Environmental Protection and Green Growth

David Wright Excerpts

Wednesday 26th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mary Creagh]

I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend’s role in government. Obviously, the decisions that we made in government paved the way for Mitsubishi and Siemens to think about relocating here. We do not want to drive energy-intensive industries or jobs overseas, because in many cases such industries are contributing directly to green development—for example, the steel that is pressed for offshore wind turbines that are manufactured in the UK. Companies in these industries want transparency so that there is a level playing field, showcasing the best and exchanging knowledge so that they can reduce their costs and their environmental impact. We pay tribute to the companies that have already done that work.

[David Wright (Telford) (Lab)]

I represent the seat that holds the birthplace of industry, and, some would therefore argue, the birthplace of global warming. These things are probably best done locally. Some local authorities have incredibly good partnerships with businesses. My hon. Friend will be aware that Ricoh, the technology company, has its European headquarters in my constituency. It is a fairly energy-intensive company, but it puts over 90% of its waste product back into the industrial process, internally or with partners. That is an example of where an energy-intensive business can do a lot for the environment as well.

[Mary Creagh]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for that contribution. I agree that it is very important that these companies now look through the whole of their manufacturing processes. I will deal with the role of waste in a moment.

In July this year, the Aldersgate Group, a collection of charities with large companies such as BT, PepsiCo and Microsoft, commissioned a report that provided an independent analysis of the impact assessment produced by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs on mandatory carbon reporting. Taking just one of the options—option 3—Aldersgate found that DEFRA had overestimated the total costs by up to £4.6 billion and underestimated the benefits by £980 million. It said that DEFRA’s impact assessment had ignored wider behavioural change, product and service innovation and other strategic advantages from carbon reporting. It also states that DEFRA underestimates the benefits to companies over time, because the DEFRA model assumes that once companies have reduced their emissions in year one, they will not reduce them again over the following nine years. As my hon. Friend the Member for Telford (David Wright) said, large companies such as Ricoh and Tata get very good consultants in every year to see how they can drive down their costs and environmental impact.

--- Later in debate ---

[Richard Benyon]

I am sorry, but I really must make some progress.

We will shortly publish our White Paper on water, which will set out how we want to reform the water industry and address the need for resilience to drought and climate change. A few weeks ago I stood on the bed of the River Kennet, which was as dry as the carpet in the Chamber. It is one of the “rivers on the edge” identified by the World Wildlife fund and is one of the most precious ecosystems in the south of England, although there are many more. Many Members represent constituencies where there are serious concerns about the decline of river quality. We will explain in the water White Paper how we seek to address the problem. We will consider not just the narrow issues involved in that particular stretch of water, but the entire catchment. We will take account of the calls on water, the loss of water from those precious ecosystems, and how we can manage the situation in future.

[David Wright]

Will the Minister give way?

[Richard Benyon]

If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I will make a bit of progress. Many other Members wish to speak in the debate.

We are implementing the Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009, which was mentioned earlier, and creating new marine conservation zones around our coast. Let me tell those who talk of the checklist that may have found its way into the motion that that item is flagged as a red, and is very much ongoing. We are adhering to the timetable that was set by the hon. Member for Ogmore when he was a Minister. We are determined to complete the task, and to create an ecologically coherent network of conservation zones around our coast.

--- Later in debate ---

[Richard Benyon]

I have already said that we will address that in the near future in the water White Paper. We are determined to comply with directives, because that is what we all have to do, but we are also more ambitious, in that we want our aquatic environment to be restored. That legacy will be difficult to achieve, but we can achieve it. We can secure huge improvements in biodiversity and ecosystems by just making some changes. It is not easy to change abstraction when large numbers of people rely on the water in question for their daily lives, but this can be done, and it will be done under this Government.

[David Wright]

What discussions has the Minister had with Department for Communities and Local Government Ministers about the use of grey water produced in urban environments? That is of key importance. The right hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Nicholas Soames) made a good point about the level of water abstraction in the UK, but what we are not very good at—whereas other countries in the European Union and around the world are good at this—is using grey water in the built environment and recycling it.