Fisheries Bill [HL]

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 2nd March 2020 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Teverson]

1: Before Clause 1, insert the following new Clause—
“Fisheries principles
(1) Marine stocks within the UK Exclusive Economic Zone are a resource that belongs to the nation as a whole.(2) Any quotas or other rights to harvest marine stocks whether allocated to vessels, public bodies, or persons natural or corporate remain the property of the nation.(3) No vessel, public body, or person natural or corporate shall have a permanent claim over quota or other rights granted to them by a public authority or authorities.”Member’s explanatory statement
The amendment makes clear that UK fish stocks belong to the nation and not to private organisations.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, it seems that whenever we start a fisheries discussion there is rather a lack of sustainability among our Members. One of the useful things between Second Reading and Committee is that we can reflect on the arguments and the Bill until we get into the discussion of amendments. One thing that struck me very strongly after Second Reading, on looking through the Bill again, is that it has hardly any ambition whatever. The withdrawal Act effectively makes us an independent coastal state, which we will be after the transition period, but, apart from that, all the Bill does is provide an administrative framework to keep the status quo.

I do not think that the status quo is good enough for the fishing industry. For instance, there is no provision for new entrants into the industry, which is important. There is no improvement in sustainability methods for fisheries. In fact, the Bill fudges sustainability even more than when we were in the common fisheries policy. There is no particular help for the small under-10 fleet. Because of that, there is no specific help for coastal communities either.

That is why I tabled this amendment, which goes to the fundamental matter of who fish stocks belong to, because the Bill does nothing to change that. At the moment, we have a situation where half of English stocks are owned by companies that are effectively owned by Iceland, Holland or Spain. In Scotland, a vast majority of the industry is owned by a very small number of people. It is a very efficient operation and I certainly have nothing against that, but we have an industry that has become quite fossilised and significantly foreign owned, with no apparent appetite to change that.

We will come on to a number of those issues as we go through the Bill and the amendments, but we are trying to state the completely obvious: if fish stocks belong to anyone while they are in the UK EEZ, they should belong to the nation. That is simply what the amendment says: they are not the everlasting property of a vessel, an individual, a company or even a public body such as the one we have in Cornwall that buys up quota for the local fishing industry. They do not belong to them for eternity; they belong to the nation.

I do not understand how anybody could argue against this concept, but it is really important, since it is fully in line with the ideals of Brexit, becoming an independent coastal state, and Parliament and the nation having control, that we notice and mark that these fish stocks belong to the nation. That does not mean that there should not be, through the Secretary of State or the devolved authorities, a way that those fish stocks—

[Lord Grocott (Lab)]

I wholeheartedly agree with the noble Lord about the fish stocks in the zone belonging to the nation. Presumably that could never have occurred had we remained a member of the European Union. Will he confirm that?

[Lord Teverson]

Absolutely. I agree with that. That is what I am saying. Given the new opportunity that we have, we should take advantage of being an independent coastal state. The Bill does nothing to change the status quo in any way. This is one thing we can do—lay down a marker on the ownership of those stocks. As to how those stocks are distributed, the amendment does not prevent them being leased for a period, rented or allocated without charge. We are trying to make the point that, at the end of the day, these stocks belong to the nation and not to any individual.

Coming back to the point made by the noble Lord, 17 million people voted for Brexit and for taking control of our own resources. They did not vote for—in relation to fishing—a profitable industry keeping all the advantages that it has at the moment. They were thinking more of the smaller fleets and the fact that those fishing stocks should belong to us rather than to individuals and perhaps, if you would like to call them that, to the elite of the fishing industry at the moment. I beg to move.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB)]

My Lords, I support the amendment. At the beginning of last year, in Committee in the Commons on the earlier incarnation of the Bill, the Minister—who is now Secretary of State—George Eustice MP, said:

“I do not believe we need a statement that fisheries resources are a national asset or public property, because that is self-evidently the case and our common law has always held as much.”—[Official Report, Commons, Fisheries Bill Committee, 13/12/18; col. 285.]


At the time I took that as gospel. I admire his legal confidence—I say that in a “Yes Minister” context—because I am not certain that the legal confidence is supported by all involved in the industry. There is a famous case where Justice Cranston suggested that there was a type of property right attributed to a fixed quota allocation and that owners would probably need to be given in the region of seven years’ notice of the intention to move away from those FQA units as a type of property right. Such a legal hitch—this is important—might hamper the Government’s intention to move away from relative stability to zonal allocation.

The point I am making is that if the Government believe that quota and marine stocks belong to the nation as a whole, it cannot possibly do any harm to make that clear in the Bill right at the start, so there is absolutely no doubt throughout the industry; and, more importantly, that in any future court case, trying to prove the opposite will founder on the rock of this legislation, set out in 2020, at the start of a new fishing era by the express will of Parliament.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Teverson]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his reply. The noble Lord, Lord Lansley, made an interesting and important point. He assumed that this was already the case, but the British courts do not see it that way. The Minister, now Secretary of State, tried to reallocate quotas towards the under 10-metre fleet, but that was disputed within the legal system. There is an underlying assumption here that this is a privatised resource, not a resource of the nation. That is why, to deliver what the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, wants, it is important to have an amendment like this in the Bill.

As the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, pointed out, this makes no difference to the quota allocation in Scotland: the devolved management authorities can make what decisions they want in allocating harvesting rights in those territorial areas. We are saying here that, ultimately, fundamental ownership of those rights is not for keeps, whereas at the moment they can be interpreted that way. I am not suggesting that, as part of this amendment, we should not allow a degree of certainty and ability to invest, but, as the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, put it very well, these rights are in trust to the nation.

As to how one interprets “the nation”, I see our fishing stocks as a national resource, not as devolved. Clearly, however, how they are shared out and used is an issue for the devolved authorities. I look forward to the later amendments in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, which come back to this subject, but I believe that this is fundamental to the way in which we should view this national resource and how that affects policy decisions as we go through this Bill and make fisheries policy. But, for the moment, I am content to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 1 withdrawn.

--- Later in debate ---

Moved by

[Lord Teverson]

2: Clause 1, page 1, line 4, at end insert—
“( ) the socio-economic objective,”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment ensures that socio-economic issues are included in the fisheries objectives.

[Lord Teverson]

My Lords, as the Minister said, we have here a list of objectives of great importance. I would not disagree with most, but one or two I have an issue with. There is always a danger in having too many objectives: which is the important one that guides regulatory authorities and which guides legislators in drafting subsequent secondary legislation? That is difficult, because it is almost impossible to meet all objectives at the same time. This amendment, and the others in my name—Amendments 6, 10 and 27—are based on my belief that sustainability is the most important objective. I take “sustainability” as here meaning the aquatic biosphere and the health of our fish stocks.

I do not accuse the Government of putting it this way, but the Bill reads to me as having a muddled sustainability objective, because it is prejudiced by the addition of what is almost a socioeconomic objective. A socioeconomic objective is very valid. In fact, one of my amendments in this group states that there should be a socioeconomic objective. The sustainability objective should, however, relate to the marine ecology, fish stocks and the wider marine inhabitants. I therefore suggest that we leave out subsection (2)(b), which states

“the fishing capacity of fleets is such that fleets are economically viable but do not overexploit marine stocks.”

That is a socioeconomic objective and should go under that heading. The sustainability objective has to be the lead objective. There are various ways of sorting out the socioeconomic objectives, including financially, and that is how we should do it.

We need clarity; we need the sustainability objective to be the prime objective, and we need it to be well policed. That is why my Amendment 27 would bring in the office for environmental protection. I would be interested to hear what the Minister says. He may tell me that this is unnecessary, and I could well be persuaded that it is, but it is vital that that office, once founded and operational, has full oversight of the fisheries industry and the protection of our marine environment. I beg to move.

[Baroness Worthington]

My Lords, Amendment 7 is in my name. I support many of the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Teverson. My amendment would change Clause 1(2)(b) simply to state

“the fishing effort does not overexploit marine stocks.”

The Bill states

“the fishing capacity of fleets is such that fleets are economically viable but do not overexploit marine stocks.”

The purpose behind trying to simplify the provision is to make it clear that we cannot have a sustainable long-term fishing effort if we overexploit stocks. That should not need to be said, but we have seen routine overexploitation of stocks as a consequence of how the common fisheries policy is interpreted, with member states then allocating quota to private fishing enterprises.

To state first that fleets should be economically viable and then to qualify it by saying that they should not overexploit marine stocks gives entirely the wrong impression. It implies that we are to continue with the belief, commonly held in Europe, that fishing rights and the economic viability of the fishing industry are the first and foremost concerns. That speaks to short-term political considerations because these are entities that employ people and pay taxes. My amendment tries to correct for that short-termism endemic to political thinking by stating that it is the sustainability of the stock that we should regulate for, not the commercial viability of the entities that exploit it. The latter is entirely what has been wrong with the common fisheries policy since we have been in it. There is an assumption that the exploiters’ rights should come first, with the environment an afterthought. We must turn that around. It is short-termism not just politically but in the context of the changing climate. Nothing from now on is business as usual; everything is shifting. We must put the resilience of our marine resources at the heart of everything we legislate on and at the heart of everything we do today in considering the Bill.

My amendment would simply take away the qualifier; there is no need to qualify this. It is simply logical that we legislate so that we do not overexploit fishing stocks. That is the only purpose of this legislation. Therefore, it must be stated unequivocally in the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

I will conclude on this, otherwise the “Ah, buts” will lose the force of the sustainability point of this debate. It is clear, I believe—as I always have—that the House and your Lordships need to make a compelling case, which a government Minister will always want to listen to. If a compelling case is made, as I have said previously, my answer will be, “Gosh, I wish we’d thought of that.” I emphasise that the Bill has been considered over a very long time. We have one go at this Bill and there have been a lot of representations. It has gone through a mincer in a way that most other Bills do not. Given our very close connections and our responsibilities, and given that fishing is devolved, we have worked collaboratively and positively with the devolved Administrations. I emphasise to the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, that I do not use that as an excuse. It is a statement of fact that we are legislating on behalf of all parts of the kingdom. That is really what I wish to say at this point.

[Lord Teverson]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for probably one of the most important debates during this Committee and for all the points made. They were made pretty much in the same direction, even if they did not totally agree on the detail.

I was very grateful for the intervention of the noble Lord, Lord Grocott—I thought it was fantastic. The sad thing to someone like me is that, apart from relative stability and technical regulations, which are not dealt with in the Bill, we could have done everything else over the last 40 years, but we did not because we just went along and did what was easiest. We did not need to let our quotas go to foreign owners, we could have changed the balance between the large and small fleets completely, and we could have put far more European money into our coastal communities when they did not have enough quotas. We could have done all those things, but we did not. However, the noble Lord was absolutely right: we have here an opportunity to really open our minds. The Minister says, “We’ve gone through all of this before, it’s been looked at before and we’ve talked to all the other sides”, but we have had a break, we are now out of the European Union, we have opened our minds and we have had some really good suggestions on the Bill. We should not be railroaded by past negotiations. Clearly, devolution is key—we do not want to change that settlement in any way—but that cannot prevent our making some changes.

One fundamental thing, on which I disagree completely with the Minister, is that referring to “balance” between socioeconomic issues and sustainability was exactly the argument that Ministers used on the common fisheries policy from the 1980s to about five years ago, when the whole regime changed. Because of that so-called balance, stocks disappeared from the North Sea and the Baltic Sea and were depleted from western waters. If we do not decide to make sustainability a prime objective, that is what we will end up with. The history shows that the politics takes over from the science.

I was very pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Randall, mentioned Newfoundland. I went out to Newfoundland in 1996 at the height of the conflict with the Portuguese and the Spanish. I went out on an aeroplane with the Canadian fisheries department to look at the line of big Atlantic fishing vessels fishing right along the EEZ line. I saw the communities of St John’s in Newfoundland that were unable to fish their own waters because there was nothing left. That was due to the short-term socioeconomic objective taking the place of the sustainability objective. That is exactly what you get and exactly what we must not have in this country, whether in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland or England. We cannot afford that.

If I was chief executive of a company and somebody gave me eight different objectives and did not rank them, the first thing I would do is ask the chairman to fire the non-executive directors, because it is absolutely impossible to have eight equal objectives in any subject. That is for running a company; if you are running the marine environment of a nation, surely it is far more important.

To come back to the point from the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, we absolutely need a socioeconomic objective. The noble Earl, Lord Caithness, is absolutely right as well—we will come to the financing part of the Bill. There are amendments to that part to say that we will need to intervene when there is a socioeconomic problem and that we should not be afraid to do so. We should protect those communities in that way. We should not pretend that we are protecting them by letting people go out for fish stocks that are not there and are not sustainable.

I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington. She made her argument very strongly. The same goes for the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, on the points he made. Although my amendments may not be perfect, I have tried to stick within the Government’s framework by changing around some of the words but using the Government’s own settlement with the devolved authorities. I am absolutely sure that we will come back to this on Report, but at this point I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 2 withdrawn.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Worthington]

My Lords, in moving Amendment 4 in my name I shall speak also to Amendment 25, which is grouped with it. I also seek permission to speak to Amendments 47 and 56, which will come up later in Committee but are related to this point, so I hope I can speak to all four in this speech.

The purpose of Amendment 4 is to add a new fisheries objective to the Bill stating that there is a “marine planning objective” in relation to fisheries management. The reason is that there is a real need to integrate fisheries into our wider marine planning processes. The phrase “fisheries exceptionalism” has been used. In essence, what is being got at there is that the way we plan for our use of the marine environment for fisheries is very separate from our wider spatial planning that we use for other activities that occur in the marine environment. Sometimes we forget that, although fishing is a hugely important part of our marine environment, it is certainly not the only economically productive activity that occurs within our seas. It is important that we integrate fisheries into marine planning and that marine planning integrates fisheries into its processes.

Therefore, there is a very clear objective missing from the Bill, which is to accomplish that wider integration in public policy. Many users of the marine environment interact with fisheries, not least the growing and highly profitable energy sector. We are shifting towards greater use of our marine environment for the production of sustainable energy. That has an interesting intersection with fisheries: the offshore wind farms that we are putting into the marine environment can act as no-take zones for vessels over a certain size, and as hatcheries and protected areas that allow fish stocks to return to an area that would otherwise be decimated through overexploitation by large vessels with large gear. There is a real benefit to be gained from integrating fisheries with our spatial planning.

It is not just about reducing fishing effort, although another key part of planning—now in UK law—is the protection of areas of high biodiversity interest or sites of scientific interest in the marine environment. We have a marine planning process that designates marine planning areas, some of which are working well while others need to be better thought-through and planned. It would be much more effective if, when setting these new fishing policies, we think of them as an integral part of our marine planning for conservation.

There are other uses of the marine environment that require planning, including dredging the shipping channels. It is an environment that requires careful management and balance—I agree with that—but not to mention the existing marine plans that are required to be made, and not to integrate them with the fishing objectives, feels like a missed opportunity. I tabled this amendment in the hope that we can have a wider debate about spatial planning and how it relates to fisheries management. It is not a negative proposal: it could bring greater benefits as we think about how we manage our seas. I look forward to the Minister’s response, and I hope that we have a good debate. I beg to move.

[Lord Teverson]

My Lords, I very much welcome marine planning. I should perhaps declare a past interest as a board member of the Marine Management Organisation, which is responsible for marine planning in England. Last week I talked to Gillian Martin, the convenor of the environment committee of the Scottish Parliament, about marine planning. It is happening in Scotland, too.

I am certainly not advocating this as yet another objective—we have too many already—but it is important that the Bill takes account of marine planning and all the work going on in that field. Today our seas are, to put it mildly, used in multiple ways—for trade, renewable energy, undersea carbon capture and storage, and lots of other areas. I am not sure that the Bill even mentions things such as marine conservation zones, which are part of marine plans and, inevitably, part of the management of the fishing regimes. I would like to think that there was a way to refer to marine plans in the Bill, although not quite in this way.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, for tabling these amendments. As she said, they relate to the importance of marine planning and the conservation obligations of the fishing sector.

The Marine and Coastal Access Act is an important piece of legislation, passed in the final years of the Labour Government, of which we are very proud. It already requires the UK and devolved Administrations to prepare marine plans. The point made by the noble Baroness was important: new legislation should incorporate the marine plans where they overlap and apply. With this Bill it is sensible to incorporate them into the joint fisheries statements and the fisheries management plans. We should not risk one piece of legislation overriding the obligations of another: the case for integration is well made.

As marine plans have been with us for some time, there is an argument that they should provide the bedrock on which other policies are built and developed. There is little sense in having marine conservation measures in place if certain protections are at risk of being disrupted by fishing activities authorised under the Bill, so the case for integration is strong.

We have raised previously with the Minister the wider challenge of how all Defra Bills integrate; for example, how this Bill will integrate with the Environment Bill. They all need to interlink and create a bigger whole. I am sure that we will be told that a number of the issues that we raise here will be dealt with in the Environment Bill. We need to make sure that everything is in its place and is interlinked. Everything should be developed as a package. The points made by the noble Baroness about the links between this Bill and marine conservation are well made. As with all these things, it is about finding the right wording and the right place in the legislation, but the principle is one that we should adopt.

[Lord Teverson]

My Lords, I should have made another declaration: I am co-chair of the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Local Nature Partnership. Obviously, being surrounded by sea apart from the Tamar—which is an even more important boundary with our brothers in Devon—Cornwall has a marine interest.

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, for her amendments. Together, they would require policies made to achieve the fisheries objectives to be consistent with the objectives and policies in relevant marine plans.

I want to take this opportunity to make it clear that the UK Government recognise the importance of marine plans, which enable the increasing and, at times, competing demands for use of the marine area to be balanced and managed in an integrated way—a way that protects the marine environment while supporting sustainable development. Using our marine resources effectively and sustainably has the potential to provide significant benefits for the UK economy and for coastal communities. The economic contribution of marine-related industries to the UK’s GDP in 2015 was estimated at £27 billion, with scope for further growth.

In England, the East Inshore and East Offshore Marine Plans were published in April 2014 and the South Inshore and South Offshore Marine Plan was published in July 2018. The remaining marine plans for England are out for consultation by the Marine Management Organisation and will be in place by 31 March 2021, delivering the Government’s commitment in the 25-year environment plan.

Marine plans support economic growth in a way that benefits society while respecting the needs of local communities and protecting the marine environment. That is why I understand the importance of the points that the noble Baroness has raised. We believe that what her amendment requires is already provided for. As was referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, Section 58 of the Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009 requires public authorities to have regard to

“the appropriate marine policy documents”—

which could be a marine policy statement or a marine plan—when taking decisions affecting the marine environment. The amendments would therefore duplicate this requirement. I am advised that the requirement is already sufficient to meet what I know are the noble Baroness’s positive intentions.

With that explanation and the assurance that I have been advised that Section 58 covers this point and that the amendment would merely duplicate what is already a legal requirement, I hope that she will feel able to withdraw her amendment.

Fishery Protection Squadron

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Wednesday 12th February 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

As I said in my first reply, co-ordination and collaboration with all the devolved Administrations—indeed, the four fisheries administrations —is absolutely key. Marine Scotland is represented on JMOC. In addition to the three vessels referred to by the noble Earl, it has two aeroplanes for aerial surveillance. The point is that there is collaboration with all four fisheries administrations to ensure that all UK waters are better protected.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, does the Minister agree that fishing vessels are very sophisticated nowadays? They know when a large, grey naval vessel is about to go over the horizon, so surely, exactly as the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, said, we must put more investment into electronic surveillance—aerial surveillance and satellite surveillance. We must also ensure that all vessels fishing in UK waters are on an equal footing, and that all comply.

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

This issue goes back to the very essence of sustainability and the reason why we need to do this. Heightened surveillance is in the long-term interests of the fishing fleets—for all vessels, whether they are foreign and subject to negotiation, or our own. It is about ensuring that sustainable stocks are in our waters and are fished properly. That is why, as I outlined, we have the electronic reporting and data system, the vessel monitoring system and even more innovative technologies to complement what we already have. This issue is really important.

Fisheries Bill [HL]

Lord Teverson Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords & 2nd reading (Hansard)
Tuesday 11th February 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, one thing that I have come to learn about fisheries is that, the more you learn about it, the more you do not understand it. It is absolutely true; if there is one sector where the more you know, the more you do not know, this is it. Following on from that, it is very easy for us, quite rightly, to criticise the common fisheries policy—I have been one of its fundamental critics in the past—but no fisheries policy is perfect. Nowhere in the world can you find a perfect fisheries regime.

The closest I have ever got to seeing one was in New Zealand, which is seen as having one of the most successful systems that works well for producers as well as conservation. It has complete control of its continental shelf, which helps, but strangely enough its industry is totally concentrated. In fact, we would find it completely unacceptable in this country because there are no fishing coves with small boats; it is dominated by large vessels with tradeable quotas that everybody bids for annually or triennially—I cannot remember which. Because of that, those few boats can be controlled very strongly by the authorities, and it is in the interests of the three or four producers not to keep an eye on each other—and the problem, actually, is recreational fisheries, which I am pleased to say come under this Bill.

That model is absolutely inappropriate for the United Kingdom, but we should not forget that we have a very disparate industry here. Some in the industry make a shedload of money in this country. We all think of these sectors—which I know in Cornwall and others will know on the west coast of Scotland, the east coast of England and, I suspect, Northern Ireland—where fisheries are a really hard living. However, the big companies make a lot of money, so we should not think too sentimentally about a large proportion of this industry in terms of money and volume. Good luck to them; I am not against that, but there are certain things which come from that. We think of fisheries in terms of the products we eat for our supper or have with chips, but the shellfish industry is also incredibly important to the UK—going out with pots and all those other things are important as well. It is a very varied industry.

Scotland is very different from England as well. I was slightly surprised by the noble Lord, Lord Dunlop, who I think said that the Shetlands lands more fish than the whole of England. I may be wrong, but I think Peterhead is the largest fishing port in the UK by far, followed by Fraserburgh, then Lerwick and Scrabster. However, Newlyn and Brixham are not far behind, certainly compared to Lerwick, but they are very different industries looking at different things.

We on these Benches are looking for four principles in this Bill. The key one is sustainability. The noble Lord, Lord Krebs, has said that that must be defined better, and I accept that entirely. The amendments I have been thinking about do not do so sufficiently, so I look forward to his intervention.

The second principle is looking at how the inshore fleet—particularly the fleets with boats under 10 metres—are dealt with. Exactly as the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, said, ironically it was completely in our power to give that sector as much of our total quota as we wanted. To give George Eustice, the Fisheries Minister, his due, he started to reallocate some of that quota to the under 10 metre or inland fleet over the last couple of years. That is an important area.

Another important issue for these Benches, which I do not think has been mentioned, is transparency. This is a national resource, yet there is little transparency about how quota is divided up and who owns what among the producer organisations. We talk about statistics of foreign-owned British flag vessels, but no one has an exact percentage of what quota they have. Much of this area is not easily understood, and we would like to see a dose of transparency about the industry—this is not to threaten commercial confidences in any way, but we need to understand how a lot of these mechanisms work. There is an incumbency at the moment; it is not necessarily just for the future.

The final principle for us, coming back to what the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, said, is that we should never forget that this is a national resource. We are talking about the UK taking back control; this should be a resource that is nationally ours as citizens. We should take care over how it is distributed and looked after.

I will go through a couple of things in the Bill. To come back to something said very well by the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, the objectives at the beginning of this Bill are seriously muddled. There is the sustainability objective, yet most of that is about a socioeconomic objective. I would not be averse to maybe having a separate socioeconomic objective. The sustainability objective must be the prime objective among all the others. We have confusion with eight, potentially nine, objectives, and that is almost impossible. Organisations such as Ofgem in the energy area have a number of objectives that can become confused. We need to indicate which objectives are the most important and which are not. The sustainability objective needs to stand by itself and the rest should be shifted elsewhere.

The socioeconomic aspect is important, but there are other ways to solve that issue other than going for short-term non-sustainability. We can fund fleets—the EU does that—and there are ways in which we can finance people not to fish, if necessary, to protect our national resource. It would not be perfect, but it is a way in which to do it. There have been decommissioning schemes in the past, and one of the main reasons why all fleets have reduced in size is nothing to do with the common fisheries policy specifically but because we are much more efficient in how we operate our fishing vessels. Of course we are. They innovate with larger vessels, larger nets, bigger engines and all the technology that allows them to fish more intelligently. Therefore, fleet sizes are going to come down. The biggest example of that was when sail was replaced by steam. The whole of the south-west fishing fleet halved in a matter of years. It is around technology.

The objective on equal access also concerns me. It sounds reasonable and means effectively that wherever vessels are registered—in Scotland, Wales, England or at a particular port—they can fish where they want. That is my understanding. My concern is because the industry is highly concentrated and wants to concentrate more. It has large returns and big financial resources. The Bill proposes a method by which quotas can be auctioned, tendered or used, but what is to stop additional concentration and for those vessels to come to other parts of the UK and start to take away other stocks that are relied on by other regions? I can imagine a situation whereby there was an auction for a quota in the south-west and Scottish vessel owners said, “Yes, we will try to buy that up”, but the Government said, “No, we want that for the south-west”. Given the current objective, I would say that that situation would be a matter for judicial review and the Government would lose. I am concerned that having a stated objective would be a potential threat to other regions that the mobility is no good for. However, I am not trying to stop that mobility because, in Plymouth, Scottish vessels are important for a lot of the fish processing. I am just concerned about having equal access as an objective.

Another issue in the Bill is the stock management plans, which, as proposed, are a fiction. As we know, some 80% of our precious stocks swim outside our EEZ, and quite a few of the spawning grounds for those stocks are also outside it. It is therefore impossible to have a credible fisheries plan—the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, mentioned this—just for one’s own territorial waters. That does not work around the United Kingdom. I should be interested to hear from the Minister what will happen to what has been the relatively successful regional management of the common fisheries policy, with agreements on regimes for the North Sea and the western waters. Will we try to continue those? We must try to make them work first before we go down the route of national plans, which need to be produced as a result of the overall plans in those fishery areas. Otherwise, the national plans cannot work and I do not see that sequence provided for in the Bill.

Another issue is data, which has been mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Byford. There must be more transparency within producer organisations. They effectively run the business and sort out quota, which has huge value, but they are pretty opaque organisations. There should be a public duty to have much more transparency in their actions, allocations and how they are run. A lot of that is there to some degree already, but it would be a lot healthier for what is a national resource if there was more transparency.

I am delighted that the landing obligation remains in the Bill and that the Government still see it as important. However, as has been said in previous debates and mentioned by a number of Members, if the landing obligation is to remain, we must have remote electronic monitoring. One cannot have non-discarding regimes that work without it. That obviously needs to apply also to foreign vessels that come into our waters. As has been stated by, I think, the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, there also must be a way in which we can access the data from foreign vessels that land abroad in order to have joint management.

The Bill is necessary. The marine environment is under pressure. Fisheries must become sustainable, not just in the long term but in the short term—and that is possible. The noble Viscount, Lord Hanworth, who is a valuable member of the committee that looked at this area, was right to say that maximum sustainable yield may not be the right measure and is something that must be looked at. That area gets complicated.

The Bill is needed, but we must put that painting that the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, talked about into the picture frame before the legislation leaves this House. Understandably, a lot of downstream regulation in terms of technical measures and so on has to be done by secondary legislation. However, we have to get the Bill right. I am not sure about banning foreign landings by UK vessels. I have talked to the industry about that and it takes away part of their commercial ability. Now that we will have the friction of phytosanitary controls on land borders—although they will still be in operation at ports—such a ban would make it even more difficult to keep our markets open in the European Union. It is an interesting concept, however.

The Bill is important. We agree on a number of areas, particularly on the landing obligations and on getting the objectives right, and we very much look forward to Committee.

Direct Payments to Farmers (Legislative Continuity) Bill

Lord Teverson Excerpts

3rd reading & 2nd reading & Committee negatived & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords & 3rd reading (Hansard): House of Lords & Committee negatived (Hansard): House of Lords & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 3rd reading (Hansard) & Committee negatived (Hansard)
Wednesday 29th January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I confess to having a roughly 4 acre field for which I get no subsidy whatever, except for an electricity pole for which I get about £200 a year—maybe less than that. I am also a co-chair of the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Local Nature Partnership.

I will approach this in a slightly different way. I support this Bill, which is a sort of sticking plaster between now and 12 months’ time. It is quite delicious to me, in a way, to see the Conservative Front Bench going out strongly for state aid for a particular sector—something that normally the Conservative Party would not necessarily associate itself with. I know that this is a money Bill, so we will, quite rightly, not have much influence over it, as it is the other end’s business. We say that perhaps rather glibly as the Bill goes through, but this is big bucks—it is a lot of money. We put state aid into this industry of between £3 billion and £4 billion a year. That is quite a bit of money. In fact, if you look at it per household in the United Kingdom, every household contributes about £120 to the agricultural industry. That is just a little less than the TV licence fee, for instance. I guess that the 1.6 million people who use food banks might find it quite ironic that, on average, as a household they also pay £120 towards the food production sector in this country. That may well be necessary, and I will not argue against it here, but we should be aware of that, because that money can be used for other things as well, and increasingly will be, we are promised, over the next eight years.

I must admit that I am particularly impressed by the noble Lord, Lord Bew, who has somehow managed to persuade the Treasury, almost it seems without any argument, to add about a quarter of a billion pounds to this. That is excellent—perhaps we could find a way to do that with other sectors. I would like to have a masterclass from him afterwards on how he managed to achieve that.

The noble Earl, Lord Devon, in his excellent speech, talked about trying to get more certainty in this area. In fact, he mentioned that one good thing about the common agricultural policy, with all its faults, was that there was predictability. However, I should remind the House that, at the moment, the EU Commission is going through a major reform of the common agricultural policy which is in fact so fundamental that it has had to postpone it for one year. That has two strands: one is semi-renationalisation of agricultural policy, and the other is that some 25% of the EU budget, of which agriculture is a major part, will be dedicated to the climate change challenge. Ironically, therefore, even if we had stayed in the European Union, which clearly we will not, some of these issues regarding our agricultural sector would have come anyway, and maybe the Government could have come up with some of the same solutions that they are coming up with now. However, I am concerned that that uncertainty will be extended over some seven years—in fact you have to add this year on as well, so there will be eight years of transition to the next form of final implementation of the new system regarding payments for public good.

Actually, I want to praise Michael Gove as Secretary of State in Defra for changing the agenda here in a forthright, brave and courageous way to make a radical change in how this works. I regret that he will no longer be the custodian of the 25-year environmental plan, of which this effectively is a key part, because there is public expenditure here on a big scale, and a way to do it.

I was quite surprised that the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, did not mention that we have a biodiversity crisis in this country at the moment. If you look at the State of Nature 2019 report, which came out at the end of last year, you will see a list of all the species, particularly in rural areas, which are heavily challenged and the numbers of which have decreased since 1970. That is urgent, yet we have an eight-year transition period until we put in a scheme that has some hope of reversing that biodiversity challenge. I say to the Minister that, both on getting more certainty for the sector, as the noble Earl said, and on our environmental challenges, surely we can start to make that transition shorter. We had a debate on the landing obligation for fisheries—the Minister did not answer it, but he was there—and, although that was a European and partly British issue, we know that you tend to wait for deadlines to happen before you get round to doing something about them. I think that eight years is too lazy; it risks leaving those major reforms to the last few years, which to a large degree it already does. So let us bring it forward.

Of course, the real challenge to the sector is not this one. The destabilising factor is not the funding mechanism; it is international trade. Let us be under no misapprehension whatever that, with the United States, with Canada—which has refused to do a rollover deal with the United Kingdom on its EU agreement—with South America and with Australasia, the key asks for those trade deals will be on agricultural entry to the UK market. How that is done is down to how good we are at negotiating as a country with those other nations. I hope and pray that we will be very good at doing that, but the uncertainty about those trade deals, how they will be interpreted and who has power—that power equation—will be unknown for some time.

I want to ask the Minister a couple of questions. As he is probably aware, in the Northern Ireland protocol under the withdrawal agreement, Article 11 states—clearly for once; it is a pretty unclear document otherwise—

“consistent with the arrangements set out in Articles 5 to 10, and in … respect of Union law”—

that is, European Union law—

“this Protocol shall be implemented and applied so as to maintain the necessary conditions for continued North-South cooperation, including in the areas of environment, health, agriculture”.

Under the state aid provision in Article 10, it states:

“The provisions of Union law”—


that is, again, European law—

“listed in Annex 5 to this Protocol shall apply to the United Kingdom, including with regard to measures supporting the production of and trade in agricultural products in Northern Ireland”.

Will this and future state aid to the agricultural sector be constrained by that Northern Ireland protocol?

My other question is this. Previous speakers have mentioned the Rural Payments Agency. The RPA has done a lot better on Pillar 1 payments. We are never confident about it, given its history, but what concerns me is that, as my noble friend Lady Bakewell pointed out very well, the current delay relates to Pillar 2. Effectively, the future support mechanism will be a Pillar 2-type process. How that is managed, enforced and communicated will be very complex. I wonder whether Defra has taken into account how much of the capacity of the RPA will be needed under the future regime.

My last question is this. A fundamental change that has not been mentioned in this debate is that at the moment, under the CAP, the money comes from Brussels a year later, as we heard, to cover the cost of the CAP paid out by the UK Government. That changes. This will now be an integral part of Defra’s budget. Given the fact that it is quite difficult to predict payments, there will be a difference from what has been budgeted for in government expenditure—Defra expenditure in particular—at the end of the year. If it is 10% of £3.5 billion, that is quite a bit of money. Will that be taken off Defra’s budget if it has under-budgeted or, if it goes over, will it be sent straight back to the Treasury? I know that in the past Defra has often suffered from Treasury cuts, and I am concerned that, if it gets its budgeting wrong, other essential services it provides will be prejudiced by the fact that the Treasury will be very unhelpful at the time.

Fisheries: EU Landing Obligation (European Union Committee Report)

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Thursday 23rd January 2020 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Teverson]

That this House takes note of the Report from the European Union Committee Fisheries: implementation and enforcement of the EU landing obligation (26th Report, Session 2017–19, HL Paper 276).

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, perhaps I may say to those Members who are about to leave the Chamber that fisheries is going to be a big issue over the next 11 months, so do not miss this chance to educate yourselves.

I will speak to both of our reports, but before I start I want to make clear that, although parts of the committee’s report may be critical not just of the industry but of the sector, we should recognise that fisheries is one of the toughest and most dangerous professions, so we should have this debate in that context. I also welcome the Minister, in his continued role, in this House, and I welcome the fact that he will be replying to the debate on behalf of the Government. I look forward to his speech.

I shall go through one or two facts about the landing obligation or, as we know it in common parlance, the discarding ban, although the fishing industry itself would argue that the two things are rather different. However, most people can think of it as being pretty much the same thing.

In 2013, when legislation in the European Union on the landing obligation came into force, the estimated amount of discarding by European fleets was running at 1.7 million tonnes of fish in that year. That is not just a biodiversity challenge; it is obviously an obscenity in terms of food waste. Of course, for some people who do not know much about this subject—and why should they?—returning fish to the ocean because the vessels do not have a quota for them might sound quite benevolent, but in fact the vast majority of those fish are unable to survive.

Why are these reports, the first of which was published in the middle of last year, still important? It is because this is a challenge for the European Union fleet as a whole and will continue to be relevant once we become an independent coastal state. No doubt one of the questions that will be asked is whether it is still the Government’s policy to have a landing obligation once we have “control of our own waters”. Confirmation of that would be useful, although I know that the Government have been quite strongly supportive of the landing obligation since it was introduced.

I shall give a timeline on how the legislation has been working. It was passed in 2013, much of it as a result of pressure generated in the United Kingdom by celebrity chefs and British NGOs. It was implemented over a four-year period, meaning that it was gradually introduced. It was a major culture change for the fishing industry, so it was sensible to introduce it gradually to cover different classes of fish and stocks over the period. It was finally implemented in total on 1 January 2019, after that long period of preparation— six years overall—since the legislation was agreed.

For our second report, the committee wanted to understand how the discarding ban or landing obligation had fared. The answer was not something good or anything that could be welcomed. What became quite clear from the stories we heard in the evidence, some of which I will go through, is that in reality, if I can be harsh enough to put it this way, the fishing industry itself has carried on as it was, the regulators have been gentle in terms of trying to enforce the discard ban but have not had the tools to be able to do so, and member states have effectively turned a blind eye to what has been happening. We still have that great challenge there.

What is the evidence for that? First, we should have had a lot more undersized fish landed. Half way through 2019, the total tonnage of undersized fish landed in the UK was 85 tonnes. Noble Lords might think that sounds small, but, interestingly, even more was landed—almost four times as much—the year before, so that had actually gone down.

Secondly, there were very few facilities in the ports in reality. One of the big issues is around choke, which is when a vessel in a mixed fishery—very relevant to United Kingdom fisheries—runs out of quota for a species and therefore has to stop fishing altogether. That is one of the problems of the landing obligation, which no doubt many speakers will talk about. But, to the end of 2019, I do not think there was any sign at all of any choke arising and fleets having to stop fishing because of that.

Thirdly, another area that should be an indicator of problems, with the landing obligation coming into operation and fear of the choke, is that quota swaps would stop happening, because fish quota owners would not wish to lose the opportunity to carry on fishing. Yet the information from Defra is very much that the level of swaps continued.

It is not only the fact that this is not happening out there on the high seas; there are also particular dangers. First, a disregard of legislation and the law is clearly not a good thing generally and is a bad culture in any industry. Secondly, quotas were increased to take account of the fact that fish would be landed rather than thrown away. Those quotas have gone up, but the way in which people have acted has not changed, so we have the real issue of greater overfishing.

What are the challenges here? First, there is enforcement; this is always difficult on the high seas and in territorial waters. Fishing is a secretive industry in many ways; people do not want to say where those resources are. There is culture; this is a major change in the way the fishing industry works, and all industries find it difficult to change quickly. Also, there are not the tools to do the job. The stark fact is that it has been proven in other areas—New Zealand, British Columbia, parts of the United States and other parts of the world—that you need remote electronic monitoring, effectively closed circuit TV, to be able to do this. The technology has been tested, works and is getting much less expensive. The other area of challenges is exemptions. If you have too many exemptions, the whole system starts to fail—and those have been increased recently. I suppose there is also the experience of two other nations, Iceland and Norway. It is said that it took some 20 years for Iceland in particular to adjust to its landing obligations. No one is saying that this is easy.

This is relevant because these whole issues will remain post Brexit, when we have control over our independent waters. My questions to the Government that arise from this report are: will it remain government policy to keep the landing obligation? I looked through the Conservative manifesto, which says a number of good things about fisheries, but I did not see a specific commitment to this. If you really want to stop discarding, you need remote electronic monitoring technology. Will the Government bite the bullet, however difficult that is, and eventually—hopefully in the medium term—introduce this technology? If so, will they also then insist that non-UK vessels coming into UK waters also have that technology? Also, when will the fisheries Bill—which I understand might be introduced to this House—actually arrive, so that we can see and start to really look at legislation on these issues?

What is quite clear is that the discard ban is the right policy. Discarding however many million tonnes of food is clearly wrong commercially, ecologically and morally, so I support the Government entirely in what I hope is their intention to keep this policy. But we have to make sure that we have a way to implement it. I beg to move.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Teverson]

My Lords, I congratulate the Minister on his response, especially because I do not think that he is even going to have this as part of his portfolio in the future. I hope he will remain very involved in this issue because clearly, in terms of biodiversity and all the other areas, the marine environment—as has been said, particularly by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett—is extremely important. I am sure that the House recognises his great expertise and his track record in environmentalism from the anthropological side—in his early days of travel abroad—right the way through to his editorship of The Ecologist. He hugely boosted its readership at the time, although latterly it became difficult for it to survive due to the change in the way the media works.

Furthermore, an MP standing down from Parliament on principle to cause a by-election is something that is not often done. It was courageous; it may not have paid off absolutely immediately, but it did two years later. I think that the House recognises both his courage and his commitment to this area.

On the report, he may well have had, as he suggested, instructions on how Ministers respond in the House of Lords and been educated on how to perform today. There is also a rule for committee chairs introducing reports such as these: when you sum up, you should be as brief as possible, especially when there is a debate coming up with 30 more speakers and it is the last business of the House on a Thursday. So I am just going to thank all those who have contributed, particularly those who are not members of the committee. I also want to thank our excellent committee clerk, Jennifer Mills, and our administrator, Jodie Evans, for their work. This is a really important subject and I think it is recognised that it will certainly be a key issue during the negotiations with the European Union. We will no doubt come back to this subject.

Motion agreed.

Trade Policy: Environmental Aspects

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Thursday 23rd January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

We will obviously want to retain all our environmental standards—our food safety and other standards—both in our own production and in that coming via imports, because we want to be one of the world-leading countries with a successful green economy. Clearly, we will not compromise on those standards in our trade negotiations.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, the Minister will be very aware of biosecurity—I welcome his work in this area—the absence of which could be one of the greatest threats to our environment and our future biodiversity. One area of concern is ballast water for ships on international trade. In 2017, the International Maritime Organization greatly tightened up the regulations governing ballast water, yet I understand that the Department for Transport has not put any resource into implementing that decision. Will the Minister have a word with his DfT colleagues and make sure that this happens?

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

The noble Lord hits on an important part of what we need to do. We are working on this; I have already had discussions with the Department for Transport, and I will continue to do so. We are very clear about the importance of this issue. One of the chief areas I am concerned about is invasive species, which is one of the key five environmental problems. What the noble Lord has said is extremely helpful.

Office for Environmental Protection

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Monday 20th January 2020 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Teverson]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government when the Office for Environmental Protection will become (1) operational, and (2) take on its full statutory powers and responsibilities.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Gardiner of Kimble) (Con)]

My Lords, we plan for the OEP to be operational from 1 January 2021, at which point it will begin to perform its full statutory powers and responsibilities. It will therefore be operational from the day that the UK leaves the oversight of the EU institutions, at the end of the implementation period. The OEP will be ready to receive complaints from day one.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister, and welcome that announcement and that reassurance. The Minister will also be aware that Defra, where this body probably will lie, keeps very close to its executive agencies and its non-departmental public bodies. In fact, it calls them “the Defra family.” How will he ensure that, if it is part of that family, the office will remain entirely independent and fearless in carrying out its statutory duties?

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

The noble Lord is right: independence is key. The environment Bill will state that the OEP will be operational independent of Defra. Ministers will not be able to set its programme of activity or influence its decision-making. It will be accountable to Parliament through a sponsoring Minister. We intend the chair to be subject to a pre-appointment scrutiny hearing. Ministerial appointments will be regulated by the Commissioner for Public Appointments. It is important that the OEP is independent. It will be.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

Yes, I asked rather the same question of officials, if I may say so. The OEP must lay its annual statement of accounts before Parliament, including an assessment of whether it has been provided with sufficient funds to carry out its functions. Clearly, we want to get the OEP set up and we need to establish a board and a chair before it becomes operational. We will have to see. As I say, I used the figure of 60 to 120 people. It may be 100. We are not setting a distinct figure. What we want is for the job to be done properly.

[Lord Teverson]

My Lords, it is well known to the Minister that perhaps one of the greatest reasons for the Government taking notice of the Commission and its powers and beyond is that the Commission is able to fine Governments who do not comply as an ultimate sanction. Will the OEP have that power over the United Kingdom Government?

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, the distinction is that under the EU arrangements the Commission may bring legal proceedings against a member state Government only. Under our domestic legal arrangements, we believe that fines would simply move money around the domestic public finance system. Indeed, fines may also shift resources away from their intended use in implementing measures to protect the environment. The key point is that if a public authority failed to comply with a court order, the OEP would be able to bring contempt of court proceedings, which could lead in turn to fines being imposed.

Common Fisheries Policy and Animals (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Wednesday 30th October 2019 Grand Committee

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the Minister for his explanation, although I was disappointed in that he pointed out that there will be greater opportunity for scrutiny in future, as I assure him that my colleagues on the EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee, including the noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, scrutinise very carefully all the Explanatory Memorandums and everything else that comes through the department as does, I am sure, my colleague in the European Parliament, Mr Chris Davies, who is chair of the Fisheries Committee there. The scrutiny might be different, but it will be, I hope, as good as what we do at the moment.

That brings me to one of the items that we looked at in our committee meeting this morning, although it might seem slightly irrelevant: the Council regulation on fish stocks in the Baltic Sea, an area of European waters that has particular issues. I was interested in a comment made by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, on the previous SI about dates, because that Explanatory Memorandum said that the UK is leaving the EU whatever the circumstances on 31 October 2019. I am not making a point on that. My serious point is that I note from the Explanatory Memorandum that this SI is necessary partly because the date of 29 March is no longer applicable. I would like reassurance that whatever date we leave—if we leave—we will not have to go through this process again; for example, if the date moves from 31 January to, say, 14 January, because Brexit gets sorted out earlier. Is this SI now robust in respect of dates?

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson. He struck a key point in relation to the office of environmental protection, which was in the draft environment Bill but was, to a degree, amended to become more robust in the Environment Bill that will now be lost with the Dissolution of Parliament. Will the Minister confirm two things? First, when that body is established, will it include the marine area? I am almost certain that it will because the Bill mentions waters and so on, but I would like to understand that more clearly. Will the responsibility of the OEP extend to the territorial waters, the EEZ line, or, indeed, to wherever British fishing vessels fish, even in international waters? More importantly—this is exactly the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson—how long are we likely to have to wait until that body is established and what will happen in the meantime? How will we make sure that the decisions made post-Brexit by Defra are enforced and that, exactly as the noble Baroness said, Defra is not just marking its own homework.

It seems to me that our marine environment is as important as our terrestrial environment. On that theme, as the Minister will know, there is an overall target for all stocks in the common fisheries policy to be sustainable in terms of MSY by 2020. That is next year, and the rest of those stocks will be agreed, with scientific advice, in December this year. One of the cod stocks in the Baltic Sea is not at a sustainable level, so this principle has already been broken. If that is true for some of our own stocks in the North Sea and the western waters, will Defra actually change the stocks post Brexit—if that happens—to a sustainable level in the waters over which we have control, thus at least maintaining the government policy, as I understand it, to retain sustainability not just within a CFP context but in our own waters?

Another area mentioned by the Minister, which is in the Explanatory Memorandum, is regional management fisheries organisations beyond territorial waters and EEZs. Through the EU, we were signatories to a number of them, and I know that we are trying to rejoin a number of them, including the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission. The most important one is the North East Atlantic Fisheries Commission, an important if imperfect conservation organisation. Have we now joined it? Are we a member of that organisation so that we can participate in its actions?

As the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, said, enforcement is key to this. I entirely accept that the Government wish the landing obligation to remain, so that the discard ban will continue and will be enforced post Brexit. However, and I understand the questions here, traditional control methods do not work to stop discarding. Just having a fleet of vessels that plod around inspecting other vessels does not really work in terms of the landing obligation. I would be very interested to understand the Government’s position on this and whether they have started to move on remote electronic monitoring, which is the only tool in the box that really works for this challenge.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his introduction to this SI and for organising a helpful briefing beforehand. I also thank all noble Lords who have contributed to this discussion.

At the outset I will say something about the overall content of this SI. I find it amazing that an SI dealing primarily with amendments to the common fisheries legislation also has buried away in it amendments to the transport of animals regulations. This is particularly irritating as we dealt this afternoon with a separate SI on animal welfare; it would have made much more sense to have included these amendments in that.

It is even more concerning since the Minister of State, George Eustice, stated in the other place that the Government had no intention of consolidating these SIs into a meaningful piece of legislation, which would have made more sense for those working in the sector and abiding by the rules. So do the Minister’s civil servants consult before issuing what seem to be random pieces of legislation that do not bear any connection? Does he agree that this is not the best way to go about making legislation that could be on the statute book for some time before being superseded by new primary legislation? While we are on the subject of primary legislation, can the Minister shed some light on when the fisheries Bill is likely to see the light of day? It might address some of the issues raised this afternoon.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Teverson]

I have a caveat. I fully welcome the extra resources that the MMO has and the fact that the Navy is doing that. The Navy has been largely absent from monitoring recently, because it has been dealing with other border security issues. However, the difficulty is that that budget is mainly financed from the Brexit process. Many of us do not have a lot of faith given the fact that, as the Minister will know, Defra is always on the front line regarding budget cuts, and once we get through Brexit—if indeed we do— frankly, those extra budgets will disappear and we will be back to where we are, with all the enforcement challenges that we had prior to that. I am not asking the Minister for a reply but warning him, in case he stays in office.

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe]

I am not sure that I am allowed to comment, but I was rather reassured by the list that that my noble friend read out and the fact that the Navy will now be more involved—as indeed it used to be historically, before Defra experienced cuts. It feels as though fisheries, if we get Brexit, will become a more important national asset, which will therefore justify the expenditure. I hope that that will be respected by Ministers when they come to look at these budgets.

Peatlands: Commercial Exploitation

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Monday 9th September 2019 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Teverson]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to end the commercial exploitation of peatlands.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Gardiner of Kimble) (Con)]

My Lords, we have taken action to tackle domestic extraction of peat. The National Planning Policy Framework, published in 2012, ended the granting of new licences for peat extraction. We continue to focus on reducing demand for peat in horticulture in England, and on the uptake of alternatives. We are investing in research to overcome barriers to peat replacement. The forthcoming England peat strategy will set out our approach to speeding up progress.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I welcome some progress in this area, but the Minister will know that our peatlands hold the equivalent, or a carbon sink, of something like 20 years of industrial emissions. Although I welcome things such as the peat restoration programme, surely it is better that they are not destroyed in the first place than that they need to be reconstituted? The voluntary process for reducing the commercial use of peat is not meeting its target, so when are we going to have mandatory targets that end the use of peat for commercial reasons?

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, I sympathise with all that the noble Lord has said. That is why we are working on recovery plans. Amateur gardeners account for two-thirds of the peat being used. We have to reduce our use of peat and go for peat-free products. I read of one that incorporates wool and bracken, for instance. We are working with industry; I am very pleased that Kingfisher, one of the big retailers, is moving towards peat-free compost. That is how we must all proceed in reducing the use of peat and restoring what we have. It is vital to our environment.

Brexit: Plant and Animal Biosecurity

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Wednesday 15th May 2019 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Teverson]

To move that this House takes note of the Report from the European Union Committee Brexit: plant and animal biosecurity (21st Report, HL Paper 191).

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, it is very appropriate that this debate should follow one on defence and security because it has exactly the same theme, except that the bugs are not cyber bugs but actual ones, since those still exist. It is also appropriate because I understand that this week is Invasive Species Week; the first such week took place in 2015. I know that the Minister, who is very involved in this sector, has also been involved in a number of other initiatives. The other reason this debate comes at exactly the right time is the publication of the report by the intergovernmental committee on biodiversity and ecosystems, which laid out how the numbers of species within the ecology across the globe were threatened. One thing it highlighted, which was perhaps not publicised quite so strongly in the press, was that alien and invasive species are a severe threat to biodiversity across the globe—including Europe, obviously, and our own country. That is why this subject is so important.

Also, to reflect some of the comments in the previous debate, if Brexit happens, although we will be leaving the European Union, we will not be leaving the European biosphere. We share its marine and aerial environments, and we are only 22 miles away from its terrestrial environment. The question to which my committee particularly wanted to find an answer was whether, post Brexit, our ecology will be as protected on invasive species and biosecurity as it was during our membership of the European Union. Can we even improve on the situation that we have at the moment?

The threat is very real. I am sure that all of us will remember the foot and mouth outbreak back in the early 2000s. That cost the country some £8 billion, but in some ways that was nothing compared to the effect it had on farming communities and rural communities throughout the kingdom. We know that we now have ash dieback disease; a recent report from Oxford University suggests that the total cost of that disease will be some £15 billion over 100 years, half of that—£7.5 billion—coming over the next 10 years. These threats are real and they are about real organisms. There is the Asian hornet and the American skunk cabbage, which I am sure the Minister will talk to us more about later, although I had never heard of it before. It is also about oak disease and a number of other threats to our ecology at this moment.

We are not only a part of the European biosphere but absolutely integrated into the systems of the European Union in this area of national security and defence. Let me remind Members of four of those systems: the animal disease notification system; the alien species notification system; the rapid alert system for food and feed; and, lastly, the plant health interception system. While I very much welcome the Government’s response—they wanted to remain a part of those systems—one of my first questions to the Minister is: has that bid progressed in any way? Are we at all confident that we will be able to participate in those systems, and if there is no deal in place do we have alternative systems? Most importantly, I am aware that, through those systems and that shared intelligence among the communities of scientists and researchers in those areas, we have advance warning of these organisms approaching us across the continent. We are able to prepare and plan for those potential invasions. How will we be able to continue having those connections and those sorts of systems once we are outside the European Union?

On day-to-day issues, the IT system called TRACES is absolutely fundamental in tracking the progress of trade between European Union member states of animal and plant products. We have had assurances from the Government that we now have an alternative to that system. Has it been truly tested yet? Will it be able to integrate with the TRACES system, allowing us at least to approach on the phytosanitary side the frictionless trade that will be so important between us and Europe on food and animal products in future? Those are clearly key issues.

Other issues that came out of the report are, first, around trade. I have mentioned EU-UK trade, which is very important for the farming industry in this country, but will we be able to have the systems that we will need to cope in the future? It particularly concerns me that the Government are clear in making the point that from day one, when we leave the Union or end the transition period, we will have exactly the same list of potential threats to biosecurity. We will have the same lists as parts of those systems but, clearly, they are likely to diverge quite significantly over the first one to three years. How will we deal with frictionless trade at the point when we have that divergence on scientific advice? Will we instead ensure alignment well into the future?

The greatest concern is about new trade deals. We often talk about America and the great leverage it would have on a trade deal with us. On the details of that trade deal, we are far from confident that environmental and biosecurity issues will be at the top of that list. Will they be a sine qua non, without which we will not do that deal? Can the Minister assure us that that is still the case? We know that even with China, there are huge issues with food quality. A lot of the problems with invasive issues in foodstuffs have been to do with Chinese products, as is a lot of the protection. Again, there is huge leverage there so, as a nation, will we be so concerned about having those trade deals post Brexit that we will not pay sufficient attention to those areas?

I come on to resources. We know that Defra has in the past been under huge constraints and reductions in funding. We know that large resources have been taken in there for Brexit planning. Will they remain there to ensure our biosecurity well into the future, rather than just on Brexit day one?

I come back to a theme that my committee has often talked about and taken evidence on: the veterinary profession. On the front line of industrial veterinary work, something like 95% of staff are EU citizens. The committee went to the London Gateway port two weeks ago, where we met the veterinary team on the front line. Of that team of eight, the lead and six others were Spanish, and one was Italian. There is a real issue about keeping those people here. Most of them will earn less than £30,000 and, under the present government proposals, they will not be able to enter the system.

Our research laboratories are the pride of the country; we are the European Union experts on foot and mouth disease, bluetongue disease and many others. We have access to the rest of that network of research laboratories, with all their scientific evidence and expertise. In addition, there is a collegiate feeling among the scientists and researchers in that community. How will we replace the research laboratories that concentrate elsewhere in the EU on other diseases and threats that do not exist here?

On the island of Ireland, the issue is different from the normal one about customs and borders, as bugs know no borders. Can we keep the island of Ireland as a single biological territory in terms of rules, regulations and biodefence? Will that be possible?

I have laid down a long list of challenges. However, we recognise that Brexit will give the United Kingdom the ability to make its own rules and regulations about biosecurity. Witnesses have looked at the very strong rules that New Zealand and Australia have to protect their bio-environment. Does the Minister see what areas of greater protection we might have, taking into consideration that those southern ocean territories are much more isolated from other territories than we are from Europe?

This is sometimes seen as rather a niche subject, yet it is a key part of the defence and security of our nation. There is already a threat and it is costing us £1.7 billion annually to make this defence effective. We are looking to the Government to assure us that once we leave Europe—if we leave Europe—we will have the same defence that we have now.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Teverson]

My Lords, I congratulate the Minister on pronouncing “epidemiological” correctly. I was trying to avoid it and find an alternative all the way through my speech. The committee and I absolutely recognise his dedication to this area. We welcome his taking the responsibility so seriously and the way he has responded to the debate. We look forward to him writing to us as well.

It is the end of the day, so I thank all those who have contributed, including committee members. It is also great to see some recent former members, particularly the noble Lord, Lord Trees. I thank him for all his excellent input on the veterinary side and broader areas during his membership of the committee. I also thank the Deputy Speaker, the noble Viscount, Lord Ullswater, who has presided over the debate and was an important member of the committee until recently. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Browne, and the noble Earl, Lord—

[Noble Lords]

Caithness.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Teverson]

I know the noble Earl so well by his forename that I sometimes forget his title. He regularly contributes to these events. As others have, I thank Alexandra McMillan and Jennifer Mills, the clerking team for this committee. They have been absolutely excellent.

I sum up by saying that I welcome everybody’s concentration in bringing this matter to the fore, but it will get more difficult to contain, not just, as the noble Lord, Lord Trees, said, because of increasing global trade, but because of climate change and the proliferation of personal travel. Yet it is so important that it is contained. I am positive about the way the debate is being taken seriously and has been responded to by the Government. I thank the Minister for that. I beg to move.

Motion agreed.