INSPIRE (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020

Baroness Jones of Whitchurch Excerpts

Wednesday 9th September 2020 Grand Committee

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for his explanation of this SI. He provided some welcome context for its stop/start history and updates. However, we remain concerned about its drafting given that, in addition to the version that expired when the election was called, another version of this instrument was laid in May and then withdrawn in June. Was that as a result of errors? If so, presumably those errors existed in the made SI agreed last year?

The Minister may be aware of our continuing concern about drafting errors and the lack of a robust scrutiny process to weed them out. This discussion has been ongoing during many of the debates on SIs that we have had over the past couple of years. If, as we expect, there is another rush of SIs to clear up before we finally leave the EU at the end of the year, can the Minister clarify what lessons have been learned from the errors that have been dotted through various pieces of secondary legislation to date? What improved processes have been instigated to overcome them? In many ways, we are running out of time. When we leave at the end of the year, that will be D-day. We want to make sure that our legislation at that moment is absolutely accurate and robust.

Having said that, I can confirm that we support the legislation. We welcome the fact that the House has already legislated to stay in line with the INSPIRE regulations, and we share the Government’s desire to continue sharing spatial information in a meaningful way with our EU friends after Brexit. This data sharing is increasingly important in a globalised data world. Whether it is on energy, ground water, air quality, water quality or a whole host of other datasets, we stand to benefit as much as others from accurate and timely environmental information, much of which can be time-critical.

On a more specific point, I echo a couple of the questions from the noble Baronesses, Lady McIntosh and Lady Bakewell. Can the Minister say who actually uses this information? Obviously the public have access to it, but is there a wider review of it? The noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, talked about universities using it. It feels like we are producing a huge dataset, so it would be good to know that it is being used meaningfully, both locally and nationally. It would be useful if the Minister could reassure us on that.

Bearing in mind the question from the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, about resources, what sort of quality assurance process takes place for that data? Is it double-checked in any way? Can we be sure that it is accurate, or is it just a tick-box exercise that nobody really follows up?

On a wider point, I will ask the Minister about the future programme of EU exit SIs that will require updating before December. This SI incorporates new arrangements set by the EU for monitoring and reporting. Presumably other SIs need updating because of changes in EU practice. As a result of the election, and then Covid and lockdown, we have not been dealing with the normal flow of secondary legislation for quite a while, and Defra staff will understandably have been called on to deal with more pressing matters—but is there a backlog and can we expect a flurry of other updates in the next couple of months? I look forward to the Minister’s response and I hope he can clarify these issues.