Infrastructure Bill [HL]

Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer Excerpts

Wednesday 18th June 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer (LD)]

My Lords, the Bill offers lots of opportunities and I certainly look forward to hearing more about them. Due to the slightly fragile nature of my voice today, I will cut my points short. However, what I would like my noble friend the Minister to consider concerns the proposed new road company. The Bill suggests that existing environmental duties would apply to the new company. However, we have learnt that whenever there is a major new road scheme, the real difficulty comes when it is faced with environmental issues. The Bill offers us an opportunity to do more than simply apply the existing environmental duties to the new company. We could be requiring the new company to apply much more sophisticated new measures, such as whether or not a new road scheme would dramatically reduce total carbon emissions. This is now as important as whether there is a colony of great crested newts in the road’s path.

I am sure that your Lordships would not expect me to make a case for lesser environmental protection, and I am certainly not doing so. It is a tragedy when a road drives through an ancient woodland or SSSI. However, we must now balance all sorts of things in a much more sophisticated way. Just transferring existing duties is insufficient. I note the interesting suggestion of the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, about our view of such a road and whether it would incorporate, for example, a cycle path. That is an opportunity that is offered and might add further environmental pluses and carbon reductions. I would be disappointed if we simply transferred duties without using what we now know about carbon emission measurements, for example, to further the balance when we come to look at these things—my noble friend used the word “balance” in the context of housing, but I use it here.

On Part 2, the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, asked “What species?”. My question is simply: what is “non-native”? I know that some of the NGOs are concerned that things that have been non-native for a long time, like the great bustard, the giant crane and even beavers and all sorts of things that fly and swim, could be caught by this. I do not suppose that anyone is going to say that they are invasive, but defining “non-native” more rigorously would be useful. Otherwise, we could be setting the status quo in law as a one-way system for biodiversity loss: if an animal, insect or any living creature ceases to appear in the wild, it ceases to be native.

Of course, I imagine that Part 2 applies mainly to plants, because that is where we have mainly seen the problem. I praise the Government for tackling the issue of landowners who will not allow measures to be taken on their land; that is positive. I simply echo the comments on ballast water of the noble Lord, Lord Cameron. Ballast water can import all sorts of things that you would not want to see, including things that damage our very infrastructure, such as our sewerage outlets and drainage systems. It is not so severe in this country, but in some parts of the world various crustaceans have really wrecked the water infrastructure of various cities.

My final point in this short contribution is about how much I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington, on affordable housing. I join him in hoping that nothing in the Bill will in any way jeopardise the ability of rural communities and local authorities in rural areas to make an affordable housing requirement.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Kramer]

My Lords, this evening really has been a testament to the range of knowledge in this House. I thank all noble Lords, but give a special note of thanks to two who have not spoken in the debate, my noble friends Lady Verma and Lady Stowell, who are supporting me in taking the Bill through the House and whose support, both moral and in terms of knowledge, is frankly invaluable. I will try to respond to as many questions as I can, but there have been so many that I already know that failure is stamped upon me, and I will follow up in writing where I am unable to cover issues here on the Floor.

The noble Lord, Lord Adonis, opened the debate. I think he was grudgingly supportive of the Bill, but I have to say that some of his comments seemed to ignore the fact that he was part of a Government for 13 years who invested very little in infrastructure. To talk about lack of investment in new power generation, suddenly having found the light when the coalition Government are in place and seen the need for investment, was a little strange, I thought. I will not reiterate the very extensive investments that the coalition Government are making but, as I said earlier, there has been £100 billion for roads, railways, building affordable homes and boosting the internet, as well as a lot of private money going into areas such as power generation. I thought the noble Lords, Lord Teverson and Lord Jenkin of Roding, answered the question so well that I will just pray in aid their comments and add mine from the Queen’s Speech rather than continue with that point.

More generally, I say to the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, that we are taking on one of the largest infrastructure investment projects in a generation, as I have just described. The purpose of the Bill is to ensure that there are delivery mechanisms that are fit for purpose to deal with that. That is the theme that links the various parts of the Bill and by definition the range is broad.

The noble Earl, Lord Lytton, asked whether infrastructure was more than roads. My goodness, just looking at the Bill makes it very clear that it is. Of course, there are many other avenues of opportunity. We have talked extensively about our investment in rail, sustainable transport and a wide range of other necessary infrastructure.

I will say a word on procedure, if I may. It is difficult to go through this in detail without taking up too much time. We are very much looking forward to detailed scrutiny. Many noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, just a moment ago, gave a very clear indication of wanting to go through the Bill in great detail in Committee, and we welcome that. We think that is a very important part of the role of this House.

I will provide some clarification for the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin of Roding. It is our intent, subject to the usual channels—and I say this to those who have looked at Forthcoming Business—that further time will be allocated after the Summer Recess to ensure effective debate on all the clauses of the Bill. We recognise that that is important. I reassure noble Lords that, where important decisions have not yet been finalised, the House will be given clear guidance and information about our intentions in Committee. A number of people asked why the consultation will start in June or August. Obviously, the secondary legislation documents that are to be consulted on will be very important in informing the debate in Committee and the other stages in this House.

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer]

Before my noble friend leaves the point of procedure, perhaps she shares my disappointment that the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Chesterton, who brought up procedure, is not in his place to hear her remarks on the procedure of the Bill.

[Baroness Kramer]

I hope that my noble friend will encourage him to read my comments.

Moving on to more substantive issues, we had actually very little discussion of shale gas. My noble friend Lord Teverson spoke about geothermal extraction. I think that is rather positive. There is clearly an appetite in this House to ensure that this is a successful project. I know that many people are waiting for the detail, and that is exactly right. I would encourage anyone with an interest in this area to look at the consultation that is under way until 15 August because they may wish to participate in it as well as use it to inform themselves of what may happen, since the Government will not be making their final decisions until that consultation is complete and its implications are understood. We do not want to prejudge.

My noble friend Lord Teverson asked for more information on geothermal. I suspect that he knows this area far better than I do, but I remind him that geothermal power projects are eligible for support through the renewables obligation, and that under the contracts for difference the department has set a final strike price for geothermal power of £145 per megawatt hour until 2016-17 and £140 per megawatt hour thereafter. Indeed, there are a lot of measures to exploit geothermal, of which I think everyone recognises the potential.

In the same vein, my noble friend Lord Purvis mentioned the Wood review. We recognise that the oil and gas industry in the UK is of national importance and will be a vital part of the energy mix. While investment levels in the UK continental shelf are rising and near-term prospects are strong, there are new challenges for exploration and production. The environment is, frankly, very different from the circumstances when production peaked approximately 15 years ago. We will be responding very shortly to the Wood review. Details of how this will be carried forward will be available in Committee—I think my noble friend might have thought it would be later but it will be in Committee.

On zero-carbon homes, my noble friend Lord Teverson constantly reminds us that as well as talking about the supply side for energy we must focus on the demand side. This part of the Bill is absolutely critical in this area, and we will see those clauses before the Summer Recess. We recognise, as I suspect all noble Lords did in their speeches, that making all homes zero-carbon “on site” is sometimes not physically feasible or cost-effective for housebuilders. There are technical limits. Of course, we will be exploring the whole issue of allowable solutions. My noble friend Lord Teverson said he was concerned that we were focusing on potential exemptions for small sites, but we must recognise that small housebuilders face a very different economic framework from that faced by the big housebuilders, lacking economies of scale. But it is an important industry throughout the UK and we rely on it heavily for housebuilding in this country, and we must always keep in mind that the industry needs to be successful.

On roads reform, there was a very wide range of questions. A number of noble Lords, including the noble Lords, Lord Whitty and Lord Adonis, and my noble friend Lord Bradshaw—and there may have been others—talked about the importance of ensuring that reforms to the Highways Agency were seen within the context of spending on local authority roads, particularly the maintenance of those roads. It is obviously a very important point. Your Lordships will know that the Government are investing more than £6 billion in this Parliament—£12 billion in the next—on highways maintenance for strategic and local roads, enough to resurface 80% of the national road network and fill 19 million potholes a year on local roads. I also want to make it clear that there are benefits from that integration between the strategic highways network and local roads that come from our proposals for changes to the Highways Agency. The licence agreement for the reformed Highways Agency will include a duty to co-operate that will foster and improve partnership working with local authorities.

The new company will be a traffic authority and have the same legal responsibilities to ensure that traffic runs smoothly on its own network and the local network. These changes will strengthen the interplay between local authorities and the Highways Agency.