Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Benyon and Tristram Hunt

Thursday 24th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)]

25. What plans she has for the future of British Waterways.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Richard Benyon)]

I made a statement on Monday 21 June on inland waterways policy for England and Wales. The Government consider that civil society has a valuable role to play in delivering public services as part of the big society. We will be looking in detail at options for a third sector model that will be appropriate for British Waterways, including the possible inclusion of Environment Agency navigations. No decisions will be taken until after the spending review.

[Tristram Hunt]

The Minister will know that Stoke-on-Trent is blessed with many things, and among them are the great canals of England: the Trent and Mersey and the Caldon canal, where we recently had the Hanley regatta. In order to become a proper third sector organisation, British Waterways needs an appropriate financial settlement following the comprehensive spending review and a longer contract with Government to replace annual grants. Can British Waterways’ property endowment be put in a charity-locked mechanism, so that the Treasury does not sell it down the canal, and we can be assured that, as an example of the big—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, but I think that we have the gist of his question.