condition of progress, while Labour refused to even sit down with the PM until the concession was guaranteed.

Mrs May did hold talks with Liberal Democrat leader Sir Vince Cable, SMP Westminster leader Ian Blackford and Plaid Cymru's Liz Saville-Roberts late yesterday.

But Downing Street refused to make such a concession, with the Prime Minister's official spokesman saying: "Want to leave with a deal but she is determined to deliver on the verdict of the British public and that is to leave the EU on March 29 this year."

Asked by a reporter if he was "taking no-deal off the table" in response to the opposition leader's demand, the spokesman replied: "I am not."

Mrs May made a short live television address to the nation, in which she said the talks had been constructive, adding: "I am disappointed that the leader of the Labour Party has not so far chosen to take part, but our door remains open."

Mrs May also aimed remarks at Parliamentarians who voted against her Brexit plan on Tuesday, saying that "MPs have made clear what they don't want, we must all work constructively together to set out what Parliament does want".

She added: "It will not be an easy task, but MPs know they have a duty to act in the national interest, reach a consensus and get this done."

Mrs May will hold further talks with other groups, including eurosceptics in her own party and the Democratic Unionist Party today.