Flooding: Defence

Debate between Lord Hunt of Chesterton and Lord Henley

Tuesday 29th March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, I remind the noble Baroness that no schemes whatever have been cancelled. Some have been deferred, because obviously we have to make very difficult decisions about the money available. As I made clear in my original Answer, we will involve local communities in discussions, which is why we have consulted—and we are reviewing the consultation—about how we can see the money going further by allowing communities themselves to have an involvement in these schemes, and for communities themselves or for private money to come in to assist the public money that comes from Defra.

[Lord Hunt of Chesterton]

My Lords, I wonder whether the Government relate the flood defences to many other applications, such as agriculture and wind energy. As you cross the channel, you can see that all the major dykes in Holland have windmills on them. Do the Government agree that we need to move in that direction?

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, it is an interesting thought whether we should put windmills on all the dykes that we have to build for flood defences. I shall certainly take that on board and consider that matter, although there would obviously be planning considerations as well as to whether you would want windmills along all the dykes to which the noble Lord refers.

EU: Common Fisheries Policy

Debate between Lord Hunt of Chesterton and Lord Henley

Wednesday 22nd December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, no I do not think that it has suffered a blow. The important thing is that your Lordships’ committee, this House, the Government, many member states and the Commission all now believe that reform of the CFP is necessary and desirable. As part of that process, we will push for greater regionalisation in decision-making, as we think that that will lead in the end to a much better process. We are fortunate to have reached a stage where there is slightly more agreement than there has been in the past. We want to build on that.

[Lord Hunt of Chesterton]

My Lords, does the Minister agree that the data about the state of fishing that were referred to in the supplementary question are much less complete than they should be? The only data on the decline of fisheries available to the pre-legislative scrutiny committee on the marine Bill came from an official of the EU. I am afraid that our colleagues in Defra were extremely reluctant to give us any substantive figures, and even now many of its documents are very weak in this area. Can we be given the facts both from the UK's and the EU’s point of view, because that should be an important part of revising this policy?

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, we would always like more data on these matters. I will take up the noble Lord’s point with officials to see whether we can provide better data for future debates.