Environment Bill

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Duke of Montrose

Report stage
Wednesday 15th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Duke of Montrose (Con)]

My Lords, I follow on from the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter. Both the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone, and my noble friend Lord Caithness mentioned the enthusiasm of the devolved Administrations for this type of approach. It would be hard to find anything more enthusiastic than the way the Scottish Government have approached it. The noble Baroness, Lady Young, must have experienced this with the various organisations she has dealt with across the border. I have no doubt that my noble friend the Minister has looked at some of these other countries. In fact, in spite of all the things the noble Baroness, Lady Young, has incorporated in her amendment, the Scottish Government have gone way further than that. We need to think about how far we want to go in this type of organisation.

My noble friend Lord Carrington mentioned the drawbacks that could occur. The Scottish land use strategy has been in place since 2016. There are a whole raft of policies—a natural resource management policy to tabulate stocks of ecosystem services and use an ecosystem approach. Land-based businesses, including the Crown Estate, have trialled the natural capital protocol. They had a statement on the land use strategy, then found they needed to incorporate a national marine plan as well as a national planning framework. It overlaps into forestry as well.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I am speaking in favour of Amendment 117 in the name of my noble friend Lady Young of Old Scone. I feel she made a very good case for an overarching land use framework to address the acute shortage of land we know we have in the UK and the competing pressures on it. This has been a developing theme that she has very much championed throughout the passage of this Bill and the Agriculture Act before it.

Whether it is setting aside land for habitat renewal and biodiversity, identifying land for planting trees to help with carbon sequestration, providing better public access to green spaces or becoming more self-sufficient in food, all these issues have to compete with the need for more housing, hospitals and schools, and it all needs to happen on the same scarce and expensive pieces of land. As my noble friend says, it has become an impossible jigsaw.

As we pile on the pressure for more and more uses for the land, there is still no accepted understanding of what the priorities are and how all those needs can be addressed. We are virtually operating on a first come, first served basis: those who already own the land decide its future, regardless of the pressures stacking up for other, maybe more pressing, needs.

Which land should be used for growing food and which for nature recovery? We never really resolved that during consideration of the Agriculture Act. Where are the millions of trees in the tree action plan going to be planted? How can we maximise our land use to mitigate the impact of climate change and contribute to net zero? What will be the impact of the new planning laws on our desire for biodiversity net gain? Are we in danger of locking up land through conservation covenants before we have decided on its ideal use? These are all urgent questions that need to be addressed, and we believe the creation of a land use framework is an excellent way to address them.

However, I am very pleased that, since the earlier debate, my noble friend has received considerable support for her proposal for a Lords special ad hoc inquiry into this issue; I was very pleased to add my name in support. I believe this would be an excellent step forward. Undeniably, as noble Lords have said, this issue is hugely complex and not easily captured in an amendment to a Bill. Whatever the outcome of her bid, I hope she will keep raising this issue, in the planning Bill and beyond, until we can reach a settled view about how to prioritise our land use for the future. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Protection of Vulnerable Groups (Scotland) Act 2007 (Consequential Modifications) Order 2011

Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Duke of Montrose

Tuesday 25th January 2011 Grand Committee

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch]

I thank the Minister for his kind wishes and look forward very much to working with him constructively in the future. I thank him, too, for his explanation of the technical nature of the order and the purpose behind it.

The order builds on the important legislation introduced by the previous Government across the UK in response to the Bichard inquiry, which followed the tragic murders in Soham in 2002. As we heard, the Protection of Vulnerable Groups (Scotland) Act 2007 was Scotland’s response to the recommendation for a registration scheme for those working with children and vulnerable adults. We fully support this consequential order and the intentions behind it. Again, I understand that the Minister has underlined its technical nature and that some of the changes and information we request might be more pertinently directed to the Home Secretary when further announcements are made after the review.

In advance of that, I have two questions that the Minister may be able to answer today. First, given the enormous sensitivity of the information contained in the children’s and adults’ barred list, what steps are in place to guarantee the confidentiality of the information provided by the Independent Safeguarding Authority and Disclosure Scotland to Scottish Ministers? Secondly, how is it proposed to store the information? I am sure the Minister will be aware of the stories that blight all Governments about such sensitive information going astray. I would be grateful if he would confirm that proper protection is in place for the storage of that information.

Secondly, the regulatory impact assessment refers to the need for a post-implementation review to measure the time taken to process applications. As the Minister will know, this has been an ongoing source of frustration, particularly for those applying for jobs working with children. It is also potentially frustrating for volunteers who find that their attempts to help out with fairly simple tasks in schools and youth clubs are put on hold while their applications are processed. It may be that the Home Secretary can comment on this, but in advance of that, can the Minister say whether there is anything in the order that might lead to further delays in processing these applications?

[The Duke of Montrose]

Can I ask my noble friend a couple of points on these measures? First, he explained in some detail how the order will allow Disclosure Scotland to obtain information from the Independent Safeguarding Authority in England. Is mirror legislation already in place to allow the ISA to obtain information from Disclosure Scotland? He said that it would be, but I do not know whether it is already. Secondly, is there any way of distributing the costs of obtaining this information between the different devolved authorities? It is an advantage that each authority has access to the other’s material, but there is a danger that it could be interpreted that there should be a monthly update and they would swap the latest information. In that way, each would have an up-to-date database, but again there is the question of security, which has also been raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones.