Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Dan Rogerson

Thursday 29th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

5. What discussions she has had with her ministerial colleagues on the environmental case for supporting the development of onshore and offshore wind power.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dan Rogerson)]

The Secretary of State has been working with ministerial colleagues to implement the electricity market reform programme. This will deliver the greener energy and reliable supplies that the UK needs while minimising costs for consumers in the long term. Government planning guidance makes it clear that the need for renewable energy should not automatically override concerns about local impacts. When applications for wind turbines are determined, the impacts on matters such as ecology, noise, landscape, heritage and amenity are considered.

[Mr Sheerman]

That is all very well, but 57% of applications for wind farms are rejected and a very large number are called in by the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] I note that Government Members are saying “Hear, hear.” None of us wants wind farms in the wrong place, but surely that is a vital question, because we need renewable energy in this country. It is about time the Minister worked with his colleagues to get a sensible way forward so that we can have alternative energy sources.

[Dan Rogerson]

I am delighted to work alongside my Department of Energy and Climate Change colleagues on this issue. We have seen a dramatic increase in renewables such onshore and offshore wind. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to say that development has to be in the right place. It is only right and proper that local issues are considered, and we have to be very clear about the way it is done. He is welcome to come to my constituency and see that there has been an increase in onshore wind. However, this has to be taken forward through the proper planning procedure.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Dan Rogerson

Thursday 11th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Dan Rogerson]

The important point to note about tariffs is that they are funded within water company areas. As money comes from those areas, it is important that water companies discuss with their customers what the right level of support is, as there are different situations in different areas. The number of schemes is expanding. I, too, welcome what is happening in the hon. Gentleman’s part of the country. Northumbrian Water has worked hard to address these issues with its customers to ensure that it can take forward a scheme that works in its area.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Many of us in Yorkshire want not only a social tariff, but a social conscience. Yorkshire Water is owned by a Singapore investment trust, our electricity is owned by the Germans and our gas by the Chinese. Foreign companies, such as Lidl and Aldi, do not seem to have the same corporate social responsibility and social conscience as other companies. What is the Minister doing about foreign-owned utilities, such as Yorkshire Water, that do not have as much of a social conscience?

[Dan Rogerson]

We have a strong regulatory system that looks at not just the value for money and investment that companies offer customers, but the transparency of their business models and how they operate. Yorkshire Water, for example, has a good debt management programme to help people who have in the past struggled to pay their bills. We are making progress on a whole range of issues, and I welcome the fact that companies are upping their game.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Dan Rogerson

Thursday 17th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Dan Rogerson]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise this. We have produced a prioritised plant health risk register to identify risk and to agree priorities for action. We have also produced new contingency plans for plant diseases and we will be testing them in an exercise later this year. The measures in the new tree health management plan set out clearly the approaches that we are taking, for example against chalara, phytophthora ramorum and oak processionary moth. As soon as we were aware of a threat to plane trees, we moved quickly to impose an import restriction on them.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

May I, through the junior Minister, congratulate the new Secretary of State? I have enjoyed sparring with her in education debates. Sometimes, I have agreed with her, but I have never tried to sit on her. May I send a message on trees and plants? I know that evidence-based policy is what she believes in, so when we are dealing with disease in trees and plants, let us use the evidence and the scientific advice. Can we also do that with badgers?

[Dan Rogerson]

The Department believes in heeding scientific advice and taking action on it, especially with regard to the issues that are under discussion. The newly appointed senior chief plant health officer, who offers us such advice, is doing incredibly valuable work.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dan Rogerson]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right that this is crucial for the future. We will finalise the strategy when we have received and considered the recommendations from the Environmental Audit Committee’s inquiry into the draft strategy, which was launched in May and is due to report at the end of July.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

T5. Does the Secretary of State share my concern that so few young people in our country ever visit the countryside? If she does, will she join my campaign, as many Members across the House have done, to raise £1 million—£5,000 from 200 constituencies would do it—so that more young people from underprivileged schools can visit the countryside?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Dan Rogerson

Thursday 27th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the Minister not realise that the Environment Agency has been haemorrhaging good staff? It is very important that we curb the cowboys and poor operators in the waste sector who do so much damage to our environment, but we just have not got the people or the resources in the Environment Agency to do that properly now.

[Dan Rogerson]

I have a great deal of respect for the hon. Gentleman and in the past we have both been members of the all-party group on this issue. The fact is that we have excellent staff in the Environment Agency working very hard on these issues, and in the recent Budget we secured an extra £5 million to tackle waste crime. It is a priority for the Government, and we should ensure that the businesses that operate effectively, fairly and safely are protected from those that act unscrupulously. That is why we are investing extra money in tackling this issue.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Dan Rogerson

Thursday 13th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

5. What assessment he has made of the threat posed to ancient woodlands and their biodiversity by development in the area.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dan Rogerson)]

Local planning authorities assess any potential threat to ancient woodland case by case while applying the strict test set out in the national planning policy framework. That test stipulates that planning permission should be refused unless the need for, and benefit of, any development in that location clearly outweighs the loss of any ancient woodland.

[Mr Sheerman]

That sounded like a civil servant’s brief. The fact is that the Secretary of State made a widely reported statement that suggested that we could have offsetting through a system in which ancient woodland was given up because other areas of the country would be planted with trees. In some people’s minds, that would be like introducing 100 rabbits for every badger shot. It is not good enough. This is precious habitat that must be defended in this country and in Africa, because wildlife depends on it.

[Dan Rogerson]

I am not sure that I entirely follow the hon. Gentleman’s logic when it comes to British mammals, but there we go. The key principle is that ancient woodland must be protected and the national planning policy framework is totally clear about that. Offsetting potentially offers benefits for less irreplaceable biodiverse areas that we can explore when planning applications are made. That is what any policy will be based on. I hope that there will be support across the House for introducing those solutions, but ancient woodland should be protected and the planning policy framework does that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Dan Rogerson

Thursday 9th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Dan Rogerson]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his question. We have introduced further restrictions on, for example, the import of sweet chestnut and plane trees before the 2013-14 planting season. Our negotiators are successfully influencing the review of the EU plant health regime, which will maintain strict controls and simplify the broad range of legislation.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Minister will know that this year is the 150th anniversary of the death of one of our greatest poets of the countryside, John Clare. He wrote a great deal about diseased trees—there was a plague of oak disease in his lifetime—and he was certainly a great defender of the English countryside. What does the Minister think John Clare would have thought of giving up our ancient woodland and replacing it with new growth?

Education Bill

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Dan Rogerson

Wednesday 11th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Dan Rogerson]

The point that the right hon. Member for Leigh raised is that we do not have the code in front of us, and so the hon. Lady is raising the issues that she fears may result. We will have to wait and see the code and examine it then.

[Mr Sheerman]

My hon. Friend the Member for North West Durham (Pat Glass) was actually making the point that she thought she heard the hon. Gentleman say that this was theoretical. May I disclose a secret to him? I was the parliamentary church warden here for seven years and I am a lay canon at Wakefield and what amazed me in the evidence was that Church schools—schools that I thought would have been bending over backwards to look after the poorest children and those from deprived backgrounds—were the best at excluding those children. I am saying that as someone who is relatively active in the Church.

[Dan Rogerson]

I welcome that contribution and the hon. Gentleman has been very forthright in raising the issues that he has mentioned. I am sorry to see that the hon. Member for North West Durham (Pat Glass) has had some misfortune in hurting her arm and I am pleased, of course, that it has not restricted her ability to be present and to put forward her views, which she does forthrightly and in a well-informed way on all education issues. What I was trying to say in response to her is that the key to what the Government are trying to do, not just with the admissions code but with some of the bodies and partnerships in which schools have hitherto been forced to participate, which we have discussed before, will be to trust schools to take decisions. We will still have a schools adjudicator and we will still have a code that will cover such matters. The question is where we should strike the balance. The Opposition clearly feel that the Government are getting it wrong, but I want to see the code. It is unfortunate that we did not have it before this debate, but we will be able to examine it when it comes. I shall give the Government the benefit of the doubt that we are striking the right balance.

Sure Start Children’s Centres

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Dan Rogerson

Wednesday 27th April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Dan Rogerson]

It is crucial to ensure that programmes that sometimes seem specifically targeted at urban areas also deliver in more rural areas. Sometimes there is a misunderstanding that all rural areas are prosperous communities and that money should be targeted elsewhere. That is not the main thrust of what I am saying, however, so I do not want to get drawn further down that road. Of course I look forward to working with my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Sarah Newton) to ensure that Cornwall gets its fair share of spending and investment.

Sure Start has done a fantastic job of reaching out to people in communities, but there are questions about whether all the money has been spent efficiently. When the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) pointed to projects under threat in her constituency, she specifically referred to a planning team. I am not aware of how much on-the-ground work that planning team does—it might be crucial—but it does not sound to me like a front-line service that is, as her Front-Bench team seek to imply, for the chop.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Before the hon. Gentleman moves on, will he comment on—and, hopefully, dissociate himself from—his colleague who intervened and quoted one part of the Audit Commission’s report totally out of context, suggesting that the Audit Commission had said that early years intervention through children’s centres was a waste of money?

[Dan Rogerson]

I do not think it was said to be a waste of money. The argument was that things can always be done better, which is what the National Audit Office said. I hope that all Members agree that where issues have been identified independently and targets and aspirations for a policy have not been met, we can look for ways to do it better. My fundamental point is that, despite the financial situation, good councils up and down the country will prioritise children’s centres and keep them open to ensure that services have a reach—even if there is no insistence on having full-time workers in every specialism in every centre, which is what I would like to see if the money were available to fund it.