Environment: Rio+20 Conference

Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead Excerpts

Thursday 14th June 2012 Lords Chamber

Asked By

[Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they intend to promote the inclusion in the outcome document of the Rio+20 conference of a commitment to the right to safe and clean drinking water and sanitation as a human right.

[Lord De Mauley]

My Lords, the UK has long recognised the right to water as an element of the right of everyone to an adequate standard of living and is now in a position to support the inclusion of commitments to the right both to safe and clean drinking water and to sanitation as a human right in the Rio+20 outcome document.

[Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead]

I thank the Minister for his response to my Question. The focus from the Government is very much on water and there is little concentration on the importance of sanitation, but it is indispensible to public health and vital for human development. Does the Minister recognise that the lack of sanitation is a major cause of diarrhoeal disease, which is the second biggest killer of the world’s children? Against this background, will he tell me when the Government will conclude their exceedingly long review, join the majority of OECD countries, really acknowledge that sanitation is a human right and, at last, ratify the UN right to sanitation?

[Lord De Mauley]

My Lords, I thought that that was what I had just said. The right to sanitation is not specifically provided for under any of the international human rights treaties. The UK has therefore waited until it was satisfied that there was sufficient basis in international law to recognise the right without undermining the international human rights framework. While placing a high priority on improving sanitation in development terms, the UK has, I think understandably, been cautious about recognising new rights under international law—as, presumably, were the previous Government, who, while recognising the right to water in 2006, did not recognise the right to sanitation.