Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 (Substitution of Cut-off Date Relating to Rights of Way) (England) Regulations 2023

Baroness Scott of Needham Market Excerpts

Monday 27th November 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to take part in this debate and particularly to listen to the powerful and incisive speech of the noble Lord, Lord Rosser. I seek to add to the content of the debate rather than to repeat what has been said, but I could not resist rising to support entirely the regret Motion tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts. It is not often that your Lordships’ House sees the two of us aligned, but it reflects the fact that, all around this House, every speech has expressed great regret, not just in technical but in real terms, about the direction that the Government are taking on these public rights of way.

I will very briefly set this in historical context. Since the election of Margaret Thatcher, 10% of what was public land in the UK has been sold into private hands. If we look back to centuries before that, it is one long tale of enclosure, of the public being excluded from more and more land. The real tragedy of the commons is that they were stolen from the people. Today, we are not talking about ownership but about rights of way: the right to walk on our own land. Maybe that path up the hill towards the church was once how people visited a family grave. Maybe the path between one village and the next was how courting couples got together and how, historically, families were created. We might make different uses of those rights of way today, but they should still exist. This country is sometimes referred to as a property-owning democracy, yet 40,000 land millionaires, 0.06% of the population, own nearly half our land.

We are in a situation where people have rights which are threatened with being cut off. I pick up one point that was highlighted in the excellent Ramblers briefing. As the Government are presenting this to us, it was never intended that paths in current use would not be cut off, yet our current arrangements are that this could be happening. These days with social media and mobile phones—I am probably not the only one with a walking app that often records the route that I took in various places—there may well be a great deal of data indicating that footpaths are in use. However, I invite your Lordships to consider for a second, as many others have referred to, how difficult it would be for volunteers and small local organisations to collect and collate all that data to provide the proof that is needed. That is not something that will happen quickly. We have lost so many rights. Let us not lose any more.

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD)]

My Lords, I support these Motions from a particular perspective. Back in 1993, I was first elected to Suffolk County Council. Somewhat to my surprise, I found myself chairing the rights of way committee, a position that I held for some years. With all the experience that I gleaned, I can do nothing but agree with all the comments that have been made tonight.

When I was first learning about rights of way, I came across a summing-up by Lord Denning in which he said that nothing excites an Englishman so much as a footpath—I always thought that said rather a lot about Englishmen. Nevertheless, what I learned pretty quickly from that is that you have the coming together of two polar opposites. On the one hand there is the right of access, often historic, that people want to exercise, and on the other, “This is my land, it is private and I do not want anyone on it”. These are often irreconcilable. However, I also learned very quickly that, as public bodies and as legislators, it is not our job to pick a side but somehow to find a way of bringing them together. This is what saddens me about current proposals: they do not do that; they are partial and have come down on the side of the landowners.

The stakeholder working group, which other noble Lords have mentioned and which brought together local authorities, landowners and user groups, was able to come up with a consensus report. It is worth reflecting on how nigh-on impossible that must have been, and yet the stakeholder working group did that. That ought to be a gift to the Government, to say, “Here is a package on which all the stakeholders agreed”. Yet the Government have taken one piece of that and ignored all the rest, despite the conclusions of the group that

“implementation of the proposals in full is crucial to preserving the balanced nature of the package”.

It is a real pity that, all this time later, we have not moved; in fact, this is a massively retrograde step.

As we have heard, we do not have information about the exemptions from the cut-off date. There are some really important categories of rights of way here. Many paths in urban areas have never been on a definitive map and yet are used all the time. There are paths which are already in use. Where I take issue with the speech, with which I otherwise agreed, from the noble Lord, Lord Thurlow, is that they are often not long forgotten and ill-used; many of them have been used for hundreds of years and still are but just happen not to have been recorded. It would be tragic if they were to be lost. Then there is the backlog of which we have heard: what is the status of those for which applications have already been made?

I want to finish by agreeing with noble Lords who share my disbelief at the Explanatory Memorandum, which says there will be no significant impact on the voluntary or public sectors, because that is palpable nonsense. Local authorities, as we have heard, already have a massive backlog and are hugely strapped for cash. If you are running a local authority and you have limited legal support, are you going to put it into childcare or public rights of way? That is the reality that many of them are facing. All that will happen is that the backlog will get larger. Who is putting in these claims? They are being put in by volunteers from various user groups. In all the years I chaired the rights of way committee, I never saw a specious claim. Every one of them had been immaculately researched, often over many years, and although occasionally we would disagree on the point of law or its interpretation, they were made in good faith and deserved proper consideration. How volunteers are to carry on working against this sort of deadline, and produce that quality of work, defies belief.

I urge government to prioritise the regulations governing these historical paths and the exemptions from the cut-off date, and to set out how government funding can be used to support the work of both local authorities and the voluntary sector, if we are not to lose them for ever.

[Lord Redesdale (LD)]

My Lords, I want to support the Government on a couple of points, which I know the Minister will find surprising. Is it just me, or is it cynical to suggest that the date for the cut-off was set not for after this Government, nor for the next Government, but for the Government after, which always gives the impression that we have moved to the point where it is in the long grass and nobody is thinking about it?

The noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, talked about the 2000 Act, and I remember being part of the debates when we discussed that in 2000. There was great hope at that point that there would be money pouring into the rights of way from the Labour Government, but that sort of dissipated. I very much hope that the Minister can raise with his officials whether there could be discussion with the national heritage fund about coming forward with some funding, because it is not going to come from local authorities and the volunteer groups are going to find it difficult to push this forward.

I want to speak on this because I am one of those very rare individuals—one of the landowners that the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, talked about: a rapacious landlord in the north of Northumbria. The success I have had recently is introducing a new right of way, in relation to higher-level stewardship. I give a note of caution to anybody who goes down that route, which is that we agreed the right of way on a map. This summer I decided to actually follow the right of way, as set out by Northumberland National Park. The first half a mile is absolutely fabulous, through bucolic pastureland. However, you then hit a stile, and if you go over the stile and follow the path, you go down a near-vertical cliff face, which is almost lethal. In fact, it is totally lethal because it is covered in bracken. If you manage to get to the bottom of this without breaking your ankle, you hit the next helpfully placed marker, which directs you straight through a bog, which my children used to call a “welly-eater”—a bog you get half way through and then realise it has sucked your welly off and you will never see it again. After that you get to the most beautiful site on the riverbank, before you then have to think about going back the other way. I was told by the local authority that I could change it, but that it would probably be a harder process than taking the route in the first place.

Republic of Belarus (Sanctions) (EU Exit) (Amendment) Regulations 2023

Baroness Scott of Needham Market Excerpts

Wednesday 28th June 2023 Grand Committee

I want to reiterate the point—I know that the Minister has heard me bang on about this—that sanctions are one thing but, without matching them with strong enforcement and investigation, they will be doomed to fail. One key thing about the debate in the Commons on this particular issue, which my honourable friend Stephen Doughty raised, is that a better understanding of those enforcement and investigation elements acts as a very strong deterrent, which stops people avoiding or trying to get round the sanctions regime. He asked a specific question about the transparency of this and mentioned how the OFSI website does not show any financial penalties for non-compliance since September 2022. Of course, as we heard in the debate, the Minister’s response was to say that he would write to my honourable friend—oh, there we go, mid-stream.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Scott of Needham Market) (LD)]

My Lords, a Division has been called. I understand that there are to be two Divisions in quick succession, so I propose that we reconvene 10 minutes after the second Division starts, or sooner if we are all back.

Environment Bill

Baroness Scott of Needham Market Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 30th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Chidgey (LD)]

My Lords, I am delighted to follow my noble friend Lord Bradshaw. We have a history of working together that goes back many years. I think the last time was to do with Railtrack, which is a million miles away from Amendment 120A, which I shall speak to today, concerning septic tanks and their management.

I have some experience of this, going back a while to when I was a much younger married man with a small family who had moved into a rather old but pleasant Edwardian house on the edge of the country. When there is a sewer in the main road outside, naturally one assumes that one’s house is connected to it, but I discovered one morning, when an unexpected hole appeared in the back lawn, that there was no mains drainage at all, but a septic tank. As I say, I was a young man with a family and not a lot of money, and I had to get a second mortgage in order to pay for the drainage works to connect up to the sewer in the road and explain to my friends and neighbours that it was I who had caused traffic lights to be put up to cope with the construction works.

That is not to say that I have a particular bias against septic tanks—an issue that we will return to later in the Bill—but this amendment is to do with something very similar to my noble friend Lord Bradshaw’s point, which is that caustic household cleansers, when used too liberally, or even at all, you might argue, to cope with the cleansing of waste into septic tanks in domestic homes, can cause damage. What can happen so easily is that chlorine-based or similar bleach-based domestic cleaners prevent the tanks from functioning at all, and the result can be that you end up with little better than open defecation. So the purpose of the amendment is to try to reduce, and in due course eliminate, the discharge of untreated or poorly treated sewage into our rivers, watercourses and aquifers.

This occurs mainly in rural communities that remain—as I found out to my cost—unconnected to mains sewers, and are reliant on septic tanks and cesspits. Those are often inefficient and poorly maintained. Not only can septic tanks poison our rivers, streams and other watercourses as a result, but in areas with chalk aquifers they can poison the groundwater as well, often causing irreversible long-term harm.

Elsewhere in our European continent, several countries have not only banned this form of drainage but replaced it with more sensible and rational mains drainage systems. I would like to think that we would be trying to catch up with them. I therefore support the amendment.

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD) [V]]

My Lords, this is an important group of amendments, ably introduced by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch. I completely share her frustration, and agree with pretty much every word that she said. All the amendments in the group are concerned with the application of extended producer responsibility for single-use plastics, particularly those that are highly polluting in our sewers, such as wet wipes and—as we will hear later from the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett—nappy liners. I support all the amendments in the group.

There cannot be a better example of “out of sight, out of mind” than sewers. People simply flush all sorts of things away and give no thought as to the consequences. The water industry tells us that wet wipes make up 90% of the material in fatbergs, and because they do not break down, they cause 300,000 blockages every year, at a cost of around £100 million. That is money that the water industry could spend in far more productive ways—dealing with leaks, for example, or investing in water-saving schemes. Fatbergs also cause flooding in people’s homes, and pollute our rivers. As well as wet wipes, other products are routinely flushed, despite not being suitable, including nappy liners, sanitary products and condoms, which also lead to clean-up costs and add to both micro and macro-pollution.

There is an urgent need to develop a strategy and a legislative framework for dealing with this, and we must start immediately, with more public education and awareness campaigns. This can start the business of behavioural change and, crucially, it will start to help people understand why the more drastic measures that are needed will have to be taken. It is amazing that volunteers give up their time to clean beaches and rivers—and when they do that, it helps to raise awareness, as well as removing the pollution. But volunteers are no substitute for the serious measures that are needed.

There are many consumers who want to do the right thing, but the problem is that they do not always know what the right thing is. I agree with my noble friend Lord Bradshaw that we need clear labelling on product packaging to help improve the level of appropriate disposal of those products. At the point of sale, including online, packaging and advertising should identify products that contain plastic and do not comply with the water industry’s standard for flushability, Fine to Flush. Clear instructions are needed—“Do not flush”—with appropriate advice on waste disposal options.

Finally, clean-ups of blockages should be funded through graded financial penalties commensurate with the damage caused by the product. Products containing plastic should incur the highest penalty, followed by products that do not, but which also fail to meet the Fine to Flush standard.

The Government urgently need to provide clarification and detail about the schemes they will introduce under extended producer responsibility and the powers in the Bill. Their coverage, their delivery, the methods of consultation and the anticipated financial flows all need to be developed quickly. Action should be targeted on those areas where the most environmental damage is caused. The objective of my Amendment 124 is to provide some urgency, and to ensure that the Government have to bring such a scheme forward. That would give the industry, and to some extent consumers, a very clear direction of travel, and it sits very well with Amendment 119, which would introduce the statutory start date.

Environment Bill

Baroness Scott of Needham Market Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 23rd June 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord McNicol of West Kilbride) (Lab)]

We have two withdrawals from this group: the noble Duke, the Duke of Wellington, and the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra.

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I take the opportunity given by my noble friend’s amendments to probe the Minister on government thinking about the relationship between the principles of polluter pays and extended producer responsibility. I do so by using an example that we touched on in the closing remarks in Committee on Monday.

About two years ago, not far from where I live, a well-known fast-food company opened a drive-through restaurant. Since then, the brightly coloured packaging from this company has festooned our lanes. The National Association of Local Councils says that this sort of littering and pollution, much of which is plastic, is a growing problem in rural areas.

Clearly the litterers are the polluters here; they are winding down their car windows and throwing the stuff out. Do the Government therefore think that this is an enforcement or educational matter, or that there is some extended producer responsibility here, given that the originator of the packaging being littered is the one profiting? I wanted to use this example to try to get some clarity from the Government about where they see the relative balance of responsibilities.

[The Earl of Caithness (Con)]

My Lords, I start by repeating something I said in the first day of Committee. This is a hangover from Monday, but the batting order is not satisfactory, because I want to speak to Amendment 28 and none of its proposers has spoken yet, so I cannot follow them. However, I am delighted to see the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, in her place and hope she can come in after the Minister, because few in this House know as much about the problem as she does.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, covered the problem comprehensively. I was going to raise the point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market, which is that we must take this opportunity not only to reduce the amount of plastic, but to curb the problem of plastic litter, which is spoiling the countryside in a way it never has before. This is particularly apparent with Covid and the pressures now on farmers, landowners and councils, because of the total disregard that a lot of people have for the countryside. They are happy just to dump their rubbish anywhere. This Bill must be used for that.

I would like to say a lot more about Amendment 28. I like that it does not attack all plastics, as they can be the right solution for the right good in the right place, but they are not great overall. We must find a way to reduce and recycle them better.

Environment Bill

Baroness Scott of Needham Market Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 21st June 2021 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market]

8: Clause 1, page 2, line 1, at end insert—
“(e) public access to and enjoyment of the natural environment.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment is designed to require, rather than enable, the Government to set legally binding, long-term targets to increase public access to, and enjoyment of, the natural environment.

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD) [V]]

One of the themes that has run through the debates that we have had so far today is the extent to which the public understand the provisions in these Bills and, more importantly, the extent to which they buy in to the sorts of things that we are trying to achieve with this legislation. It seems to me that the best way to make sure that people support what we are trying to do is to ensure that they have access to nature in all of its different forms, because it is very difficult to get public support for something that is entirely theoretical.

It seems to me that there is an opportunity in the Bill to think about creating a new national framework that relates to people’s access to, enjoyment of and understanding of the natural world. From all sorts of studies that have been carried out, including by government, we know just how important access to open spaces and nature is for people’s physical and mental well-being. This has been particularly important over the last year.

As I say, we also need to understand that people need to have access to nature if they are going to support what we are trying to do. They should not feel shut out or that the countryside or nature are somehow for someone else. I am not just talking about the countryside or public rights of way; I am really talking about access to nature in all its forms, whether it is our magnificent urban parks, the smaller spaces that pop up sometimes, or places such as canal tow-paths. All of these provide important opportunities for people to access the natural world. This is not just about walkers, although it is mainly walkers: there are also cyclists, bird-watchers, kayakers, wild swimmers and all sorts of other people who benefit and wish to get access. But we know that that access is not equally distributed. We know that access is limited for people with disabilities, for example. We know that, in a lot of deprived, particularly urban, environments, access is limited, and that this is particularly a problem among certain ethnic groups.

We are still debating Clause 1, and we are talking about creating a framework for target-setting. But while subsection (3) creates areas where the Government must set targets, the whole question of access and public enjoyment is in subsection (1), which sets out areas where targets “may” be set. Similarly, when we get to the EIPs, in Clause 7, with all of its monitoring, planning and reporting requirements, enjoyment of the countryside is enabled rather than required.

So these amendments would require the Government to put more focus on the question of access and the public enjoyment of nature. However, there are real benefits to the Government from thinking about this approach, because it would enable them to start pulling together a framework that would link the work they are doing on the coastal path and the refreshed Countryside Code with the system of new payments for farmers, with its emphasis on public goods, as well as the planning Bill when it emerges and the green infrastructure provision—all alongside the health and well-being agenda, and in particular social prescribing. So I hope that the Government will at least consider putting public access and enjoyment on a slightly more secure footing and I beg to move.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)]

I thank the noble Viscount for his question. I certainly do not pretend to be an expert on this, but my understanding is that the use of motorised vehicles is already regulated and, therefore, limited to access routes classed as byways. My understanding—I think this is what the noble Viscount said—is that it is not about creating new laws or new restrictions; it is about implementing the rules already in existence. If he disagrees with that and thinks that it is a matter of tweaking the laws, I am very happy to hear from him after this debate—not tonight, I hope, but perhaps tomorrow.

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD) [V]]

My Lords, this has been a fascinating debate. I am very pleased that I tabled these amendments because they have enabled the Committee to surface a number of almost apparently contradictory themes. There seems to be a general sense that access is a good thing, but only on certain terms and only if people do not do certain things. It has really highlighted the tensions involved, whether greater access or better access. In many ways, the debate has made the case for a more strategic approach on the part of government, because it is the only way some of these things can be resolved.

I am very grateful to the Minister for his broadly constructive response. I was slightly struck by the irony that it appears that all sorts of government initiatives and funds are being put into this, but they are not really being joined up in the way that they probably should be. I will bet that there is already a whole set of targets established in every one of these funds, because that is the way government funds always work. I think it is possible to set targets in this way, so I hope the Minister will give a little more thought about how he can work with user groups and other interested people to think about this.

Finally, for me, this is always about access to nature; it is not just about access to the countryside. I thought the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, made a really important contribution when he focused first on the financial and economic inequalities, but also on the importance of these smaller local green spaces. There are many people in our crowded island who, sadly, will never get out into the countryside. That does not mean we should not aspire to it, but they will find it difficult. It just makes it all the more important that they have access to good-quality space close to where they live. With that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 8 withdrawn.

Circular Economy and Elimination of Waste

Baroness Scott of Needham Market Excerpts

Monday 18th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con) [V]]

I certainly agree with that assessment, and the Government do too. Reusing and repairing products saves people money. Low-income households saved, we believe, £468 million in 2019 through reuse and repair. Widespread adoption and circular economy business models have the potential to add around £75 billion in gross value added to the UK economy, according to WRAP. It also believes that moving to a more circular economy, including recycling, could create around half a million jobs across all skill levels and regions in the UK. This is central to what we are attempting to achieve through our waste strategy and via the Environment Bill, which will facilitate the changes that are needed.

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD) [V]]

My Lords, electronic waste is an enormous problem, particularly given the speed at which we replace our devices. One of the main barriers to recycling is a concern about the security of those devices. Will the Minister give some urgent thought to how to support and extend initiatives to make devices secure and get them out to schools and other settings where they are badly needed?

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con) [V]]

UK law can already be used to set requirements in relation to electronic equipment: on durability, repairability and recyclability. BEIS has run a call for evidence, which will be completed in June. Following that, BEIS and Defra have commissioned research to prioritise energy-related products for future eco-design regulation. I cannot confirm whether that work covers the security aspect that the noble Baroness raised, but I will write to her on that specifically following this session.

Repair and Reuse Programmes

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Monday 14th December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con) [V]]

That is exactly the focus of the work that we are doing. The purpose of the Environment Bill and the overall waste strategy is precisely to tackle “built-in obsolescence”—the problem that products are designed and sold with the view that they can only be thrown away and end up in landfill. As I said, no single policy lever can deliver the change that we need, and a whole ecosystem of changes is reflected in the Environment Bill and in our broader waste strategy. Combined, these will have the effect that the noble Baroness is seeking.

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD) [V]]

Is the noble Lord aware of the amazing work being done by social enterprises in this field? They are not just making a huge contribution to the environment but providing jobs, often to people in very challenged circumstances. Are the Government doing anything to see how that sector can be helped to grow and develop?

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con) [V]]

That is a very important point. There are examples further afield, for example in Austria, where government subsidises the creation of repair centres, which are specifically designed to employ people defined as difficult to employ; that is something we are looking at. There are so many benefits of shifting towards a reuse, repair, recycle model—with regard not just to the environment or lessening our global environmental footprint but to the economy and job opportunities, often for people who struggle otherwise to secure employment.

Terrestrial and Freshwater Protected Sites

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Monday 2nd November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con) [V]]

A number of pieces of work will help us to better understand the economics of biodiversity. One, as the noble Baroness knows, is the Dasgupta review, which we commissioned some time ago and is due to be produced very soon. She is right that we also need a more comprehensive audit or inventory of our natural capital in order to understand best how to introduce policies tailored to improving biodiversity. That work is ongoing. It is an enormous undertaking, and my department has been in discussions with the Treasury about working together to ensure that we are able and resourced to fill the gaps.

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD) [V]]

My Lords, by any measure, biodiversity in this country is now falling, at least in part because protected nature areas tend to be in small pockets that lack the necessary food webs and resilience for proper biodiversity. Can the Minister assure us that the zoning proposals in the planning White Paper will not make this situation worse?

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con) [V]]

I can give that assurance. Our planning reforms are intended to speed up decisions that can and should be sped up. We are determined to maintain and improve on the high standards we have set for our environment. We recognise that our biodiversity has been in sharp decline for decades; this transcends any one Government. We have put the levers and funding in place to begin the painful but necessary process of reversing those trends.

Environmental Protection (Plastic Straws, Cotton Buds and Stirrers) (England) Regulations 2020

Baroness Scott of Needham Market Excerpts

Friday 10th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD) [V]]

My Lords, in welcoming this SI, I echo the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, that this is a very tiny amount. Unfortunately, one of the impacts of the pandemic has been to go back to plastic use where we were getting rid of it; for example, supermarkets are now delivering in plastic bags. Therefore, I wonder if the Minister might give an indication of what work is being done with health authorities to produce guidance that balances the need for good health practice and the reduction of plastic use.

Secondly, I echo the concern of the noble Lord, Lord Oates, about the extent of the exceptions, which do seem very wide. Can the Minister give an assurance that encouragement will be given to the research and development of alternatives to plastics that can be used in these different contexts?

Water Industry (Specified Infrastructure Projects) (English Undertakers) (Amendment) Regulations 2020

Baroness Scott of Needham Market Excerpts

Monday 8th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD) [V]]

My Lords, it is a mark of the new arrangements that in recent weeks I have spoken in debates on food security, the charity sector and heritage and had between one and two minutes in which to do so. With the luxury of five, I will start with the usual courtesy of thanking the Minister for his comprehensive and useful introduction, and his officials for producing an extremely readable and useful set of accompanying documents.

Although narrow in its scope, this SI gives us a very useful chance to carry out some post-legislative scrutiny. I am not clear why a sunset clause was introduced in the first place. It might be because it was only ever envisaged for one project, but it would be useful to understand that better. I would rather know precisely what it was intended to do and what the risks are in removing it. The regulations as they stand have certainly done an extremely good job for the Thames tideway tunnel project. It will remain to be seen whether it is suitable for projects going forward. I am interested in the Minister’s thoughts about why this might not be a suitable framework for the four projects which he outlined, because it seems to have been successful.

It would also be helpful if he could give a bit more detail on the timetable for the proposed major new projects, as I did not quite hear what it was. In recent years, the emphasis seems to have been on improvements —particularly environmental improvements—to existing assets, and I welcome that. I am old enough to remember the 1970s, when the UK was known as “the dirty man of Europe”. UK standards have played a huge part in driving improvements in water quality across the piece. I am sure that all noble Lords would welcome an assurance that the UK will not, in any way, be slipping back once it is removed from EU standards.

Managing those assets, getting better value and using water more efficiently is an interesting challenge for the industry. Can the Minister say a little more about the limits? How much more water efficiency can we get out of existing infrastructure before we have to start thinking about new infrastructure, especially given the combination of climate change, increased population and differences in the way we lead our lives? It is good to hear that this model has worked so well for Tideway. It has suggested that the regulatory and contractual arrangements have given it a framework which has incentivised delivery on time and on budget—I would like to hear an update on that—as well as lower expected costs of capital.

The Consumer Council for Water has observed that customer handling in this project was not effectively done, because it was not sufficiently financed. Is that inherent in the regulatory structure or just an oversight that we can learn from and change next time? I look forward to the Minister’s reply.