Degraded Chalk Stream Environments

Debate between Charles Walker and Cheryl Gillan

Monday 22nd July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Walker]

Of course, and there was nothing spurious about my delight at Veolia failing to get its application through—it was just that I wanted to bring it to the attention of a wider audience.

[Dame Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)]

My point of order was not a spurious one. I wanted to inquire whether the Secretary of State for Transport had indicated that he was going to make a statement on the escalating costs of HS2, which will damage the chalk streams in my area, as my hon. Friend well knows.

[Mr Walker]

I thank my right hon. Friend for alerting the House to that very important point. HS2 does pose a risk to chalk stream and riverine environments. No doubt if time allows, my right hon. Friend will bring her concerns to the attention of the House.

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[Dame Cheryl Gillan]

It is always a great pleasure to welcome my hon. Friend to Chesham and Amersham, particularly at the invitation of Paul Jennings. Does he agree that Paul Jennings is one of the most outstanding advocates for chalk streams and our environment, and that he should be praised for all the efforts that he and the River Chess Association put into trying to maintain and preserve this chalk stream for our children and our children’s children?

[Mr Walker]

I entirely agree. I know Paul Jennings well; he is one of the greatest friends any chalk stream could have. He is a conservationist of the highest order, and he deserves our full congratulations and respect for the tenacity that he has shown in ensuring that the issues that afflict so many of our chalk streams are kept somewhat in abeyance on the Chess. However, I am afraid that even he would admit that he has not always been successful in doing that.

In the past 10 years there have been five dry events in the Upper Chess. In the 20 years prior to that, there were three. Drier years mean more abstraction, and things are only going to get worse. Affinity Water serves the home counties north of London, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham and my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for North East Hertfordshire (Sir Oliver Heald) will know. Affinity has no reservoirs. It only abstracts waters from the chalk aquifers—that is the only place it can get its water from. As we know, the aquifers it abstracts from are those that feed the rivers that are dying. Affinity serves 3.6 million people. In 20 years’ time that number will be nearer to 4.5 million. Where on earth is the water going to come from? If we go on as we are now, the water will come out of the aquifers and we will not have a single chalk stream running in Hertfordshire or Buckinghamshire. That is not an exaggeration; that is where we are at.

Affinity has tried, within the constraints that it is operating under—bearing in mind that it has no reservoir. It reduced pumping at one pumping station on the River Beane by 90%, which was actually a very brave thing to do. Yet that part of the river has not started flowing again because the long-term damage to aquifers that have been used and abused for the past 30, 40 or 50 years is so extreme that it may take decades to recover.

It is not just abstraction that kills rivers; it is what happens after the abstraction. If companies are abstracting water from chalk streams, they either dry them out—and that does kill them—or they reduce the flow. When there is low flow in a river, it cannot get rid of pollutants; pollutants concentrate. A river that is flowing well can move pollutants on down it, dilute them and dissolve them. This does not happen when a river is being extracted to death. So what is the next consequence of extraction? We get topsoil run-off, which just sinks to the bottom of rivers and depletes them of oxygen. It sticks to the chalk at the bottom, destroying any oxygen that can get into the chalk for the small invertebrates that live in it. Then there is phosphorus from agriculture and sewage works, which causes oxygen depletion from algal blooms and eutrophication. Basically, we have environments that cannot support life, or which support limited life, because there is no oxygen. Agricultural pesticides wash in off the fields, destroying biodiversity and wiping out invertebrates and the fly life that comes from them. Then there are the many septic tanks up and down the country that are unregulated and leaking into groundwater that finds its way into rivers. The challenge is immense.

This is an environmental crisis of a monumental scale that we are failing to address. Fundamentally, we need to reduce abstraction now. Thames Water, which I have worked closely with at times, has done that on the River Chess and the River Cray, but it wants to do more—and quite frankly it needs to do more. So what is Thames Water doing? It is making efforts to reduce leakage, and those are to be welcomed and applauded. It can introduce metering, promote water efficiency, and go into schools to educate children as to the importance of water, but, at most, these efforts will reduce consumption in the area it serves from 142 litres per day to 136 litres per day. That is just not a significant decrease. It is an important amount of water, but at 3.5% it is not going to save the day. Thames Water estimates that by 2045 there will be a shortfall of 350 million litres of water a day between the amount available and the amount needed.

There is only one game-changing solution to this crisis, and that is to create more storage capacity, which we do by building more reservoirs. I think that the last major reservoir we built was the Queen Mother reservoir for the east and south-east of England in 1974, so we have grown the population by millions but we have not put in any additional water storage. If we want to save our chalk stream rivers, of which we have 85% of the world’s resource, we really have to build reservoirs. The spade-ready reservoir that has been on the books for 12 years but has been blocked by a well-organised group of 20 people is the Abingdon reservoir in Oxfordshire. That is a game changer. If we get the Abingdon reservoir built, that starts to create the capacity we need, but at the rate the population of London and the south-east is growing, we will need more than one Abingdon—we will need two or three Abingdons. Until we start capturing water at the times of plenty and using it during dry periods like we are experiencing now, we will remain in trouble. We will be in a position where our own environmental record falls well short of where it should be, and we will limit our ability to change the way that other countries handle their natural resources, because they can look at us and say, “What on earth are you doing? You are in no position to lecture us.”

I could go on at great length, but I am not going to. In fact, I may have already gone on at great length, but this subject warrants some exploration. Finally, I would like to thank the Angling Trust, particularly Martin Salter—a former Member here—and Stuart Singleton-White, for the amazing document they have published, “Chalk Streams in Crisis”. It really is an extremely good, but somewhat depressing and sad, read. It is a call to arms. If we are to be taken seriously, we have to make changes to the way in which we approach our valuable and precious ecosystems. One of the most valuable and precious is our chalk streams, and, as I said, we have a lamentable record in this area.

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[Dame Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western). When I was growing up politically, one of my great mentors was Sir Keith Joseph. He said that one of the greatest challenges we were going to face in the future of the world was water shortages and the resulting movement of populations around the world, and I think that is starting to come very true today. My mother was always very keen on saving water. I do not know how many hon. Members will remember doing so, but she used to put a brick in the cistern to make sure that she did not use too much water when flushing the lavatory.

Aside from that, may I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne (Mr Walker) on obtaining this debate? It would be fair to say that he and I have spent many a happy hour, with Paul Jennings, sitting beside one of the purest and clearest chalk streams, the River Chess, just outside London. It is not even at the end of the Metropolitan line; it runs alongside the Metropolitan line. It is accessible to the public, and it is one of those wonderful habitats and environments that can really bring people peace and tranquillity. People can leave this world behind as they sit there and, in the case of my hon. Friend, try to attract a trout to the end of his line.

[Mr Charles Walker]

The great sadness is that, to the uninitiated eye, the river looks beautiful—and it is beautiful—but as Paul Jennings would say, it is clinging on by its fingertips. Its flow is a fraction of what it should be; although it remains beautiful, its ability to support life is just draining away.

[Dame Cheryl Gillan]

I am afraid my hon. Friend is right. I came into the House at the same time as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for North East Hertfordshire (Sir Oliver Heald), in 1992. That reservoir is not overdue, but long overdue and should have been built many years ago.

May I also pay tribute to the authors of “Chalk Streams in Crisis”? Four of the organisations that contributed are closely associated with my constituency. The Chilterns chalk streams project—a fantastic project started in 1997, prompted by the low flows in the 1990s—was expanded in 2000 to include all the rivers. It is led by the Chilterns Conservation Board, with the River Chess Association and the Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire wildlife trusts. All these organisations work constantly and tirelessly to try to protect our environment.

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[Dame Cheryl Gillan]

I think the points made by colleagues across the House have been very accurate in that we are busy lecturing other people around the world about how they should save their environment, but we are not actually looking over our shoulders at our own backyard, which is deteriorating.

The point that we have 85% of the world’s chalk streams is not lost, particularly in the south-east, because about a fifth of those are in the Thames Water region. The combination we have talked about—the climate and the geology of where these chalk streams are—means that they have the most amazing characteristics. They support special wildlife habitats and species, including things such as the brown trout and the water vole. Chalk streams are really important not just for angling, but because they are fed by groundwater aquifers. That means the water is clear, pure and inviting, which is of course why the water companies always wants to take water from them.

The hon. Member for Dagenham and Rainham (Jon Cruddas) spoke about the Thames Water briefing that was put out. He said he was struck by the predicted shortfall of 350 million litres a day between the amount of water available and the amount we will need by 2045. Population growth, climate change and environmental regulations will dramatically affect our demand and need for water. I echo the call made by the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington, because unless we build in safeguards and build in the reuse of water, we are going to find ourselves in a desert and in a drought like no drought we have ever seen. We take water for granted in this country; it is such a shame that we have that attitude. We will have to change it if we are going to preserve our environment, particularly our chalk streams.

[Mr Charles Walker]

I hear what my right hon. Friend says, and she is absolutely right. There is nothing more irritating than to hear weather forecasters on the BBC, ITV or radio programmes such as on Radio 4 going, “Good news, it’s going to be a dry week.” or, “Good news, it’s going to be a dry weekend.” This country needs rainfall. We do not have it in abundance—and when we are not having it, we really do suffer.

[Dame Cheryl Gillan]

The point is well and emphatically made: that is absolutely right.

High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill

Debate between Charles Walker and Cheryl Gillan

Thursday 31st October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Gillan]

I welcome to the Front Bench the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill). This is his first outing and it is good to see him in his place. I welcome the hon. Member for Wakefield (Mary Creagh) to her place on the Opposition Front Bench. It is good to have some authentic northern voices speaking on this subject, albeit from the Front Bench, so we probably know exactly what they are going to say. May I also welcome my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns) and, with your indulgence, Mr Deputy Speaker, thank him for the courtesy he showed towards me during his time in office? This is a difficult subject for me and, I think, it has proved a difficult subject, from time to time, for him.

Amendments 18, 12 and 13 relate to the Government’s commitment to Scotland. I tabled them in Committee, because I felt it was important to have something in the Bill that registered the verbal intentions, expressed by Ministers and others, eventually to take High Speed 2, if it is ever built, through to Scotland. It is ironic, and slightly odd, that clause 3(1) extends the scope of the Bill to England, Wales and Scotland, given that there is no mention of HS2 going to Scotland.

If we have time, we will get on to the Barnett formula. Undoubtedly, there is precedent for the Government ensuring that Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland get their fair share of the infrastructure spend that is being spent exclusively in England, and I believe there is already such a precedent regarding the money for HS2, but will the Minister confirm that?

[Mr Charles Walker (Broxbourne) (Con)]

In drafting her amendments, did my right hon. Friend consider how to deliver extra passenger capacity to the east and west coast lines, but without the vast costs?

[Mrs Gillan]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. I am afraid that I do not have the resources to table an extensive list of amendments, and although I considered that, I dismissed it fairly rapidly. I just do not have the back-up and resource, on a project this large and complex, to keep up with the machinations of the Government, as they bring out 400 or 500 pages of information a couple of days before any crucial stage of the Bill—I am expecting the £50,000 environmental statement to arrive on our desks shortly.