REACH etc. (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Tuesday 26th March 2019 Lords Chamber

My amendment regrets this duplication and requires the Government to make sure they do what they have said they will do in other contingencies and make participation in the ECHA a negotiating goal. That goal should be there for a no-deal situation, as well as any other situation. We are going down the wrong road by spending money, resources and time on seeking to establish a completely replicate system in the UK.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I have tabled an amendment to this Motion, and speak very much as the chair of your Lordships’ EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee. We deal with Defra issues. We issued a report on Brexit and the chemicals industry which has not yet been debated on the Floor of the House, so that is why I want to bring up some of these issues here.

I will give a little background about the chemicals industry, because it is key to this debate. It is the second-largest manufacturing industry in the UK, after food processing. It has a total gross value added of something like £12 billion. It is extremely dependent on trade: some 60% of its output goes to the EU and some 80% of our chemicals imports come from there. It employs half a million people. Not just the chemicals industry but a huge proportion of industries in this country use chemicals in their supply chains. Therefore, it is not just the chemicals industry that is affected by this but all those other businesses that use chemicals in their processes, particularly those that are downstream in the manufacturing process. They do not import, export or manufacture chemicals themselves but they use them, so they are affected by the REACH regulations.

I will be more critical than I usually am, as chair of the committee. The committee found—and felt very strongly, if I am honest—that Defra was not on the front foot on this issue. Understandably, Defra focuses on agriculture, fisheries, flooding and stuff looked at by the Environment Agency; the EA obviously has a role in this. When we had Ministers and senior department officials in front of us, we felt very strongly that they did not understand the gravity, timescale and effect on industry of coming out of REACH. That is not the case now, but perhaps this SI is an example of trying to catch up and lay a statutory instrument that is sufficient for the industry’s needs, but not being able to do that quickly enough.

I will talk a little about the European Chemicals Agency. To give your Lordships an idea, it has 500 staff, a budget of around £100 million, and 21,000 registered substances, of which only about 5,000 are registered by UK companies and organisations. That is a serious operation. What I want to come back to is that all of its functions will now have to be replicated in the United Kingdom. That is essential after Brexit. There will still be 21,000 chemicals that the UK will want to use, which will have to be authorised, recorded and checked up on, to make sure that the regulations are applied.

The committee very much welcomed the Prime Minister’s view that we should remain part of the European Chemicals Agency. We agreed with that very strongly. But of course that is not possible if we are not in the single market or a member of the EU or EEA. That is just not on offer. We asked many times what the Government have managed to negotiate further with the EU on this. They are not able to, because the EU will not do that. It is not in the Government’s power to arrange that pre-Brexit, unfortunately. That is the situation: we cannot be part of the chemicals agency and the REACH regime if we are not part of the single market.

The committee was also struck by the absolute unanimity of the whole industry, NGOs and the scientific community—far more than on any other subject we have looked at, whether fisheries, biosecurity or food supplies—that we should try still to be part of the European Chemicals Agency; or, if not, we should have total alignment with its decisions, however we manage to do that.

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The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, referred to the gross value added. I add that 95,000 jobs were recorded as directly relying on this sector in 2017. Perhaps what is not widely known is that, of the 2,800 chemical businesses, 97.5% are either small and medium-sized businesses or micro-businesses. I think noble Lords are united in being aware of the consequences of our leaving the European Union for that category of SME and micro-business: this sector is especially important in that regard.

[Lord Teverson]

I absolutely endorse that: we often think of this industry as dominated by large corporates and internationals; it is not. There is a huge SME sector which is just as important in this.

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering]

I am most grateful.

In paragraph 17 of the 15th report the department is recorded as replying to one of the concerns thus:

“Should it become clear that we are in a ‘no deal’ scenario, staffing levels will be scaled up as required over a period of several years, allowing time for recruitment and training”.


The question has to be asked: as we are on the eve of a potential no deal, what is the position now and how far advanced are we with the scaling up? Are the officials coming from the industry and from other departments? What certainty can we have that the officials who are being asked to prepare for exit day under no deal are in place and have the knowledge in this regard?

My heart sank when my noble friend said that the dedicated IT system had been tried and tested and was ready to go. Successive Governments have found themselves in an embarrassing situation where we have a new, swanky IT system in place, it has been tried and tested and is ready to go, but it has proved to fail. I think the two examples I am going to choose actually reflect badly on my own Government. One relates to the Rural Payments Agency, where we not only introduced a new system of farm payments but, at exactly the same time, introduced a new IT system which had been tried and tested—and failed. The other IT system that caused great distress throughout the country was rolled out by the Child Support Agency. Again, we had a new IT system that had been tried and tested and proceeded to fail, with devastating consequences for families across the country. I hope that my noble friend will be proved right that this IT system is indeed ready to go.

At paragraph 27 of its 15th report, the committee raises concern about the possibility of failure and disruption:

“We remain concerned … that there may be disruption to the UK chemical industry, supply chains and wider economy as a result of new requirements to register chemicals from the EU after exit”.


That is certainly something noble Lords would wish to be satisfied on this afternoon.

My final point is that the House is incredibly grateful to Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Sub-Committee B for its work in preparing us for this debate on a very important SI.

I am rather concerned that the noble Lord, Lord Fox, might be at my dinner. We were at breakfast together this morning, as indeed was my noble friend Lady Byford and a number of others. We are now together—almost—post-lunch. I pray that we might be at dinner together this evening, but perhaps we might both have a reprieve. He mentioned the need for reassurance about ongoing consultation, and that all the groups are united. It is quite a challenge to unite such disparate groups as the Green Alliance and the broader environmental groups, the health companies, the animal rights charities and indeed the chemical industry. I conclude by asking my noble friend to give the House an assurance that the consultations are indeed ongoing and will continue throughout any transitional period.

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Tabled by

[Lord Teverson]

At the end insert “but this House regrets that the draft Regulations do not address concerns raised by the European Union Committee in their report Brexit: chemical regulation, published on 7 November 2018, about Her Majesty’s Government’s plans for chemical regulation after the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union.”

Relevant document: 23rd Report from the European Union Committee

Amendment to the Motion not moved.

Motion, as amended, agreed.

Rural Development (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Wednesday 13th March 2019 Grand Committee

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak to the first two of these four statutory instruments that are being taken together. I thank the Minister and his officials for their very helpful briefing session on what is, as the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, has already indicated, a very complex subject.

The European agricultural fund for rural development provides rural development programmes which run under the multiannual financial framework. This SI allows funded programmes to run allegedly unhindered after exit date, until their natural end in 2020.

Annexe 2 of the Explanatory Memorandum lists the six legacy regulations affected by the SI, two more in which deficiencies will be remedied and four where the devolved Administrations have had programme amendments approved. This will ensure that structure fund programmes continue to run smoothly. As I understand it, these programmes will continue to report in the same way as previously but will report to the rural development programmes of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, as the relevant devolved Administrations, instead of direct to the EU.

The aim of these SIs is to ensure operability of schemes and the continuity of investment in rural areas, which is the key element for me—it is really important. I wish to ask about the specifics of reporting mechanisms. The EU was very stringent on the information that was required by those who had received structure funds. Being involved with an organisation that had some of their money, I am aware of just how stringent it was. Can the Minister assure us that the UK will get good value for public money? This is especially necessary now that the Exchequer will pick up the funding instead of the EU.

As someone who comes from a rural community, I have a keen interest in the effect of these SIs. Last Friday I took part in a rural conference whose chief aim was to press the Government to produce a rural strategy. The Government have produced an Industrial Strategy which addresses the needs of urban communities and their economy. Now it is time to produce a strategy to address some of the huge disadvantages that rural communities face. These include lack of infrastructure, lack of transport, significantly less pupil funding, lack of affordable housing and poor access to services. I am concerned that the lifeline of rural development funding will be cut off by 2021, to be replaced by a nebulous undertaking that this will in future be covered by the Agriculture Bill.

The Agriculture Bill as published makes some significant changes to the way funding for farming and the environment would take place—as has already been said, public money for public good—but the Bill has become stuck in the Commons after Committee. I am concerned that a large gap in funding for rural areas is opening up before us. As the noble Lord has indicated, Sub-Committee B of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee estimates that the value of EU funds that will need to be replaced is between £400 million and £450 million a year of the European agricultural fund for rural development programmes for the remainder of the period to 2020. The loss of this investment will be keenly felt by many in deep rural areas.

Paragraph 7.3 of the Explanatory Memorandum states:

“After EU Exit, no new rural development programmes will need to be approved and from 2021 new agricultural and environmental schemes will be delivered under the Agricultural Bill”.


The Agriculture Bill will therefore need to be in place by 2021. It should have been in place by the 29th of this month, so that rural communities could plan ahead and have confidence that they were not going to suffer from a severe lack of resources. I know that the Minister understands these issues, but I am not sure the rest of the Government do.

Paragraph 12.1 of the Explanatory Memorandum, under “Impact”, states:

“Beneficiaries will continue to receive rural development funding as before EU exit”.


I am not confident that this will happen and am very concerned about the fate of rural communities.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I first thank and apologise to the Minister for having missed his briefing on Monday; I was election monitoring in west Africa. I left central Guinea-Bissau at the right time and the journey all the way back to Gatwick Airport was perfect until I tried to get the Gatwick Express to Victoria, when it all went wrong and I missed the meeting.

For six years I had the great privilege of being a board member of the Marine Management Organisation, a Defra non-departmental public body. I have had an awful lot to do with structural funding over the years as an MEP, in other roles locally in the south-west and a little bit as part of the MMO. The EMFF recently has been one of the best-delivered structural funds. I am particularly thankful for the good work of the MMO’s finance director, Michelle Willis, under the direction of the chief executive, John Tuckett, who managed to deliver a programme of structural funding pretty well on time and of the right quality, which is unusual in this area.

I know the Minister always likes me to be positive, so I seriously congratulate the Government on one thing in particular—there will be others: in paragraph 6.7 of the Explanatory Memorandum, for the first time ever the Government have used the term “fishers” rather than “fishermen”. I have brought this up before, and the government response on why they used that word was that they consulted with the industry and that is the term it said it wanted to be used. There is something wrong in the way that that logic works. But congratulations on that. My sub-committee’s most recent report on the landing obligation, which I cannot go on to today, also used that terminology, because that is the way that participants in this industry are described in most other English-speaking countries. I hope that that will continue in future.

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[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, I am most grateful for what has been a valuable debate and consideration beyond what are, as we all know, the technical requirements behind why we need to do this. I fully appreciate that many of us have been waiting and wanting to get on with some primary legislation, but that is not in my gift, alas. If it is my privilege to do so, I look forward to taking part in discussions, in the Chamber and beyond, on how we take forward fishing and marine interests and agriculture, and the produce we create in our waters and on our land, which is so important for domestic production and for export.

These instruments ensure that the rural development programmes and the maritime and fisheries operational programmes continue to operate effectively. As I said, the rural development fund is worth some £430 million per year and the maritime and fisheries fund is worth some £32 million per year. I am sure that, at this point, the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, is thinking that that looks like a big gap. It was very generous of him to raise the fact that the fund has been a good custodian of other people’s money.

I will try to give as much detail on this as possible. The Government have guaranteed that any projects funded from the 2014 to 2020 allocations from these funds will be funded for their full lifetime. Whatever is agreed up to 2020, and if thereafter those projects are to be funded, that will be honoured. My noble friend Lady McIntosh opened by asking where the money is coming from. The Treasury allocates to departments. My advice to applicants is that Her Majesty’s Treasury funding is a guaranteed cover of all rural development projects entered into before the end of 2020 for their full lifetime. I encourage those who are minded to think strongly of that Treasury guarantee.

My noble friend raised another point. I have declared my farming interests, and we all would like as much certainty as possible. That is precisely why there is a promise to, as far as is possible—I use those words deliberately, and will seek to clarify that—guarantee the same level of funds until 2022. Some noble Lords will wish completely the reverse, but I have no idea whether this Parliament will go on until 2022, and, as we all know, no Parliament can bind its successors. But this is a promise to the rural community, while this Government are in office and have that responsibility, to honour the level of funds until the end of this Parliament. None of us here is in a position to know precisely when that Parliament may conclude.

My noble friend Lady McIntosh raised the legal basis for reimbursement and the date. It is because the EU is bound by the regulations while they apply to the UK as a member state. Any commitments that the UK has entered into prior to exit are commitments made from the EAFRD. That is the basis, and it was why that was the date in Article 50 and why precisely the Treasury guarantee kicks in for anything after the date of us leaving.

Several noble Lords raised the issue of the link to the Agriculture Bill, including my noble friend Lady McIntosh and the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell. These SIs are made under the withdrawal Act; they allow us to correct deficiencies. The purpose of the Agriculture Bill, for which we are waiting, is obviously to provide the opportunity to redesign our approach to agricultural support, so that if we wish to we can amend retained EU law. Therefore, any amendments that we make are, yes, probably for the short term, and they will probably be to see how we might improve the current arrangements and give better experience to agreement holders.

Under Clause 1 of the Agriculture Bill, the Secretary of State may provide financial support for managing land or water in a way that protects or improves the environment. Of course, as we design our agriculture policy, we will look to see—and this is a point that I would like to put to my noble friend Lady Byford—how we can support bringing together groups who work together in the agricultural sector. Clearly, as we look at how we can enhance the environment and how we deal with landscape, it is with clusters and the concept of catchment areas. I think of Slowing the Flow at Pickering, in regard to my noble friend Lady McIntosh. All this is where working together in schemes is going to be very rewarding in terms of enhancing the environment and producing very good food as well in that context.

To my noble friend Lady Byford, I say that I am delighted that the House of Commons said that we should have a debate on this. My understanding is that future funding is important to rural and marine communities. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, that on 10 December 2018, the Government committed to providing £37.2 million of extra funding for the UK seafood sector for projects approved for 2019 and 2020 to boost the industry as we become an independent coastal state.

On the Agriculture Bill, rural growth, which includes the LEADER scheme, is currently included in the rural development programme and will continue under the government guarantee until the end of the programme period. Beyond that, the expectation is that rural growth initiatives will be supported through the UK’s shared prosperity fund, which is intended to deliver for all parts of the country. Wearing the rural-proofing element, which is a strong one, I say that Defra is working with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to develop the ways in which it will support the rural economy.

Perhaps I can immediately say to the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, on the rural strategy that I was fortunate enough to give evidence with the Secretary of State, and he has said publicly that he was looking forward to the report of our Select Committee and that it might be an occasion to respond. I think he was generously saying, as noble Lords who were in that committee will have heard, that this was something that was raised. I know that he and I will be very much looking forward to the rural economy report whenever it comes out.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, asked for reassurances about reporting. I assure your Lordships that the level of rigour currently applied to ensure that the rural development programme achieves value for money and overall public benefit will continue. Inspections will still take place. Annual implementation reports will continue to be produced and approved programmes can continue to be evaluated administratively by relevant authorities. The National Audit Office will continue to be involved to maintain existing levels of scrutiny and good practice. We have put in place arrangements to ensure that the Commission’s functions are now taken up by each devolved authority or the programme monitoring committee, which is composed of representatives of environmental, rural and agricultural stakeholders, including non-government organisations.

The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, raised the question of EMFF and how new replacement work schemes will work. In the Fisheries Bill, we propose a power to replace, modernise and broaden the existing grant-making powers in the Fisheries Act 1981. This will provide greater flexibility and ensure that new grant schemes can deliver value for money. Fisheries are devolved and once we leave the EU and on the closure of the EMFF grant scheme, devolved Administrations have indicated that they would want to run their own grant schemes targeted on their national priorities.

The noble Lord asked about fishing support after 2020. The Government have committed to replace EMFF from 2021 across the UK for the next two years, as I said. It was announced that that extra EMFF will be available to UK-licensed vessels.

The European Investment Bank was raised by the noble Lords, Lord Grantchester and Lord Teverson. It currently has no involvement in UK rural development programmes or the maritime and fisheries programme. Treasury funding will still be accessible to those seeking it. The impact on agreement holds will therefore be negligible. I am bound to say that the loss of access to the EIB is a result of exit, not as a direct result of the instrument.

[Lord Teverson]

My Lords, may I say that my fishers friends in Mevagissey did not have the European Investment Bank highest on their priorities, but I am glad he clarified that.

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

I thank the noble Lord. I have dealt with the issue of further financial assistance.

The noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, raised areas where different Governments are engaged in regulating the same area. We are working closely with the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy in developing the instruments. The European rural development fund and the European social fund have domestic power to continue making payments following exit. This is not the case for the European agricultural fund for rural development or the European maritime and fisheries fund, which rely on the spending powers in the EU regulations. That shows the distinction. A different approach is therefore necessary to allow funds to continue operating under the Treasury guarantee.

The noble Lord also asked why the provisions do not apply to the European rural, development, social and cohesive funds. They are being addressed in a separate SI by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. That SI and others will be developed in your Lordships’ House on 14 March.

Aquatic Animal Health and Alien Species in Aquaculture (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Wednesday 20th February 2019 Grand Committee

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for bringing this statutory instrument forward. He will be pleased to know that I do not oppose it; I just have a couple of questions. I remind the Committee that I chaired the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee next door for one term of five years.

My noble friend set out very clearly the importance of aquatic health to the whole of the island of Ireland. My question goes to the heart of this. I presume this is a no-deal statutory instrument; is that correct, or is it something that will continue in the event of a deal? I read with great interest of the trade deal that has been made with the Faroe Islands. I have visited those islands. I am very proud of my Danish heritage and that the Faroe Islands used to be a part of Denmark. I was intrigued to see that the United Kingdom is selling £6 million-worth of goods to the Faroe Islands, but importing £200 million of goods from them, most of which is fish, particularly shellfish. I understand that a lot of this is crabs. Will this pose a problem for Northern Ireland? Specifically, is the MSC the body that will continue to check all imports from what will effectively be third countries, including other European Union countries—the remaining 27 members of the European Union—at the point of entry? I should know the answer to this, but making the analogy with the Food Standards Agency in England, I want to ask what the relevant body will be and whether my noble friend shares my concern about ensuring that we maintain the excellent aquatic health that Northern Ireland currently has.

In paragraph 7.5 on page 5 of the Explanatory Memorandum—I think this is repeated in the next statutory instrument as well—I was delighted to see that the Government have very wisely chosen to maintain the equivalent or higher standards set by the World Organisation for Animal Health; I will not say it in French, even though I am quite proud of my French accent. I hope that is something that the Government intend to do going forward; I am sure we will discuss this. I am sure my noble friend agrees that it is absolutely vital that we maintain regulations regarding aquatic health in the EU. This is relevant because these will be third-country imports from the date of our leaving, if we leave with no deal.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, it is always with some sadness that we deal with a Northern Ireland issue, a part of this country that voted remain quite decisively yet is completely unrepresented in the other place. In fact, it is represented by a very extreme party of Brexit. However, we are where we are.

I say to the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, that in my Select Committee this morning we looked at the Faroe Isles FTA and have brought it to the special attention of the House. It would be quite useful to debate it on the Floor of the House, even though it is only our 144th trading partner worldwide.

Farming: Carbon Emissions

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Tuesday 12th February 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, research is essential, whether it is agritech or research into tackling endemic disease, which obviously affects livestock. For instance, we want to deal with bovine viral diarrhoea and salmonella in poultry and pigs. All the research will help us to reduce emissions, whether it is through low-emission fertilisers or whatever. In all that, we need to collaborate strongly.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, just as, in the energy sector, energy efficiency is the best way to reduce emissions, surely in agriculture one of the best ways to reduce emissions is by reducing food waste. What action are the Government taking to reduce the one-third of food waste there is in the supply chain, particularly when in this country we have food banks looking for food, for all the reasons that we know?

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

The noble Lord is absolutely right about another key strand of work, which is reducing the extraordinarily high amount of food waste produced by many households. That is happening with retailers through WRAP and the Courtauld commitment, but we need to change how we conduct ourselves and reduce food waste, because it is highly inefficient unnecessarily to produce food.

Invasive Non-native Species (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, one of the privileges I have in this House is to chair your Lordships’ EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee. We were very grateful to the Minister for giving evidence for the Brexit and biosecurity report we produced, and part of biosecurity is invasive species. One thing that particularly stood out for the committee was the cost of getting it wrong in this area, with the example given of the 2001 outbreak of foot and mouth disease: it cost us some £8 billion to solve that crisis over many weeks, to say nothing of the misery caused to the farming community. As we have not yet managed to debate that report—and I suspect we will not do so for some months—perhaps I could ask one or two questions that came out of it concerning invasive species.

My first question is on notification, which has been touched on by other Members. The Minister said that, once we leave the EU, this would be a responsibility for the Secretary of State. But what will happen during the implementation period, if there is one, and after that in terms of the divergence of the European list that we have at the moment? Will we just copy that current list when we start afresh as a third country? But that list will change rapidly over time, so how will we deal with that divergence, particularly when it comes to border control?

On border control, at the moment, one of the fundamental building blocks of protection is an IT system called TRACES, which concerns the transfer of animal products, animals and vegetable products, and whatever bugs and insects they happen to have with them. Are we still looking to try to integrate that system and use it ourselves? Post Brexit, particularly if there is no deal, how will we replicate IT systems for the import and export of these types of materials? That is absolutely fundamental to being able to control the management of this.

We were shocked—and shocked is the right word—by one thing that the Minister from the other end, George Eustice, told us when he appeared before us. We suggested that, if there was no deal, we would have huge border issues around transit times. The Minister said that, in that case, the phytosanitary checks would not be done. That is a pretty dangerous approach, to be honest, and one that is, I suspect, contrary to WHO rules—to WTO rules, sorry; although perhaps it may be contrary to WHO rules too. Can the Minister help me understand how we will approach phytosanitary controls, particularly in the case of no deal—an option that the Government have not taken off the table?

On the island of Ireland, there is clearly no barrier or sea border—ineffective as that might be against certain things, as my noble friend Lady Parminter said when she talked about species coming across the channel. But our committee felt strongly that Ireland as an island should be treated as a single econological area, as it is at present, to some degree. I would be interested to hear the Minister’s view on that. A lot of trade goes between the two parts of Ireland but obviously there are no natural barriers at all.

Lastly, I am interested in reference laboratories. I do not know whether they come into this area—they certainly come under biosecurity. I am interested to hear from the Minister whether we should be concerned about reference laboratories in terms of invasive species. This is an area where, as the Minister says, we have great expertise, but it covers only certain areas that other parts of the European Union also cover. Will we up our game through Defra funding to be able to ensure that our scientific and research base is sufficient for this area?

[Viscount Ridley (Con)]

My Lords, I walked through Hyde Park this morning and saw three invasive alien species: Egyptian geese, ring-necked parakeets and, of course, grey squirrels. That reminded me that there is quite a gap between the way we talk about the issue in this place as mainly a bureaucratic issue of getting the right regulations, committees and quangos in place, and what is actually needed on the ground, which is to control and, where possible, eradicate these species. The grey squirrel is doing terrible harm to the position of the red squirrel in this country. Will my noble friend confirm that, in this case, we are not changing policy at all and this is a simple tidying-up exercise, and what needs to follow is more effort going into actually doing something about these creatures?

Floods and Water (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Byford (Con)]

My Lords, I will add just a couple of things. I thank my noble friend the Minister for so clearly setting out the objectives of these transfer regulations, because that is what we are discussing, while looking to the reports in the future. Like other noble Lords, I look forward to the setting up of the environmental body, because it is key to future regulation and checks and balances on what happens. Clearly, it is not good just to have reports; actions need to follow on from them. That has not quite been touched on today.

I will follow the noble Lord who spoke just now of droughts and the rain position. The Minister will know, because I raised it with him quietly earlier, the difficulty that some farmers are having in drought areas. I refer in particular to the position of Norfolk, which was referred to earlier, and the difficulty that farmers there are having because the Environment Agency is dragging its feet and not getting on with the business of giving answers to questions that are raised. Although it is not clear, because it does not quite fall within the remit of these regulations, it raises another issue altogether. We want to make sure that the various organisations that exist now and which are responsible for making things happen are doing the job that they should be doing. If they are not, who then holds them to account? I think it would be the new environment body, but I worry that if we are not careful, we will have so many different bodies, and at the end of the day, who will be in control of saying yes or no? It should be the Government of the day, but the Government of the day have passed some of these responsibilities on to well-established bodies. Clearly, however, in this case the job is not being done, which is causing immense angst for those who are in business there. Without having those sorts of issues settled on what they can and cannot abstract, in future their businesses will be very much in jeopardy.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I strongly endorse the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Deben. We had real issues about water quality in the south-west, where I live, before we had the various framework directives, particularly the bathing water directive. Through the action of the European Union and a pressure group called Surfers Against Sewage, we now have fantastic beaches in the south-west.

I intervene because I want to personally thank the noble Lord, Lord Deben. Privatisation of the water industry meant that those improvements could be afforded, which meant that water bills in the south-west, and Cornwall in particular, went up by a huge amount. As a result, I was elected as an MEP for Cornwall, Scilly and Plymouth in 1994. I was one of the first two Liberal Democrats ever to be elected to the European Parliament, so I again thank the noble Lord. Perhaps that was not meant to be the result of that policy decision, but we still have excellent beaches in the south-west, and I encourage everyone to visit them, enjoy them and celebrate the European directive that meant that we could enjoy bathing in the clean waters of the Atlantic in the south-west.

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

I too put on record my congratulations to the noble, Lord, Lord Deben, not for the first time, on his forthright and important intervention. It is not very many years since I remember a glorious summer’s day bathing off Bournemouth and finding myself swimming next to a gigantic turd. I thought that this was too much, and I wrote to the clerk of the council in Bournemouth to register my protest. I could hardly believe it when I received in reply a letter from the clerk saying, “You must understand that this sewage must have come from Poole; it does not come from Bournemouth”. How we have progressed is extraordinary. It would be very unfortunate if we did not place on record our appreciation for all those in the European Union who have worked so hard to produce the legislation and rules which have enabled us to enjoy some of the best beaches in the world.

That did not happen by accident but by a great deal of co-operation and commitment within the European Union. As in other spheres, such as security and so many others, that is crucial to recognise. It is not to overuse the word to say that it is tragic that so few people recognise that in so much of this work, British officials and expertise have played such an important part in developing the policies. We have to reflect on why people with real commitment, insight and expertise found it possible to get us to the state we are in only in the context of Europe. We will, as the noble Lord, Lord Deben, said, have to work very hard not just to sustain what we have inherited but to maintain the dynamism and imagination which have come from Europe.

Recycling

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Tuesday 9th October 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, that is exactly what we wish to do. We wish to accelerate the consistency of what is recycled across England. Of course, we want to learn lessons from other countries where it has gone well, but we are clear that, for our environment and the world environment, we need to reuse and recycle very much more. Some local authorities have very high recycling rates while others have very low ones. We need to work on that because consistency is precisely what will be so important, along with increasing food waste collection.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, while I welcome very much the Government reminding us that landfill has gone down substantially, the real risk in waste disposal is that energy from waste will very soon exceed recycling. When we build energy-from-waste units, should we not make it mandatory to have recycling centres at the front end of that process so that we burn less and recycle more?

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

The noble Lord hits upon the waste hierarchy and the importance of reuse and recycling before considering incineration as an energy source—and of course landfill is a very last resort. That is why our ambition is to have zero waste in landfill, and why we all need to work on the circular economy and getting recycling rates much higher across the piece.

Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act 2006 Committee Report

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Monday 2nd July 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I make a couple of declarations of interest: I am a director of Anchorwood Developments Ltd and a board member of the Marine Management Organisation. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, on his chairmanship of the committee, on the report and on the excellent work that he has done over the years in this area. It is very good that he took on the role of chairman of the committee, and I thank him.

I had almost forgotten about the Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act, but it was a landmark piece of legislation 12 years ago, followed by the Climate Change Act 2008 and the Marine and Coastal Access Act, which I think was passed the year after that. This trilogy of legislation has been very important for our environment and now is absolutely the right time to consider it again. It is not so much that it is deficient but, as the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, said, time has moved on.

I live in rural Cornwall. We do not feel sorry for ourselves. We are not there as a charity part of the country. We are proud of being rural and believe that we contribute a great deal not just to the national economy but the social fabric of the nation. I was on a Local Government Association working party on the rural economy. A statistic that struck me was that non-metropolitan England had a greater proportion of GDP than metropolitan areas. Clearly, not all of that is rural, but we should be aware that this is not an economic backwater or hinterland.

Some really important messages came from the report. One, as other noble Lords have said, is that government intervention in this area—whether we think that that is good or bad—has declined. The Commission for Rural Communities and the rural advocate disappeared—during the coalition Government, I must say. I dealt regularly with the rural communities policy unit as the predecessor to the right reverend Prelate on the Rural Coalition. They were very committed people in that unit and it was quite effective—perhaps not as effective as the CRC; it did not have the independence, power and research ability—but even that disappeared.

I remember the role of the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, looking at rural proofing some years ago. He brought a number of noble Lords with him to departments—I think it was a Cabinet Office or a No. 10 exercise—to find out what was happening. I was staggered. He managed to keep a straight face, but when he was in front of non-Defra departments, so often there was the response, “What’s rural proofing?”, or, “Yes, I’m sure we do something in that area”, but it was very diluted and unfocused. I was very pleased that the committee came up with recommendations about that.

Rural Britain—rural England—has suffered many pressures recently, and several of them have been recognised. On the subject of rural buses and roads, I was out this morning cycling. I left at 5.46 am. I noticed that all down my very rural road, yellow markings had appeared. I am delighted to say, as a compliment to local government and the Government, that they were to replace potholes with actual surface, which is starting to happen, but only just in time before those roads get even worse.

I was really pleased that the noble Baroness, Lady Warwick, mentioned housing, because rural housing is so important. We have had a crisis, which continues, because of the broadening right-to-buy legislation passed when the Conservative Government took effect post 2010. There is still suspicion by landowners that if they donate land at agricultural value to housing associations, other people will benefit financially in the long term as they come out of affordable housing services.

And, of course, there are Defra budgets. We know that Defra, along with the former DCLG, is always the department hit first in terms of budget cuts. I take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, about protecting the Defra family, but when your budgets are cut by some 18% to 20%, you have to streamline your overheads. That, too, leads to a slight undermining of the independence of non-departmental public bodies within that area.

Biodiversity is such an important part of the report. We know that in Britain biodiversity is getting more difficult. We have increasing challenges from climate change. I know that the Minister is very concerned about invasive species—these are all threats to the fabric to our rural communities.

One thing that noble Lords have not mentioned, which I was very pleased to see in the report, was national trails and their funding. These are a fantastic means of access to the countryside, used by so many for tourism and exercise. That access through those national trails is crucial. Are there ways in which, as the report suggests, maybe through sponsorship or other means, we can make sure that what is truly a national treasure—our national trails—are kept?

The report says that certain areas are getting better. We now have a 25-year environmental plan, which is an important strategy, primarily for England. I hope that Scotland and the other devolved authorities will be able to go along with that in a parallel fashion. It is key that that plan has a statutory basis to it as it is developed. I would be interested to hear from the Minister what the next concrete step is to make many of those important aspirations take effect, as that affects rural communities so much.

We have moved on to the concept of natural capital. Dieter Helm, whom I would describe as the Government’s favourite guru, has moved out of energy into natural capital—and they are still digesting his energy report, because he has some big asks there. On the rural side and natural capital, it is excellent, and we all applaud it; but we have to remember, as other noble Lords have said, that those concepts have not really been tested to destruction in any way, and putting values on a number of the areas of the natural environment is very difficult. But we look at that with optimism and hope that it happens.

We have a Secretary of State who champions the environment very strongly—let us be clear about that—and all the areas of biodiversity. I also benefit from having broadband fibre right to my house, which is increasingly permeating rural communities, although I suspect that a number of Members of this House do not have that yet, and probably not in urban areas either. But that is improving.

What we welcome from these Benches is the report’s suggested removal of rural affairs from Defra. As noble Lords have said, the challenges for Defra over the next few years are huge, in terms particularly of Brexit, fisheries legislation, farming and agriculture, along with the environmental area and all those other streams. Some 3,000 pieces of legislation will have to be brought on to the UK statute book. I am sad to say that the track record, as the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, said, shows Defra having not performed and having retreated from this function. It naturally fits within the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, and clearly needs to go there.

The issue in the report that is most important for our future, on the environmental side, is—as my noble friend Lady Parminter and the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, have said—the need for tough environmental enforcement post Brexit. That is a key challenge. There is zero doubt that government departments take notice of European Commission threats of infraction proceedings in the European Court of Justice, and that has made a very significant difference in terms of our enforcing environmental legislation in the past. We are starting to see that on the clean air side and in other areas as well. We also need to strengthen the biodiversity duty, as has been said.

On rural proofing, from my experience of having accompanied the noble Lord to departments on the issue, I think that that has to be done within the Cabinet Office. That is the natural way for it to go.

On the need for a long-term funding strategy for national trails, that is something that I really appreciate myself, and I know that visitors to the south-west do as well.

This is an excellent report. I hope that the Government will take forward its many and diverse recommendations, which over time, when the consultations finish, could be much strengthened. However, given the governance gap on environmental enforcement, we will need a robust, independent organisation, with teeth, post Brexit—that is absolutely clear.

Transport Emissions in Urban Areas

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd May 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, there are many plus points in hybrid cars and I entirely agree that, at this time, they are a very good option. However, with our investment in ultra-low emission vehicles and in more publicly accessible charging points, we are clearly moving towards ensuring that ever more ultra-low emission vehicles are bought.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, the Minister has quoted our position worldwide. However, the fact is that the end of last week the European Commission infracted us for not meeting air quality standards. So we are one of the six dirty half-dozen of Europe for air quality. That is a fact—we would not be going in front of the ECJ if we were not. Commissioner Vella put that down in particular to those six member states being persistent offenders that were in the last chance saloon. Can the Minister say how we can make these strategies, and all the other plans we have, credible, not just to Europe but to our own citizens, to convince them that this time we will perform where in the past we have singularly failed?

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

There were a number of points there. We are one of 22 member states reporting exceedances, and there are 12 other countries against which infraction proceedings are carrying on. So this is undoubtedly a problem in many of the developed economies, which is precisely why the £3.5 billion, plus what we are announcing today on particulate matter and ammonia, is all about bearing down on the problem of improving air quality generally. We recognise that it is a great health problem that has a great cost in misery and financially. We wish to address this, and this is what we precisely need to do.

Animal Products: Labelling and Packaging

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Monday 14th May 2018 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Teverson]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action they will take to ensure that the labelling and packaging of animal-derived products does not mislead consumers as to how those animals were reared.

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

My Lords, it is against the law to mislead consumers about any aspect of food. Methods of production for eggs and poultry meat are defined and the use of various assurance schemes helps to identify that animal health and welfare standards have been met. While legal definitions are not in place, information can be given voluntarily and trading standards is responsible for ensuring that this does not mislead.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

I thank the Minister for his reply. I know he feels the same way as I do on many of these issues, but it is not right that consumers are still misled. The area where that happens the most is illustrations on packaging. Will the Government use the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 to tie down and tighten up these procedures far more? If the Government do not feel that those are sufficient, will they introduce additional measures in their agriculture Bill?

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

As your Lordships will know, many of these rules are subject to EU regulation. I am absolutely clear that no produce should be labelled in any way that misleads the consumer. As the noble Lord has said, under the Health and Harmony consultation into the agricultural way forward we have consulted on that, and we are considering whether there are better ways in which labelling could satisfy the consumer better.