Forestry and Land Management (Scotland) Act 2018 (Consequential Provisions and Modifications) Order 2019

Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve Excerpts

Thursday 28th March 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Duncan of Springbank]

The noble Lord speaks of Silvan House. He is absolutely right about the value of the work undertaken by the staff of the Forestry Commission in Scotland, and I understand that this will have no material effect on their well-being or conditions. I do not know about the building itself, but if the noble Lord will permit, I shall write to him once I have an answer, because I am not familiar with the situation there.

[Baroness O’Neill of Bengarve (CB)]

Before the Minister sits down, I want to ask him a little more about treating Northern Ireland separately from the rest of the United Kingdom in these matters. It is surely one thing to treat the Irish Sea as an effective border for the movement of animals, but that has not proved true for the movement of plant pathogens. When one looks at the map of the distribution of both ash dieback and phytophthora ramorum across the island of Ireland, one sees that it would be a fiction to regard Northern Ireland as separate from the rest of the UK.

[Lord Duncan of Springbank]

The noble Baroness makes an important point. It would be very difficult for us to look at the islands of the British Isles as a whole as anything other than one biogeographic unit. We cannot lose sight of that: the borders themselves are broadly meaningless, including the sea borders. I suspect, however, that that question requires a more detailed answer than I can give just now. If the noble Baroness will permit me, I will commit to writing with a very detailed answer to her question.

I am conscious that my opening remarks were slightly waylaid by the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, asking a very sensible question: are the Scottish Government ready to exercise these powers? We have assurances that they are, but this House and the other place must be vigilant in our scrutiny of this: we cannot take our eye off it for a moment. We must make sure that there is no diminution whatever in the way that we treat our forestry estate and our forestry more widely. I am conscious that the noble Lord will remain vigilant, and we can rest assured that he will not let anything slip by. On that basis, I hope that noble Lords will allow this to move forward.