POLITICIANS were cleverer back in 1953. When Britain set out to build its first nuclear power station at Calder Hall in Sellafield, the government refused to reveal either how much it would cost or when it would be ready. A mere three-and-a-half years later, at a cost of £35m (equivalent to £780m, or $1.2 billion, at today’s prices), it opened. It didn’t matter that it generated only a trickle of power. It was hailed around the country as the dawn of an “atomic age”.

George Osborne, the chancellor, should have learned a lesson from that. Already the £24.5 billion project to build a nuclear power station called Hinkley Point C in Somerset is expected to finish over-budget and beyond the projected start date of 2023, if it ever starts at all. But on September 21st, after unveiling in Beijing a £2 billion inducement to China to help finance Britain’s first reactor in 20 years, he exposed himself to further criticism. The country should lead the way on nuclear power as it did in the 1950s, he said. But the implication was, it could only do it with China’s help (see Bagehot).

Critics say this reveals a whiff of desperation about the government’s bet on a nuclear renaissance, however sensible it may be to secure a zero-carbon, stable source of energy to replace old power plants. Hinkley Point C has long been problematic. Last year, the European Commission (EC) revealed that the initial £16 billion cost had risen by £8.5 billion. The subsidies will also be immense, though the EC gave the government the green light to back it. Once built, the government will pay EDF, the French utility running the project, up to £92 per megawatt hour for 35 years, around double the current wholesale price.

The problems are compounded by setbacks in Finland and France with the same type of reactor that EDF wants to introduce in Somerset and in another plant, Sizewell C, in Suffolk. This month EDF said its plant at Flamanville in France would not be completed until 2018, six years later than first planned. Costs had tripled to €10.5 billion ($11.8 billion).

That’s where China comes in. Analysts say Mr Osborne is engaged in a complex manoeuvre to ensure that two Chinese firms help finance EDF. The £2 billion guarantee is one inducement. Another is an offer for China to build a reactor of its own at Bradwell in Essex. That has set off further alarm bells, though. Not only would it test confidence in Britain’s Office for Nuclear Regulation, it would also put a critical part of the nuclear industry and the national grid into Chinese hands.

Roland Vetter of CF Partners, an energy trader, doubts a go-ahead for the China project will come soon; licensing new nuclear technology in Britain takes years. It could be a strategic gambit, though. EDF’s boss in Britain, Vincent de Rivaz, notes that British and French companies are keen to help China, which has an ambitious programme of its own to build nuclear power plants. Mr Osborne may also calculate that Hinkley Point will create numerous jobs and building opportunities, the economic benefits of which would accrue quickly. The costs, meanwhile, would not become apparent until the plant is completed and bills rise. Future governments would reap the fallout, not this one.