Environment Bill

Debate between Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle and Lord Curry of Kirkharle

Committee stage
Wednesday 23rd June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, in following the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, I should briefly offer a defence of targets—particularly the target of ensuring that everyone in the UK has a warm, comfortable and affordable-to-heat home. I hope that no one would disagree with the target of ending our utterly disgraceful excess winter deaths that come largely as a result of the poor quality of our housing stock. I also wish to defend the targets that we are talking about here in terms of our natural environment, on which our entire economy and lives depend.

I will be fairly brief. I want to speak in favour of Amendment 34 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter. As the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, said, that would seem to be an easy, obvious amendment for the Government to accept. As the noble Baroness said, their ability to ask the office for environmental protection for guidance on the targets is simply not good enough and does not reflect the provisions of the Climate Change Act. We are very much creating a parallel here between action on climate and action on biodiversity. To mirror those two things would seem to be an obvious, simple and not difficult step.

On Amendment 19 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Addington, I would go broader than consulting the Department of Health and Social Care. The noble Lord in his introduction spoke particularly about recreation and the value of the natural environment to recreation. When we think about the health of human beings, the health of the natural environment is related in much deeper ways. I should point noble Lords to an interesting United Nations scheme called HUMI—the Healthy Urban Microbiome Initiative—which addresses a fast-growing and developing area of science: understanding the human microbiome and how it is related to our physical and mental health, and how what is happening around us in the natural world is utterly integral to a healthy microbiome.

I also wish to speak in favour of Amendments 41A and 41B in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Wigley. Again, we are in what could be described as no-brainer territory. We surely should not be imposing anything in terms of environmental regulation on the devolved nations without their “prior consent”—words that are important. This matter also raises a subject that we have not broadly discussed and might like to think about further. As the noble Lord said, rivers and waters do not suddenly get to a national border, stop and turn around, saying “Oh, I’m Welsh water and am staying in Wales”. That is also true of birds, insects, mammals and the whole ecosystem. A question to the Minister, either for today or a future date, is on how the Bill, this Act-to-be, will fit within the common framework and co-ordinating efforts of the nations of these islands. How will that work? I think also of many of our debates on the internal market Bill, now an Act.

[Lord Curry of Kirkharle (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I will be brief. It is a delight to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle.

When I first read this series of amendments, I wondered whether they were really necessary. However, the more I reflect, the more I have become concerned and I now believe that these amendments, or something like them, are required. The Government will set targets as permitted within the Bill and we will debate that matter again later. However, it will be difficult to determine the unintended consequences of setting targets, which can distort behaviour, as we know. We have seen this in the NHS and other sectors in which the Government have intervened and set targets.

I understand the need to have a clear sense of direction and the discipline of knowing what we are driving to achieve within a given period. However, let us be clear, as far as possible, on the need to be aware of the costs involved and the consequences of fixing targets. Even the best-researched impact assessments with a range of assumptions can be wrong. I therefore encourage the Minister to take this issue seriously and establish systems with which to monitor the potential negative consequences as well as the benefits.

Environment Bill

Debate between Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle and Lord Curry of Kirkharle

Committee stage
Monday 21st June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Curry of Kirkharle (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I speak in support of Amendment 11 in this group, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, and supported by the noble Lord, Lord Whitty. I will endorse the comments made by the noble Earl, Lord Caithness; I apologise for speaking in advance of them. I will also comment on Amendment 32, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb.

I declare my interests as recorded on the register. Specifically, I chair the Cawood Group, which has a large soil-testing facility, so I have a commercial interest in the subject; I am a former chair of the Meat and Livestock Commission; and I was a beef and sheep farmer until two years ago.

On Amendment 11, I endorse the importance of soil health and that soil quality should be included on the face of the Bill as a priority area. As I am sure the Minister will agree, the quality of our soil is a matter of deep concern. The degrading of soil is a worldwide problem with huge consequences for the natural environment. As a soil scientist at Rothamsted Research told me many years ago, once soil has been completely degraded, it cannot be recreated. Its loss can be permanent, with all the consequences that might lead to. We often use “fundamental” rather loosely but, as far as soil is concerned, its quality is of fundamental importance. Without healthy soil, our ability to sustain ourselves, have healthy ecosystems and biodiversity and sustain the entire natural world will be impossible, so it is rather odd that it is not included as a priority in the Bill—especially as it was given significant importance in the Government’s 25-year environment plan. Understanding the health of our soil is crucial if we are to continue on the journey towards more sustainable agricultural production and to capture its carbon sequestration potential, since the organic matter content of soil varies enormously. I hope that the Minister will accept this hugely important small amendment.

On Amendment 32, which is also included in this group, I am sorry but, rather like the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, I must inform the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, that I cannot support this amendment. Perhaps we should all join and have a drink afterwards when we can. First, let me say that the idea that the Government will control what we are allowed to eat by regulation would take the nanny state into new territory entirely. So far, successive Governments have failed to compel consumers to eat five portions of fruit and vegetables a day, so their record of managing consumer diets is not a great success story. Obesity continues to spiral out of control; the Government have a huge enough challenge trying to get to grips with that without trying to intrude on the eating of meat and dairy products. I cannot believe that any Government, particularly a Conservative one, would dare to impose such a policy.

Secondly, the amendment bases the regulation of meat and dairy products solely on the emission of methane when we now know that its impact on the environment is nothing like as long-lasting as carbon and without taking into account the huge benefit that the grazing ruminants sector delivers in supporting a vast range of ecosystems and biodiversity, together with vital carbon sequestration capability—not to mention the visual appeal of the British countryside, in which grazing livestock are a big part of the attraction so are important to tourism and the rural economy. Of course, we must continue to reduce the emission of methane and carbon as well as the environmental impact of ruminants, but I am confident that we will achieve that by building on scientific knowledge, which is very encouraging and developing all the time through protogenetics, better management, influence on ruminant diets and the choice of grassland species.

I just add in conclusion that I fully support the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, on his Amendment 6, which he presented very confidently. I also have a lot of sympathy with Amendment 31 and the comments of the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries. Tree health is a huge challenge and we need clear action by government; the Bill is an opportunity to try to improve tree health and reduce disease. I shall listen with interest to the Minister’s response on these issues.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I rise with a very long list of amendments to speak to, and I shall begin by very briefly addressing the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Curry of Kirkharle, and the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, in response to my noble friend’s Amendment 32. I begin by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Curry of Kirkharle, for offering his support for my Amendment 11 on soils. I agree with him that it is rather odd that it is not initially in the Bill.

On Amendment 32, I first point out that this amendment does not seek to impose a diet on anyone; it sets a target to head the national diet in a certain direction. On what the noble Lord, Lord Curry of Kirkharle, said about methane, yes, its impact on the climate is shorter lasting, but it is also more than a score higher than that of carbon dioxide. When we consider the facts that we have an emergency and have to ensure that we stay below 1.5 degrees above industrial warming right now, the next 10 years are absolutely crucial and methane emissions now particularly crucial.

My noble friend will not forgive me if I do not stress that we very much understand that animal agriculture has an important place in the British landscape, but we have to start by tackling factory farming—for many reasons, from antimicrobial resistance through to the point that it is food waste to feed perfectly good food that people could eat to animals to produce much less food as a result.

I shall now get to the list that I started with. I shall briefly speak to Amendment 10 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Randall of Uxbridge, on light pollution. We in the Green group would have attached our signature to this amendment, had there been space to do so. Clearly, this is a huge issue. The noble Lord, Lord Randall, referred to what has been called “insectageddon”, the huge loss of insect numbers and species, and light pollution is certainly part of that. I also point out that this is very much a case for joined-up government. So much of the light that we emit and pollute our skies with is utterly unnecessary. For example, the French Government have brought in a law that says that neon shop signs have to be switched off between midnight and dawn, which undoubtedly has benefits for the natural world. I am sure it also has huge benefits for people who live in flats above shops, who live in the environment. We are talking about making the environment benefit people and nature.

I also briefly offer support for the general intentions of the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries of Pentregarth, in focusing on trees, while taking on board the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, that we need the right tree in the right place, to use the buzz-phrase. We talk a great deal about tree planting, but it is important that we think about the natural regeneration of trees, because that is one way in which nature will help to ensure that we get the right tree in the right place. We also need to talk a great deal more about agri-forestry and the possibility of forage crops and crops producing human food—nut and fruit trees and so on—mixed in to our existing agricultural systems.

Now I get to the three amendments that I really want to talk about here. I apologise that this will be rather a long speech, but these are short but very important amendments. I come first to Amendment 7, which appears in my name and changes one of the proposed targets set down by the Government. The target as expressed by the Government is for resource efficiency and waste reduction, but I am calling for the words “resource efficiency” to be replaced by “reduction in resource use”. The current wording essentially says, “We’ll continue to treat the planet as a mine and dumping ground, but we will do it less wastefully”. What I suggest is that the law should acknowledge that we cannot have infinite growth on a finite planet and that a circular economy is a necessary but not sufficient condition for a sustainable world. In the terms of the neat video, “The Story of Stuff”, which has been around since 2007, we must have less stuff in our lives.

I refer to an important report from the Green Alliance, which I encourage noble Lords to read, which points out that resource use drives half the world’s climate emissions and 90% of nature destruction around the world. The UK’s use of resources, renewable and finite, is twice the level considered sustainable. Of natural resources alone, the UK uses three times as much as the planet can sustainably provide. That report, by what is not by any means a radical green group, calls for resource use to be halved. The UK’s material footprint was estimated at 971 million tonnes in 2018, equivalent to 14.6 tonnes per person. In 1997, 40% of that came from domestic extraction, which fell to 27% in 2018. We are taking a huge quantity of resources from the world—far more than the world can bear.

I stress that cutting resource use does not have to mean a lesser quality of life. When we think about the damage that stuff is doing, whether the ocean is turned into a plastic soup, the planet heated dangerously or soils destroyed in producing food then wastefully fed to animals, which then produces health-damaging junk food, we can see that reducing resource use can considerably improve our quality of life—not just using it better but using less of it. Really, there is no alternative. In a debate on the Finance Bill earlier this month, the noble Lord, Lord Agnew of Oulton, for the Treasury, responded to my remarks along these lines, by pointing to the book More from Less by Andrew McAfee, which claims that technology is enabling the dematerialisation of growth. As many critics have pointed out, however, that book ignores the fact that very often material use and exploitation are being exported, not replaced, and the acceleration of planned obsolescence means that more efficient use of resources has very often not meant less use of resources.

The noble Lord, Lord Agnew, pointed us to the United States Geological Survey figures for 72 resources, saying that only six had passed their peak, but that is a reflection of what the known reserves are. What about the damage done to people and nature by extracting them? Mining is by its very nature inevitably destructive. In a world suffering a pandemic of environmental ill health and the biodiversity emergency, more destruction tips us over multiple planetary boundaries, a concept that the response from the noble Lord, Lord Agnew, suggests that the Treasury has yet to grasp.

I am well aware that the Minister will find his work cut out in tackling the Treasury on these issues, but I point out that, if this Government want to be—as they so often tell us—world-leading, the European Parliament has demanded that the EU reduce resource use by 2030 and bring it within planetary boundaries, which means cutting it by two-thirds by 2050. That is the target set by the European Parliament. If we are going to be world-leading, that is where the Bill should be going. I am well aware that running the country for the economy instead of running the economy for the well-being of the country is deeply engrained, but that is a challenge for the Minister to take on.

I come to the two other amendments that appear in my name. Before I do, I want to refer back to a comment made in the first group by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, who said that we are inadequately exploring the relationship between the Agriculture Act, the Trade Act and the Environment Bill. I had a meeting last week with farmers and farming advisers who expressed to me exasperation and frustration because they were struggling to understand the Government’s intentions in that process. These two amendments that I am about to speak to attempt to deal with some of those issues.

I come to Amendment 11, on soils—and I hope that I get it through. I express my great thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, for attaching his name to this amendment and want to thank the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, and the noble Lords, Lord Curry and Lord Randall of Uxbridge, for expressing their support for it. As the noble Lord, Lord Randall, said, it is astonishing that it is not in the Bill to start with.

I want to quote Thomas Jefferson:

“While the farmer holds the title to the land, actually, it belongs to all the people because civilization itself rests upon the soil.”


I will also refer to a few points in the report The State of the Environment: Soil from the Environment Agency in June 2019. It is really telling that it says:

“There is insufficient data on the health of our soils and investment is needed in soil monitoring”.


It is very clear that we do not know enough, and if we set a target, that will create a framework where we need to do the measuring. In some ways perhaps it is a bit “chicken and egg”—but let us get this started, because it clearly needs to happen.