ANTI-nuclear campaigners have staged an annual Christmas protest outside the Hinkley Point C (HPC) construction site to highlight the years-long delay in completing it.

Members of the campaign group Stop Hinkley took a giant stuffed turkey and set up a traditional Christmas dinner complete with sprouts on a table outside the site.

They unveiled a banner reading ‘It is now 2025, where is the lecce for the HPC Turkey’, ‘lecce’ being local slang for electricity.

The stunt, which started eight years ago, was prompted by a claim made in 2007 by then-EDF Energy plc chief executive Vincent de Rivas that by 2017 people would be eating their turkeys cooked with electricity provided by Hinkley C.

Spokeswoman Katy Attwater said: “This is Stop Hinkley’s reminder to EDF that they ain’t doing the job that they keep boasting about.

“HPC was supposed to be operating by 2017 and cost £18 billion.

“It is now projected for 2031 at a cost of £46 billion.

“This cost will be recouped by EDF, plus profit, from the electricity bills of our children and our grandchildren.

“Was it worth it?”

Ms Attwater said it seemed the group’s annual protest would ‘probably continue for some time’.

Stop Hinkley was founded in 1983 and played a major part in a 14-month public inquiry held in 1988/89 as it campaigned for alternative renewable energy sources and energy conservation measures.

The group claimed the closure of Hinkley A was announced in May, 2000, as a result of its campaigning.

EDF is currently expecting the first of Hinkley C’s two nuclear reactors to start generating electricity in 2029, four years later than an earlier target, with the second reactor following a year later.

Hinkley C will provide enough low carbon energy to power six million UK homes when fully operational.