Hinkley Point C in Somerset is the first new nuclear power station to be constructed in the UK in a Generation. It is a light water “EPR” reactor, based on a design very similar to those which have just begun commercial operation in China and are nearing completion in France and Finland. This is one of the largest infrastructure projects in the World, costing around £20bn, employing 1000s of people on site and has a truly international supply chain. As a “Third Generation” reactor, it includes several safety and efficiency improvements compared to the previous generations of reactors which were designed and constructed over the last 50 years. The safety systems have been developed using a Defence in Depth approach with multiple redundant and diverse systems to reduce the frequency of an event leading to core melt significantly lower than previous generation reactors. There are additional design features to ensure that in the extremely remote event of a “severe accident”, the resultant core melt is managed and cooled using engineered systems. This design philosophy of engineered redundant and diverse mechanical and electrical systems is mirrored in the I&C systems. There are two independent digital control and protection systems, and a third non-computerised system which are largely independent of each other but act in a hierarchical manner to provide very high levels of reliability. This keynote speech will describe how the design has achieved very high safety and reliability levels using the defence in depth approach, explain how this is justified in the safety case and provide some insight as to how independent oversight is provided on such a complex project.