British Overseas Territories

Viscount Montgomery of Alamein Excerpts

Thursday 10th March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Montgomery of Alamein]

My Lords, like other noble Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Hooper, for her comprehensive introduction to this subject, in which she demonstrated the enormous diversity of the islands. I propose to follow up a slightly different angle, following on from the right reverend Prelate, who in the latter part of his speech talked about ecology. I am going to talk about Antarctica, the largest overseas territory. It comprises some 660,000 square miles and has a resident population of 50 in winter and 400 in summer. Antarctica holds 80 per cent of the world’s fresh water locked up in the ice mass, which in places is 5 kilometres deep.

British Antarctica is part of a mutual recognition agreement with four other sovereign nations and their Antarctic claimed territories. The UK is an active participant in the Antarctic Treaty system, which is extremely important and provides the framework for how operations take place there. However, today I propose to concentrate on some of the events that will take place this year in connection with Antarctica.

I start with the International Maritime Organisation, which at a meeting at the end of March will consider a polar shipping code for all passenger and cargo vessels with more than 12 passengers. This is very important, as every year there are accidents in the tourist season. The last season was no exception, as the “Polar Star”, a Bahamas-flagged vessel, hit a rock and passengers had to be evacuated, fortunately with no loss of life. However, I believe strongly that Her Majesty’s Government should press for the code to include fishing vessels and yachts. I hope that the Minister will be able to say something about that when he replies to the debate. A Korean shipping vessel sank in the Ross Sea in December with 22 fatalities, while a Norwegian yacht sank last month also with loss of life. This needs to be rectified and clearly the IMO should extend its plans to include such matters. The organisation moves very slowly, so I hope that, as we are an important participant, the Government will start to press for that to happen.

The next important event is the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting, which is scheduled to take place in Buenos Aires in June, marking 50 years of the Antarctic Treaty. It has been an enormous achievement and it is important to recognise that. An Antarctic Bill concerned with environmental protection and safety planning is in the pipeline. Indeed, that was mentioned in part by previous speakers in connection with what the IMO is doing. The wide consultation phase has been completed and the Bill awaits parliamentary time. On present progress, it does not look as though it will get on to the statute book before spring next year. So far, only four countries have ratified the treaty out of a total of 28. As we are one of the most important, and original, consultative members, we should be the first to ratify and not among the last.

At the next treaty consultative meeting in June, the UK will present an environmental evaluation of a scientific project to drill into a sub-glacial lake in the Ellsworth mountains. In order to find a freshwater source, drilling will be required to take place some 3,000 metres through the ice, taking it to below mean sea level. It is a fascinating concept, which could reveal much about the evolution of organisms and so on. This lake has never seen sunlight and one wonders what might be growing there. Therefore, science is of the essence in this matter.

Next year marks the centenary of Scott’s last expedition to the South Pole. Scott reached the pole on 17 January 1912 but of course never returned. Unfortunately, he was beaten to the pole by 35 days by Amundsen, who arrived on 14 December 1911. The Scott centenary is something that we should also recognise and I hope that we will do so. A number of events to mark the centenary are at the planning stage and many of them will focus on the scientific legacy. Science is the important thing, but I hope that the centenary will be fully supported by Her Majesty’s Government.

The final event taking place this year is the construction of the new Halley Research Station, which is going well. The handover to the British Antarctic Survey is expected to take place in February 2012. It will be a worthy successor to the first Halley station, which was established by the Royal Society in 1957. Halley is the furthest away from the cluster of bases on the peninsula on the eastern coast of the Weddell Sea and it is therefore likely to be rather colder than the others.

In summary, all in all Antarctica is a vital continent with regard to science. It is recognised by everyone concerned as being exclusively for science, so we need to, and indeed do, support it. I hope that Her Majesty’s Government will not in any way diminish any funds that may be available for the extraordinary work of the British Antarctic Survey, which is very worthy of support and needs to be continued at full speed and without any diminishment.