Genetically Modified Organisms (Deliberate Release) (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2022

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Monday 14th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

I had to send a note via the doorkeeper to wake up the noble Lord.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I declare an interest in my involvement at Rothamsted, as set out in the register.

I thank the Minister for his introduction and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, for raising considerable concerns about the impact this SI might have on the environment. We know that these concerns have resonance among the public at large, and it is right that they are taken seriously and seen to be addressed. I am also grateful to the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee for its forensic dissection of the proposals. Again, it is raising serious concerns that must be addressed.

I accept that this SI, in its current form, makes only minor changes to the regulation of GM research, which occurs only in highly regulated and respected research establishments. It is not about releasing GM food into the food chain. Nevertheless, we cannot ignore the history of GM development, which was not properly regulated in the past and created a public backlash we are still living with today. The public rightly want to be assured, on both public health and environmental grounds, that the existence of artificially modified organisms in the land and air, and ultimately in their food, is safe. If we are to persuade them that this is the case, we need to proceed with the best independent scientific evidence and the utmost transparency. These principles need to be applied both to determining the fate of this SI and to the more radical proposals that we understand this Government are now developing.

We recognise the potential advantages that scientific progress can make to the agritech sector. Many of these were flagged up in our consideration of the Agriculture Act and the Environment Act. Our knowledge of the importance of biodiversity and the adverse impact of intensive farming comes from some of the latest scientific research. We now understand the huge advantages of eco-friendly farming, harnessing the power of nature to farm in a productive and sustainable way. Again, we learn a lot of that from the scientific community. Using fewer artificial fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides can rebuild the health of our land for the long term. This goes hand in hand with the development of crops that can provide natural resistance to disease and destruction. Science and innovation will continue to have a key role to play in our food systems of the future.

However, one thing that has come to light in considering this SI is that scientists themselves are not all agreed on the approach being taken by the Government. I am grateful to my shadow Defra colleague in the Commons, Daniel Zeichner, for painstakingly reading through all the submissions and highlighting some of the discrepancies among scientists in the Commons debate on this SI. As has been said, this SI attempts to delineate between genetically modified organisms whose modifications could have occurred naturally and GMOs where an external unrelated gene has been introduced. The Government have chosen to define these naturally modified plants as “qualifying higher plants” but this definition has proved contentious among scientists. As Daniel Zeichner said:

“The Roslin Institute says: ‘it is exceptionally challenging to define which changes to the genome could have been produced by “traditional” breeding.’ The Royal Society says: ‘this question is problematic as there is a difference between what could be produced by traditional breeding in theory and in practice’. The Royal Society of Biology says: ‘No clear criteria can be described that would determine whether an organism produced by genome editing or other genetic technologies could have been produced by traditional breeding. This means no clarity can be achieved using this principle, and it is not appropriate as the basis of regulation.’”—[Official Report, Commons, Delegated Legislation Committee, 2/3/22; col. 7.]


These are hugely worrying critiques if the Government are planning to base the whole of the future reforms of GMO on this distinction.

Of course, the Government have quoted the advice of ACRE, the Advisory Committee on Releases to the Environment, in support of their proposal. However, that brings me on to the second concern, about transparency; this point was made by other noble Lords. It turns out that six of the seven scientists on the board of ACRE have links to commercial companies, and three of them quote Syngenta as an interest. So, although I am sure that these scientists are experts in their field, it does not appear that they have the independence to make a purely scientific judgment on this issue. This is precisely the sort of concern that will fuel public anxiety and objection if it becomes known. Can the Minister provide some assurance that the definition of “qualifying higher plants” will be revisited, given the existing doubts about whether that is the right phraseology to go forward? Can he assure the House that the propriety of ACRE to rule on these issue can be, and will be, reassessed?

I turn to the submission from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, which raised a number of critical concerns about the proposals set out in this SI. It reiterated the concerns about the definition of a “qualifying higher plant”, to which I just referred. In response, the Government advised that they are in the process of developing guidance, which will be available shortly. When are we likely to see that guidance? The committee also raised concerns about the researchers creating GMOs having to self-declare whether their product is in this category, and about the fact that the new notification measures do not give details of the location or scale of the research; again, this issue was raised by other noble Lords. It points out that this is a major concern to the organic growers who want reassurance that their products will not be contaminated, putting their organic status at risk. I would be grateful if the Minister could address these concerns in his response.

The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee also raised concerns about the devolution aspects of these proposals, given that they are England-only, and the Welsh and Scottish Governments have no intention of following suit; again, noble Lords raised this issue. Although this particular SI is focused only on research, does the Minister agree that it would any future commercialisation of products extremely difficult unless there was alignment in the internal market and with the outcome of the review of the EU’s GMO regulations that is currently taking place? It is interesting that even the majority of businesses that responded to the consultation opposed the proposal, so there clearly is no demand for GMO products to enter the food chain on the current basis. As the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, asked, how will that work if it is England-only, and how will those products potentially be marketed across borders? Businesses are obviously concerned about that as well.

Finally, the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee regretted that we have no further information about the Government’s wider plan for reform. We share that concern, and I hope that the Minister is able to provide more information today.

We are not going to oppose this SI today, given the relatively small changes to research controls which it introduces. However, we will not be supporting the noble Baroness’s fatal Motion, as it is not our practice to do so, except in exceptional circumstances. None the less, I hope that the Minister is hearing the message that any future proposals will need to be underpinned by much more rigorous regulation. We need to have much greater transparency. It will need to be overseen by a truly independent and trusted scientific committee if it is to have any hope of gaining the public support—and the support of this side of the House—which it will need going forward. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Environment Bill

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Wednesday 15th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I will not repeat what I said in our previous debates on this, but I very much support the noble Baroness’s amendment. We agree that the Government should take action to encourage reusable nappies, including, where necessary, incentives for the low paid to be able to access them in the first place. The sooner we use innovation to encourage alternatives to single-use nappies and that whole industry, the better. On that basis, as the late hour is descending on us, I look forward to hearing what the Minister says.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, I know the hour is late, but this is a very important subject, just because of the quantity that goes into landfill. I thank noble Lords for their contributions to this debate and my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe for a very informative meeting yesterday. I know that she is passionate about this issue and is keen to see progress, but it is also important to ensure that our policy-making is evidence-based. That is why the department has commissioned an independent environmental assessment of the relative impact of washable and disposable nappies, the most recent study having been done some time ago. This research is being carried out by Giraffe Innovation Ltd and will cover the waste and energy impacts of washable and disposable products, disposal to landfill and incineration, and recycling options. We expect to publish the final report later this year, following peer review, and I am very happy to write to my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe and the Nappy Alliance about our plans once we have the results of the research.

We will use an evidence-based process to consider what, if any, action is appropriate. This could include backing voluntary initiatives or introducing measures such as standards and consumer information and labelling. I also confirm that existing powers in the Bill, in the schedules on resource efficiency and information, will allow us to, among other things, set standards for nappies and introduce labelling requirements.

We are delighted that some local authorities currently operate reusable nappy schemes as part of a local decision on how to prioritise funding, which may be available from a number of sources. However, we do not need primary legislation to develop a strategy or support a scheme on reusable nappies. In relation to the landfill tax specifically, reducing the number of nappies sent to landfill through reusable nappy schemes should save local authorities money over time by reducing their landfill tax bill. The amount of money saved can be spent according to local priorities. I know that certain charitable funds are available from landfill taxes. I cannot comment specifically on those, but, as we discussed yesterday, that is an avenue well worth exploring by local authorities.

Once we have the results of the independent assessment, expected later this year, we will be well placed to prioritise and develop a plan if appropriate, so I beg that this amendment be withdrawn.

Environment Bill

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Report stage
Wednesday 15th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I do not have an American spouse to declare and I am certainly not a landowner, so maybe I bring more of a working-class approach to this. But I do declare an interest as a member of the South Downs National Park Authority, where conservation covenants are already becoming a live and slightly perturbing issue. I speak in support of Amendments 109, 110, 112, 113, 114 and 115 in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Devon, to which I have added my name. I also thank the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, for his amendments, which echo our concerns about the current wording of Part 7 of the Bill.

As the noble Earl, Lord Devon, said in Committee and again today, conservation covenants are a new and radical concept. They could bring great benefits to our landscape and to improving our biodiversity, but they are long-term agreements with huge implications for the landowners, so it is essential that we make the wording watertight from the start. The noble Earl’s Amendments 109 and 110 would require any conservation covenant to be underpinned by a deed. We believe this provision is essential. It would ensure that the landowner received appropriate legal advice before locking in the land to agreements that could last 100 years or more, committing their family for generations.

In the noble Lord the Minister’s letter following the debate in Committee, he made it clear that the covenants would not require a dominant and servient tenement. The implication was that this would be an equal agreement between the landowner and the responsible body, but we know this is not necessarily how it will work in practice. We are talking about public bodies or large institutions with huge resources compared to a single landowner, who may be a small farmer. So it is crucial that they get the best legal advice, which a deed would deliver. There would then be clarity for all on what the conservation requirements are.

As I mentioned in Committee, the concept of environmental stacking is also taking hold, where a landowner might have multiple conservation obligations to different bodies, with all the legal complexities that that would ensue. Could the noble Baroness clarify how it would work if a covenant existed for a piece of land? For example, would the landowner also be able to claim additional financial support through the sustainable farming incentive scheme?

We are also concerned about the implications of individual farmers being approached to sign covenants that are at odds with the wider plans for the landscape. How would we ensure that the covenant was in keeping with, for example, the strategic plans for the protected landscapes in the national parks? As I mentioned in Committee, farmers in the South Downs are already being approached to provide carbon offsets for developments elsewhere, and the new biodiversity offsets will complicate matters further. All of this underlines the need for a land-use framework for England, which my noble friend Lady Young will be debating in the next group.

I also agree with the noble Viscount, Lord Ridley, that the advice on conservation may turn out to be wrong, over a period of time, so we need a simple mechanism to adapt and sign off new amended conservation agreements.

Finally, we agree with the noble Earl that the responsible bodies that determine the basis of the covenant, if they are not public bodies or charities, should be organisations focused solely on conservation —we all had a great deal of sympathy with his example of Southern Water, which did not quite tick the box of being a trustworthy conservator—otherwise, there is a danger of the covenants being traded by for-profit institutions with no interest in the biodiversity outcome and no direct engagement with the landowner. In the worst case, it is possible to imagine all these covenants bundled up into packages and traded internationally, with the UK losing control of its land use. I hope noble Lords see the sense of these amendments and agree to support them, if the Minister is not able to adequately address these concerns.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have contributed to this debate and especially the noble Earls, Lord Devon and Lord Caithness, for their amendments. I also thank the noble Earl, Lord Devon, for taking the time to discuss this important topic with the Secretary of State last night, and with Defra officials and the Law Commission. I start by emphasising that the Law Commission concluded that a regime for statutory conservation covenants is needed because there is currently no simple legal tool that landowners can use to secure conservation or heritage benefits when the land is sold or passed on.

Amendment 111, in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, risks limiting crucial flexibility in the design of covenants. The Government strongly support the Law Commission’s approach of keeping the content and procedural requirements for conservation covenants simple and proportionate. We want to avoid unnecessary complexity and cost—and cost might dissuade landowners from entering into conservation covenants, leading to important conservation opportunities being lost. It is also vital that parties have the flexibility to design conservation covenants to suit their needs, given the wide range of conservation purposes they could be used to secure. We expect to see a range of different covenants created, from preserving small-scale heritage work done on a Tudor house through to securing long- term landscape-scale conservation management.

Amendment 109, in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Devon, seeks to prevent landowners inadvertently signing up to agreements, but I think this scenario is unlikely. The agreement must show that the parties intend to create a conservation covenant. A conservation covenant cannot be validly created unless the agreement clearly shows that the parties intended to create it. The Government have been working closely with stakeholders, including the NFU, CLA and the National Trust, to develop guidance, to be published, that will set out in more detail the process for creating conservation covenants and encourage both parties to take legal advice before entering into such an agreement.

On Amendment 110, I will first clarify something I said to noble Lords during the debate on the eighth day of Committee. To confirm, it is not necessary for a conservation covenant to be executed by deed for it to be registered as a local land charge. I also reassure the noble Earl, Lord Devon, that his concerns were carefully considered by the Law Commission: Clause 113 adheres to its final recommendations. His proposal that the agreement must be created in writing and signed was well received. In practice, those who prefer to execute their agreement as a deed may do so, and of course executing an agreement by deed does not guarantee that the parties will seek legal advice on the terms set out in the agreement—although, as I said, our guidance will encourage parties to take legal advice.

A perpetual agreement might be desirable to some; equally, a fixed-term conservation covenant could be appropriate to others. The proposal for flexibility on duration had the clear support of consultees and the Law Commission saw no sensible alternative. Where consideration forms part of an agreement, the clauses already allow for that to be captured. Requiring agreements to include provisions on duration and consideration risks rendering otherwise helpful agreements invalid if they fail to mention them, as consideration in particular may not be relevant to all agreements.

On Amendment 112, regarding responsible bodies, I agree with the noble Earl, Lord Devon, that for-profit bodies have a role to play in ensuring the success of conservation covenants. The Government’s 2019 consultation found broad support for allowing for-profit organisations to apply to be responsible bodies: 58% of respondents agreed, with only 26% against. The Government will closely check approved responsible bodies. Regulations on annual returns may require responsible bodies to provide an update on their eligibility. As part of the application process, we will also require organisations to notify us if conservation is no longer their main purpose or activity.

Environment Bill

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Committee stage
Wednesday 14th July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as a member of the South Downs National Park Authority. I am very grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Devon, for tabling these amendments and introducing them with such clarity. As the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, said, he was very persuasive. On that subject, we welcome the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, back to his seat—he made his own very persuasive and silver-tongued contribution. I listened very carefully to what he was saying, but I am afraid that, like other noble Lords, I was not totally persuaded. Perhaps it is just because we have not had enough time to consider what seemed, the more we talked about it, to be a more and more complex issue. Forgive me if I do not dwell on that, because I feel I am out of my comfort zone in understanding the implications for the use of common land. Perhaps we can return to that issue at some point when we have more time to debate it in detail.

I return to the amendment proposed by the noble Earl, Lord Devon. We welcome the essential principle of the conservation covenants in the Bill, which the noble Earl said was a result of the Law Commission’s recommendations. As a number of noble Lords have said, there are real concerns as to how these covenants will be applied in practice. The noble Earl said that it was particularly important that smaller farmers understood the full implications of entering into these covenants and are protected from exploitation. He has given some examples of the perverse consequences of historic covenants in the past, and I suspect that they will become more common in future. Already we are hearing in the south downs about farmers being approached by public bodies that want agreements to provide a home for their carbon offset obligations. I have no doubt that those sorts of pressures are only going to increase.

As the noble Earl says, it is in danger of becoming a bit of a wild west situation. It is likely that biodiversity net gain will create a new swathe of developers, public and private, looking to do deals with farmers to offset the damage that they are doing to the environment elsewhere. Already we are hearing talk of environmental stacking, whereby farmers have multiple obligations to different bodies to deliver environmental benefits, with all the legal complexities that would ensue if that became commonplace. Incidentally, this once more underlines the case of my noble friend Lady Young of Old Scone that we need a land-use strategy so that growing food, carbon offsetting and enhancing biodiversity all develop into a coherent policy whole, and we know where the priorities lie.

Of course, these developments could be an advantage to farmers and the environment if they were managed properly, but these agreements need to be managed with care to ensure that farmers are not exploited by big corporate players and their lawyers. That is why the noble Earl, despite being a lawyer, is quite right to pursue these amendments. They would make it clear that the covenant was a formal legal document, signed as a deed, which one hopes would ensure that the farmer received appropriate legal advice.

The noble Earl is also right to probe, in Amendment 274, what organisations that are not public bodies or charities can be defined as responsible bodies for the purpose of this clause. We agree that there are real concerns about for-profit organisations entering this market, with the potential lack of responsibility and knowledge that many of these organisations will have. We need to be assured that all the organisations described as responsible bodies have expertise in conservation. Since many of these agreements will be for the long term, we need to be clear about what happens if a responsible body holding a covenant subsequently becomes insolvent or ceases to exist, or simply sells that covenant on. A number of noble Lords have probed the consequences that could occur from applying those covenants in perpetuity, and the impact that that could have on the individual.

It seems to me that we need answers to this, and the noble Earl’s amendments go a considerable way to addressing it. I also agree with the amendments laying greater duties on the Secretary of State to manage the covenants in those circumstances, particularly in the longer term. As the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, said, what is the point of having the stopgap of the Secretary of State if he is not required to do anything, as is the case under the current provisions?

In conclusion, I very much believe that the noble Earl has made a powerful case for these amendments. Alarm bells are ringing about the actions we need to take to get this right. I hope that the Minister has heard the concerns from around the Chamber. It would be helpful if, as a matter of urgency, she was able to meet the noble Earl—and I hope that we will be able to find a solution and a revised wording of the Bill.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, I thank noble Lords for their consideration of this part of the Bill. I also take this opportunity to thank the Law Commission, as this part of the Bill is based on its work and the draft Bill that it prepared. Its ongoing support as the Bill has moved through the various parliamentary stages has also proved invaluable.

Conservation covenants are an important and flexible tool for the environment’s conservation and improvement—and I know that there is some frustration that this was not drafted as a specific Bill, but it is right that we legislate for them now rather than waiting. They complement other measures in the Bill, such as biodiversity net gain. Conservation covenants are private agreements entered into voluntarily to deliver long-term conservation outcomes for the natural and heritage features of the land—and I welcome the broad support of noble Lords from around the House, particularly that of the Green Party. Importantly, the legislation allows for covenants to bind successor landowners, which ensures that they can deliver lasting conservation for future generations; the legislation also allows for them to be modified or discharged to cater for changing circumstances.

Amendments 266, 267 and 268, tabled by the noble Earl, Lord Devon, seek to ensure greater formality in the process for creating these covenants. Before I get into the detail, I emphasise again that these agreements are voluntary, and a covenant needs to be exercised as a deed to be entered as a land charge, which I hope goes some way to reassuring noble Lords, including the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch. Conservation covenants cannot be imposed—rather, the parties will need to work together to set them up in line with the requirements set out in the Bill. As these are legally binding agreements, there needs to be a degree of formality, and the Bill’s provisions ensure that there is.

Environment Bill

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Committee stage
Monday 12th July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, for, as ever, giving us an excellent explanation of why he has tabled these amendments and for raising these very important issues. I also thank the Minister for confirming in the earlier debate that net gain will be extended to major projects in the marine environment in the future, once a suitable approach has been developed. This is certainly a step forward.

The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, rightly made the point that our coastal territorial waters are in urgent need of protection and recovery, and, if we do not use this Bill to make that happen, what other opportunities will we have? The latest Committee on Climate Change adaptation report has highlighted concerns about the quality of our terrestrial waters. It says:

“There is clear evidence that warming seas, reduced oxygen, ocean acidification and sea-level rise are already affecting UK coasts and seas … with effects seen in seabed-dwelling species, as well as plankton, fish, birds and mammals.”


It also reports that there has been a decline in the overall condition of protected coastal sites.

So, on the one hand, we need to tackle the hazardous pollution, including plastic waste, that has led to the failure to meet the environmental targets to which the noble Lord referred. On the other hand, there is an opportunity to harness the power of nature in our coastal waters to sequestrate carbon through the growth of seagrasses and seaweed, such as at the innovative kelp farm being developed in Shoreham. But a strategy is needed to provide a framework for the change, which is why preparing and publishing a nature recovery strategy for the UK exclusive economic zone seems such a good idea. It is also why linking our coastal waters into local nature recovery strategies will ensure that those initiatives do not end at the shoreline.

The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, rightly referred back to our consideration of the then Fisheries Bill and our frustration that sustainable fishing was not allowed to be at the heart of the Bill, despite all our efforts. As a result, it seems that fishing quotas are very much business as usual, and overfishing—above the recommended scientific limits—remains rife. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, that this continues to be unacceptable and needs to be addressed by the Government. A nature recovery strategy would allow the opportunity to revisit that strategy, taking different criteria into account.

I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, that we need a joined-up strategy between the Agriculture and Fisheries Acts and the Environment Bill. We have said that all along; every time a Bill comes along, we ask, “How come these pieces of legislation do not speak to each other?” She is right to raise again today our need for a joined-up approach.

Finally, I am pleased that the noble Lord has given us the opportunity to implement the recommendations of the Benyon Review into Highly Protected Marine Areas. The limits of the current standard marine protected areas are all too obvious, as damaging human activities are still allowed to destroy the marine habitat. Therefore, we very much welcome the definition of highly protected marine areas as those that allow the recovery of marine ecosystems while prohibiting “extractive, destructive and depositional” human activities. We welcome the amendment that sets out that the proposals for the initial locations should be published within six months of the Bill passing. The noble Lord said that he felt that the Government had caught up with his amendment; he might be on to something, but I feel that there are great advantages to having this spelled out in the Bill just to make sure that that progress is followed through. These are indeed key amendments, which could help to transform the quality of our marine environment. I hope that the Minister agrees and will feel able to turn these into government amendments, which I am sure would receive widespread support.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, I begin by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, for his powerful advocacy for the marine environment throughout these proceedings and, indeed, last year throughout the proceedings on the Fisheries Act, in which he knows I had some involvement.

I will focus first on Amendments 226, 227 and 229. I sympathise with the intention behind this group of amendments, but the Government do not agree that this is the right approach. Local nature recovery strategies build on the important role that local authorities play as local leaders and decision-makers within their areas, as the noble Lord will know from his time spent on the Cornwall pilot. Clearly, actions taken on land can affect the marine environment and vice versa, and we should not create false barriers to nature’s recovery.

As such, our intention is that local nature recovery strategies should integrate with existing spatial plans of marine areas. This is in order to understand the area’s current uses and its potential in adjacent marine areas. It is something that we have explored through recent pilots, which, as I said, the noble Lord has kindly supported. However, local authorities are not best placed to produce marine strategies, as these areas are largely beyond their remit and authority. I believe that requiring this would lead to significant complications and potentially unhelpful duplication with existing processes. It would include duplication with the Marine Management Organisation, which is England’s main marine regulator and manages the licensing of marine activities, recreation and fisheries beyond six nautical miles. The inshore fisheries and conservation authorities also manage fishing out to six nautical miles and any marine nature restoration strategies should include their input.

Amendment 233 would require the Defra Secretary of State to create a nature recovery strategy for the United Kingdom exclusive economic zone for England. The Government already have a strong framework in place to ensure ocean recovery through the UK marine strategy. Its goal is to ensure that all UK seas are of good environmental status, exactly as the noble Lord’s amendment would require.

In March this year, we published the updated UK Marine Strategy Part Two, setting out the monitoring programmes that we will use to assess progress towards our updated good environmental status targets. This will be followed by the update to our programme of measures, which will set out a comprehensive list of measures to help to achieve good environmental status. As the UK already has a strategy for ocean recovery, this well-intentioned amendment is not needed.

The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, generously welcomed the Benyon Review into Highly Protected Marine Areas. The Government published their response to the review on World Oceans Day 2021 and accept the majority of its recommendations. In answer to the question from the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, about when we will designate HPMAs, that will be done in 2022. We do not agree that HPMAs should be only within existing marine protected areas, which was recommendation 13 of the report, and we will consider designating HPMAs outside the current MPA network to ensure that we can maximise nature recovery. Existing governance structures of ALBs were beyond the scope of the Government’s response to this review.

I note that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, also asked about joined-up thinking, which I know has concerned a number of noble Lords throughout the passage of this Bill, the Agriculture Act and the Fisheries Act. A number of measures in all three Acts will have benefits for the marine environment. The Fisheries Act will benefit the environment, as will the Agriculture Act. They have all been put together at a policy level and have been thought about comprehensively.

Amendments 246, 247 and 251 aim to create highly protected marine areas. The Government have committed to designate HPMAs by the end of 2022, using the definition of the noble Lord, Lord Benyon, as set out in his review, which was carried out before he joined the Government Front Bench. The Government will work with their arm’s-length bodies and stakeholders to identify a list of potential pilot sites for highly protected marine areas. On 5 July, we published the ecological criteria that we will use to identify highly protected marine areas and we will create a list of potential sites this year. We plan to designate pilot sites in 2022 as marine conservation zones, with higher levels of protection than existing zones, using powers under the Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009.

I note that the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, had a number of concerns about controlling harmful marine activities. Introduced under the Marine and Coastal Access Act, marine licensing is a process by which those seeking to undertake certain activities are required to apply for a licence. The requirement for a licence extends across much of our territorial seas, including the foreshore, and covers a diverse range of activities, from depositing a marker on the seabed through to large-scale developments. Authorisation or enforcement decisions must be taken in accordance with the appropriate marine plans.

In answer to the noble Baroness’s other question about drilling for oil and gas and refusal of future licences, I refer her to the Ten Point Plan and to the energy White Paper, which address her questions on oil and gas exploration. The Government have had to tread a careful dividing line and balance between keeping energy costs as low as we can while fulfilling our commitments to the net-zero target.

I assure the noble Lord that the requirements of the amendments are already covered, as the Government have committed to identifying potential sites this year and pilot sites designated as marine conservation zones in England will be covered by the protected site strategy clause. I thank the noble Lord for raising this important issue, which I know is close to his heart, and I hope that he is reassured by the Government’s commitments in this area. I ask him to withdraw his amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, I welcome Amendment 251A from the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, and the contributions of all those who spoke about the importance of our national parks, on which I think we are all agreed. From the meres and hills of the Lake District to the chalk of the South Downs—and a lot of Wales, I must add—they are some of our most valuable landscapes.

That is why the Government commissioned the independent Landscapes Review, which set out a compelling vision for more beautiful, more biodiverse and more accessible national parks and areas of outstanding natural beauty. The panel’s report recommended strengthening the duty on public bodies to have regard to the purposes of the national parks and to support implementation of management plans. This would have a very similar effect to the proposed amendment from the noble Baroness.

In a Written Ministerial Statement of 24 June, the Government committed to address the review’s recommendations in full and consult on draft proposals later this year. Those draft proposals will address this recommendation. This has been an unprecedented year for the country, so work since the review was published has indeed been delayed, but the Government are working very closely with partners on their response to it. We have committed to address its recommendations in full and to consult on draft proposals later this year. I am of course very happy to meet the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, as part of the consultation, or we can discuss it earlier if that would be helpful.

The Government support the intention of the noble Baroness to ensure that our public bodies work together more effectively in our national parks. We all agree there has been a problem here. We are currently working closely with partners, including the national park authorities, to consider how best to achieve that aim through our response to the review. However, we cannot accept this amendment, as it is important to work with our partners and consult on any such changes before changing the law, particularly to understand potential implications for those public bodies likely to be affected. The Landscapes Review found strong evidence that public bodies are failing to have adequate regard to the statutory purposes of the national parks. It also found that the effectiveness of the management plans is limited by poor implementation by local partners, including public bodies. The Government take this finding seriously and are working with partners to consider carefully how to address it.

A number of noble Lords raised the question of infrastructure plans in the national parks. The 2010 National Parks Circular and the National Planning Policy Framework are very clear that national parks, the Broads and areas of outstanding natural beauty are not appropriate locations for major development. I will look into the specific cases that they raised and provide more detail on those if appropriate.

I also assure the Committee that, since the Glover review was published, the Government have been supporting important work in our protected landscapes through our nature for climate fund and green recovery challenge fund to restore nature, tackle climate change and connect communities with the natural environment. The Government have also recently announced their new farming in protected landscapes programme, which will provide additional investment to allow farmers and other land managers to work in partnership with our national park authorities to deliver bigger and better outcomes for the environment, communities and places.

My noble friend Lady McIntosh asked a number of questions, particularly on ELMS. This funding will help to drive forward delivery of the Landscapes Review on people, access, nature and job creation, responding to the public appetite from Covid-19 for better access to nature. Specifically, the fund should help to support delivery of the Landscapes Review recommendations on connecting more people to protected landscapes, delivering the new environmental land management schemes, increasing the diversity of visitors through tourism, creating landscapes which cater for health and well-being, expanding volunteers and rangers and providing better information and signs. Specifically, this funding will help farmers to shift towards delivering environmental benefits which, in the future, could be supported by environmental land management, particularly the components that support local nature and landscape recovery.

I thank the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, for his contribution. Sadly, I have not been able to receive divine intervention quite in time to respond to his specific questions, particularly about earlier legislation, but I will write to him and put a copy in the Library. I hope that I have now provided assurance to the noble Baroness that we share her aims for national parks: we just need a bit more time to work with public bodies, including national parks themselves, to get this right. I therefore hope she will agree to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for their contributions to this short debate. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, that we are blessed with very special national parks, each one unique in its own way. As we have heard from the contributions, everybody has their favourite and the particular one that they are a cheerleader for. We sometimes take the national parks for granted, but the experience over the last 18 months has ensured that they are back in the front line and are rightly seen as the national treasures that they really are. They have played an important part in people’s sanity, and mental health, over the last period.

I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, that the national parks have to be integrated into the work of the Agriculture Act—an issue that we addressed earlier when we talked about joined-up policies—and it is important that they play a rightful role in the rollout of ELMS. We welcome the Government’s proposals for farming in protected landscapes and the additional investment that will come from that, because the farming community in the national parks has to work in a way that is properly sympathetic to the landscape that we are hoping to develop there. There are special challenges, but also great benefits if we get this right.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, mentioned the South Downs ambition of 33% to protect our landscapes. I agree that we should be ambitious: every national park is unique and will have different constraints. South Downs has an awful lot of people living there and a lot of businesses already operating there. Obviously, we need to push to the limits of our capacity in order to make sure that nature recovery takes place in the widest possible area. We will obviously do that.

Environment Bill

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Committee stage
Wednesday 7th July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate, and I have listened carefully to the informed and thoughtful contributions from all sides. They have well represented the two sides of the dilemma. On the one hand, we recognise that water abstraction plays a vital role in the economy, generating power, driving industry and helping our farmers to grow food. On the other hand, we recognise that unsustainable abstraction can do serious environmental damage, particularly by changing the natural flow of water, with lower water flows and reduced water levels, and ultimately contaminating water resources, thereby affecting fish and wildlife and in some cases contaminating by allowing salt-water intrusion.

I think that we all accept that an abstraction licence should not give an automatic right to extract water whatever the environmental consequences. As my noble friend Lady Young of Old Scone said, water is a shared resource. The actions of one individual or business can have devastating effects on another farm or community downstream, so we have to manage it on a collective basis. In this regard, I welcome the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, which would require a licensee to measure water quality in an aquifer and share that information publicly. That is all part of that collective management of a very scarce resource.

We also have to recognise that climate change has already varied the supply of water since many licences were granted, and all the Government’s indices point to looming water shortages. We accept the point made by several noble Lords that the rights experienced by a water company are of a very different scale and impact from those experienced by farmers. It is on this latter group that we are focusing today.

The Government place great emphasis in their proposals on the Environment Agency managing the changes to licences through local consultation. In his letter to us of 10 June, the Minister said that

“we expect the Environment Agency to work closely with the affected licence holders before using these measures.”

But when I visited Norfolk with the NFU a couple of years ago, this was far from the case. Their licences, which underpinned a thriving horticultural sector producing fruit and vegetables for the UK market, were under imminent threat and, despite numerous requests, there was no dialogue with the Environment Agency—indeed, at one point, I even got the noble Lord, Lord Gardiner, involved to persuade for some consultation to take place. As we discussed in the earlier debate, the Environment Agency is struggling to meet all its statutory obligations because of the funding crisis. I hope that the Minister has received sufficient assurance that the Environment Agency has the resources to manage the renegotiation of all the licences so that we can have more sustainable licences in the future.

Ultimately, we agree that we have no choice but to withdraw a licence if the evidence shows that the environment is being damaged. We agree with the premise of Clause 82 that there should be a negotiated settlement, with a reasonable compliance period for changes to be introduced rather than an automatic right to compensation. We also agree with the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, that the new agreements should be for a minimum of 12 years. As he made clear, we should take a catchment-based approach and look to introduce the best techniques available for water efficiency in parallel with the negotiations.

We agree with the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, that an operative date of January 2028 is far too long a time. I was alarmed to hear the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, talk of deadlines as far ahead as 21 years. The current timescale does not appear to grasp fully the severity and immediacy of the problems facing our waterways. We need to move all farmers on to sustainable abstraction licences as soon as possible. We cannot wait until 2028 to start revoking licences.

If compensation remains payable until 2028, there is a danger that budgetary constraints will limit the scope of the Environment Agency to act to protect the environment in the interim. There is also the danger of perverse outcomes whereby people start to behave in their short-term interest just to protect their rights and potential access to compensation. As we have heard, the Government are already beginning to address this issue through the 2017 abstraction action plan, so there is even more reason for bringing the date forward from 2028, since presumably action on many of these areas is already in hand.

This has been a difficult debate, and I understand the arguments on both sides but, ultimately, we think that a date of 2028 is too long away and we therefore support the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, and look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

I thank all noble Lords for another interesting discussion on this Bill. As the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, has just observed, the Government are endeavouring to perform a careful balancing act by delivering on their manifesto commitments to improve the environment through addressing the consequences of unsustainable abstraction and modernising the licence system while minimising the impact on farmers.

To put things into context—I was grateful for the balanced comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone—I say that we expect that, out of the 13,000 permanent abstraction licences, there may be up to 1,200 that are unsustainable and to which these measures may apply. However, the Environment Agency expects that the number of licences will reduce in any case before the need for the measures to be applied following local site investigations and discussions with licence holders.

I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, for his Amendments 176 and 177 to 179, and understand his concerns about the effect of the proposals on licence holders. My noble friend the Minister and I were grateful to be able to meet the noble Lord alongside my noble friend Lord Colgrain the week before last to discuss this issue further.

As we have heard from other noble Lords, unsustainable abstraction can have very negative impacts on the aquatic environment, including causing low flows. Low flows can lead to reduced levels of dissolved oxygen, harming fish and insects. It can also lead to increased temperatures and impede the migration of fish species, which may not be able to reach spawning grounds. I say in response to the concern expressed by the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone, about salmon stocks—an interest of mine, of course—that Defra, the Environment Agency and partner organisations have committed to the salmon five point approach to restore the abundance, diversity and resilience of salmon stocks, ensure that river flows are adequate for the habitats they support and increase spawning success by improving water quality.

Of course, low flows have a knock-on effect on other parts of riverine ecosystems, including specialist species which rely on the aquatic environment. Low flows can also lead to dire consequences for internationally important chalk streams, 75% to 80% of which are found in the UK.

However, we also know that abstraction is vital for food production, as farmers provide drinking water for livestock or abstract water to irrigate their crops. I hope that my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering is reassured that I put that firmly on the record.

As we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington, with respect to his potatoes, skin finish is vital, and the Government recognise the importance of maintaining the high quality of British produce. We must therefore balance the needs of agricultural and other abstraction licence holders with public water supply demands and the need to protect the environment. That is why the Environment Agency is using a catchment-based approach and trialling innovative approaches in priority catchments with a range of local stakeholders, including water companies, the National Farmers’ Union, local abstractor groups, environmental groups and navigation interests to solve issues of access to water and unsustainable abstraction.

As we have discussed in our conversations to date, the Government want the Environment Agency to continue to work closely with abstractors to explore all voluntary solutions to unsustainable abstraction. I do not agree that this is a blunt regulatory process; rather, it is the last resort in a collaborative process.

On removing compensation rights, which a number of noble Lords mentioned, we want to protect licence holders’ ability to abstract where it is fair and right to do so. Unless a licence risks damaging the environment or is underused, we believe that licence holders should be eligible for fair compensation for any loss if licences are revoked or varied.

Farmers hold more abstraction licences than any other sector and so a higher number of farmers may be affected than other sectors. However, the Government expect the Environment Agency to work closely with affected licence holders to find alternative solutions which balance the needs of the environment and the needs of farmers. We expect these powers to be used by the Environment Agency only after all other options have been exhausted.

The Environment Agency, as the statutory environmental regulator, has the relevant expertise to determine which licences may be affected by the changing of the threshold from “serious damage” to “damage”. The Environment Agency grants licences and proposes their revocation or variation based on monitoring of abstraction and the water environment from which the water is being taken.

To reassure my noble friend Lord Cormack and the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, who appealed for an appeals process, as currently, an abstraction licence holder will be able to appeal to the Secretary of State in respect of a proposed revocation or variation of their licence, as well as to put forward any additional evidence from other experts, if they wish to do so. Therefore, the Secretary of State is already required to consider relevant expert evidence when using this power as it is an intrinsic part of the existing process. Furthermore, I reassure noble Lords that the Environment Agency has already started conversations with a number of farmers, which I hope will reassure the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, who asked about the ability of the Environment Agency to undertake all these powers.

We should expect that these measures will be used only after other solutions have been exhausted. Partly for this reason, they will not be available until 2028. In the meantime, we expect the Environment Agency to work closely with affected licence holders on a case-by-case basis, to provide data and evidence for why a licence needs to be varied or revoked, to consider the type of abstraction when making decisions, and to take a risk-based approach and consider what the abstraction is being used for.

On the noble Lord’s Amendments 180 to 187, I hope he can see that the Government have designed these provisions to make more water available to other abstractors and to reduce the risk to the environment. These measures will be focused on permanent licence holders who consistently abstract much less water than they are licensed to take, but the Government are well aware that not all licence headroom indicates a lack of need. It is appropriate to safeguard licence headroom in some cases—for example, to manage higher demands during dry weather as well as the planned future growth of a business. The 12-year period specified in the Bill allows for weather variations and crop rotations and fits with the current abstraction licensing strategy timeframe.

On Amendments 176A, 180A and 187ZA from the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington, I hope that the arguments I have given have convinced him that introducing these measures from 2028 strikes the right balance between protecting the environment and recognising their impact on abstractors.

As I think the contrast between the amendments in this group illustrates, the Government have worked hard to reach a fair compromise on this issue. As well as allowing time to find voluntary solutions, the 2028 date will give time for licence holders to adjust. We understand that this is particularly important for business certainty and continuity. Furthermore, it will allow time for the catchment-based approach to water resources to produce solutions. In the abstraction plan, published in 2017, the Government committed to update abstraction licensing strategies for all catchments by 2027, and a 2028 date aligns with this.

Regarding Amendment 179A, also tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, the Government simplified Clause 82 following feedback received during our consultation in 2019 that our original proposals were far too complex. Licences can be varied or revoked without the Environment Agency being liable to pay compensation where the Secretary of State considers the licence change necessary, having regard to the relevant environmental objectives under the water framework directive or to protect the water environment from damage. As such, I am pleased to confirm for the noble Lord that the clause can already apply to licences that may affect all sites designated under existing legislation, including sites of special scientific interest and Ramsar sites.

The Environment Agency also already considers the impact on flow when assessing the environmental impact of an abstraction licence, including when it is considering whether to revoke or vary a licence. The Environment Agency will continue to do so when these new powers are available on or after 1 January 2028.

Environment Bill

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Committee stage
Wednesday 30th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, in moving Amendment 133 I will also speak to Amendment 133A in my name. I am grateful to the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, and the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, for adding their names.

These amendments would accelerate to 1 January 2023 the introduction of deposit return schemes and set minimum criteria for the composition and size of the containers to be included in such schemes. These criteria are the equivalent of those already being introduced in Scotland and supported by the Welsh Government. This would make it easier for businesses, retailers and consumers to access consistent and compatible schemes, which would result in improved take-up. It would incentivise consumers to take their empty drinks containers to return points hosted by retailers. The technology already exists for reverse vending machines that can collect empty bottles and return deposits, as well as sell the original filled bottles. Trials are already running of refill schemes to ensure the same bottles can be reused.

Schedule 8 already includes outline proposals for a deposit return scheme. As ever, the weasel word “may” is in the provision, as in:

“The relevant national authority may by regulations establish deposit schemes”.


We know that the Government’s resource and waste strategy supports the idea of deposit return schemes. As the Minister said in his letter of 10 June, such a scheme will

“help reduce the amount of littering in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, boost recycling levels, and allow high quality materials to be collected in greater quantities.”

We agree with this analysis, but once again we are concerned that the Government’s timetable for action will slip. Already, by their own admission, the scheme has been delayed. They are now saying that the scheme will not be introduced until late 2024 at the earliest—in other words, in the next Parliament. This means that they will break their pledge in the 2019 Conservative manifesto to introduce a deposit return scheme. It also means that six and a half years will have passed since it first became policy.

Meanwhile, Scotland is pushing ahead and, once again, England is being left behind. This is why Amendment 133 proposes an introduction date of January 2023, to avoid further delay, and why Amendment 133A would introduce consistency across the four nations. There has never been a greater need for such a scheme. The Government’s own figures show that every year across the UK, consumers use an estimated 14 billion plastic drinks bottles, 9 billion drinks cans and 5 billion glass bottles. Meanwhile, fewer than half of plastic bottles in the UK are recycled, and we know that much of the remainder end up as litter or landfill. In contrast, as the Government concede in their fact sheet, Germany, Norway and the Netherlands have achieved collection rates, including recycling rates, of 98%, 92% and 95% respectively for plastic bottles through the introduction of deposit return schemes.

We also know that the most effective bottle return schemes include all the major sizes and material types, not just plastic. This was confirmed by the Government’s own impact assessment in 2019, which found that the most comprehensive schemes offered the biggest financial benefits. But we also have to ensure that the introduction of such schemes does not have perverse consequences. For example, deposit schemes should complement existing collection schemes and build on the success of the glass and aluminium recycling schemes already in existence. This is why we welcome the amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, which would vary the deposit fee depending on the size of the container. We also want to ensure that there is not a switch from glass to plastic bottles, given the efficient closed-loop systems already in place for recycled glass, which is collected separately from kerbsides and bottle banks. Our aim in all this should be to cut down on single-use plastic and develop closed-loop recycling for all materials captured through a deposit scheme. I hope noble Lords will see the sense in these proposals and I beg to move.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, I beg to move that the debate on this amendment be adjourned.

Agriculture Bill

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Report stage & Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords & Report: 1st sitting & Report: 1st sitting: House of Lords
Tuesday 15th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lady Young for moving this amendment and making the case so persuasively. She is raising an important point about what will happen when the environmental standards, which are currently required through cross-compliance, no longer apply when we leave the EU and the existing payments regime is phased out. We agree that it is vital that the standards that apply, such as to hedgerows and buffer strips to watercourses, should not be lost by accident or intent.

It all forms part of the promise made when we left the EU that our environmental standards should be at least on a par with what went before. It is also part of the bigger promise of the Government that they will leave the environment in better shape than when they inherited it. So we cannot afford to go backwards on this issue.

As my noble friend has made clear, these issues are part of a bigger project to review standards and develop a new regulatory regime. This is fine as far as it goes, but the clock is ticking and we know that these reviews take time. The review will be taking place against intense activity to get the new ELMS regime up and running, with all the supportive secondary legislation that will be required to make that happen.

So there is a real danger that the provision of new regulations will be delayed, and a regulatory gap will occur. My noble friend’s amendment provides a neat solution to ensure that those standards not yet required by UK law will be safely assured for the future.

To be honest, as other noble Lords have said, we do not understand why the Government have not put something similar in the Bill, and there is still an opportunity for them to accept this amendment today. But if the Minister is not so minded, I would be grateful if she could provide sufficient reassurance that the review and its outcomes are on a fixed timetable. Can she also guarantee that our environmental standards achieved by cross-compliance will not be compromised in the meantime? I look forward to her response.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

The primary effect of this amendment would be to provide a new lever to oblige recipients of financial assistance under Clause 1 to meet cross-compliance requirements. This includes parts of the cross-compliance regime where there is no backing in domestic legislation.

A large proportion of the rules currently contained in the cross-compliance regime are replicated in domestic legislation. Rules such as those in the Wildlife and Countryside Act, the Control of Pesticides Regulations and the Reduction and Prevention of Agricultural Diffuse Pollution (England) Regulations will continue to provide protection for our valuable wildlife, soils and watercourses. It will remain mandatory for individuals to continue to comply with all domestic regulation, irrespective of whether they qualify for financial assistance.

We understand the important role that regulatory standards play in trade, in protecting our environment and in protecting the health and welfare of animals. That is why the Government will take a proactive approach to engaging with industry. Responses to our landmark Health and Harmony consultation, our wide-reaching review led by Dame Glenys Stacey, and our discussion document on the ELM scheme have informed, and will continue to inform, our regulatory framework. This autumn, we intend to launch an engagement package—the intensive consultation to which the noble Baroness referred—which will provide an update on the thinking around the future regulatory system. We want to use this to start a co-design process with industry, opening the conversation with stakeholders on the best approaches to designing a future regulatory system.

The Government are exploring other possible levers that we could use to encourage more effectively industry compliance, which would deliver improved environmental outcomes. The ELM scheme will cover a range of environmental outcomes to ensure that farmers and land managers improve their practices and are rewarded for doing so. We are considering a range of measures to ensure that we deliver these outcomes, including, for example, requiring individuals to meet certain requirements as a condition of entry within the scheme itself.

Finally, I assure noble Lords and emphasise that we should take the time to get this right—and we have the opportunity to do so. Individuals will be expected to continue to comply with all current cross-compliance regulations until we delink payments from the land or direct payments end, and until not before 2022. The noble Baronesses, Lady Jones of Whitchurch and Lady Bakewell, and the noble Earl, Lord Devon, worried about the regulatory gap, but we are striving hard to ensure that this does not occur. Through our engagement process and the development of our ELM policy, we will ensure that our high environmental and animal health and welfare standards continue to remain world-leading.

I hope that I have given sufficient reassurance on this important matter, and that the noble Baroness, Lady Young, will feel able to withdraw her amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

On Amendment 31, I reassure the noble Baroness that the Government will fully take into account the proposed steps and goals of environmental improvement plans, including the 25-year environment plan, when they determine the strategic priorities that will sit within the multiannual financial assistance plans, so the amendment is simply not necessary.

The Government are absolutely committed to achieving their aim of leaving the environment in a better state than when they found it. That is why they are seeking to legislate for environmental improvement plans in the Environment Bill that is currently in the other place in order to drive forward long-term improvements to our natural environment. The 25-year environment plan will be adopted as the first statutory environmental improvement plan and the Government expect it to set the benchmark for future EIPs.

The noble Lord, Lord Krebs, asked a characteristically cogent question about the lack of a proper system of measurement, as identified by the Natural Capital Committee. We are engaging with stakeholders, scientists, economists and environmentalists, including the Natural Capital Committee, to develop comprehensive indicators to measure progress towards the goals set out in the 25-year environment plan.

The planned introduction of the ELM scheme under Clause 1 of the Bill clearly demonstrates the Government’s commitment to look at wider environmental objectives when setting their strategic priorities for funding under their multiannual financial assistance plans. Indeed, the ELM scheme will be a key mechanism for delivering the environmental goal set out in the 25-year environment plan by providing farmers and other land managers with public money for the delivery of multiple public goods.

There are six key public goods that the ELM will help to deliver that correspond directly with goals set out in the 25-year environment plan: namely, clean air, clean and plentiful water, thriving plants and wildlife, a reduction in and protection from environmental hazards, mitigation of and adaptation to climate change, beauty, heritage and engagement with the environment. Defra’s ELM team is currently working on understanding the full range of actions that the scheme could pay for in order to deliver across all the goals in the 25-year environment plan.

Should there be any changes to the plan or a future environmental improvement plan, the Government will review the ELM scheme to ensure that the public goods that it is funding remain in line with delivering the priority goals and commitments that the Government have set out in the plan. The Government will be publicly accountable for the delivery of the strategic priorities in both its multiannual financial assistance plan and the environmental improvement plans. This House will of course have the opportunity to scrutinise the drafting of provisions for the environmental improvement plans when the Environment Bill reaches this House.

I had hoped that with this reassurance I would be able to persuade the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, to withdraw her amendment. However, I cannot make the commitment that she seeks to table a government amendment at Third Reading.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have added their support today. As the evening gets later, we seem to be finding more and more consensus around the Chamber, which is very welcome.

I particularly thank the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, who rightly reminded us that, as the Natural Capital Committee flagged up, proper systems of measurement are absolutely crucial in terms of the future of environment plans and the crossover with our agricultural activities. We have to have proper measuring systems to measure outcomes and to measure success, but at the moment those links are not obviously made through legislation.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, for reminding us of the State of Nature report and the RSPB report. They make very depressing reading but show the scale of the task ahead and why the sorts of measures that are in our amendment are so important.

I am very grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Caithness. He is absolutely right that we do not know what the future holds, but we need to get farmers more guarantees and security for the future, and that is why we are attempting to build in those long-term connections. I am also grateful to him for pointing out that the amendment would not cost the Government anything; indeed, there is a very strong case for saying that the integrated policies that we are suggesting should be introduced might actually save the Government money. That should be a welcome outcome.

I say to the Minister that the Government can make commitments but, as noble Lords have often been reminded on other occasions and in other debates, the Government cannot commit future Governments. We are trying to build in a long-term connection between these two separate arms of Defra’s activity. Yes, I absolutely agree that ELMS will be a crucial part of delivering the 25-year environment plan, which is why it is important that that is in the Bill and that it has long-term resonance to it. The Minister was right to anticipate that I would not be happy with her response. I am sorry to say that I am not. I therefore wish to test the opinion of the House.

Agriculture Bill

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Committee stage & Committee: 6th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 6th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 23rd July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I shall speak briefly. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, and my noble friend Lord Hain for raising these issues. The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, has made an interesting point about extending the levy, but I would like far more detail about the economic and perhaps unforeseen animal welfare consequences of broadening the levy via some kind of impact assessment. I would also like to see the proposal underscored by a commitment to consult on the proposals in advance.

We have touched on the benefits of diets based more on plants and less on meat on several occasions. I believe that measures like this should be introduced as part of a wider national food strategy, rather than in isolation. To the noble Viscount, Lord, Trenchard, I say that there are plenty of sources of vegetable protein; we do not have to rely on eating meat.

My noble friend Lord Hain is right to raise the issue of the repatriation of levies raised to the point of slaughter, rather than where the animals were raised. This is particularly concerning in the case of Welsh lamb, as he very eloquently pointed out, and it will become more of an issue as smaller slaughterhouses close down and animals are forced to travel greater distances for slaughter. This point was made well by my noble friend Lord Blunkett.

It has been good to have this short debate. A number of useful issues were raised, but if we are serious about it, a great deal more work would need to be done. In the meantime, I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, for Amendments 211, 213, 214 and 216. Perhaps I could tell her at the outset that we have the red meat levy; it was established in 1967 under the Agriculture Act.

The term “red meat”, or “cig coch”, is written into Welsh legislation to describe the cattle, sheep and pig industries and has been used regarding the levy for those sectors for many years. Changing the name of the red meat levy in the Bill would necessitate amendments to related legislation across the UK and risk confusion and complications with the existing provisions. A further levy extending to all meats and carcasses of animals slaughtered in the UK would probably require a new levy body to be established, or the scope of the existing levy bodies to be broadened, to cover the additional species, such as goats and deer, that do not fall within the remit of the existing levy bodies. Consultation to determine the need for, and the benefit of, such a levy would also be required. This is set out in the Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act 2006. More importantly, agriculture is a devolved matter, as are these industry levies. It would therefore be for the devolved Administrations to choose to take forward their own regulations in this area, should they wish to do so.

Turning to Amendment 215, plant-based food production already benefits significantly from the UK levy system. The Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board collects levies that are used to fund activities in this area, valued at approximately £27 million. Legislation providing for our levy bodies clearly sets out the collection of these levies and that they are to be spent to benefit the industry from which they are collected.

My noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering also asked some questions about how they are collected, and I should say that the red meat levy collected in one country can be spent only to benefit the contributing industry in that country. For example, any pig levy that is collected in England must be spent to the benefit of the pigmeat industry in England. Currently, levy cannot be spent for the sole benefit of producers in another jurisdiction.

Clause 33 addresses an acknowledged unfairness in the GB red-meat levy system that has existed for a number of years. It is not intended to change the way these levies are collected or spent. The Government wish simply to right the wrong that has been identified in the red-meat levy system. My noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering also asked when we would have the government response to the AHDB consultation. The government response to the request for views on this was published in April 2020.

Turning to Amendment 212, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Hain, Clause 33 was introduced to provide for a scheme that allows for the redistribution of red-meat levy between the levy bodies of Great Britain. It will provide a fair approach to resolving an inequity that has been acknowledged by the Governments of these Administrations for several years. The provision in this amendment is based purely on the origin of the animal, rather than where it has gained economic value. It will allow for the repatriation of levy to the devolved Administrations themselves, whereas the scheme established using the provisions in Clause 33 would allow for the redistribution of levy between levy bodies in the three Administrations. By widening the provision of the scheme from that of Great Britain to that of the United Kingdom, the amendment extends the repatriation of red-meat levy to Northern Ireland. However, the scheme is to be made jointly by Ministers of England, Scotland and Wales, and is not needed by Northern Ireland.

In addition, the repatriation of levy is restricted by this amendment to the devolved Administrations. This could create a disparity between the devolved Administrations and England, as the devolved Administrations will be allowed to repatriate levy dependent upon origin, but England will not.

The noble Lords, Lord Blunkett and Lord Wigley, also brought up the question of small abattoirs, and the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, made the point that slaughtering animals close to the point of production is an important consideration in animal welfare. I am delighted to say, since they may not have heard my earlier response to this issue, that they are included in Clause 1(5) of the Bill, which provides for small abattoirs, under “preparing” and “processing”.

With this reassurance, I ask that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, withdraw her amendment.

Agriculture Bill

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Committee stage & Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 21st July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch]

My Lords, I will also speak briefly. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, for raising this issue. I had not considered it before so I am grateful to him for drawing our attention to it. I agree that we need provisions in force in the special circumstances of the use of common land; he made a very good case for the need for a multilateral approach to it. On that basis, I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist]

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Greaves for his amendment. He is absolutely right: our commons frequently provide some of the richest opportunities for the provision of environmental public goods and they are an important part of our cultural landscape. The Government are designing future financial assistance schemes to be accessible to as many farmers and land managers as possible. This includes tenant farmers and those who work on common land.

As part of the planned three-year pilot for ELM, the Government will be ensuring that it tests how best to enable commoners to participate and to provide those environmental benefits. To support the development of ELM, we are undertaking a number of tests and trials, working with farmers and land managers to co-design the new schemes. They will help us understand how the scheme could work in a real-life environment. Two of our tests and trials, on Dartmoor and in Cumbria, are looking at issues concerning common land.

The noble Lord, Lord Greaves was correct to identify the particular difficulties that can arise when administering payment schemes on common land. The general powers given by the Bill in Clause 1(1) and (2) will enable us to develop agreement terms which work for common land. I can add a bit more detail. The Federation of Cumbria Commoners, and partners, aims to develop and trial a delivery model for creating common-specific land management plans. These plans will support the pastoral economy and maintain the balance of the delicate ecosystems found on commons. The delivery model will encompass a commons toolkit, including baseline data gathering, producing maps, health checks for agreeing and enabling public good delivery, developing commons management plans and commons-proof recommendations for ELM.

If I can add any more detail to that brief answer, I will write to the noble Lord and put a copy in the Library. With that, I ask him to withdraw the amendment.

Agriculture Bill

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Committee stage & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 14th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I declare an interest through my involvement with the Rothamsted agricultural research institute. We have covered a wide range of issues in this group and I thank all noble Lords who contributed to the debate last week and again today. The amendments explore in more detail what we will need to deliver environmentally sustainable agriculture. We have had reference to nature-friendly farming, to agroecological systems, to agroforestry, to organically and ecologically sustainable systems, to the improved nutrient content of crops, to integrated pest management and to the importance of soil health. I agree with all those concepts, but also with my noble friend Lady Quin that we need to be clear about the definitions of these phrases when we use them.

All these systems have detailed research behind them, which reinforces the evidence that harnessing nature can improve farm outcomes, as well as enhancing the environment. Many noble Lords will have seen at first hand the positive impact on farmland productivity that can occur when these techniques are embraced. At the same time, we know that nature-based measures to reduce emissions can make a substantial contribution to tackling climate change while preserving or restoring habitats. We agree that natural ecological processes and agroforestry techniques should lie at the heart of the Bill. When adopted on a whole-farm approach, they will reduce the use of agrochemicals, encourage biodiversity, improve soil health, recycle nutrients, energy and waste and generally create more diverse, resilient and productive agroecosystems.

Last year, the RSA Food, Farming and Countryside Commission report set out the case for bringing agroecology systems out of the shadows and into the mainstream of farming practice. It argued that farmers need to be helped to make that transition and recommended a 10-year programme to provide more research, training and capital grants to make this a reality. This would be an excellent use of the financial assistance in the Bill.

I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, who talked about the need for a long-term programme of soil monitoring. We face a fundamental eradication of soil fertility that will be difficult to reverse. Our APPG on science in agriculture had an excellent evidence session last year on the numerous research projects taking place on this issue, but what we really need is to bring the evidence together in one place. While I am on the subject, will the Minister update us on the work of the Sustainable Soils Alliance, launched by Michael Gove, that was meant to do just that?

The noble Duke, the Duke of Wellington, specifically mentioned the transition to organic farming. I agree that this also has an important role to play. Organic farms have 50% more wildlife than conventionally farmed land and healthier soils, with a 44% higher capacity to store long-term soil carbon. Clearly, if the soil is more fertile, it increases productivity, so organic farming can make a real difference to biodiversity while sustaining food production.

The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, and others talked about agroforestry. We agree that this system of planting has huge benefits over traditional forestry techniques. We know that the pressure is on to plant more trees. The Committee on Climate Change has set a target of between 30,000 and 50,000 hectares of new planting a year, but so far the Government have fallen well short of that target. It is important that trees are planted in a way that is sympathetic to the countryside and to the environment, rather than the monoculture plantations we have seen in the past. Agroforestry supplies the answer to this. Mixed plantings of trees and shrubs grown around crops can reduce erosion, increase biodiversity and create complex habitats, so we very much hope that financial assistance will be available to help farmers to create this mixed planting economy.

Finally, the amendments in the name of noble Baronesses, Lady Bennett and Lady Finlay, highlight the need to reduce the use of herbicides and pesticides. The noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, in particular, highlighted the potentially damaging impacts of pesticides on health, and recommended looking at the evidence and producing an annual report. These views were echoed powerfully by the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, and the very moving examples he gave. The noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, also rightly raised the need to avoid contaminated products being imported into this country. We agree with these objectives and have our own amendments, Amendment 226 on pesticides and Amendment 173 calling for a national food plan that addresses the problem of pesticide residues. I hope that the debates on these amendments will enable us to set out our position in more detail.

This has been a good discussion and I hope the Minister has heard the collective call for a funding priority for nature-based ecological farming. I am sure we will start to narrow down our priorities in this regard as we continue to consider the Bill, but in the meantime I look forward to her response.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

I thank my noble friend Lord Lucas for his Amendments 29 and 217, with which I will also discuss Amendment 224 in the name of my noble friend Lord Caithness. Soil is indeed one of our greatest natural assets and the Government are committed to having sustainably managed soils by 2030, as set out in the 25-year environment plan. Providing financial incentives for protecting and improving the quality of soil will help to protect and improve all the properties that contribute to healthy soil. The 25-year environment plan sets out the Government’s ambition to have sustainably managed soils by 2030. A healthy soils indicator is being developed as part of a framework of indicators under the plan.

My noble friend Lord Caithness asked about spending commitments in the plan. This spend has been allocated to developing a robust and informative soil health indicator and monitoring scheme, and the Government are currently in the process of confirming actions for their work programme to protect and improve soil quality. The Government will develop a definition of soil health with stakeholders. To ensure that it captures the complete picture of soil health, this definition will be a balance of biological, chemical and physical characteristics, and could therefore include characteristics that help define the biodiverse nature of the soil, such as earthworms and fungi, as mentioned by my noble friend Lord Lucas.

To help achieve this target, the Government are considering the development of a soil monitoring scheme informed by natural capital approaches. As such, this scheme will recognise the relationships between soil properties and the ecosystem services that soil provides, such as clean water and carbon storage. A new soil monitoring scheme would provide a baseline national-scale picture of the state of our soils. This will enable the Government to quantify targets for improvements and then monitor progress towards these targets. These metrics could directly feed into ELM to incentivise better management approaches. Maintaining the metrics of measure across national and localised schemes will enable shared data collection, storage and analysis to further inform impacts of management actions.

There are a number of key vehicles through which the Government are working to address soil quality. These include: this Bill, which will provide financial assistance for the protection and improvement of soils; the Environment Bill, which will allow a future soils target to be set; the 25-year environment plan, through which a soil indicator is being developed; and the new ELM scheme, which could act as a lever for incentivising sustainable soil practices. Protecting and improving our soils will involve a wide variety of actions, reflecting the wide diversity in soil quality, soil types and land uses in England. This would include actions to protect our best grade 1 and 2 lands as well as actions to improve the poorer-quality grade land—in the words of the father of the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, farming within the grain of nature, cropping not quarrying.

Fisheries Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Committee stage & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 11th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch]

My Lords, I will speak very briefly. I am grateful to the noble Lords, Lord Teverson and Lord Randall, for proposing these amendments.

As the noble Lord said, Amendment 123 seeks a consultation exercise on how fisheries regulation activities can be rationalised or better shared. The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, made a very good case for better co-ordination, particularly between the IFCAs and the MMO. Again, we all acknowledge his considerable experience in this regard. We would hope that this is something that the department is doing anyway, particularly as part of the repatriation of policy from the EU. However, I agree very much with the noble Lord that there is further work to be done on this and that this information should be made available to Parliament for further consideration and debate. Therefore, it would be helpful to have this as a requirement in the Bill.

The noble Lord, Lord Randall, has made a very simple proposal about changing the Short Title of the Bill to “Fisheries and Marine Conservation Bill”. It is a simple idea, but we very much support the amendment. It encapsulates many of the preceding debates we have had. It is clear that we do not want to put an artificial divide, with marine conservation being dealt with in the Environment Bill rather than as part of the Fisheries Bill, as we think it should be. This is important and it is a central principle here. As the noble Lord, Lord Randall, made clear, this Bill is not just about the industry; the decisions we are making have all sorts of wider ramifications and knock-on effects.

We have so much more to do in delivering the rollout of the blue belt of marine conservation areas. The amendment underlines the importance of marine planning in the conservation of our fishing stocks. As the noble Lord said, changing the title of the Bill would send an important message in this regard, so we share the hope that the Minister will see that this simple and helpful suggestion is something that the Government could support. Therefore, we add our support to the noble Lord’s suggestion.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist]

My Lords, I am grateful for Amendment 123, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Teverson. I welcome the opportunity to set out the arrangements already in place for ensuring such co-ordination, because I believe the Bill supports the aims of the noble Lord’s amendment. I will address the amendment as two parts.

First, the Maritime and Coastguard Agency and the Marine Management Organisation have distinct and separate regulatory functions. The MCA is responsible for providing a 24-hour maritime search and rescue service around the UK coast, as well as producing legislation and guidance on maritime matters, and certification for seafarers. The MCA is sponsored by the Department for Transport, as its responsibilities relate to vessels and infrastructure. By contrast, the MMO licenses, regulates and plans marine activities in the seas around England to ensure they are carried out in a sustainable way.

Notwithstanding this distinction, there are areas of shared interest where these organisations already co-ordinate and work jointly to achieve their regulatory purpose effectively. This includes the operation of aerial assets for monitoring and surveillance, the collocation of personnel in the Joint Maritime Operations Coordination Centre, and intelligence sharing. Opportunities for further collaboration and efficiencies are still being identified.

Fisheries Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Committee stage & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 4th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch]

My Lords, we have a relatively simple amendment, Amendment 74, in this group. The Bill requires the fisheries policy authorities to produce periodically a report on the extent to which their policies as set out in the joint fisheries statement have been implemented. Where there is an omission, the Secretary of State is required to intervene.

The amendment would require the Secretary of State, if required to produce a report on the policies omitted from the joint fisheries statement, to consult not only the devolved Administrations but a wider group of representative bodies on the content of the report. It is a straightforward amendment which seeks to fill a gap in the consultation provisions made elsewhere in the Bill. The provision in Schedule 1 does not spell this out in sufficient detail.

On an earlier amendment, the Minister read out a list of representative bodies which the department regularly consults, which of course is welcome, and described it as an “expert advisory group”. However, that is different from a statutory requirement to consult at various stages of policy production and review. I hope that the Minister will concede that our amendment would fill a gap in the consultation proposals. Like the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, I hope that she does not just bat it away.

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, for his amendments. As he said, we need mechanisms to address what happens when things go wrong, and he made a good stab at doing that. He made the useful proposal that an independent review could be sought when conflicts over policies and their application arose. I hope that the Minister agrees that those proposals have some merit. The noble Lord’s other amendments touch on the extent to which representatives of the UK fishing fleet should be consulted. Again, that is important. We agree with the proposal but, as in our amendment, would want any consultation extended to a wider group of stakeholders.

The amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, relate to the timescale for the review of joint fisheries statements. He proposed a more meaningful review period of five years rather than six. We agree that there is little logic in the six-year timescale. Given that it is assumed that international negotiations will continue to take place annually, it seems far more practical to review and update the joint fisheries statements in a more timely way in line with changes taking place scientifically and the negotiations with the international community. As he said, five years is consistent also with the parliamentary cycle, so there seems to be not much logic for six and a whole lot more logic for five. I hope that the Minister is able to take that on board.

The noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, seeks via his amendments to build more flexibility into the production of joint fisheries statements. He may have a point, although I doubt that there would be many occasions where there would not be some need for a review every five or—if necessary—six years.

At the heart of these amendments is a need for proper statutory consultation, meaningful timeframes, the best advice and flexibility. I hope that the Minister will see the sense in the proposals and perhaps take some on board.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist]

My Lords, I congratulate your Lordships on getting through a daunting-looking group of amendments in record time. Your points have been made well and succinctly.

Any Secretary of State fisheries statement, or SSFS, would cover only reserved and UK quota matters and would be published only if such matters were not covered in the joint fisheries statement. It is our intention that the joint fisheries statement will be the vehicle which sets out the fisheries administrations’ future fisheries management policies, respecting the devolved nature of fisheries but recognising the benefits of a joined-up approach.

My noble friend Lord Lansley’s Amendment 36 relates to a process to resolve disagreements through an independent review. While I appreciate the sentiment behind making provision for disagreements over policy between fisheries policy authorities to be dealt with amicably, it is unclear exactly how he is interpreting the expression

“a statement under this Act”.

Sadly, I am advised that the amendment would create legal uncertainty.

In respecting the devolution settlements, the provision for a JFS allows for the fisheries policy authorities to set out individual policies alongside those agreed jointly. This means that an authority could publish its own policies if they would contravene its wider policies as part of the statement. Therefore, given that the statement requires administrations to set out their policies, it is hard to envisage how they could then claim that the statement was incompatible with those very policies. If the amendment related to the SSFS, the Bill is clear that this can contain only reserved or UK quota matters, so it would be inappropriate for other fisheries authorities to be able to block a decision by the UK Government in this case. The amendment also seems to allow for a review to be invoked at any time after a SSFS or JFS is finalised, potentially leading to uncertainty around the state of those documents after they are in force.

The review process could also cause problems for the fisheries policy authorities in complying with what the Bill sets out as their legal duty to produce a joint fisheries statement, because it would appear to undermine the statutory framework for co-operation that we are seeking to build, by consent, with the devolved Administrations. I appreciate the concerns that my noble friend seeks to address through the amendment, but perhaps I can provide further reassurance to him by saying that other, non-legislative elements of the framework will be set out in a memorandum of understanding which is being developed with the devolved Administrations. This will enshrine co-operative ways of working and a mechanism for escalating and resolving disputes, were they to arise. Existing governance structures and agreements such as the overarching MOU on devolution between UKG and the devolved authorities, which sets out the JMC process for managing intergovernmental disputes, will also continue to apply.

Fisheries Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Committee stage & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard - continued) & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Wednesday 4th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Teverson]

My Lords, this is a really important issue and one that we need to clarify. I am sure that there are international obligations to do this, but I would be very interested to hear what they are. The noble Baroness raises some really important points about the fact that at sea, things can get difficult and emotional. We saw the incidents in the Baie de Seine last year or the year before, so we have to be very clear and careful about some of these things.

One thing I want to point out, which the Minister will be completely aware of, is that we sometimes envision an EEZ where foreign vessels have to stay on one side and British ones on the other; but under international convention, as long as they are steaming and not fishing, they are absolutely allowed to go through international waters. It is important to remember in this debate that it is not all about keeping foreign fishing vessels out of the UK EEZ; they are perfectly entitled to be there, not necessarily in territorial waters but between 12 miles and the median line, or 200 nautical miles. They are entirely allowed to steam through there as long as they do not fish, and we should remind people of that.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness for her amendment. This again touches on an issue that I am sure we can all agree is of great importance. The Merchant Shipping Act 1995 has special provisions for assisting vessels in distress. These provisions allow for any UK or foreign vessel that is wrecked, stranded or in distress at any place on or near the coast of the United Kingdom or any tidal water within UK waters to receive any assistance required. In addition, Articles 17 and 18 of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea allow for the right of innocent passage, which applies to all ships of all states, to territorial seas——between 0 and 12 nautical miles—and to the exclusive economic zone, which is between 12 and 200 nautical miles, or the median line. Passage in this instance means navigation through the territorial sea, anchoring or stopping in territorial waters in cases of force majeure or distress or for the purpose of rendering assistance to persons, ships or aircraft in danger or distress.

For example, in poor weather, foreign vessels can stop fishing and shelter behind a headland to escape the worst of the wind and waves. According to the MMO, it is a common occurrence, especially in east and south-western areas and in Northern Ireland waters, to allow vessels safe navigation and passage. Through this existing legislation, we have a duty to provide shelter in our waters and in our ports so that vessels may deal with injuries, replenish their provisions and refuel; and also to allow them safe transit through our waters to reach more distant fishing grounds. Therefore, foreign vessels that need to access UK waters to get to their fishing grounds, or where there is a concern over danger to life or property, will continue to be able to do so. Any further exceptions will be agreed in international arrangements or set out in vessel licence conditions. This is already provided for in Clause 12(1).

I thank the noble Baroness for her explanation, but I regret that the second part of the amendment, which allows the Secretary of State to prescribe other reasons by regulation, is rather broad and potentially could be a catch-all. Additionally, as drafted, the breadth and ambiguity could cause challenges within the devolution settlements, depending on how broadly or narrowly the reasons were interpreted. I believe that the matter that this amendment relates to is covered in legislation already. With this explanation, I hope the noble Baroness will feel able to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch]

I thank the Minister for that. It is useful to have all that restated. My only other point is that things will change with the new licensing arrangement. The last thing we want is for foreign vessel owners to put their own interpretation on how this will work, so the more we restate it and communicate it very clearly to all concerned, the less scope there will be for other people to try to misinterpret it. I do not wish to pursue this any further. I thank the Minister and I therefore beg to withdraw my amendment.