Water Bill

Debate between Baroness McIntosh of Pickering and Sheryll Murray

Monday 6th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Miss McIntosh]

Indeed, that is a different argument.

I shall give our reasons for new clause 4 in a moment. Abstraction reform forms the basis of new clause 5, in which we would return to what was in the White Paper, where the Government waxed lyrical on abstraction regimes. We particularly call for the abstraction regime to be introduced no later than the end of the period of seven years beginning on the date on which the Bill is passed and comes into legal effect.

Amendments 2 and 3 would insert into clause 21 the relevant language of “undertakers” and “highways authorities”. I am attracted to amendment 1, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood (Mr Spencer), and look forward to his speaking to it in due course. Amendments 5, 6, 7 and 8 would include small businesses in the flood reinsurance scheme, for reasons that I shall give in a moment.

[Sheryll Murray (South East Cornwall) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the Flood Re clauses will help the people whom the Minister and I met in Looe last Saturday who were unable to get insurance because of repeated flooding? Flood Re will give them the opportunity to obtain realistically priced insurance.

[Miss McIntosh]

Our thoughts are obviously with my hon. Friend’s constituents who were sadly inundated during the recent flooding. I look forward to hearing further from her during the debate, as well as the Minister’s response.

Amendments 10 and 11 are consequential amendments to clause 80 arising from new clauses 4 and 5.

Before I explain why the amendments and new clauses are important, I should point out that we have seen three types of flooding in the past three or four months. The most recent examples have been of coastal flooding, but the Yorkshire and East Anglia coasts suffered tidal surges before Christmas to devastating effect; more than 80 houses were evacuated at Filey in my constituency and a number more in Whitby. However, we have become more accustomed to surface water and river flooding, and surface water flooding has been on the increase, and has become more of a problem, since 2007.

I want to hear from the Minister why SUDS have been delayed. The latest we heard was that there was an implementation date of April 2014. People have been trying to convince me that Brawby in my constituency suffered in 2013 not from flooding but due to surface water running off from fields and roads into the combined sewerage pipe, which then spilled water from the sewerage system back on to the road. In that case, the water did not go into anyone’s house, but at Castlegate in Malton when exactly the same thing happened—water ran off the road into the combined sewers—water then entered a house.

The missing link is an audit of existing SUDS and an examination of future SUDS when major developments and roads are built. However, from my experience, and given what we heard during the statement on the floods, there is a further problem to deal with. If water runs off a highway, it is the responsibility of the county council, the unitary council or the Highways Agency itself. However, if that water then runs into the combined pipes, it suddenly becomes the water company’s problem, although what has happened is not its fault. I hope that that unacceptable situation can be addressed through the measures that I and other members of the EFRA Committee have tabled, or through amendment 1, which was tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood. If fields are saturated, as is the case at present—it was the situation in my constituency between September 2012 and March 2013—highways authorities must take responsibility and create a SUD to take the excess water. I accept that such a process would involve cost, but I applaud the Government’s approach on partnership funding, so we could look to public sector partners, or be more imaginative by looking for private sector partners, such as local businesses that might be interested in investing. However, we cannot allow a situation to continue in which surface water running off a road becomes the responsibility of a water company and thus forces it to take preventive measures, given that the highways authority—whichever one it might be—should accept responsibility for it.

The EFRA Committee’s report following our pre-legislative scrutiny of the draft Bill highlighted concern about the delayed implementation of the provisions on sustainable drainage systems in the Flood and Water Management Act 2010—it is now four years since that Act was passed. The Committee also criticised a lack of urgency on improving the management of surface water in its report on the water White Paper, so I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will be able to clarify what has been happening and why the process seems to be so complicated. As the Committee has not been convinced that the Department’s work to improve the management of surface water has involved the urgency that constituents throughout the country would expect, new clause 4 would require the Government to implement the relevant provisions of the 2010 Act within a month of the Bill being passed.

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[Miss McIntosh]

I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s intervention, but I believe that homes generally are covered. Our Government have persisted with his Government’s arbitrary choice of 2009 as the relevant year, although this is a new Bill and we have a still relatively new coalition Government. I was very taken by what the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley) said in a previous debate about 2009 having been plucked from the air as an arbitrary date, and many people will not realise that homes built after 2009 on a floodplain are simply not covered by insurance. One of the purposes of tonight’s debate is to entice the Government to seek a different year—it could be 2013 or 2015, but let us be imaginative.

[Sheryll Murray]

Will my hon. Friend clarify the difference between an insurance policy that covers a business premises and one that covers a private home? Insurers, and the Association of British Insurers, would probably find it difficult to distinguish if we were to include small businesses, but because her amendment is well intentioned, I am sure that she will be able to clarify her differentiation.

[Miss McIntosh]

I am sure that the Minister will be well aware of the point that my hon. Friend is trying to make. There is great concern among the farming community that farms may be excluded whereas the farm house may be included. I commend my hon. Friend’s knowledge, because she worked in the insurance industry for a time. We need to know whether farms and people working from their own homes are going to be included, and what the position will be for small businesses, because this could put them out of business in some of the areas that we have seen flooded over the past two years in repeat flooding incidents. It has also been brought to my attention, although, unfortunately, too late to have tabled an amendment, that there is concern that blocks of flats—leasehold flats—may be excluded from this arrangement. That may be news to the Minister as well, but before Third Reading he might like to ponder whether such blocks will be excluded.

Our amendments to clause 51 address concerns relating to the exclusion of small companies such as charities and, as I have mentioned, farms under the new Flood Re proposals in the Bill. Any business based in a property that is primarily a residential one, and on which the occupier therefore pays council tax, would fall within the Flood Re scheme. Any business based in premises used primarily for business will not be covered. It is extremely important that we understand these issues. For the first time that I can remember, under the Flood Re scheme, once it is up and running, the Government will be added as an insurer of last resort if in the three years before the fund has built up we suffer an exceptional one-in-a-thousand-year incident.

In the Public Bill Committee, the ABI stated that Flood Re is not the solution for small businesses and that there is not a sufficient evidence basis for providing insurance cover for small businesses. The Federation of Small Businesses is concerned that small businesses that have affordability problems will not be covered, other than in respect of the insurance premiums or excess that they might seek to defray. Although they do not pay council tax, they do pay business rates and therefore could be rated in a similar way to household customers under Flood Re. There remain a lot of known unknowns with Flood Re as to why a council band rate has been chosen and which particular band rate has been opted for, but that is a separate debate. If there is a lack of evidence, further investigations and monitoring should be conducted with regard to small businesses and how they might cope with sourcing flood insurance in the free market.

Our amendments to clause 53 would have the effect of ensuring that insurance companies cover for any liability in excess of a one-in-200-year loss. Our amendments seek greater clarification of the Government’s role in this scenario of a one-in-200-year loss, and, in particular, how the taxpayer would be protected. As I have mentioned, the Government will, for the first time, be the insurer of last resort. In later years, after the fund has built up, I do not believe that that will be a problem, but we are seeking the Minister’s reassurance about what the implications will be in respect of the first three years. In Committee, the Minister confirmed that there is no Government liability for Flood Re and that the Government have made it clear that Flood Re is not guaranteed above the one-in-200-year level, so he might just like to revisit that and clarify the point.

Our amendment 8 would put the Government’s commitment in the Bill and create certainty for all concerned as to who will assume the additional liability. A one-in-200-year loss scenario would be the total value of claims from households reinsured through Flood Re that, during the course of a year, actuaries would not expect to be exceeded in 99.5% of years. Expressed in a different way, that would mean that the actuaries would be 99.5% confident that the limit would not be exceeded in any one year. It is important to note that that is not the same as a one-in-200-year flood event; the ABI has estimated that this would mean flooding six times worse than that experienced in 2007. Obviously, neither the Minister nor the insurance industry will yet be able to say what the cost of the recent floods has been, but I hope that he will see fit to lend his support to our amendments, and I commend them to the House.

Contamination of Beef Products

Debate between Baroness McIntosh of Pickering and Sheryll Murray

Thursday 14th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Miss McIntosh]

Absolutely. As I said, consumers have responded to the challenge by buying more locally, and I hope that they will continue to do so. For example, if we buy meat for a Sunday roast or stew and then freeze what is left over to serve in other ways over the week, we are basically processing the food ourselves, and that will lead to a much better understanding of what we are eating. I entirely take the hon. Lady’s point.

The Committee’s view is that the FSA has been reduced to a food safety body. We believe that its powers were weakened in 2010. It told us that labelling policy was “not really for us” because that is not a food safety issue.

[Sheryll Murray (South East Cornwall) (Con)]

With regard to the EU regulation that would allow certain national derogations, which the Government are consulting on at the moment, does my hon. Friend agree that when responding we should consider very carefully the implications that we have now seen?

[Miss McIntosh]

I am delighted that we do conclude that that approach should be taken, as I will mention in my closing remarks. It was very much the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) who proposed that, and the Committee was absolutely at one with him in that view.

Although policy is rightly the responsibility of Ministers, we are firmly of the view that the FSA’s diminished role has led to a lack of clarity about where responsibility lies, which has weakened the UK’s ability to identify and respond to food health concerns. Furthermore, the current contamination crisis has caught the FSA and the Government flat-footed and unable to respond effectively within structures that were designed primarily to respond to threats to human health. I believe that this is a firm wake-up call. Having had the BSE and foot and mouth crisis, we have perhaps been a little slack in our food inspections. We conclude that the FSA’s testing regime is weak. It was Ireland’s FSA that identified the contamination, using tests not currently used in the UK, which leads us to question whether the UK’s FSA is at the forefront of scientific analysis.

In our conclusions and recommendations, we state that the Government and the FSA have called for a wide range of tests to be undertaken, which we welcome. I am sure that the whole Committee would welcome the European tests that have been announced. I firmly believe that we need a European solution. We need to examine the whole supply chain. In the urgent question earlier today, an hon. Friend said that the miles and the number of countries that these ingredients have travelled through before ending up on our plates in processed and frozen foods is staggering.

The FSA should be responsible for food safety. It should be given the statutory power to require those in the food industry to undertake tests to determine that their products comply with food standards regulations. That process should be risk-based and proportionate, and the results of all tests, whether mandated by the FSA or carried out independently by the retailers themselves, should be reported to the FSA. As regards the European testing that was announced yesterday, we must ask to whom the results will be reported and whether they will be shared across the piece with all the responsible national authorities.

We want strengthened testing regimes in the UK meat industry. We want to know what the Government are doing to improve the operation of the European horse passport system, given that the Minister said earlier that it is not as effective as we would wish. The Government must also explore how best to avoid future contamination and to achieve the correct balance between affordable food prices and regulations to ensure transparency and quality.

In my constituency, we face a deep crisis in the sheep sector. Across the north of England, and I am sure in many other parts of the country, there is a real fear of sheep producers going to the wall. Most farmers have used their winter storage but are unable to allow sheep to forage because the grass is under snow or deep under water. I personally believe that this is a very worrying development. Farm gate prices have gone down and the costs of farm production have gone up. The cost of foodstuffs is going up, the cost of fuel to take animals to market has gone up, and farm gate prices are going down.

We have seen the constant drive by supermarkets to store on their shelves low-value, low-cost, and, we now know, very suspicious adulterated food. We are worried that the consumer will be caught in a Catch-22 situation between paying the costs of higher traceability, labelling and testing standards and having to accept that they will not be provided with comprehensive information about the provenance and composition of the food they eat. There are strong indications that people with criminal intent have intentionally substituted horsemeat for beef. That leads us to conclude that British consumers have been cynically and systematically duped in pursuit of profit by certain elements within the food industry. As my hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Sheryll Murray) and the hon. Member for Brent North said, this is not the time, given the current crisis of labelling and traceability, for the Government to be seeking through their consultation a derogation to reduce the labelling requirements for beef or other meat products,

We are calling for more testing of food safety and composition across the European food industry because the current arrangements for testing and control have failed UK consumers. The Food Standards Agency needs clear powers and responsibilities to back up what Ministers are demanding that it do, and what consumers expect from it, so that it can respond more effectively to any future food adulteration scandal. It gives me great pleasure to commend the Committee’s eighth report to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Common Fisheries Policy

Debate between Baroness McIntosh of Pickering and Sheryll Murray

Thursday 15th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Miss McIntosh]

I am sure that the Minister will be more knowledgeable than I am on matters relating to the high water mark and the 12-mile limit. What I hope we can achieve, in principle, is agreement on each fishery—those in the Baltic sea and the North sea, as well as the Irish fisheries. These are a shared resource, and I hope that they can genuinely be determined by those coastal member states.

[Sheryll Murray (South East Cornwall) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend explain how, under a system of qualified majority voting, and given that the basic regulation contains the principle of equal access to a common resource, she is going to be able to achieve what she wants? A lot of member states, albeit that they have a blocking minority, will oppose her proposals, so how will she get them through the Council of Ministers?

[Miss McIntosh]

Happily for me, I will not be arguing the case, and I hope that today’s debate will convince the Minister. I am pleased that the European Parliament has reached out to the national Parliaments and I hope that ours is the first leading report in that regard. We should amend the regulations—we should not accept them. My hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Sheryll Murray) looks baffled, but it is blindingly obvious that that is where we have gone wrong in the past. We should grasp the bull by its horns and amend the regulations for the duration of the piece, recognising them as a shared resource. That is key.

The television campaign against discards by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall captured the public imagination last year. Discards are deeply unpopular and unsustainable and they are failing to conserve our fish. The conclusion we reached was that we agree there should be a discard ban, but it is very clear that there is no scientific evidence on the survival rates for each species for which the ban is proposed. We believe that we should proceed with caution on the basis of the scientific evidence. Rather than having an end date of 2014 or 2015, we should start gradually. We do not want a discard at sea being substituted by a discard on land, with the fish going to landfill. That would not meet the wishes of the great British public.

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[Miss McIntosh]

I hope that if we can amend the regulations on how we will proceed, the reformed common fisheries policy will go forward. I understand the hon. Gentleman’s sense of urgency and I am sure that my hon. Friend the Minister, who takes part in the annual negotiations, will see this as welcome relief, but it will happen after the regulations are amended.

The Committee was persuaded that there are other means of conserving fish stocks—the tools in the box, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye said. We were hugely impressed by the work on selective gear being done by the Danish fishermen and by the agreement that the Danish and Swedish fishermen and their Governments had reached about fishing in their waters. We believe that that model could be used.

We applaud the work done under successive Governments off the Devon coast to reduce discards. We want to hear more of it and to see such schemes rolled out. As we said in our earlier domestic fisheries report, we believe there is a role for celebrity chefs and supermarkets to persuade the public to eat species that are not widely eaten at the moment. That would also help to conserve fish stocks going forward.

The Commission mandated member states to introduce a system of long-term fishing rights; it is looking to introduce transferable fishing concessions. In our earlier report on domestic fisheries, which we reported to the House on 3 June 2011, we highlighted the problem of slipper skippers and those who trade fishing quotas who are not actively involved in fishing. My local fishermen are absolutely convinced that there are football clubs trading in this way. We have not established that as a fact, but equally no one has denied it, which makes me believe that it is probably happening. May I challenge the Minister on this? We asked for a register to be introduced and I would like him to report where we are with that when he sums up. Local fishermen in Filey and across the Yorkshire area would warmly welcome that.

[Sheryll Murray]

Did my hon. Friend establish that a fishing quota can be attached only to a vessel that is held by a fish producer organisation? So either a dummy vessel that has been invented in a producer organisation or a real vessel has to be owned by a football club before a quota can be attached to it.

[Miss McIntosh]

We have not always established whether football clubs or others are involved, but my hon. Friend raises a very telling point. We believe that transferable fishing concessions would make the situation worse and would not necessarily reduce over-capacity. What we propose is a siphon mechanism to reallocate fishing rights away from potential slipper skippers. I hope this addresses her point. Under our proposal, if an operator chooses to lease his fishing rights, a percentage of that allocation would be returned to the national envelope. That could then be reallocated to active fishermen so as to maintain traditional fishing activities in coastal communities. We urge the Minister to recognise the role of active fishermen, who are the lifeblood of coastal communities such as those in Filey, Hastings and elsewhere. We also emphasise the need to protect small-scale fishermen, such as those in our under-10 metre fleets, by keeping them outside any market-based system of fishing rights.