Official Controls (Fees and Charges) (Amendment) Regulations 2024

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Thursday 18th April 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Douglas-Miller]

That the Grand Committee do consider the Official Controls (Fees and Charges) (Amendment) Regulations 2024.

Relevant document: 18th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee (special attention drawn to the instrument)

My Lords, I hope that it will be helpful to your Lordships if I speak to both the Official Controls (Fees and Charges) (Amendment) Regulations 2024 and the Plant Health (Fees) (England) and Official Controls (Frequency of Checks) (Amendment) Regulations 2024 given that they deliver legislation addressing fees for import controls on UK sanitary and phytosanitary goods under the border target operating model.

Turning first to the Official Controls (Fees and Charges) (Amendment) Regulations 2024, these regulations facilitate flexibility in the application of fees and charging requirements for official controls on sanitary and phytosanitary imports arriving in Great Britain. We have designed a global risk-based import model, BTOM, for sanitary and phytosanitary goods, which will deliver a streamlined approach which protects the public and plant and animal health, boosts our economic growth and minimises friction at the border. This instrument enables the necessary fees and charges for official controls, reflecting the new sanitary and phytosanitary border official controls regimes, as published in the border target operating model.

This instrument introduces flexibility on the composition of fees and charges for official controls while maintaining the requirement of cost recovery. This allows for more comprehensive cost recovery and enables the application of risk factors set out in the BTOM to the fees. This instrument changes the duty to charge to a power to charge by extending the circumstances in which charges may be reduced or waived. The implementation of the BTOM model is reliant on the flexible application of risk, the ongoing financial viability of competent authorities and the proportionate financial liability across stakeholders and operators. Changing the duty facilitates this desired flexibility.

This instrument enables a consistent charging model across any government-run border control post in Great Britain. This will be vital once border control post checks on EU imports are introduced to Wales and Scotland to support trade continuity in all our Administrations. Finally, this instrument enables fees and charges to be levied digitally and away from border control posts. Without this legislation, all sanitary and phytosanitary consignments entering Great Britain would be required to visit a border control post to make payments physically. This would be administratively and operationally unworkable, as it would require all consignments to attend a border control post, not just those selected for an inspection, adding time and burdens for hauliers.

Every effort has been made to ensure these fees and charges distribute costs fairly and proportionately for businesses of all sizes and across all sectors while enabling the Government to fulfil their cost recovery obligations. I am pleased to state that the devolved Administrations have given their consent for these regulations to extend across Great Britain. To summarise, this instrument facilitates the implementation of the border target operating model and is necessary to enable fees and charges to fund the new sanitary and phytosanitary border official controls regime.

Moving on to the second instrument, the Plant Health (Fees) (England) and Official Controls (Frequency of Checks) (Amendment) Regulations 2024, these regulations apply a requirement for risk-based import checks on medium-risk goods from the EU, Switzerland and Lichtenstein from 30 April 2024 as published in the border target operating model. This instrument ensures that certain imported goods are not within scope of this charge, including fruit and vegetables that are currently being treated as low-risk goods while risk assessments are being conducted. It also excludes goods entering Great Britain via a listed west coast port.

Changes are also being made to the fees legislation to reflect the risk-based level of identity, as well as physical and documentary checks on medium-risk goods, to ensure that the cost of plant health services are recovered. Fees are also updated for certain goods from non-EU countries to account for changes in the frequency of checks. Finally, two minor typographical errors regarding import checks are being corrected in the fees legislation.

Checks are currently carried out on high-risk consignments of plants, plant products and other objects imported into Great Britain from the EU, Switzerland and Liechtenstein. Checks are also being conducted on regulated goods imported from all other third countries, on a risk basis. GB plant health services carry out these checks and charge for these services accordingly to prevent the introduction and spread of organisms harmful to plants and plant products. This instrument therefore removes the temporary easement that applied after EU exit from import checks of medium-risk plants and plant products imported from the EU, Switzerland and Liechtenstein. These goods will become subject to risk-based checks and the associated fees.

I am pleased to state that the devolved Administrations have given their consent for these regulations to extend across Great Britain—except for Regulations 2 and 3, which relate to fees and apply to England only. Welsh and Scottish Government Ministers laid their equivalent fees legislation earlier this year.

In closing, these regulations ensure that checks are in place from 30 April 2024 to mitigate against any biosecurity risks from certain goods from the EU, Switzerland and Liechtenstein. I emphasise that protecting our biosecurity is of paramount importance. By facilitating the implementation of the border target operating model and enabling fees and charges for the relevant import controls, these instruments enhance the operation of the biosecurity regime of Great Britain.

I hope that noble Lords will support these measures and their objectives. I beg to move.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I feel I should begin by declaring my fellowship, through the Industry and Parliament Trust, of the Horticultural Trades Association, which is the trade association for environmental horticulture. I am sure the Minister knows this but that is what used to be called ornamental horticulture. The Government have not always shown that they know what this refers to, so I make that clarification.

We are talking about a Brexit cost here. That is what is being inflicted. We have spent several years with people looking around and trying to find Brexit benefits but they have been extremely hard to find on the ground. This is a cost and is particularly likely to impact on small and medium-sized enterprises across Britain.

I would like to make a comment about the timing of this debate, on 18 April. These fees are coming in on 30 April and were announced two weeks ago. That is not a great deal of time for businesses to prepare for and understand what is happening, so I must express my concern.

This is even more crucial in the context of environmental horticulture. Now is the worst possible time for this massive change in the industry to happen. There are a few peak weeks for horticulture when people are planting their gardens in spring and looking forward to summer. This measure will hit the sector extremely hard at this moment. The seasonal peak may last for only a few weeks and this is happening in the middle of it. It would seem that it is too late to make any change to that but I hope the Government acknowledge—this is a question for the Minister—that the industry will be taking on a significant cost at this moment. They should be thinking about what kind of compensation and extra support it needs.

It greatly concerns garden centres, nurseries and other suppliers that there could be delays on 30 April and in the week or so afterwards. We have heard many reports of people importing woody plants, shrubs and perennials en masse beforehand. However, it is not possible to do that with bedding plants and many other smaller plants. What arrangements do the Government have in place to provide compensation should there be significant delays at border posts?

Sustainable Farming Incentive: Species Management and ELMS

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Thursday 25th January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I begin by thanking the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, for securing this debate and introducing it so comprehensively. It is a great pleasure to follow the noble Earl, with whom I share a considerable passion for soil health and soil quality, which we have often discussed.

I agree in some respects with the noble Earl’s diagnosis of why we are one of the most nature-depleted corners of this battered planet. The Green Party right across the EU has very much led opposition to the common agricultural policy, although the way in which it was applied in the UK seems to have been particularly poor compared with parts of the EU, in terms of environmental and biodiversity outcomes. However, it is important that we add in other causes of the problem and recognise that the Government need to take a comprehensive policy approach.

Just this week, we had a debate in the other place following very strong public backing of the petition to “get fair about farming”. Giant multinational companies hugely dominate our food system, and a handful of companies dominate areas such as factory farming of chickens. That dominance has squeezed farmers’ margins and forced them into farming systems that have done huge damage to the natural world. I put it to the Minister that we are talking about the SFI, and that the Government need also to take action from the other side and make sure that farmers are indeed allowed to manage their land as they would like to.

It is important in this debate that we look at the other context. The Government have been doing trade deals, letting into the UK food with standards considerably below the standards we ask environmentally, as well as animal welfare standards. All these things are acting against what the Government are putting money into through their farming programmes. These issues have to be looked at together.

I shall continue with the theme of the need for a systems approach. We are in a climate emergency and nature crisis; we have exceeded six of the nine planetary boundaries, as identified by the Stockholm Institute. It is in the British countryside where you can really see that happening. We do not talk about this as much as we probably should, but the UN last year pointed out that, in global terms, we have more problems with plastics in our soils than in our oceans, to which a great deal of attention has been paid. Since we are talking about biodiversity in general, according to the terms of the noble Earl’s debate, I was tempted to raise the issue of the biodiversity of our soils and the research conducted in the past year. We have started to realise the extent to which we are losing the biodiversity of the microbiome of the soil. I am aware that the Minister is new, so I am going to be kind and not push too far down this road today—but he can expect more of it in future.

I turn to the overall view of ELMS and the impact it will have on the targets of the Environment Act. I am sure that noble Lords have seen an excellent briefing from the Green Alliance that digs into that issue. It notes that this month’s agricultural transition plan update does not provide evidence of how the actions being encouraged by the update will impact on targets. We need to see how those are joined up. These are the Environment Act biodiversity targets that the Government are legally committed to, yet how do the two things relate to each other? We are not seeing the explanation, the figures or the setting out of that link. We have a list of schemes that will contribute to supposedly delivering the targets, but we do not know how or how much, and we are not seeing an evaluation of how much progress has been made. Is what is being suggested in this update enough to get us where we are supposed to be by 2030?

Even where there is some detail, it did not relate the action to what is currently included in the ELM scheme. For example, in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the biggest single measure identified in the plan is using SFI to reduce emissions through methane-suppressing feed additives for livestock. Yet the use of methane suppressants—however much I might question that—is not incentivised through any ELM scheme. Of course, your Lordships’ House—and the entire country—is acutely aware of the issues around the state of many of our rivers. The focus has tended to be on sewage and water companies but what is happening in terms of nitrogen phosphorous and sediment pollution from agriculture is a big part of the issues in the River Wye and in many rivers in East Anglia.

The Office for Environmental Protection says that the scale of reductions needed to meet the targets in the Environment Act may require

“up to 100% of farmers adopting nature-friendly farming”

methods. At the moment, as the noble Earl said, we are at 10%. We have a huge gap here that has not really been set out.

Looking at the context in which we are talking today, we of course have to focus on the recent report from the Office for Environmental Protection, which has to be described—fairly—as scathing. It acknowledges that there has been some progress made in the implementation of the ELM scheme but says that its rollout needs to be vastly accelerated. The OEP says that, overall, it is keeping in reserve the possibility of taking legal action against the Government for failing to deliver on their legally binding targets. That is the context we are in.

We are particularly focused on biodiversity so I will be positive here and welcome the fact that, among the 50 new environmental actions, the Government have introduced agroforestry and restoring water bodies and water courses—and I think, at least to some degree, ponds and mires, which is a really important area that has not had sufficient attention. If the Minister has not visited Wakelyns agroforestry in Suffolk, I would strongly recommend doing so. If you want to see a long-term agroforestry scheme in action, delivering what is visibly and obviously a wonderful level of biodiversity, productivity and diversity in the human diet, I would encourage going to look there.

Agroforestry is an area—I declare an interest, I suppose, as having a fellowship with the Horticultural Trades Association—where we ideally need a supply of locally grown trees from nurseries here in the UK. Perhaps the Minister can comment on how we will ensure that, if we go forward with this agroforestry, we can have locally grown trees suitable for local conditions all around the country—ideally native species, of course—while making appropriate adjustments for the impact of the changing environment of the climate emergency.

I also want to look at enhancing water bodies and water courses. I would be interested in any thoughts that the Minister might have about the restoration of ponds and mires. What we have seen with industrial agriculture—the flattening of hedges and large fields that the way we have administered the CAP has encouraged—is huge amounts of the filling in of ponds, which are absolutely crucial to biodiversity. In East Anglia, there are some really exciting developments whereby old ponds are being excavated, carefully and in the right way, by expert ecologists. They are finding that the seed banks still remain there and, in those ponds, species that we thought had been totally lost from an area are in fact recovering. They are there; we just have to give them the air, light, moisture and capacity to flourish. Are the Government doing enough and providing the advice and support that farmers need for this kind of restoration, which we need to see on a large scale? This also has huge benefits if we think, for example, about flooding and Slow the Flow; it is a really important measure from the perspective of impact benefit as well.

Now I come to a section where, I am afraid, I entirely disagree with the noble Earl: predator control. I am drawing here on the briefing from Wildlife and Countryside Link. It talks about the funding of the management of wild species that prey on farmland birds. Wildlife and Countryside Link says—and I agree—that this is

“a distraction from the core objectives of the scheme. As confirmed in the State of Nature Report of 2023, the decline in the abundance of farmland birds is primarily due to increase in intensive farming practices, not natural predation. Predators are a marginal factor in farmland bird species abundance, for a few species only”.

I accept the RSPB studies that the noble Earl questioned but I would go broader and point to the reason why, in some areas, we have such an abundance of predators. Of course, one of the key factors, which has been increasingly highlighted in recent years, is the massive release of large numbers of game birds, particularly pheasants.

We are talking about a slow, non-native, not-very-well-adapted-to-our-environment feast for our predators, so we have lots of predator numbers. Now, having released those pheasants into our natural environment, we are going to fund farmers to do predator control. There is a very obvious alternative: to stop, or at least massively reduce, the amount of release of food into the environment. Then we will have fewer predators. We might also have a bit more safety on our roads as well, as an aside.

What we need to do, looking at this in a systemic way, is ask what our entire countryside looks like. That is where I have to raise the issue of the land use framework, something long awaited that was dealt with at considerable length, in detail and quality, by a committee of your Lordships’ House. We need a vision of what the countryside should look like. It needs to be a holistic vision that guides the whole ELM and SFI schemes. What we really lack is an overall, long-term strategy.

On briefings, I point to the Nature Friendly Farming Network briefing for this debate, which very much majors on and focuses on the need for a long-term strategy. What we seem to be doing is offering some money for this scheme and some money for that scheme, but where is the picture of what the countryside looks like? We know what the vision of the countryside has been over the past few decades. It has been farms and fields getting bigger, grubbing out hedges and getting rid of trees. That was the vision. Now we are starting to establish a vision where we acknowledge that we need to restore hedges and bring back trees. We need a different kind of environment yet we are still a long way from looking at proper crop diversity—genuine diversity, not just two or three crops on a farm but scores of different crops on a farm. I come back to Wakelyns as an example of what I would say is the Green Party vision for what our countryside could look like and how rich it could be. We need to look at this in a holistic way.

I am almost out of time so I will come to one specific point because I hope that this debate will be a useful way of settling a debate that has been carried on in the media. As part of the rollout of these schemes, the Government said they would maintain the annual farming budget for England at £2.4 billion a year. However, the Guardian has looked at Defra figures and concluded that there were underspends of £110 million in 2021-22 and £117 million in 2022-23. The Government have said that those figures are untrue. It would be useful if the Minister could set out in a little detail, as time allows today, and say from the Dispatch Box whether he believes that that promise of spending has been met.

Biosecurity and Infectious Diseases

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Thursday 18th January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, and to throw in some good news about grey squirrels, which is the increasing spread of pine martens. Early evidence shows this to be having a positive impact, in reducing grey squirrel populations through natural means. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Trees, for securing this crucially important debate and for his expert introduction to it. I join others in welcoming the Minister to the Front Bench and to your Lordships’ House; I am sure that in the future we will have many debates discussing driven grouse shooting, but not today.

We are speaking in what is now an age of shocks. We have the climate emergency and the collapse in biodiversity, and we have choked our planet in plastic and other novel entities such as pesticides and pharmaceuticals. Our biogeochemical flows are hopelessly out of balance. We have exceeded so many planetary limits. Within that environment, diseases present far more threats than they have in the past. Biosecurity is now a much more pressing issue. In bringing the Green approach to this debate, it is really important to stress the precautionary principle and the sense that what will protect us ultimately is a healthy natural world, healthy people and a healthy environment—the One Health approach, which has already been mentioned several times. If we think about many of our plants, we find that we have bred them in ways that have removed their natural protections. We need to have a diversity of crops and to look at natural ways in which we can manage the threats that are presented.

During Covid, we were all acutely aware of the phrase, “No one is safe until everyone is safe”. I very much fear that, since then, the acknowledgement that we need a healthy world, and humans to be able to be healthy all around the world, has really slid off of the agenda. Of course, the cuts to the official development assistance have certainly seen the UK doing a lot less. Vaccine inequality is one of the issues that absolutely needs to be put on the agenda here. One statistic that might shock your Lordships’ House is that, still, in low-income countries, fewer than 25% of people have had even a single Covid vaccination. That is despite all the wonderful scientific discoveries and the effort that was made. The effort has not been shared around the world, which is a huge problem for us all.

It is tempting to think, as we have already heard and will hear a great deal more, that biosecurity means that, essentially, we have to put up walls to keep these threats out. Of course, that is something that we have to do. Mention has already been made of food security. Traditionally, from this Government and others, there has been a belief that we do not have to worry about producing our own food because we will just import it from around the world. That is a huge risk, as has already been referred to in the example of African swine fever, given by the noble Lord, Lord Trees. It is a security issue for all of us, to make sure that we do not import more food that is necessary. What if we build those walls to keep out biosecurity threats? Take the example of flooding: the risk with the flood wall is that, if it is overtopped and built too high, the impacts are very great. When we talk about biosecurity, we have to think about the security of the whole world.

We also have to think about the security of our own environment from the One Health approach. We still do not have the UK national action plan for the sustainable use of pesticides. If we are thinking about a healthy environment in the UK, that is crucial. If we think about a healthy environment around the world, so many actions in the UK are having massive impacts. Many Members of your Lordships’ House are champions of efforts to prevent deforestation. Deforestation is a crucial contributor to damage to the idea of “one health”, through the spread of human, animal and, potentially, plant diseases.

I had a meeting yesterday on this and will in future be bringing to your Lordships’ House the idea that, in all our companies and supply chains, there needs to be a duty to prevent environmental damage and human rights damage. Those things are also a biosecurity issue, and we need to see this in a holistic way. In thinking about the whole issue, and looking at the themes, I think diversity is the key to health. One of the things that we are seeing is the great microbial extinction—something that has come to scientific attention only in the last year or two. That is a real threat to the balance we have, and to the rise of diseases, as we have taken away beneficial microbes.

I could mention many diseases here but I will finish by focusing on the threat that is presented to all our health and to animal health from factory farming. We have already talked a great deal about antimicrobial resistance. I believe that it is this threat that will demand the end of factory farming. However, when people talk about factory farming, they are usually thinking of it being on land, but in UK salmon farming we have seen a significant increase in antimicrobial use—it is broadcasting antibiotics into the sea to spread around the world. Such behaviour has to stop.

Storm Babet: Flooding

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Wednesday 25th October 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

I thank my noble friend for his question. This is an absolute priority for the Government and we are putting in record sums. We want to see £52 billion spent by water companies on upgrading their sewage systems. I will give my noble friend an example: there are eight villages up a small chalk stream close to where I live. Every one of those villages has increased in size by between 15% and 30% more households over the last few decades. While some attempts have been made to improve the sewage infrastructure up that river system, a lot more needs to be spent on it. It is now being spent on that and many other rivers, but we need to make sure that we look at this in the context of the vital necessity to protect the environment and the rare and wonderful chalk streams and other rivers that exist, including those close to where my noble friend lives. We also need to make sure that we consider the ability of that infrastructure to withstand the impact of storms, and that those are not just seen as an excuse, by some, to release more sewage into our environment.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I join many others in offering my deepest sympathy to the families of those who tragically died in Storm Babet and those whose businesses and homes were torn apart by the flood-waters and the storm.

I am sure the Minister will join me in regretting another impact of the storm that was very visual on social media—the loss of fertile topsoil. To cite one example, a farmer in the east Midlands, Sarah Bell, posted a video of storm-water rushing down the lanes around her property. It was a very deep brown colour taking, as Sarah said, “precious” topsoil with it. This raises the point that time is passing by. Many times in the past, the Minister and I have discussed the protection of our soils and he has pointed me to the 25-year environment plan, which says that our soils must be sustainably managed by 2030. Looking at how much soil we have lost from erosion in just the last few days, can the Minister tell me what progress has been made in the past few months to get to a sustainable management of soil by 2030?

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

Like the noble Baroness, I saw that clip—at least I think it was the same one—and it is horrible to see this natural capital being swept into a river system, where it can clog up that environment or just disappear out to sea. What are we doing about it? These events will always happen and there will always be some movement of soil when a month’s rain falls in one and a half days, as happened in some areas. But we are working hard to make sure that we fulfil our commitment on sustainable soils. One example of the many that I could give is the new actions we have announced under the sustainable farming incentive, which will see farmers rewarded for planting species of deep tap-rooting legumes and certain grasses to make sure that they stabilise soils and get them to function like the proper ecosystems they should be. Farmers are being rewarded for moving to a regenerative system of agriculture that protects topsoil.

Combined Sewer Overflows

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Thursday 14th September 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

My noble friend knows that there is a major investment in infrastructure, the largest ever, which is seeing many of those thousands of miles of Victorian pipes being replaced by modern ones. It is absolutely vital that any developments take into account the sewage infrastructure. That is why we are insisting on the entire impact of those, and any, developments being reflected in investment, and why we are front-loading a lot of the expenditure. We are requiring water companies to do a lot, but that is what their customers and the people of this country want. We have the right system by which to make that happen, and we want to encourage that expenditure to happen as quickly as possible.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, the current system of private monopolies dates back to 1989, when Margaret Thatcher sold off the publicly owned water and sewage industry for £7.6 billion, debt free. Since then, average household bills have risen 40% above inflation, the companies are now £54 billion in debt and have since paid out £66 billion in dividends to shareholders. Of the bills that people are paying today, 20p in the pound is going to shareholders or to cover that debt. Given that the regulation of these companies and the economic situation are clearly failing, surely it is now time for the Government to at least set up the process of looking into how we can bring these companies back into public hands and run them for public good.

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

I may have misunderstood the noble Baroness, but I have certainly had it put to me in this Chamber that, when this system of private ownership was put in place, it was somehow an ideological Conservative Government that was doing it. Nothing could be further from the truth. It was done because we were the dirty man of Europe: our rivers were stinking, and a very small percentage of our beaches were compliant. Now, we have nearly 93% of our bathing waters in good or improving conditions. I am not naive; I know that there are serious problems. But if the noble Baroness is really suggesting that the way of dealing with this is to completely change it and require the taxpayer to pay billions of pounds to purchase these companies back, which would see investment in this country into the regulated utility sector fall off a cliff, that is very dangerous not just for our water industry but our energy companies and every other regulated utility.

Hunting Trophies (Import Prohibition) Bill

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 12th September 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Caithness (Con)]

My noble friend is absolutely right, and I am sure that the source of that misinformation will not be a surprise to him or anyone else. It is a regular source of misinformation, and it was quite correctly shot down in flames by the Botswanan Government.

My noble friend raised an important point, on which I will end. We should use the Bill to improve conservation by getting rid of bad trophy hunting practices, while at the same time keeping the good and improving standards and welfare for all. I beg to move.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I commend the noble Baroness, Lady Fookes, for bringing the Bill to the House and championing it. For the Green group, I express my strongest possible support for the Bill as it stands—and opposition to all the amendments.

I have been in your Lordships’ House for nearly four years, and I have to admit that I was rather surprised when I looked at the misnamed “grouping of amendments”. I have never seen this before: it is a list of 62 amendments in 62 groups. It is surprising that people who might perhaps regard themselves as champions of the traditions of the House have produced something that has not been seen in recent history—and I checked with someone who has been around the House for much longer. It could keep this House going for several days. Those who would champion the traditions and progress of the House appear to be heading in the opposite direction with this.

It is interesting to look at the gender balance of the names on the amendments: every single one is male. There is something to be said there. Only the other day, I had a conversation with a noble Lord about how it has often been put forward that, if we could hand over some countries in the global south to the women, and let the women run things, they would look different. That might be an interesting case study tonight.

[Lord Robathan (Con)]

I understand what the noble Baroness is saying, but is she really implying that those people, such as myself, who put down amendments have no right to express an opinion on this, and that their views are valueless because they are not female?

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

I would love to see a true balance of gender in contributions in your Lordships’ House, as I would love to see a balance of membership in it. Of course, we are a long way from that point here and in the other place.

Something else that joins the people expressing views here tonight in terms of moving the amendments is that these are a small number of people who appear to think that hunting is a sport. It might be something like a sport if you gave the elephants, lions and birds guns but, until you do that, it is a slaughter—and that is what is being supported by the proposers of amendments to this very modest and heavily supported Bill.

It is noticeable that the amenders and the people sitting in the Chamber tonight are all largely sitting on the Benches on one side. But this was a 2019 Conservative manifesto promise—to ban imports of hunting trophies for endangered species. The intent for such legislation was in the Queen’s Speeches in 2019 and 2022. A 2022 public opinion survey showed that 80% of the British public support a ban on the imports of hunting trophies. Again, for those champions of tradition who say that we are the unelected House and that we should not stand in the way of the will of the House of Commons, the Commons passed this Bill with only minor amendments in March 2023.

I want to pick up just one point expressed by the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, who spoke about closeness to nature. We are talking about imports of these trophies into the UK. Practices of indigenous people embedded in local landscapes is one thing; a UK dentist or aristocrat bringing back a trophy from Africa is something else again. So I ask everyone proposing amendments to this Bill to search their conscience to ask themselves what they are really doing in the Committee this evening.

[Baroness Wolf of Dulwich (CB)]

My Lords, I express my support for the amendment moved by the noble Earl, Lord Caithness. I support it as the first amendment because it highlights straightaway the need to put conservation at the heart of this Bill—not simply disgust at the idea of trophy hunting, but conservation. I hope that the Government will take account of this and of the arguments that they will hear this evening on both sides and that they will be able to bring an improved Bill back to the House.

I was struck on reading back through the Second Reading speeches, which unfortunately I mostly missed, at how widespread the disgust is at this practice. I share it, as I have never shot anything or hunted anything, and I cannot imagine why people want to do this. But of course the point of this Bill is not to express disgust at this; it is to improve the prospects for animals that are being hunted. To do this, we have to look at the broader context. Particularly in Africa, we have a situation of huge rising demographic pressure and huge rising demand for the products of poaching, especially as those countries that believe in traditional medicine get richer, and the pressure on poaching for the ingredients for traditional medicine becomes more severe year by year. We can make sense of this Bill only by looking at that wider context and looking at whether it takes account of those pressures.

In the earlier debate, there was a certain amount of, “Well, we all pick our experts, don’t we?” Of course, we do all pick our experts to some extent—but I am sure that noble Lords would agree with me that this is not a reason not ever to listen to experts. I was extremely struck by the recent letter to the Times, signed by almost 200 different experts, who were very clear in their request that our Government

“should support an amendment whereby hunting trophies are permitted only if”—

I would say if and when—

“they demonstrate clear benefits to both conservation and local livelihoods, fulfilling the government’s manifesto commitment and helping, rather than harming, conservation.”.

I do not know whether any noble Lords have ever been involved in trying to put together a letter to a newspaper, but when you get one that is signed by almost 200 people from a very wide range of countries and associations, you have to feel that there must be some major arguments and major concerns that need addressing. Just to name some randomly, we have: Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority, the Frankfurt Zoological Society and the charity Stop Rhino Poaching; and we have experts from Kew, Oxford and Cambridge. Those are experts that we need to take some account of.

I was also very struck that, in fact, our Government internally recognise that hunting is not necessarily at odds with conservation. In fact, the Minister made this point himself at Second Reading, pointing out that

“some of the richest wildlife habitats that we find anywhere on these islands are sustained through the activities of people who hunt for sport”.—[Official Report, 16/6/23; col. 2245.]

I want to emphasise the need to take account of expert opinion, and the need to look at the context within which trophy hunting takes place. This does not mean that there is no place for this Bill. As the noble Earl has said, there are nuanced arguments. But when there are so many people arguing that we need to amend and improve this Bill, we should take these recommendations seriously and make sure that conservation is at the heart of this Bill. I therefore support the amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Trees (CB)]

I am sorry, but there is no grouping, is there?

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

Every amendment is in a group.

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

Can I invite the noble Lord, Lord Hannan, to support our amendments tomorrow, since he clearly laid out what this House does? Some amendments tomorrow exactly cover the kinds of issues that he was talking about.

Clearly, the Bill deals with a very passionately felt issue, with strong views on both sides of the argument. That has come across today in Committee and previously. The debate was introduced by the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, with his Amendment 1. However, before referring to that, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Fookes, for introducing this Private Member’s Bill and for her excellent introduction at Second Reading. We offer our strong support to this Bill. I remind noble Lords that the ban which has been debated has widespread public support and clear cross-party support in Parliament.

There are many amendments in front of us today, but our concern around Amendment 1 is that the effect of the noble Earl’s proposal would be to grant to the Secretary of State alone the power to decide whether a legal prohibition applies, where it is within scope. We do not think that is the correct way to go forward with any legislation. We have said with regard to many Bills that the strong Henry VIII powers being given specifically to Secretaries of State is not how to go forward with legislation. Also, the proposal is not a standard clause retained within conservation or animal welfare legislation, as the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, mentioned. That is specifically why we would not support Amendment 1.

The noble Lord, Lord Trees, tried to speak to Amendment 34. I would like to make a point about the groupings. Degrouping every amendment from the proposed government groupings to deliberately frustrate the progress of this Bill is pretty poor and undermines a manifesto commitment of the party that those noble Lords say that they support. They are part of this Government. They sit on the Government Benches. This is pretty poor behaviour on their part, and I want to put that on the record.

Clothing Sales: Sustainability

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Monday 11th September 2023 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what they assess to be a sustainable level of clothing sales by volume and material in the United Kingdom.

[The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Benyon) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government have not made an assessment of sustainable levels of clothing sales, but reducing textiles waste will be critical to hitting our net-zero goals. Our Maximising Resources, Minimising Waste paper, published in July, outlines our initial policy proposals for reducing textiles waste. We propose to ban textiles waste from landfill, require clothing retailers to provide in-store take-back of unwanted textiles and ask businesses to separate textiles waste for reuse and recycling.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

I thank the Minister for his Answer and am pleased that he acknowledged the critical place of dealing with the fashion sector, given that 20% of the world’s water use and 10% of greenhouse gases are generated by this and that the level of waste has trebled in the last 20 years. However, in the EU they are actually making very strong rules compared with what the Minister offered: clothing must become more durable, more repairable and more recyclable, and they are demanding extended producer responsibility. When is the UK going to catch up with—or, if we are to be world leading, exceed—what the EU is doing now?

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

We have very demanding targets in our Environment Act commitments, which include reduction by 50% to 2019 levels. The noble Baroness is absolutely right about the impact of fashion and textiles in terms of both carbon and the use of embedded water, and we will be publishing details next year of how we are going to progress the producer responsibility for textiles. Our priority is packaging.

Climate Change

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Tuesday 11th July 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

When I arrived at Defra in 2010, there were five ministerial cars; that has gone down to one, and I travel mostly by the use of an Oyster card.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, can the Minister tell me the comparative fuel consumption and emissions from a helicopter flight compared to travelling by car?

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

No, I am terribly sorry, but I am afraid that I cannot.

Disposable and Reusable Nappies

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Wednesday 28th June 2023 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what action they plan to take following the publication of the DEFRA report Life Cycle Assessment of Disposable and Reusable Nappies in the UK 2023.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, in begging leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper, I acknowledge support in work on this issue from the reusable nappy industry-linked Nappy Alliance.

[The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Benyon) (Con)]

My Lords, Defra’s assessment of disposable and reusable nappies concluded that no type of nappy clearly had better or worse environmental performance across its life cycle. We have no plans to take further policy action on nappies at this time. We hope that industry will use the report to continue to improve the environmental impact of nappies, and that it helps consumers make the best choice for them.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

I thank the Minister for his Answer, although I find it somewhat astonishing. I am not quite sure that he is looking at the same report I am, given that it shows that reusables are 25% lower for carbon emissions right now. If you have a green electricity supplier they are 93% better, and in terms of material outputs they are 98% better. This report clearly shows that if the Government want to deliver on their waste reduction, carbon emission and plastic pollution targets, as well as saving so many families money, they should work towards reusables.

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

I wish it was as simple as that. The noble Baroness is absolutely right with her figures on the global warming potential of reusable versus disposal nappies. However, reusable nappies have a higher environmental impact in 11 categories. These include terrestrial acidification, marine eutrophication—the noble Baroness shakes her head, but it is in the report—fresh water and marine ecotoxicity, an issue she has raised with me before, human carcinogenic toxicity, mineral resource scarcity and domestic water consumption. If you look at this in a one-sided way, as somebody once said, with every action there is an equal opposite reaction.

REACH (Amendment) Regulations 2023

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Tuesday 13th June 2023 Grand Committee

[Lord Monks (Lab)]

My Lords, I too have experience of dealing with REACH at the European level. When I was the general secretary of the European Trade Union Confederation, we worked with the British chemical industry, including the Chemical Industries Association—often against opposition from the powerful German chemical industry lobby, which was hostile to the whole concept of REACH. I was very pleased when we got it through; as my noble friend Lord Stansgate just outlined, it was not without considerable difficulty and this is an extremely complex area.

I will make two points today. First, I want to give a little tribute to the Chemical Industries Association, which I have found over the years to be as good a lobby group as any in the business world in terms of taking a broad view of issues, as well as looking after its members’ interests. That is important.

I am particularly concerned to ensure that in the extension that has been given, which I support, we continue to adhere to EU REACH, because we have nothing at the moment and the game plan is there. No doubt we will have some variations on it in due course, and I accept that, but in the meantime, in the absence of a British UK-EU arrangement, I hope that the Minister can ensure that the British industry follows the EU rules until they are replaced.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I rise to express significant green concern about this SI and the general direction of travel. We must look at the framework within which we are considering this. We have recently seen published peer-reviewed research showing that the world has exceeded the planetary boundary for novel entities. We have natural systems and, increasingly, human health systems, that cannot cope with the burden of novel entities. I usually talk about those as shorthand for pesticides, plastics and pharmaceuticals, but it is basically what is covered by the REACH directive.

There is now increasing scientific and public concern about the impact of these on environmental health and public health. PFAS forever chemicals are one example of an area that we are coming to understand in our understanding of biology. Most organisms on this planet are structurally holobionts, made up not just of their own entities but of bacteria, fungi and viruses. We are grasping the sheer complexity of life on this planet far more than we did 10 or 15 years ago, and the impact of these chemicals is increasingly understood—for example, the impact of chemical exposure creating antimicrobial resistance, a whole new area of research where there have been considerable advances in the last few years.

In that context, it is interesting to look at some figures. I pay tribute to CHEM Trust, which has provided me with a large amount of information on this issue, with significant expressions of concern. If we take the substances of very high concern, the UK has not added any hazardous chemicals to its list since we left the European Union, while 24 substances have been added to the EU’s list. Defra is considering just four out of 10 substances for the UK list which the EU added in 2021 but is yet to publish assessments on them. In the meantime, another five substances were added to the EU list in 2022 and nine since January this year. This is happening at a very significant pace, and we are falling further and further behind. There seems to be no interest. Can the Minister suggest how we might catch up with the EU in this specific area?

There are obvious public and environmental health issues here, but there are also issues for trade. If our companies are operating on our standards, they will increasingly be excluded from other markets. The Prime Minister has this week been speaking of the desire to be world-leading in innovation. When substances of very high concern are put on that list, there is a push on companies to look for alternatives—to innovate and find new ways of doing things. If we are not creating an environment in which that is likely to happen, then even in the Government’s own terms we are falling behind on the global stage of science and innovation.

Picking up on the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Monks, it is worth noting that the UK was one of the driving forces behind the creation of EU REACH and the restriction of chemicals regulations in 2007. Last night, I was at an Industry and Parliament Trust meeting, talking about trade. I heard there an expert in standards talking about how the UK has in recent decades been a leader in pushing the creation of ISO standards. However, it is our industry, our scientists and our NGOs that led that push towards higher standards. The Government must keep up, and support the drive in our industry, our NGOs and our scientists.

I shall pick up the points made by other noble Lords about the lack of regulatory capacity. The National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee have pointed to this lack, which is creating serious problems that are being identified on every side. Others have already spoken about the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, which also highlights concerns about human health and the environment, and the HSE’s capacity. We are hearing the same messages from all angles.

In particular, the impact assessment says that the absence of data

“could lead to reduced regulatory oversight and regulatory delays”,

but suggests that it would not be significant because other sources of information can be drawn on. However, the publicly available information about registered substances in EU REACH does not include details on safety tests, uses and how the industry reached its conclusion on the hazards and risks of substances.

The time factor needs to be focused on, as does the fact that we know that today, at this moment, we are exposing everyone in Britain and every bit of the UK’s natural systems to harm from chemicals that we continue to release into the environment when we know we should not be doing so. That will keep piling the costs on. The slower we operate, the more costs there will be. Think of the pressure on our NHS and on one of the nature-depleted corners of this battered planet: if we act slowly, the costs will just keep mounting up. For example, I mentioned PFAS forever chemicals: once they are there, we cannot get rid of them. There is no going backwards if we allow their use to continue.

I have some very specific questions. Will the UK look towards mirroring, moving faster than and eventually matching the EU’s pace of action, particularly on the chemicals of most concern? The UK Government talk about whether a control is right for GB. Do the Government see lower standards as being in some way better for us? How can the Minister say that lower standards of chemical regulation and safety are better for us?

An issue on which I have done a great deal of work and have a great deal of concern is microplastics. The Committee will remember microbeads. Indeed, the Government acted a few years ago on microbeads, but many intentionally added microplastics are still not covered by that legislation, which the REACH work programme of 2022-23 indicated as one of its five priorities. However, it has not yet published an evidence review or initiated any restrictions. Can the Minister tell me when we are likely to see that evidence review on intentionally added microplastics? In the light of that question, I note that EU national experts recently voted to adopt restrictions at the REACH Committee. That is now going to the European Parliament and the European Council, so the EU has steps in progress on these microplastics. When will we?

To be really concrete and scientific, and to focus on the importance of this for environmental and, potentially, human health, we—by which I mean scientists collectively: the human race—have identified the new disease of plasticosis. That was identified in one species of seabird, because we have looked for it in only one species of seabird. We are choking this planet with plastics and we have no idea what that is doing to us or to nature.

[The Duke of Montrose (Con)]

My Lords, I had the honour to serve on the EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee when it considered Brexit and the trouble with EU REACH, in that it was not in the least transferable so it is totally dependent on grandfathering, unless there is a stream in which we allow people to apply for new chemicals. We obviously started from zero in our collection and we rely on manufacturers to submit the EU REACH approvals. Do we keep track of how extensive our REACH is, compared with the European one? As the previous speaker said, the EU is expanding its schemes. Do we have tighter regulations than the EU imposes at present?

--- Later in debate ---

We have made these changes to UK REACH without any impact on the high levels of human health and environmental protections, as demonstrated by the consistency statement and the impact assessments that accompanied the public consultation in summer 2022. Our chemicals sector is world leading and one of the UK’s largest manufacturing exporters by value. We fully recognise this sector’s economic importance and its importance to the way we all live our lives. At the same time, we also recognise the risks to human health and the environment if chemicals are not used properly. We must continue to strike an important balance between these two factors. I commend the draft regulations to the Grand Committee.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

Before the Minister sits down, may I briefly raise two points? He said that a difference in exposure patterns would help to explain the differences in regulation between the EU and the UK. I tried to imagine what those differences might be. Some parts of the EU have considerably more heavy industry. We were at a joint event this morning where we were told that both have large areas of factory farming. Thinking about what people actually consume in the EU and the UK, I cannot think of any significant differences between the two that there would be in the pattern of life in terms of consumption. Either now or perhaps in writing, would he consider explaining what those different exposures are?

Finally, I acknowledge that the Minister very much welcomed and is enthusiastic about the microplastics review. What timeframe are we looking at there? I realise that he might not be able to be precise, but will it be this year or next year?

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

The noble Baroness half answered her first question. An example is that river flow is often lower in England than in the EU. That is a factor, but I will certainly go back to the department and seek further answers on that and on her subsequent question on plastics. I will certainly write to her.