Lake District National Park Authority
Lord Dubs Excerpts(10 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Dubs (Lab)
My Lords, it is the turn of this side; I live there. Is it not shocking that parts of the national park—one of the most beautiful national parks—have to be sold off as a result of government cuts? Is there not a problem that, in a further sale of the land, the Lake District planning people might well give a more relaxed permission in order to get half the money? Is it not rather unhappy that we are doing this at all? Surely we should adamantly say that the Lake District is not for sale to the highest bidder.
Lord De Mauley
I agree with much of the sentiment behind the noble Lord’s point, but the national park has assured me that this is not about cuts. It routinely reviews its assets and makes disposals where appropriate so that the proceeds can be reinvested into the acquisition, improvement or maintenance of other properties. It is worth saying that between 2007 and 2010—three years during which the noble Lord’s party was in government—it made sales totalling £1.9 million. In the five years from then, sales have totalled £1.8 million.
Single Use Carrier Bags Charges (England) Order 2015
Lord Dubs Excerpts(10 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Dubs (Lab)
My Lords, I broadly welcome this proposal. Some of us have been arguing about it for years and years. I remember that when I raised it with another Minister, I was slapped down and told that the Government had no intention of doing this, even though I pointed out that it was a benefit and the Government might even raise some revenue. At the time we were talking about a tax on the bags rather than a donation to the supermarkets.
This is a good idea. I think Ireland started this even before Wales and it seems to work pretty well there. Despite the objections of the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, the system works pretty well where it has been in used in Wales, Ireland and Scotland. But I welcome the Government as a repenting sinner. The Government were against this in the past, but it is pretty good that they are in favour of it now.
Some supermarkets—Sainsbury’s or Marks & Spencer or both—charge 5p already. But, of course, they do not publicise the fact at the till. It is only when one does a self-service transaction, by putting one’s purchases against the barcode—you see, I go shopping myself; how many others go shopping?—that, occasionally, it asks you to indicate whether you have no bag or that you should be charged for the bag. Sometimes, for very small bags, there is no charge. The system needs more publicity, both at the point of sale and more generally. If people know that they are being charged—sometimes it is easy not to notice, they might pay more attention.
I remember some years ago, when Ireland introduced the scheme, I was at a conference with Irish politicians in Oxford. We looked out the window and saw somebody walking along the street with 15 plastic bags—I think they were the orange Sainsbury’s ones. The Irish politicians said, “That wouldn’t happen in Ireland any more”. They have stopped it, and it works there. We are following on a bit late, but we are doing it.
My other specific point on publicity is this: I am trying to interpret the exemptions. If, say, somebody buys six loose oranges, does that enable them to have a bag without the charge or would the charge apply? It is not clear to me. Sometimes fruit is packaged and sometimes it is sold loose. It is slightly less expensive if it is sold loose. I wonder how that will be handled.
I understand that there is higher energy content in making a paper bag than a plastic bag but there is a good argument against plastic bags.
A lot of us were brought up to go out with a shopping basket—I am old enough to remember that—or bag and would not dream of expecting the shop to provide the packaging. There is no harm in going back to that.
I add one other plea about the amount of plastic wrapping on products, which is not directly concerned with the order. Buy a simple toothbrush and try to open it without a pair of scissors or a knife; it will be too firmly packaged. The Government should move on from this to look at other forms of packaging, which are totally excessive and add to the amount of plastic in the environment.
Lord De Mauley
Yes, I am quite sure that the right reverend Prelate’s chemistry is still current in that regard.
Lord Dubs
Perhaps I may ask a couple of questions. One is on unwrapped fruit. If one goes shopping, one normally buys a lot of things, including, say, four oranges. That means the shopping will be automatically exempt from the charge. That seems to be an inconsistency and, to my mind, not all that sensible. My other question is about publicity for the scheme. Surely one needs to encourage supermarkets to have publicity at the point of sale and wider so that people know what they are about. That will encourage people to take reusable bags.
Lord De Mauley
My Lords, my experience when buying oranges in the same way as the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, is that supermarkets tend to offer a very light bag specifically for that purpose. We are talking about a very light bag, not one into which he could put the whole of the rest of his bottles and other heavy items. I hope I made that as clear as I can. He also asked about publicity and I entirely agree with him. We very much hope that retailers will do as he suggests.
Japanese Knotweed
Lord Dubs Excerpts(11 years, 3 months ago)
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Lord De Mauley
My Lords, in returning regularly to this question, my noble friend is almost as persistent as the weed itself. I am not sure whether she is a hardy annual or a perennial. We need to spread public awareness of a number of non-native species including, of course, Japanese knotweed. The website nonnativespecies.org is our central point. Other awareness-raising measures include nearly 70 identification sheets, including one for Japanese knotweed, the Environment Agency’s PlantTracker mobile device app, which I recommend to your Lordships, non-native species local action groups, and the Be Plant Wise and Check, Clean Dry campaigns, which target aquatic security and non-native species more generally. Awareness-raising is a key focus of our current review of the GB strategy on invasive non-native species.
My noble friend mentioned mortgages. Two years ago, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and the Council of Mortgage Lenders agreed that a less draconian approach was needed.
Lord Dubs (Lab)
My Lords, while we are awaiting the result of those trials—four years is a long time—can we not have some action for those people who have knotweed on their neighbours’ land? I have not got any on mine, but my neighbours have. Can we at least persuade local authorities—without legislation—to be more co-operative with local people? My local authority will not co-operate at all: it will give me no information and is quite unhelpful. I know that some are better than that. How about leaning on local authorities?
Lord De Mauley
That is a subject which I have been thinking about very carefully. It is quite interesting that the community protection notices under the new Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act are potentially useful in this regard and we have to look carefully at them, as is the community trigger, which we should also look into.
Bovine Tuberculosis
Lord Dubs Excerpts(11 years, 7 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord De Mauley) (Con)
My Lords, there is, indeed, a debate among veterinarians on this matter. While the evidence does not provide a definitive answer, it is important to note that TB has been eradicated from Scotland and many other countries despite the use of artificial insemination and, furthermore, that bovine TB was already endemic throughout Great Britain well before the widespread adoption of AI in the 1950s.
Lord Dubs (Lab)
My Lords, is the Minister aware that I got the idea for this Question through talking to a local farmer in my valley in Cumbria? He told me that, although there were many badgers in the valley, there was no bovine TB at all, and that local farmers did not use artificial insemination. Given that there is at least some scientific basis for this, would it be right to pursue this rather than going for a badger cull for which the scientific evidence is doubtful?
Lord De Mauley
The noble Lord will not be surprised to hear that I do not agree with the last thing he said, but he might be interested to know that bull pedigree and TB data analysis of Holstein Friesian bulls, carried out by the Roslin Institute for Defra, have shown clear evidence of genetic variation to bovine TB susceptibility with a moderate heritability of 18%. However, no link was found in those studies between selection of bulls for milk yield and greater susceptibility to bovine TB. The study authors went on to conclude that,
“selection for milk yield is unlikely to have contributed to the current”,
bovine TB epidemic in Great Britain.
Japanese Knotweed
Lord Dubs Excerpts(12 years ago)
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Lord Dubs
My Lords, if the Government are not willing to legislate, can the Minister at least urge local authorities to co-operate locally? When a resident spots knotweed in an adjacent property, the local authority can be helpful in identifying the owner of that property so that something can be done about it. At the moment, some local authorities wash their hands of the problem.
Lord De Mauley
Yes, my Lords. I understand the point that the noble Lord makes. We have to balance, on the one hand, a determination to control this odious invasive species and, on the other, an imperative not to unnecessarily penalise people who are simply not in a position to do anything about it. However, I take the noble Lord’s point.
Flooding: Insurance
Lord Dubs Excerpts(12 years ago)
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Lord Dubs
My Lords, given that previous deadlines have already been missed, as regards bringing the negotiations to a conclusion, what assurance can the Minister give that this will not be announced some time in the middle of August or September, when there is no chance for us to scrutinise the detail? Further, the Question uses the wording “affordable insurance”. Will he comment on the fact that after the Cockermouth floods, my insurance company for my house in Cumbria increased my premium more than sixfold?
Lord De Mauley
Yes, my Lords. In answer to the noble Lord’s first question, the ABI, in its letter to which we referred when we last debated this subject a month ago, has expressed confidence that we will be able to conclude this before the end of July, and I have every confidence in that. We need a solution that provides affordable insurance, as the noble Lord said, for those at risk, but that does not place unsustainable costs on wider policyholders or the taxpayer. Obtaining insurance might involve some householders shopping around or going through specialist brokers if flood risks are significant. In terms of help for householders, in July last year, we published a guide to obtaining flood insurance in high-risk areas in collaboration with the National Flood Forum and industry representatives.
Insurance: Flood Risk Areas
Lord Dubs Excerpts(12 years, 1 month ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord De Mauley)
My Lords, we are at an advanced stage in negotiations with insurers towards a successor to the statement of principles. Insurers have voluntarily agreed to abide by the current agreement until 31 July to allow time for the outstanding issues to be concluded.
Lord Dubs
My Lords, will the Minister confirm that there were 500,000 insurance claims for flooding last year and that 2.5 million properties are deemed by the Environment Agency to be at risk of flooding? He will know that the negotiations have gone on for a long time. Does he accept that it is vital that they are brought to a rapid conclusion to safeguard the position of many homes in the country and to ensure that people can sell their houses, which at the moment may prove impossible?
Lord De Mauley
My Lords, I broadly agree with the noble Lord that negotiations must be brought to a satisfactory conclusion as soon as possible. That is what we are working on, as I have said. It is worth saying that the Secretary of State has received a letter from the ABI—I have ensured that a copy is in the Library—in which it confirms that its members agree to continue to meet their commitments for a further month to enable the resolution of negotiations. To me this clearly demonstrates its good intentions and its determination to reach an agreement.
Air Quality
Lord Dubs Excerpts(12 years, 2 months ago)
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Lord Dubs
My Lords, I thank the Minister for that Answer, but the Government are not being very effective. Will the Minister confirm that in the UK as a whole there are estimated to be 30,000 early deaths as a result of poor air quality, that in London the figure is over 4,000, that the number of people who have an early death through poor air quality is second only to the number who die of smoking, and that about 17% of the National Health Service budget is used to deal with the consequences of poor air quality? Are we not dealing with a major national emergency, rather than something that can be dealt with as the Minister suggested?
Lord De Mauley
My Lords, we take this subject extremely seriously. It is fair to say that air quality in the UK has improved significantly over recent decades, but we continue to face severe challenges, particularly from nitrogen dioxide in densely populated towns and cities. As a Government, we are committed to working towards a much better situation and, indeed, towards full compliance with EU air quality standards. There is close working between departments and local authorities to consider air quality in all policy areas. The noble Lord mentioned health, and he is quite right, but transport, energy and planning are also important.
Food: Banks
Lord Dubs Excerpts(12 years, 5 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord De Mauley)
My Lords, Ministers meet a wide range of organisations and individuals at locations all over the country. There is no central record of visits to food banks since May 2010 but I can inform noble Lords that, in their official capacities at Defra, my noble friend Lord Taylor of Holbeach and Caroline Spelman both made visits to FareShare in 2011, that my noble friend Lord Taylor and I have both visited FoodCycle, and that I will soon visit FoodCycle again.
Lord Dubs
I am sure that the Minister will agree that the volunteers working in food banks provide an essential support service for people in poverty. Will the Minister comment on the fact that from April there will be savage cuts in the welfare budget, estimated at some £3 billion, which will hit the incomes of the poorest in our society, while at the same time there will be £3 billion-worth of tax handouts for the better off? Do the Government have any contingency plans to provide extra support for the voluntary organisations running food banks so that they will be able to cope with the inevitable extra needs that will be created?
Lord De Mauley
First, I absolutely echo the noble Lord’s welcome for the work done by the volunteers who work in these wonderful charities. We know that families are seeing the price of their weekly shop increase. The impact of food price inflation is a real concern to us. Food prices are affected by global drivers such as world food prices, oil prices and exchange rates. In answer to the noble Lord’s supplementary question, there are several schemes that help people, especially children, get a nutritional diet, including Healthy Start and the school fruit and vegetable scheme.
Japanese Knotweed
Lord Dubs Excerpts(13 years, 3 months ago)
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Lord Taylor of Holbeach
I would like to thank my noble friend for her persistence, which I think rivals the Japanese knotweed in its vigour and eradicability. Research is going on into a leaf spot fungus, which also has the capacity specifically—this is the key to biological control—to attack Japanese knotweed. Defra and the devolved Administrations are also supporting catchment scale control work on Japanese knotweed in several areas across the country.
Lord Dubs
My Lords, while waiting for this new panacea to have effect, does the Minister agree that Japanese knotweed is pretty lethal stuff and that there are virtually no powers to deal with it if one sees it in adjoining gardens or houses? Short of having to take civil action, which is pretty cumbersome—especially given the legal aid Bill—should we not have better enforcement powers? People do not know about it, and not all police forces have wildlife officers, so why not give local authorities the power to deal with it?
Lord Taylor of Holbeach
The noble Lord makes a very important point. Japanese knotweed is a pest and it is extremely difficult to eliminate. However, I remind the noble Lord that this House guards jealously the right of entry. I remember many debates on that issue and I am not sure that this House would be particularly happy to have people’s gardens invaded by enforcement officers in the way that he suggests.