Humber Flood Risk Management Strategy
Graham Stuart Excerpts(11 years, 4 months ago)
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Mr David Davis (Haltemprice and Howden) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger. Although I have been fortunate enough to secure the debate, the interests of other Members in the Chamber are at least as great as mine, so I will be as brief as I can. I will try to limit my contribution on this important matter to 15 minutes.
On 5 December last year, news around the world was dominated by the death of Nelson Mandela. The death of the greatest statesman in modern history rightly dominated all news coverage, as his achievements and legacy were celebrated. An unfortunate side effect of that was that it almost totally eclipsed one of the most serious tidal flooding events to hit the United Kingdom for more than half a century.
The tidal surge that hit the east coast of England that night was devastating. The floodwater overtopped more than 40 km of flood defences, and the Hull tidal barrier was inches away from being defeated. Had that happened, a significant part of the city would have been flooded, and thousands upon thousands of homes would have been rendered uninhabitable, causing misery for tens of thousands of people. In the event, although that did not happen, more than 1,100 properties in the area were flooded, which was still a miserable consequence for the families and businesses involved. The event was devastating, with the highest water levels ever recorded in the Humber, and we were fortunate that no one was seriously hurt or killed. When there was a similar but lesser tidal surge in 1953, more than 300 people in the east of England died.
For the people most closely affected, the flood has been a living nightmare. Warnings were not given in time, and in some cases alarms sounded only after the floodwater had inundated people’s homes. Across the Humber, most warnings were received only an hour before the waters rose. Those who were affected had no time to prepare and were forced to abandon their homes and their dearest possessions to the elements. They subsequently faced a living hell of temporary accommodation, not knowing when they would be able to move back into their own homes.
In the East Riding alone, 200 homes and nearly 50 business properties were flooded, and 15 miles of roads were submerged, which led to communities in my constituency being completely cut off. Blacktoft, Yokefleet, Saltmarsh and Faxfleet became virtual islands, and residents unsurprisingly felt abandoned and isolated. People in those remote villages were either evacuated while there was time or forced to abandon the ground floor of their own houses. They gathered what they could upstairs, but they were powerless to prevent the torrent of floodwater and debris from entering. For much of the time they were in complete darkness, because the power went as well. Some of them are pensioners, who moved to the area for a quiet and happy retirement only to see everything that they have worked for destroyed.
One respondent to a survey conducted by the local council had been informed that “Blacktoft never floods”, because of the defences, but in this case the defences simply were not good enough. Of course, defences that were perfectly adequate 25 years ago are not necessarily adequate today. In 2012, I asked the then Minister responsible, my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon), how many homes in my constituency were at risk of flooding, and he replied that from 2008 to 2012 the number of properties at risk had increased by 1,000. That illustrates the fact that with sea levels rising, if defences are not improved, that figure is certain to grow.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
My right hon. Friend rightly paints a picture of the devastation that occurred in December last year. Does he recognise that if the timing had been different by a couple of hours and if the wind direction had been different, the devastating event that we are talking about could have been catastrophic and caused major loss of human life?
Mr Davis
I think my hon. Friend has read the next page of my speech, as happens so often. He is absolutely right, and there were a number of coincidences that could be described as fortunate, although it may seem odd to describe the events of December last year as such. Had the tidal surge coincided with the astronomical tide—he is right to say that the difference was two hours—the event would have been much bigger. Had there been the levels of rainfall that we saw in 2007, the Aire, Calder, Ouse, Derwent and Trent rivers, which all feed the Humber, would have been fuller. The Humber would have started from a higher level, and I suspect that the Hull tidal defences would have been overtopped and defeated. If that had happened, we would have seen a similar picture to that in the Somerset levels, where the land was flooded for weeks, if not months afterwards. My hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that had we not been fortunate with the other events besides the tidal surge, we would have faced a much bigger catastrophe, and the events of 5 December could have included fatal incidents. The situation would have been at least as bad as it was in the Somerset levels, but with the difference that there would have been three international ports and a city of 256,000 people in the middle of it all.
The danger is real. As all hon. Members present know, we have had serious flooding in the region twice in less than a decade—in 2007 and 2013—with other serious localised flooding in 2011. The Humber represents the second highest flood risk in the country, behind only the Thames estuary. The national risk register considers tidal flood, which is what we face, to be second in severity only to an influenza pandemic. That is the scale of the threat facing the region.
The economic case for action is clear, given the strategic importance of the region to the rest of the country. Local authorities have worked incredibly well together on the matter, completely ignoring party, regional or geographic differences. Using the Treasury guidelines for such calculations, they have identified £32 billion of potential damage, which includes straightforward damage, lost productivity, increased insurance costs and deterred investment.
The economic value that is at risk includes several industries of significant strategic importance. The Humber is vital to the UK power industry, and the pressure put on the UK power network by a major flood event of the type that is predicted to occur in the next 50 years would be colossal. In addition, 28% of the UK’s oil refining capacity is situated in the Humber floodplain, and the loss of such capacity could not be made up by shifting demand to other plants. That is an important point, because it underpins one of the criteria that the Treasury uses to assess such things. It is often assumed that if an industry is at risk, it can go somewhere else, but that is not the case in the Humber.
Oil and gas terminals in the region process 30% of the country’s gas demands. More than 30% of the UK’s coal and an increasing amount of biomass fuel lands at Humber ports and is transferred to power stations such as Drax, Eggborough and Ferrybridge on road and rail routes that are also at risk from flooding. The chemicals industry in the region is enormous, amounting to more than £6 billion. Altogether, more than 20,000 businesses in the Humber are at risk from flooding, and the area contributes some £15 billion to the nation’s economy.
That all makes the Humber a national strategic asset, and rising sea levels mean that the next flood risk to that asset is not merely some distant probability. It is not something that just might happen. In the next 50 years, if we do not enhance our defences, there will be a costly and probably fatal catastrophe. Given the region’s vulnerability and the number of people under threat, it is past time for action to be taken to deal with the flood risk. By comparison, London, where the Thames floodplain has the highest flood risk in the country, is protected from events on a one-in-1,000-year basis. To achieve that, the Thames flood barrier was built between 1974 and 1982 at a cost of about £534 million, with an additional £100 million of investment around it to make it work. It is hard to assess accurately, but in today’s money that would be equivalent to more than £3 billion.
What we are discussing today would cost a lot of money. For the Humber, we are talking about £888 million, but that would still be significantly less than a third—perhaps less than a quarter—of the spend on the Thames barrier, which I do not think anyone disputes was an absolute necessity and an act of serious foresight by the Government of the day. With those figures in mind, the people of the East Riding, north Lincolnshire and Hull will rightly ask questions if the Government do not take action to improve the region’s defences.
Once it is understood that the Humber represents a national strategic asset, it becomes clear that any system of flood defences must address all risk across the entire estuary. On both banks of the river, the floodplain is very flat, and some of it is even reclaimed land—using for the first time in Britain what were then innovative Dutch techniques, Vermuyden drained Hatfield Chase, which is now in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy). Because the land is so flat and low-lying, it is impossible to separate any part of the defences from another. We cannot ring-fence the major population centres of Hull, Grimsby or Scunthorpe; we must deal with the problem as a single entity.
As Vermuyden’s involvement demonstrates, our area is in many ways as close to Holland as it gets in England. The Dutch do not do flood defences by halves, and neither should we. Perhaps we should reapply the lessons we learned from Vermuyden some centuries ago. To that end, the Environment Agency prepared the Humber flood risk management strategy in 2008 with the aim of improving the defences in the Humber, most of which dated back to the 1950s following the previous flood surge. The surge of last winter showed that the defences were inadequate and gave the agency new information that it is using to inform a comprehensive update to the strategy, with the aim of bringing defences up to such a standard that they could survive not a one-in-1,000-year event, like London, but a one-in-200-year event—that is the colloquialism, but it really means an event the probability of which occurring is 0.5% per annum.
The scheme is ambitious and will require co-operation across local and national Government, across party lines and across the north and south banks of the Humber. Much of that consensus has already been achieved: the agencies, local government, the local enterprise partnership and Members of Parliament have all acted completely without attention to narrow self-interest and with serious concern about the overall interest.
In the next 50 years it is highly likely that we will see a tidal surge event similar in magnitude to the one we experienced last winter, but worse in consequence. Factoring in the possibility of even less favourable conditions and rising sea levels, it is clear that the next major flood event could be devastating. There could be a serious threat to life and more than £32 billion of economic impact. It is not a doomsday event with an outside chance of happening; it is likely to happen at some point in the next half century. We were lucky to escape that outcome last year. If we do not act by implementing the Humber flood risk strategy, there is a serious risk of such a catastrophe being repeated.
Governments of all colours—Tory, Labour, coalition or whatever—find it difficult to take more than a five-year view, for obvious reasons; when it comes to flood defences, it is necessary to take at least a 50-year view, if not a multi-century one. We must start work on a programme that will take at least 10 years to complete. Yes, the numbers are enormous and run into billions of pounds, but the cost of doing nothing would be far greater in the long run. On 5 December 2013 we were given a timely warning—one might say God-given—of the consequences of inaction. We would do well to pay attention to it.
I will not be shocked if the Minister has not turned up with £900 million for us in his back pocket—I will be disappointed, but not shocked. Nevertheless, we must recognise that we are faced with a conjunction of several things: a major risk that we know is going to get worse; a historic demonstration of the harm of that risk if it is ever realised; and a clear strategic asset that is at risk in terms of industry, economy, links to the outside world and, most importantly, the hundreds of thousands of people of the area. Because it will take so long to carry out the necessary improvements and enhancements to the defences, it is vital that the Government take a strategic view in both direction and money.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger, and to follow the excellent speeches made by Members across the Chamber, which have given the Minister and the rest of the Front-Bench team a clear message about the unity of feeling around the Humber. As has been said—it is worth reiterating—that goes across party lines and includes local authorities working together under the industrial leadership of the local enterprise partnership. We are all united in this, alongside the technical input and understanding of the Environment Agency and other agencies.
I take the Minister back to December, when I visited residents of Kilnsea in my constituency, just above Spurn point, and met the chairman of the parish council there in his house, which had recently been refurbished. I saw his devastation and that of his wife, as their brand-new kitchen and recently installed facilities had been wrecked by the overtopping of the nearby bank. To his credit, he was not primarily concerned with his own interests, but was going out to meet other residents. He took me to meet them and their homes had similarly been devastated. Some of those people were less resilient than that couple, because of their age or infirmity. As the Minister will know, the personal impact on people whose homes have been flooded is utterly devastating.
The recent flooding comes just a few years after the 2007 floods. Last Wednesday—25 June—was the anniversary of those floods. They devastated Hull and the East Riding, led to Hornsea in my constituency being cut off, and led to flooding in every area of my constituency and in Hull, with many people being driven out of their homes—not just for months, but in some cases for years. Flooding is personally devastating, and that will always be at the forefront of my mind when I consider this issue.
If I may, I shall echo the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers) around opportunity. We have a fantastic and phenomenal positive opportunity around the Humber. I pay tribute to Lord Haskins, the chairman of the LEP, and others, who are working together to take the area forward. We have lower than average incomes in Yorkshire and the Humber—in fact, they are among the lowest average incomes in England—so we start from a position of having great deprivation and some history of economic failure, relatively speaking, yet a massive opportunity is opening up. We are working on taking that opportunity, cross-party and across authorities.
The Government should take enormous credit for the steps they have taken to help. The halving of the Humber bridge tolls has meant that instead of that bridge acting as a barrier between the two banks of the river—stopping them working together for the economic betterment of the whole area—it is a catalyst. Cross-party, we made representations to the Secretary of State for Transport. He has agreed to the electrification of the line to Hull, which will make a significant difference. Of course, the previous Culture Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Maria Miller), announced that Hull had been made city of culture 2017, and that announcement, too, is having a galvanising effect. From the Prime Minister down and throughout Government, efforts were made to encourage Siemens to sign up to come to Hull and for the supply chain to come to Paull in my constituency, which is immediately east of Hull. That work was also successful.
It was my great pleasure to lead the members of the Education Committee to Hull last Monday and Tuesday, for them to visit schools there and see a real sense of renewal, energy and drive to raise standards. There is a massive opportunity for the area and it is waiting to be grasped.
If I look at clouds on the horizon, I see remarkably few. However, what I do see is the prospect of the chilling impact of the risk of flooding. If manufacturers such as Smith & Nephew, which the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Alan Johnson) mentioned, see that their investment is at risk from a failure to provide suitable protection, they can so easily take that investment elsewhere. That is true of so many of the companies that we have made such an effort to attract to the Humber area, reinforcing the presence of industry there. We have that enormous opportunity and we cannot afford to have it chilled by a failure to take the long-term view of the need for flood protection.
The Government rightly recognise the challenges of climate change. Anyone involved with climate change will know that the risks around it are twofold, or in two areas: the need to mitigate and the need to adapt. It is not enough simply to mitigate; we also need to adapt. I have in front of me the excellent latest science briefing from the Royal Society and the US National Academy of Sciences. It shows the sea level rise record since the beginning of the 20th century, including the acceleration of sea level rise in the last few decades, which is expected to carry on accelerating to the end of this century. Given that, how can we allow the short-term political time frames in which we operate—four or five years to a general election, or between local government elections—to inform our attitude to this subject? The danger is that we will and that we will not take the long-term view, which is so important if we are to get this right.
My message to the Minister is to look at how Government can create the frameworks to ensure that the resource that is required is invested in time to meet the long-term threat, because we recognise that the dynamics of the politics in which we operate on a daily basis are not very good for dealing with long-term threats. Therefore, we need to look hard at how we get a framework in place to ensure that there is an incentive to deal with those long-term threats, and that we deal with them, because although we will strongly make the case today, as we are doing, for the Humber area, the truth is that, nationally, we need to take the risk of flood damage more seriously. That fits entirely with the analysis that the Government have themselves made of the risks around climate change and rising sea levels, yet we do not see a co-ordinated, well thought through, long-term plan to ensure that the correct protections are put in place.
I want to make sure that the Minister is aware that, separately from the Humber efforts, the River Hull advisory board is studying the factors that contribute to flooding in the River Hull valley, which will have a strategic impact on the Humber, too. Across the piece, we are all working as hard as we can to ensure that we have a joined-up approach.
One criticism of the 2008 strategy was that, perhaps because of its funding and the brief it was given, it failed to understand the interconnectedness of city and rural areas, including how rural areas often act as a sponge for the urban areas. As I think my right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) said in his opening speech, we cannot view areas of the Humber in isolation. There is no way to ring-fence them, have just a limited spend here or there and somehow protect a particular place. We have to view the area as one joined-up whole.
To return to the issue affecting Kilnsea, the replacement of the bank that was overtopped in December will cost £450,000. The Environment Agency has promised £300,000 and £50,000 has been raised locally, but that leaves the project £100,000 short. The bank is important to defend the residential and business properties of the village, such as that fine purveyor of great ales, the Crown and Anchor pub, and it also plays a vital role in defending the road to Spurn point, which is a popular tourist destination of national significance. Spurn point also plays a phenomenally important role in protecting the Hull ports area. It provides a natural barrier that deflects the longshore drift away from the estuary, thus allowing the estuary to self-clean to an extent.
I must pay tribute to the local internal drainage boards, which do such an excellent job of maintaining inland watercourses. However, I have a point to make about them, which I hope the Minister might take up with the Marine Management Organisation, if he has not done so already: that new, fresh quango no sooner came into being than it slapped a £10,000 bill on my local IDB for carrying out work that, had it been carried out by the Environment Agency, with the same contractors, would have attracted no such bill, which represented more than 10% of the project cost. If we are to have local areas taking responsibility, investing money and making things happen, we need to ensure that large quangos do not come along to give an initial estimate of £3,000, which I think is outrageous, before finally charging £10,000, which truly is outrageous.
One final local point is the Welwick realignment scheme, which is ongoing, although delays are causing increased flood risk. The bank involved needs to be restored, but investment is being held back until the overall realignment scheme is confirmed. Decisions need to be made more quickly and action must be taken so that we have ongoing, sustained and sensible protection from the risk of flood for industry and for residential properties.
Minister, those of us here today will maintain our joint efforts in this regard—not only when we meet the Prime Minister next week, but thereafter. I will finish by referring to an issue that I touched on earlier, which is trying to get a framework in place that means that the MPs for a particular area do not have to make a united effort to get people to see the long-term risk when the technical evidence for that risk already exists. With rising sea levels and the risks of climate change, we need a strategic overview by Government of the risks around flooding. Without that, we are putting our constituents at risk of devastating flooding of their homes, and we are also risking investment in and commercial success for this country. Having made that plea, I shall sit down.
Barry Gardiner
I am conscious that the Minister needs to speak, so if the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I will not give way.
Last week, the outgoing head of the Environment Agency used a speech at the RSA—the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce—to call for cross-party consensus of the kind that we have seen this morning. That is what we had with the Pitt review: an approach that focused on building the capacity for strategic intervention. There were 92 recommendations, but only 46 were implemented. That approach, however, saw improvements implemented at Brough, Swinefleet, Burringham, Gunness, Stallingborough and Halton Marshes.
Since 2010 many of the projects named in the Humber flood risk management strategy have become stuck in the pipeline, because Government cuts have closed off, and in some cases indefinitely delayed, the available funding for essential projects. Examples include the Sutton Ings flood alleviation scheme, a sustainable drainage retrofit that would have protected an area of central Hull in which there are 2,982 homes at significant risk of flooding. The Ulceby flood alleviation scheme would have protected an area of Grimsby in which 2,164 homes are at significant risk of flooding. We urgently need to get back to an evidence-based flood management policy that all parties in the House can support. Nothing else will deliver the risk management strategy required for the Humber.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dan Rogerson)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger. As is conventional—but I say this in a heartfelt way—I thank the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) for securing the debate, which has given hon. Members across the region and across parties the opportunity to add their voices to a collective strategy at the political level, and to work with the technical expertise and the communities involved to move forward in addressing flood risk in the area.
As the right hon. Gentleman set out, and as others have reminded us, on 5 December 2013 the east coast experienced a very serious tidal surge, causing flooding to communities along the banks of the Humber, and indeed upstream. The defences were overtopped, and there was flooding to more than 1,100 homes and businesses, and 700 hectares of land around the Humber. A number of right hon. and hon. Members have talked about the importance of some of that land. The Government and I very much appreciate the impact that had, and the distress caused to the communities and businesses affected. I sympathise deeply with those whose homes and businesses were flooded. I have seen at first hand the effects of flooding around the country. The hon. Member for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers) mentioned that a number of Ministers have visited his constituency and the surrounding area to look at the impact.
I am grateful to the Environment Agency and all the other risk management authorities in the area, and to the emergency responders, for their excellent work in preparing for—that is important—and managing such events, without which the damage would have been much worse. When the flooding happened, they responded quickly and efficiently, so I particularly thank, as I have done in previous debates, all the professionals and volunteers for the way in which they responded to the exceptional weather.
Twelve thousand warnings were sent directly to homes and businesses, allowing people to prepare. We should not forget that our defences protected 156,000 properties in the area during the surge. The hon. Member for Cleethorpes said that it was difficult for people who have been flooded to hear the Government talking about what has been achieved, but as the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) pointed out, it is important to send a message to those considering investing, or those who take decisions about levels of insurance premiums, excesses and so on, that defences do protect communities, and that many such defences operated successfully in this instance, as in others.
The 2013 event was of a similar magnitude to—it was slightly greater—the disastrous surge of 1953, in which 24,000 properties flooded and more than 300 people died. Surges such as the ones we saw in 1953 and in December last year will occur again, and it is possible that climate change could make such events more common and more severe. We cannot stop those events from happening, but we can ensure that our planning, preparation and investment in defences protect communities when they do happen. That is an ongoing process that right hon. and hon. Members present are at the heart of, on behalf of their communities.
Dan Rogerson
I will, although I will not be able to do so often, because I want to get through all the issues.
Mr Stuart
I am grateful to the Minister. On the point about putting a strategic framework in place, will he reflect on whether we need to establish, as in Holland, flood protection standards that trigger the resource to deliver the standard, rather than having a certain amount of resource and doing the best possible with that?
Dan Rogerson
I will come on to resourcing. The hon. Gentleman has made a point about the approach in another jurisdiction; a number of people referred to Holland—or the Netherlands, as I should properly say.
One example of the ongoing investment I referred to is the £20 million defence improvement project that is under construction to provide better protection in Grimsby. That will be completed in autumn 2015.
I will say a little more in a moment about what is being done in the Humber area, but let me first put this issue in the national context, following on from the comments of the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner). I have worked with him in Select Committee, and I now face him in debates—he is one of the two Opposition Front-Bench Members his party leader has thoughtfully provided to shadow me, and I am obviously grateful to both of them for the way in which they do that.
Let me reiterate that flood management is a Government priority. We are spending £3.2 billion on flood and coastal erosion management over this Parliament. For the future, we have made a record six-year capital commitment of at least £370 million a year, as the hon. Gentleman said, to improve flood defences, and that will rise to more than £400 million in 2020-21.
With the 2014 autumn statement, we will publish a pipeline—to use the jargon—for flood defence improvement projects for the next six years. That will provide protection for at least 300,000 further households throughout the country, meaning that, by the end of the decade, we will have provided a better level of protection to at least 465,000 households. That is on top of our achievements over this Parliament.
Despite taking a terrible battering this winter, our defences have protected a significant number of properties. About 1.3 million properties and 950 square miles of farmland were protected during that period. In response to the exceptional events of the winter, the Government acted quickly. We not only made an extra £270 million available to repair, restore and maintain critical defences, but made available recovery money for those most seriously affected.
The £270 million of additional funding is being used on the ground now to help the Environment Agency and other risk-management authorities to ensure that important defences are repaired before the coming winter, and are returned to target condition as soon as possible. From time to time, it has been implied that some of these defences will not be there to do the job for which they were originally designed; that is why it is crucial that the money is spent to ensure that they are back up to target condition.
In 2007, the then Government approved the Humber flood risk management strategy, providing the Environment Agency with a strategic business case to invest up to £323 million over a 25-year period up to 2032 on works to manage and reduce tidal flood risk in the area. Although the strategy was led by the Environment Agency, it was developed with, and supported by, other risk-management authorities and key stakeholders in the area. The first programme of improvement schemes started to be delivered in 2009, including schemes at Brough, Swinefleet, Halton Marshes, Stallingborough and Donna Nook. Schemes have since been delivered at Burringham, Gunness, Tetney and Grimsby, and the scheme at Cleethorpes is under construction. Defence improvements are also being planned for Hull.
The right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Alan Johnson) set out the importance of the protection at the Albert dock. The temporary defences are there, so they are in place to increase the level of defence. The work he was concerned about, which will make those defences permanent, will be completed during this financial year. Even if the defences are not made permanent by this winter, the temporary defences are in place, and they will be made permanent. It is important that the right hon. Gentleman raised the issue, given the level of risk. In the time remaining, I want to pick up on a few points.
Dan Rogerson
May I respond to the points that have already been made? I apologise to the hon. Gentleman, but there is a great deal to get through.
The right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden mentioned the importance not only of new defences, but of assessing existing defences to see where improvements need to be made. That very much has to be part of the strategy, and he is right to mention the issue. Hull is an example of that process.
The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the effects over the entire estuary. It is possible to ring-fence some of the major population centres. Other Members have referred to the times when farmland can be used as part of a short-term measure to absorb water. Although I accept the point the right hon. Member for East Yorkshire (Sir Greg Knight) made about the importance of farmland to the local economy and to the country’s food security, there are schemes—there is one in Kent—in which farmers have been paid to take flood water as part of a local strategy. Where a case can be made for doing that, it can certainly be part of the solution.
We have put in place the flood recovery fund for farmers, so that they can apply for funds to restore land that has been affected. A number of farmers in the west country have done that, but the money has also been made available to people who were affected by the early December flooding in the region we are talking about. It is important to put on record that that funding was available to help people deal with the shorter-term effects.
I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden and other Members for their recognition of the fact that I do not have a cheque book with me and cannot sign over up to £1 billion of investment today.
Dan Rogerson
Although I accept that hon. Members are disappointed to hear that, it is important to note that the work they are doing, along with the technical advice that is being received and the work that all the local authorities are involved in, will make a strong case for a long-term investment plan. The Government will then be able to consider that, along with the most up-to-date information.
The right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle set out events that took place under the Labour Government, which were of huge concern and had a great impact particularly in Hull, although also in the surrounding area. We must always be aware of the severity and the likelihood of such impacts.
On the flood risk to smaller communities, one strength of the Government’s partnership approach is that it has allowed some of the smaller schemes in rural areas to go ahead. We think that up to 25% more schemes will go ahead because of that approach, which has provided an opportunity to raise money locally to partner with Government investment. Some more rural schemes would not necessarily have been scored as highly as some of the bigger schemes, but partnership funding means that they are taking place, and I am aware of many that are going ahead as a result.
The right hon. Gentleman mentioned hypothecation and using the climate change levy and other things. Clearly, it is for Her Majesty’s Treasury to decide how the taxes it receives are spent. The position of successive Governments has been not to focus on hypothecation, but to look at investing in things that are necessary. Members have made the case today for investment in flood defences, and we have heard that very clearly. That is why we are spending more than previous Governments have.
The hon. Member for Cleethorpes set out, as he has done consistently since the flooding took place, the impact on the local economy and the importance of the port in the area he represents. It is crucial that colleagues in all Departments and agencies are involved in our plans and strategies as we move forward—the flood envoy covering the area is a Minister in the Department for Transport—and that we take account of what they can do to secure critical assets and infrastructure.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned local knowledge and what local land managers, farmers and internal drainage boards can offer. The Environment Agency is keen to work with them to make sure it constantly improves provision. Of course, many of the people who work for it also live in the areas affected and have worked there for many years, so the agency has great expertise when looking at local areas.
The hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart) talked movingly about the personal impacts and about how some of the responders—he mentioned a parish council chairman—took action on behalf of their community, even though they themselves were affected. It is important to recognise that. He talked about climate change and the national picture. While the Members gathered here will want to focus on what they want for their area, it is important to ensure that everybody can make their case, because there are many vulnerable areas, including further down the east coast, for example, where people will be looking to take forward schemes. He also mentioned a number of local schemes and described the impacts and the repairs that are under way, and I would be happy to write to him about some of them to make sure that we maintain progress.
The hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North rightly mentioned, as she has done consistently, the importance of making sure there is room for development in areas prone to flood risk. The Government and local authorities want to send a strong message that we want to make these areas resilient and as well-protected as possible. We do not want just to add to flood risk. The Flood Re scheme builds on what was there before, which was set up for properties flooded in 2008. While 2009 remains the cut-off, we are investing in flood defences to protect other areas. That is why it is important we are talking today about protecting areas affected more recently.
The debate has given local Members the opportunity to show that they are working together, working with local communities and local authorities and using the Environment Agency’s expertise to make a case for investment in their area. I am delighted that they have secured a meeting with my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister to take that forward, and that there is an opportunity to work with Departments on community resilience and the resilience of critical infrastructure.
Managing Flood Risk
Graham Stuart Excerpts(11 years, 8 months ago)
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Caroline Lucas
I have given way a lot, and I fear that Mr Speaker will tell me to wind up.
We need better soil management as well as better water management, not least because that reduces the silting up of river beds further downstream. Approaches that help more water to remain in the uplands, where there may be peat bogs, rather than going downstream into people’s living rooms, can seriously improve water quality and have the potential to cut water bills for households.
Finally, on climate change, I regret that the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government is not here because his comments during the debate last week were complacent at best and reckless at worst. If he were here, he could clear up the basic matter of what he thinks is man-made and what is natural when it comes to the increased risk of extreme weather. In the same breath as he mentioned the Met Office, he said that there “might” be either short-term or long-term trends. On what basis does he query the long-term trend, let alone its seriousness? The Met Office states:
“There is no evidence to counter the basic premise that a warmer world will lead to more intense daily and hourly rain events.”
If the Secretary of State has the evidence, let us see it. The only supposed authority he offered in support of his views is Lord Lawson—not a scientist of any sort but a staunch defender of the fossil fuel industry and head of a campaign group that lobbies against the Government’s climate change policies.
When talking about what he knows about climate science, why does the Secretary of State choose not to quote a climate scientist? When he has read Hansard later, perhaps he will confirm whether he has read the recent joint report by the leading UK and US scientific institutions—the Royal Society and the National Academy of Sciences—which finds that man-made climate change is more certain than ever and will post severe threats to society and infrastructure. Will he agree to meet Sir Paul Nurse and the authors of the report to ensure that his approach to defending the realm takes account of the realities and the risks of climate change?
I accept that the Secretary of State said last week that
“the risk is there to our nation”.—[Official Report, 26 February 2014; Vol. 576, c. 335.]
Let us therefore keep to the theory of risk rather than uncertainty, which, as we all know, is a well-known tactic of obfuscation and delaying action used by those with vested interests, from the tobacco to the fossil fuel lobbies. If we talk about this in terms of risk rather than uncertainty, it is like thinking about what is more important, risk or certainty, when we decide whether to get on a plane, vaccinate our children, or insure our homes and valuable belongings, or even whether to cross a busy road. Does a rational and responsible parent say, “I’m not 100% sure that my child will definitely get a really serious disease, so I’m not going to vaccinate them”? If one has just bought a new house, is the sensible approach to say, “I’m not 100% certain that my house will burn down, so I’m not going to bother with home insurance”? No. Unless we have a science and risk-based approach to protecting UK homes and businesses from future flood risk and extreme weather, the Secretary of State will be failing in his aim to ensure that our citizens are safe.
I also object to the Secretary of State’s view that the climate debate is polarised, as he claimed, between sceptics and zealots. Organisations such as the World Bank, the International Energy Agency, insurance industry bodies, the World Economic Forum and PwC have clearly paid a lot more attention to the science than he has. These organisations, which are not in any way environmentalist, are all warning that if we continue with business as usual and fail to make radical cuts to emissions, we are on course to seeing 4°, if not 6°, of climate change within our children’s lifetimes.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
I think the hon. Lady takes issue with the Secretary of State on the wrong point. There is a danger of hectoring. Given such overwhelming scientific evidence, it should be a straightforward matter to bring people on board in seeing that there is a risk that needs to be managed, but the debate has somehow become partisan and divided. Perhaps she, and all of us, could think about how we get our language right so that we create an inclusive approach, and then we can argue about the best response, not divide on the basis of belief.
Caroline Lucas
I thank the hon. Gentleman. I suggest that the Secretary of State is one of the first people who ought to be trying to generate that inclusive approach to climate change. Instead, he has been doing exactly the opposite in referring to people as zealots and saying that those who promote a risk-based approach to climate change are completely off the agenda. I entirely agree that we could look at our language, but let us take the fight to where it starts, which is with the Secretary of State’s response to the flooding debate last week.
I can tell, Mr Speaker, that you would like me to conclude very shortly, so I shall be brief. I find it extraordinary that although this debate is about something we can agree on—we all want to reduce the impacts of flooding on the communities we represent—many of us are not prepared to look at the likely causes of extreme weather events of the kind that we have been seeing in recent weeks. If I sound frustrated, that is where my level of frustration is coming from. As the Secretary of State spoke only of adapting to climate change rather than turning off the fossil fuel tap to prevent more climate change from reaching dangerous levels in the first place, perhaps he would like to explain to the House what 6° of climate change might look like, or even what 4° of climate change would mean for the UK, and exactly how he would adapt to those changes. So far we have seen only 0.8° of climate change, but perhaps some people in Somerset, let alone communities elsewhere in the world, might argue that the situation is already dangerous.
If this Government want credibility as regards protecting the UK from the increased risk of flooding and other climate risks, we need radical action to cut emissions in line with both science and equity. That means leaving about 80% of known fossil fuels in the ground, not handing out tax breaks to companies to find and exploit yet more reserves of oil and gas that we cannot afford to burn. It means not just accepting but strengthening the fourth carbon budget in line with the science, to secure the economic and employment benefits of leading the transition to a zero-carbon economy. It means leadership to ensure that action on climate change is not just an issue for the Department of Energy and Climate Change, but a top priority for all the Government.
The flooding has led to many words being spoken in the House about resilience, and the importance of taking the right long-term decisions for our future and that of our children, but action, not just words on climate change, is the litmus test of whether or not they are meaningful.
Peter Aldous
I agree entirely. One thing the Government need to be doing is making sure advice is provided through the local authorities on this £5,000. Support and advice must be given to local communities, in particular in streets where this problem is occurring, to enable them to put in place sound and practical arrangements as soon as possible.
Mr Graham Stuart
Does my hon. Friend agree that it is also important that the £5,000 is made available in the most sensible manner possible, so that those who have been repeatedly flooded over a number of years are eligible, rather than just those who have had a one-off event, however severe, which is unlikely to repeated for a long time to come?
Peter Aldous
The £5,000 grant has clearly hit the right note across the country, and it is no doubt right that the Government should review very carefully where it is provided.
In my constituency, the preparatory and warning work leading up to the storm surge generally went well. There is scope for improvement in handling the mop-up afterwards, however, and I know the councils are looking at doing that. It is also important to support those who are facing change and uncertainty, even if that is in the long term. Long-term expensive works are required to defend the communities of Corton and Kessingland in my constituency. It is necessary to work with those communities to involve them in finding a permanent solution, even if it is going to be very expensive and some way hence, so that they have confidence that in the long term such solutions will be in place, rather than leaving them feeling marooned and isolated, as they perhaps do at the moment.
Secondly, I am concerned that the existing mechanism for accessing new flood defence schemes is deficient, in that it does not give sufficient weight to economic considerations. It is important that when the Government are determining whether to provide financial support for flood defence schemes, proper account is taken of the economic benefits of the proposals. The benefit-to-cost rules that are currently applied do not do that. In the 2008 Pitt review the recognition of the need to protect the economy is too limited, and there are similar concerns about the flood and coastal erosion risk management plan introduced in 2011.
In my constituency, the future economic viability and vitality of Lowestoft are highly dependent on investment being made by energy companies in the port area, the very area where much of the flooding occurred on 5 December. In order to attract that investment, which would regenerate the area, bringing new business and new jobs to the town, it is important that robust and comprehensive coastal and flood defence arrangements are in place. Proposals to achieve that will be submitted to the Department shortly, and I shall be lobbying vigorously for the necessary funding.
Finally, there is a need for a new approach to coastal erosion and protection, and for a longer-term plan and increased investment in sea defences. Many of the sea defences in Suffolk and Norfolk were put in place by the Eden and Macmillan Governments after the 1953 floods and are now in need of urgent repair, upgrading or replacement. Given the events of 2007 and 2013, it seems these sorts of problems are likely to become more frequent in the coming years. Sea levels on the Suffolk coast have been rising since records began in Victorian times, and since 1953 they have been rising by 2.4 mm per annum. When the impact of climate change is added, it is clear that there is a need for urgent action. In Lowestoft, Halcrow and BAM Nuttall have made the assessment that whereas the previous estimate was that a 1953-type flood would occur every 1,000 years, it could now take place every 20 years.
The UK’s approach to coastal defences over the past 20 years should be contrasted with that of the Dutch. After the 1953 floods, they designed their sea defences to withstand a one-in-4,000-year flood, whereas ours were designed to withstand only a one-in-1,000-year flood. The Dutch have pursued a different approach: the provision of their coastal defences is fully integrated with the provision of other infrastructure, be it airports, harbours, roads, houses or factories. In the UK, coastal flood defences have tended to be an add-on and have all too frequently been cut in times of austerity. The Dutch do not rely solely on hard defences, and a system of dams, dunes and dykes has been put in place which enables them to withstand a one-in-10,000-year storm. By contrast, neither the Pitt review nor the flood and coastal erosion management plan properly addresses coastal erosion and flooding. The latter does not fully reflect the differences between inland flooding, which is temporary, and coastal flooding and erosion, which can be terminal for affected properties and assets.
The storm surges that occurred along the east coast in 1953 and 2013 were the result of a combination of events: very low atmospheric pressure over the North sea, which caused the sea level to rise dramatically; high astronomic tides; gale force winds; and rainfall. On both recent occasions, we escaped by the skin of our teeth, although I concede that what happened in 1953 was horrific; in 2007, the wind dropped in the nick of time, and in 2013 the wind was blowing in a northerly direction and there was no heavy rainfall. I fear that it will not be third time lucky, and it is important both that new defences are put in place as soon as practically possible and that we adopt a different approach to the managing of flood risk.
Richard Benyon (Newbury) (Con)
I start by referring hon. Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests and by apologising to the House for legging it earlier. I had to host a long-standing event on the Terrace for land-based colleges, and I thought I should stick to that diary entry.
I remind the House that 55,000 properties were flooded in this country in 2007, and 2,500 of them were in my constituency. That was a devastating experience. One house being flooded is devastating for the individual householder, and none of us must ever underestimate the impact that this problem has on individual households. This year, approximately 7,000 properties have been flooded across the country, including 140 in my constituency. It is worth reminding ourselves that 1.3 million homes did not flood because of good-quality defences that have been built under this Government and previous Governments. Many more properties have been protected as a result of the combined efforts of various agencies and not least local volunteers, who have been unbelievably effective in my constituency and in many other constituencies. The emergency services worked to protect properties during the floods by putting up flood defences, pumping out drainage systems and being on hand. I also commend local authorities, the Environment Agency and many others.
Drainage boards are unsung heroes on flooding. They do extraordinary work, and they are successful because they use local knowledge and have real expertise. They understand how to manage water. I pay tribute to my local authority, West Berkshire council, and particularly Carolyn Richardson, its emergency manager. At an early stage, following the Pitt review and the 2007 floods, she took on responsibility for the local authority’s emergency response systems, feeding through into silver and gold commands, which come into effect for events such as those that have occurred in the past few weeks.
The response by local communities where flooding has taken place, or where there is a threat of flooding, has been quite extraordinary. Friends and neighbours are to be commended for their actions, and in those circumstances we see Britain at its best and communities at their best. Local people have done what they can to help people in their hour of need. There is an ongoing emergency. In the Lambourn and Pang valleys, we have historically high levels of groundwater, and houses that had not been flooded have now been flooded. A number of people are absolutely exhausted as a result of their constant efforts to keep floodwater and sewage out of their properties. We are not yet in the recovery stage.
I am glad that we seem to have moved on, both in the House and in the media, from a rather sterile, binary argument about the need to dredge or not to dredge: the virtues of dredging were opposed by those who said that it was wrong. We seem to have moved on and adopted more sensible thinking. The worst time to make or change policy is in the teeth of a crisis, particularly as we sometimes feel the need to play the game of satisfying the 24-hour news agenda. Parts of the press that I have come across in recent weeks and years—they know who they are—have asked me some of the most stupid questions I have ever heard. I am glad that this ended up on the cutting room floor, but I was asked by one reporter: “Should the Government apologise for the floods?” A Radio Bristol reporter, who I think had just done a course on aggressive interviewing, once asked me, “It’s been raining for days down here—what are you doing about it?” That kind of an agenda and ludicrous editorial pushing, which says to reporters, “This story needs legs: go out there and find someone to blame”, does not show our media at their best. We seem to have moved on, and recently there have been some interesting pieces of work that have begun to show the complexity of the problem we are dealing with.
Mr Graham Stuart
Will my hon. Friend answer two questions on the framework within which this is judged? First, do we need to give more power and resource to local determination? Secondly, do we need to look at the overall framework? Holland has statutory standards that have to be observed, and that trigger the funding, taxation and resource to ensure that, even when flooding is not in the public eye, it continues to be worked on.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
It is a pleasure to take part in this debate, which, as my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton South (Mr Binley) said, has been distinguished by many fine speeches covering a wide range of policies relevant to the subject in hand. One of the largest, all-encompassing issues—climate change—has been touched on, and in my exchange with the Green party member the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) I spoke about getting the language right, which is important. I declare an interest as chair of GLOBE International, and refer the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. Last week in Washington, GLOBE International held a climate legislation summit in the US Senate. The Royal Society and the National Academy of Sciences gave a presentation, which coincided with the launch of their new booklet setting out the state of the science—truly chilling information.
I am not a scientist and have always remained sceptical when dealing with climate change and trying to come up with the most rational—I hope—response, and my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Mr Blunt) said that this is about acting in the most rational and sensible way with our information and limited finances. Unlike some who would cast Lord Lawson into outer darkness for daring to question any of the orthodoxies, I do not think that is the right way to go. We need an inclusive debate in which we assess the science, taking it with an appropriate pinch of salt as we in this place learn to do with all expert opinion. However, the mounting, growing, consistency of information makes it hard not to accept that the emissions we create in our industrialised societies are contributing—and, more importantly, will contribute —to greater warming of the planet.
We are trying to work out what that means and its implications, but scientists would say that they do not understand it all. Perhaps even more complicated than understanding which areas will be colder, wetter or warmer as a result, is working out the best response to that threat, and that is the fundamental context for this debate on managing flood risk. All scientists—certainly those I have seen—seem to agree that greater energy is coming to the Earth, which will lead to greater levels of precipitation. In some areas there will be intensified drought, and in others intensified rainfall. In that context we must think not only about our response to the current environment—whether or not that is immediately driven by climate change—but about the long term.
I, too, pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Liddell-Grainger). One challenge with flooding is that when it is a hot topic, it is a hot topic. Leaders of the day make lots of promises, but there then tends to be a fading away; a salami slicing of budgets. That is why I asked my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon)—quite rightly a highly regarded former Minister—what framework we might need to put in place to deal with that.
Holland has statutory standards. I may get some of my facts wrong, which will doubtless be pointed out, but my understanding is that the Dutch have tried to look at the evidence, drawn a line, and worked out the areas they cannot afford to defend because they are indefensible or so costly that it is unreasonable. Behind that line they have statutory standards and flood boards with much wider tax bases, who are elected—admittedly sometimes with derisory turnouts—to put in place and, as various hon. Friends have said, to maintain the defences, so that that standard is delivered. The Dutch would say that that is far from perfect, but it provides a framework in which people can have some confidence that even if there are no floods for a few years, things will not fall into a state of neglect.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. Mr Parish, you have got away with it once. I am not going to let it go twice.
Mr Stuart
I would like to say a few words on how my constituency has been affected. It was devastated in the 2007 floods. The impact on homes and businesses was far greater than it has been in the current floods, but, as others have said, flooding is devastating for every home and business. About 1,100 homes and businesses were flooded by the tidal surge in December that affected people around the Humber estuary. Whatever the cause, flooding has a tremendously strong effect.
I would like to praise the work of internal drainage boards in my area. The south Holderness internal drainage board undertook work to dredge Hedon Haven. Dredging needs to be done in the appropriate way and in the appropriate place—I can imagine dredging having a detrimental effect in the valleys mentioned by the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant). The incredibly flat area of Holderness is effectively a man-made ecosystem. It is hard to see improved dredging, which would allow very slow-moving water to get out, leading to anything other than an improvement. It will not stop one-in-200-year flooding events having a negative effect, but it will make them last slightly less long with a less wide impact. Dredging also appeals to local people, who like to feel that those bits of the system that drain water away are kept in a state of usefulness.
One point I would like to make to the Minister is that when the Keyingham internal drainage board in my constituency was looking to carry out dredging at Stone Creek and Hedon Haven, the new Marine Management Organisation decided to charge it for a licence. We spent years pulling all the pools and the political will together to get the sign off to allow us to dredge and let the water out, but what happened? This glorified new quango came along and sent in a suggested bill for thousands of pounds to grant a licence, even though the Environment Agency, when it had done similar work elsewhere, had not charged anything. The MMO decided that it had to do so much more work it ended up charging £10,000 for that one bit of dredging. Will the Minister please ensure that quangos do not inflict charges that stop local people doing what is necessary to make sure that things are more sensibly managed?
After 2007, there was a good response from people who had, up until that point, not performed as well as they should; whether that was Yorkshire Water, the Environment Agency or the council. In our area, people did not know who owned the pumps, let alone whether they were responsible for keeping them going, but since 2007 they have worked together. In front of Willow Grove in Beverley, Yorkshire Water has done a great deal of work, and the local council then came in and worked closely with local residents. In 2007, a very beautiful row of houses was famously pictured all flooded. The picture went out around the world. A flood wall has now been erected in front of those homes, trees have been planted and the Westwood area has been restored. Local ownership really can work and we need to ensure we keep it that way.
We need to ensure that we have as broad an understanding as possible of catchments and their impact. That is why all the agencies involved—the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner) who is in his place, Members of the European Parliament, Hull city council, East Riding council—supported setting up the River Hull Advisory Board, which I chair. The Environment Agency and others have supported finding the funding to try to have better modelling of the River Hull catchment, so that we can ensure the effective protection of agricultural land—which deserves consideration—rural areas and the urban areas in Hull. The truth is that we are all in it together and we need to ensure that we have a coherent and cohesive approach that works. I pay tribute to all the agencies that have worked together on the River Hull Advisory Board. We really are taking forward a better understanding and a better policy for the future.
Andrew Percy
My hon. Friend is entirely right about the need for catchment plans, but is there not a fear that, such as with the River Aire catchment plan in my constituency, funding will be factored towards the urban areas because of the formula? There is a perception that the River Aire plan is all about protecting Leeds and not protecting those of us a bit further down the river.
Mr Stuart
That is a good point. As my hon. Friend might imagine, one of my purposes as chairman of the body I mentioned is to ensure that, rather than policy being skewed in favour of the rural and against the urban, we do not bind ourselves within policy frameworks to such an extent that we cannot make recommendations to the Government. I do not wish to prejudge the position, but I hope to be able to make common-sense recommendations that will enable the representatives of the city of Hull and the East Riding to speak with one voice, and suggest changes to the framework that will facilitate the adoption of an approach that is as reasonable and joined-up as possible. I recognise that finances are limited, but we need to ensure that no one, in the city or in the countryside, is unfairly deprived of the support that should rightfully be theirs.
Finally, let me congratulate the Government, from the Prime Minister down. I think they have shown that they are committed to dealing with this issue. I mentioned the framework because I want that commitment to continue long after the issue—along with the water—has, we hope, drained away. The Government have introduced a series of measures that have already been mentioned, providing not only grants but funds to help businesses that have been flooded, such as those in the constituencies of the hon. Members for Kingston upon Hull East and for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson).
One thing we must do is cut through the bureaucracy. Perhaps the Minister can help with that. For instance, a small business person in my constituency who owns a pub in Hull contacted the city council when it was flooded. He said “I was delighted to hear on the news that the Government can help me to get through this. I am paying my staff at the moment, because I do not want to lose them and I must look after them, but my pub is taking no money.” He was told “We have not got any forms yet.” “So I cannot apply for help?” “No. We have not got any forms yet.” That kind of nonsense must end. We must ensure that whichever council or other authority is involved can move quickly, because there is nothing more frustrating than hearing people make promises on television, and then finding that the door is barred by some foolish bit of bureaucracy.
Dan Rogerson
My hon. Friend made that point earlier, and a number of other Members referred to the planning process. The good news is that the advice that the Environment Agency gives is taken into account in the vast majority of circumstances. However, there may be examples where we could look at that. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, who has discussed the response and recovery aspects of these flooding events at the Dispatch Box on a number of occasions, will have heard that cry, and the national planning policy framework, which the Government have set out, makes it clear that we should not build on floodplains. There are locations, such as those, as we have heard, in the Humber area and so on, where that means no development at all, and the guidance makes it clear that we should see more resistance and resilience built into existing properties. The hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) made that point in response to an intervention.
Mr Graham Stuart
I am grateful to the Minister for giving way; he is being most generous. With regard to increasing an area’s resilience, how would the Government view any proposals to widen the levy area that supports internal drainage boards so as to increase the resource in local hands for improving resilience?
Dan Rogerson
Local authorities would no doubt take a view on that. We would need to look at what taxes and levies are being raised from an area in total, because we know that families are hard-pressed and we do not want to increase burdens. If that could be done within what is raised by local authorities, using the relationships they have with internal drainage boards, individual proposals could be considered. There are places in the country where the possibility of setting up new internal drainage boards is being examined. If we can overcome the barriers, I think that would be very helpful.
The hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton also talked about protecting rural land, which was mentioned in her Committee’s report. Some 95% of arable land in England is either outside areas at risk of flooding or benefits from at least a one-in-75-year standard of flood defence. In fact, the partnership approach that the Government have taken means that some schemes that would not otherwise have been funded are now coming forward, because local funding means that the grant in aid now makes a sufficient difference to take a project forward. With regard to the areas that have been protected, my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon), my predecessor as Minister, was right to give the figure of 1.3 million properties. Great areas of agricultural land have also been protected by many of those defences, so it is not a case of setting one benefit against another; obviously we seek schemes that will do both.
On the Bellwin scheme, which the Select Committee’s report also mentioned, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government and his colleagues in DCLG have now opened up the process of re-evaluating the Bellwin scheme, both in the short term, to meet the needs that communities are facing as we speak, and to look at how the scheme will operate in future. Hopefully my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton and members of her Committee will welcome that.
We are also conducting river maintenance pilots, another area that my hon. Friend focused on. In Somerset, which I have visited on a number of occasions recently, there are pilots on the Brue and the Axe, a little further away from the Parrett and the Tone, where some of the most extreme impacts of the recent flooding have been felt. Those pilots will run for a year. We need to allow them to run their course to ensure that we learn the lessons properly, because there are different circumstances in different catchments, as hon. Members from across the House have said. We must use the evidence to ensure that we use the right tools in the right places.
On sustainable drainage, we are bringing forward the regulations to implement those systems. As my hon. Friend said, progress on thatis slower than we might have liked, but we should be tabling those regulations next month and see them implemented over the course of this year.
The hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion set out powerfully her views on climate change. I hope that she will welcome the discussions that DCLG is having with local authorities, because she mentioned the need to take into account local knowledge, what local authorities are facing on the ground and what they are having to do. There are also approaches to land management that give us the opportunity to employ a range of strategies for managing water higher up catchments, looking at dredging where it is appropriate, particularly in catchments where rivers flow slowly and there is a reliance on pumping to clear water from the land.
The hon. Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous) followed up on the Adjournment debate he secured after the coastal surge in early December. I look forward to hearing more from him about particular schemes, although he will know that I will not personally be sitting in judgment on those and that they will have to make their case alongside other areas of the country. However, hopefully the fact that we are investing the money and bringing forward the partnership money to take forward those schemes will give him confidence that we are taking such schemes very seriously indeed. We are investing in coastal defences as well, so it is not just about defences along rivers. Coastal defences are crucial, so we are continuing to invest in them.
My hon. Friend the Member for Newbury set out once again his track record on these matters. It has been a privilege to take over from him, given all his work not only on flood management, but on implementing Flood Re, which we think will make a huge difference to those who need access to affordable flood insurance and give them confidence for the future. He referred to community action and the great strength and resilience of local communities where people have helped each other, and he is absolutely right. When I visited Somerset last week I met the Flooding on the Levels Action Group, which has taken a great deal of energetic initiative not only to support communities there, but to serve as a focal point for those from outside Somerset who wanted to help, whether through financial assistance or in kind. There are many lessons to learn about really harnessing that kind of voluntary activity.
My hon. Friend the Member for Newbury stayed away from the blame game. He was quite right to point out that we could all be blamed for the weather—of course, he can sit back and relax, because it is now my fault when it rains, not his. He mentioned flood forums, which are very important. In my local area, the Cornwall flood forum is making a significant contribution to resilience and readiness in the community. It discusses not only what has happened, but what might happen and how communities can be ready for it. The National Flood Forum brings together that expertise and provides tools on its website about the property-level protection we have heard about today. The Government, through grant in aid, provide those who might struggle to afford some of those products in their home with the opportunity to have support in bringing them in, which I think is welcome. For those who have the resources to install such products in their properties, the National Flood Forum provides guidance and advice, so they should visit its website to see what is available.
The hon. Member for Reigate (Mr Blunt) talked about the impact of flooding and the need for the insurance industry to get on with the job. The Government stayed in contact with the industry throughout the Christmas and new year period and into January and February to ensure that we fed back what we were hearing from people on the ground. I have certainly been impressed by how the industry has ensured that their loss adjusters are out there. If hon. Members want to raise any local concerns with me, I will of course pass them on to the Association of British Insurers. He welcomed the help for those who have been flooded. As I have mentioned, we have offered a package of measures to help those affected. Like many other Members, the hon. Gentleman put on the record his support for those in the Environment Agency, who have worked incredibly hard during this period. It has been relentless for those who have been under threat, but it has also been relentless for the Environment Agency. It has moved staff around the country to meet those needs and performed heroically in many areas.
My hon. Friend the Member for Reigate also asked for figures on the number of properties that have been flooded. I can confirm that since the coastal surge on the east coast in early December, 6,890 properties have been flooded in England. Those properties have had standing water inside the building. Many others have experienced flooding in their gardens, on their streets or in local businesses, and many communities, such as Muchelney in Somerset, have been completely cut off. The effects will have reached many more properties, but the number that have actually been flooded is about 7,000. The Government have prioritised flood defence repair. That is why we have set aside £130 million to ensure that the capital we are investing goes to new schemes, not to repairing those that have been battered by the extreme weather events.
The hon. Member for North Dorset (Mr Walter) mentioned volunteers and the huge contribution they made in his constituency. He talked about the importance of using local knowledge, which I think is right for learning lessons on how to handle flooding and the ongoing management of watercourses and flood risk. The hon. Member for Northampton South (Mr Binley) made a similar point about local knowledge and experience and talked about campaigning to get those resources to his local area.
The hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness talked about the pressures on us all, given the changing climate, and the need to take account of the evidence in what we do. He gave the specific example of licensing costs and the Marine Management Organisation. It is important that we have agencies that work on the basis that if there is a cost, it is covered as a fee to them, so I am happy to look at those circumstances if he thinks they represent a barrier.
The hon. Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes) talked about the range of solutions that might be appropriate in different areas, the importance of what local groups have done and the serious and ongoing impact on local communities. The hon. Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Damian Collins) thanked Environment Agency staff, and I thank him for that; many hon. Members are acquiring a depth of knowledge about the hydrology of their constituencies.
The hon. Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston) made specific points about coastal management plans, and I will be happy to discuss those with her. Obviously, there will be an element of local involvement in those solutions; local authorities, for example, will play a role in protecting the road infrastructure that she mentioned. The hon. Lady was right about the fishing industry. She has been advocating intervention. I went with the Deputy Prime Minister and my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives (Andrew George) to Porthleven, in my hon. Friend’s constituency. I met fishermen there and have met fishermen in Padstow; they came from around north Cornwall to discuss the issues with me.
We are listening closely as a Government to the fishing industry, particularly those involved in crab and lobster fishing and shrimping, which the hon. Lady mentioned, to see what might be done to help. I will not make an announcement about that now, but I know that my fellow Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice), is considering the matter closely. I hope that we will be able to offer support and advice to the fishing industry very soon.
Like other hon. Members, the hon. Member for Totnes raised planning issues, although those are primarily for the Department for Communities and Local Government. No doubt note will have been taken about what has been said; we can feed the points back to colleagues.
Partnership funding was raised, in relation to the Government’s approach to make sure we deliver more schemes than would otherwise be possible. We are on course to bring in £148 million of additional funding compared with £13 million under the previous spending review. The Opposition have rightly pointed out that that has not entirely happened, but the spending review period is not yet over; it would have been slightly alarming if it had all happened by this point. We are on course, and I welcome the contribution from the private sector and local government to delivering the schemes.
Recent events will have brought into sharp focus the initial emergency responses to flooding in the UK and the need to learn lessons when things have not worked as well as they might or when we can build on successful responses. We can focus on short-term recovery, but we also need to ensure that long-term defences remain a priority for the Government. I look forward to working with Members across the House to learn the lessons from the past and ensure that we protect more homes and businesses more securely in future.
Question deferred until tomorrow at Seven o’clock (Standing Order No. 54(4)).
Flooding
Graham Stuart Excerpts(11 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Paterson
I enjoyed my visit to my hon. Friend’s constituency. It was an extraordinary event—I think people told me that it was the worst weather they had had in 500 years, which shows what the Environment Agency has had to cope with recently. I would not want to jump the agency’s list of priorities, so perhaps my hon. Friend would be happy to write to the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall, who will take up the matter, and the particular details of the project he mentions, directly with the Environment Agency.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
It is a pleasure to be the end-stop to this statement. I have been a critic of the Environment Agency in the past, but will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating it on its staff and on the way it is working in partnership with East Riding of Yorkshire council to deliver a much more joined-up approach, as mentioned by colleagues across the House? Can he assure residents in Kilnsea which was flooded—businesses were also flooded there—that remote, rural spots such as that will see their flood defences prioritised for investment, and that they will see that bank renewed, which desperately needs to be done?
Mr Paterson
I am grateful to my hon. Friend and admire his patience in waiting until last. I nearly visited his constituency and saw the advantages of the Hull barrier, which is used as a reservoir at low tide to drain water from his constituency. If he has a particular project in mind, as with the preceding question I think the appropriate route is to write directly to my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, who will take it up with the Environment Agency.
Water Bill
Graham Stuart Excerpts(12 years ago)
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Maria Eagle
We cannot have a situation where water companies are taking strategic decisions, with the clear purpose of structuring their financial affairs in a way that leads to worrying debt and hinders their ability to invest, when their sole purpose is to minimise their tax liability. Ofwat said in March that
“the overall proportion of equity has diminished from 42.5% in 2006 to 30% of regulatory capital value today with several companies at 80% gearing, thus obtaining only one fifth of their financing from equity. This reduction is a serious concern.”
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
I thank the hon. Lady for giving way. She makes an important point about the behaviour of the water companies. Will she explain why, under the previous Government, the water companies’ combined debt of £939 million in 2004 had increased by 70% by 2010, when her party left office? Perhaps she could provide us with some context.
Maria Eagle
I understand the hon. Gentleman’s point. I do not believe the Labour Government did enough during our time in office to ensure that that was correctly handled, but that is not a reason to allow the water companies off the hook now.
Under Ofwat’s current powers, capital structure and consequent risk are matters for the boards and shareholders of those companies, so any action must come from the Government. We have seen from briefings to the Financial Times that Ministers are considering reducing the interest payments that can be deducted from a company’s tax bill, especially for larger and more highly indebted companies—as many water companies now are—or even putting a levy on the debt held by highly leveraged water companies. Whichever solution—if any—that the Government decide on, it must happen quickly.
Despite the gaping hole left by the Government’s failure to introduce in the Bill measures on water affordability for households, there are measures that we support. That should not be a surprise, given that they arose from three important reviews taken forward by the last Government: the Pitt review on flooding, the Walker review on affordability and the Cave review on competition.
Miss McIntosh
I hope that we will all continue to press the Government to proceed with SUDS.
As for abstraction, I can only support what other Members have already said. Abstraction has an important part to play in resilience in times of drought and, potentially, in times of floods, when there are competing demands for the water supply. I urge the Government to show a greater sense of urgency. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said that they would be consulting shortly, and it would be helpful to know when that consultation might take place.
The water White Paper, which we also scrutinised, placed great emphasis on the importance of resilience and the need for innovation to improve it, but I think that the Bill has toned down that emphasis slightly. I hope that the Government will find renewed enthusiasm for resilience. There will always be competing claims from the farming industry and angling, but we must not forget jam-makers such as those whom I visited in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Witham (Priti Patel), as well as brewers and other industrial users.
The role of the Environment Agency has been extremely positive, and fewer properties have been built on functional floodplains since it became a statutory consultee. However, I believe that it could do much more to share information, particularly mapping information. It is extremely frustrating for constituents not to be able to access a single map. Sir Michael Pitt—from east Yorkshire—was very clear in that regard, and I think that we owe him a great debt of gratitude for the work that he has done. I believe that there should be a one-stop shop for our constituents, and that they should be able to know exactly where to go.
Mr Graham Stuart
Does my hon. Friend agree that not only is mapping important, but it is important for maps to be updated quickly? Following the completion of a £3 million flood defence scheme in the village of Burstwick, in my constituency, it took more than a year for maps to be updated, and during that time residents were still being asked for higher insurance premiums because the insurance companies did not have access to the information.
Miss McIntosh
My hon. Friend has eloquently re-emphasised the point that I was making.
Miss McIntosh
I am sure that the whole House, including the Secretary of State, has heard what my hon. Friend said. Dredging little and often can prevent floods. The drainage boards have an army of volunteers, a huge fount of knowledge and, probably, more engineers than the Environment Agency.
I am delighted that the Government have authorised the pilot schemes, and the Select Committee will observe the outcome very closely. I commend the Pickering pilot project, which is one of those schemes at which this country excels. It has already slowed the flow, it is creating new peat bogs, and it is holding water back so that it cannot flood Pickering. If we can succeed with a combination of slowing the flow and building a reservoir, not only will Pickering be safe from flooding, but the benefits of the pilot can be used elsewhere, and resilience to flooding and possible water shortages can be improved.
I believe that the 2014 price review gives us an opportunity to invite Ofwat to reward innovation, which it is not doing at the moment. Ofwat should invite water companies to show that they can bring positive benefits to consumers by creating innovative flood defence and water supply schemes like the Pickering project, and to include such proposals in their business plans. I regret that that did not happen in earlier price reviews and this is a unique opportunity to do that.
I also invite the Government to engage much earlier with EU directives. I yield to no one in respect of the benefits they can bring, but they can be very costly. If we sign up to very short-term, tight timetables, that adds to the costs. My right hon. Friend will be aware of the EU water framework directive, the bathing water directive, the drinking water directive, the urban waste water treatment directive and others. We have to get in there early and put our views across. Their aims and objectives are laudable, but they must be affordable and done on a realistic timetable.
Mr Graham Stuart
My hon. Friend made an important point about dredging. It is essential to ensure that unnecessary costs are not imposed on those who try to carry it out. South Holderness drainage board raised money locally to dredge Stone creek and Hedon haven, but then found that the Marine Management Organisation —which, as on previous occasions, would not have charged the EA anything—imposed a cost of several thousand pounds on the drainage board and then at the end more than doubled that amount, imposing a crippling cost on local people raising local money to try to do the right thing.
Miss McIntosh
I thank my hon. Friend for that.
I want to mention briefly some new aspects of the Bill and some omissions. On the omissions, bad debt costs each and every household approximately £14 a year. That is unacceptable. We need secondary legislation to progress this matter, and I urge the Government to bring that forward as swiftly as possible.
On social tariffs, I fail to understand why successive Governments have had difficulty in releasing information on benefits. In response to a recent question to the Department for Work and Pensions, the following answer came back from the Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning):
“There is no legislation in place currently”—
well, I knew that and I told him that, but it is always good to know I was right—
“that would permit the release of benefits information to water utility companies: it is likely that new legislation would be required to enable the sharing of benefits data with water utility companies on this scale.”—[Official Report, 18 November 2013; Vol. 570, c. 681W.]
I urge my right hon. and hon. Friends to put pressure on the DWP to release that information so that we can make the best possible tariff available to the appropriate customers at the earliest possible time.
On insurance, the Select Committee came down in favour of Flood Re, but there are a lot of unknowns, and I do not believe we know any more about the known unknowns than we did before this debate started. For example, under Flood Re, why have we chosen household bands as the basis for insurance levy scales? If there is a database, where is it? What is the definition of uninsurable properties? Are small businesses excluded? If they are to be excluded, why are they excluded? It has been put to me that farms might be excluded. Obviously, that would not go down well in my area. I would quite like to know before the end of the evening whether farms and small businesses are going to be excluded.
The memorandum of understanding between the Government and the insurance industry commits the Government to take primary responsibility as an insurer of last resort in an extreme flood event while the fund is growing. We need greater clarity this evening, before the Bill goes on to Committee, on precisely where we are in that regard. The House would also like to know whether the Bill achieves the normal historical value for money requirement in respect of such proposals.
The Select Committee welcomes the commitment to open up the retail market to competition by 2017, but we believe the case for upstream reform needs to be made more vigorously. We need to know precisely what the implications are for customer bills. It has been put to us that there might be de-averaging of household bills. We also need to know the implications for national resilience of upstream reforms, including in respect of climate change and population growth. We note that the start date is two years later, but the House would like to know whether it is feasible at all and whether we even need primary legislation.
It is true that the Select Committee came down in favour of functional separation between the wholesale and retail arms and in favour of a voluntary exit strategy. We would like to hear a little more when the Minister winds up about why the Government are against that.
Members on both sides of the House are interested in cost of living issues, of course, and we need greater assurances on the impact on householders. The Flood Re levy has been set at £180 million per annum, which is £10.50 per customer, for the first years. We also need to know the timetable for the application for state aid. It would be helpful to know that we are going to be in a position to have signed off on state aid before this Bill leaves the House and achieves Royal Assent and, more importantly, by the start date of 2017. Concerns have been expressed about stranded assets and the impact on household customers generally, particularly from the Flood Re insurance levy, and the formalising of the cross-subsidy that has existed under the statement of principles.
To conclude, the potential risks of de-averaging prices in respect of household customers and upstream competition must be addressed. On the comparative merits of the Ofwat duty, we would prefer sustainable development as opposed to the Government’s proposal of resilience. That needs to be explored. We also need to look at possible greater resilience in terms of both water supply and the use of abstraction, and we need the review of abstraction policy sooner rather than later. We applaud the sustainable development and wider environmental aims of biodiversity protection and climate change mitigation, but I personally would argue that this should be addressed through Ofwat’s primary duty of sustainable development. The Government need to explain how the transition in the insurance sector from the cross-subsidy being formalised in Flood Re to an eventual free market will be managed. I believe this is too important to leave to secondary legislation and we need more details in the Bill.
I give the Bill a warm welcome. I have highlighted a number of concerns which I hope will be addressed and I look forward to hearing the rest of the debate.
Natural Capital (England and Wales)
Graham Stuart Excerpts(12 years, 1 month ago)
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Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House welcomes the Natural Capital Committee’s first annual State of Natural Capital report; and urges the Government to adopt the report’s recommendations and to take concerted action to embed the value of natural capital in the national accounts and policy-making processes as early as possible.
I declare my interest as chairman of the GLOBE International board and refer the House to my declaration of interests.
May I start by congratulating the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice) on his appointment, which gives hope to the independent-minded everywhere? I also thank the Backbench Business Committee, chaired by the hon. Member for North East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel), for granting this debate. Thanks are also due to the sponsors of the motion, representing all three main parties, including the former Secretary of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs Spelman). I pay tribute to her and my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon) for the role they played in steering the White Paper through Government.
I am pleased to see that the shadow Minister with responsibility for the natural environment, the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner), will be responding on behalf of the Opposition. Only a few weeks ago, it was he who persuaded the Backbench Business Committee to grant this debate, so it is gratifying to see that his efforts have been rewarded with such a swift promotion.
Today’s debate was inspired by the first report by the natural capital committee, chaired by Professor Dieter Helm. The report provides a framework—and a call to arms—for the Government to place a value on natural capital. Natural capital is the stock of resources derived from the environment in addition to geological resources such as fossil fuels and mineral deposits. These goods and services include material and non-material benefits such as crops, timber, water, climate regulation, natural hazard protection, soil function, mental health benefits from contact with nature, and biodiversity.
Without an economic price, too often natural capital has been treated as if it is of no value, yet it is a fundamental component of every country’s portfolio of wealth. For example, the UK has treated North sea oil purely as an income flow, with no allowance made for the fact that its use today depletes a national asset that cannot be replaced. By using it, we are, in effect, eating into our capital reserves, and it is right that we should acknowledge that when compiling our national accounts.
A private company is judged by both its income and its balance sheet, but most countries compile only an income statement showing their GDP and know very little about their national balance sheet on which it all depends. Even the income measure itself—GDP—fails properly to represent natural capital. Forestry provides a good example of this. Timber resources are counted in national accounts, but the other services forests provide, such as carbon retention and air filtration, are simply ignored. This all matters deeply.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this important debate. Oscar Wilde famously spoke of those who know the price of everything and the value of nothing. If valuing nature in the way suggested will halt the current decline of our precious wildlife and habitats, it is to be welcomed, but does the hon. Gentleman agree that we need very strong safeguards, including in the planning system, to ensure that by putting a pound sign on priceless ecosystems such as ancient woodlands we do not inadvertently open the door to their destruction?
Mr Stuart
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her intervention and she is right to sound a warning note. This whole area is embryonic and it needs to be treated very carefully to make sure that we do not end up with the exact opposite outcomes to those we seek by introducing such thinking in the first place.
In setting up the NCC, the Government said that their ambition was that this should be the first generation to leave behind a superior natural environment to the one it inherited. During the 20th century we placed unprecedented demands on global ecosystems. World population grew by a factor of four. Carbon and sulphur dioxide emissions increased by a factor of 10. Fish catch escalated by a multiple of 35. This has had serious consequences.
In 2011, the first UK national ecosystem assessment found that one third of the UK’s ecosystem services were declining. It showed that if the UK’s ecosystems were protected and enhanced, they could add at least an extra £30 billion to the UK economy. By contrast, neglect and loss of ecosystem services may cost as much as £20 billion a year to the economy. As the NCC report says:
“The risk is that rather than underpinning future growth and prosperity, degraded natural capital assets will act as a break on progress and development.”
The situation is worse in many places overseas. The World Bank estimates that in 2008, the costs of natural capital loss could have been as high as 5% of national income in Brazil, 8% in India and 9% in China. It found that the UK’s natural capital losses stood at just over 2% of national income, although that number is almost certainly incomplete.
The NCC report concludes:
“Until this is addressed, our national accounts will continue to provide erroneous signals about future economic prospects.”
To that end, the NCC recommends that the work being undertaken by the Office for National Statistics to embed natural capital in the UK’s environmental accounts should be given the “greatest possible support” right across Government.
The NCC’s report also recommends that the Government should initiate a programme to provide high-quality evidence on the economic value of changes in natural capital to inform cost-benefit analyses. Let us consider land use change. That may involve alterations in agricultural outputs, which have market prices, but it may also lead to changes in other factors which do not, including outdoor recreation, carbon storage and water quality. The best way to compare changes in such vastly different goods and services is to compare them in common, monetary terms. Developing a system that can achieve that reliably will not be straightforward.
There has been recent progress in this area. The Government’s 2011 natural environment White Paper made a welcome commitment fully to include natural capital in the UK environment accounts, with the first changes coming into effect this year. On the international stage, the adoption by the UN Statistical Commission of the system for environmental economic accounts has been a major step forward.
The prize is considerable. Measuring and accounting for changes in natural capital assets, and improving the valuation of those changes, would help to support better economic decision making. It would improve the delivery of major public policy goals, such as food and energy security, climate change mitigation and adaptation, and public health and well-being. In saying that, it is crucial that natural capital accounting is explained as a way of providing detailed information for better management of the economy. That needs to be done in a way that is coherent internationally but that resonates at home with a public who are concerned about seeing the more immediate benefits of economic growth.
This is not some doom-laden call for us to trade off economic growth for environmental protection. Pre-Victorian England was a low-carbon economy, but it did not deliver too much by way of prosperity. Rather, this is about demonstrating that better policy can result from integrating the value of natural capital into decision making, especially in a world whose population is rising inexorably.
That applies to Government and the world of business. The NCC report calls on the Government to work with leading companies, accounting bodies, landowners and managers to develop and test guidance on best practice in corporate natural capital accounting. As the chief financial officer of Unilever, Jean-Marc Huët, has said:
“The current financial reporting model only tells half the story about a business’s true performance and potential. The numbers say little of its reliance and impact on natural capital, factors that will increasingly influence competitiveness in a resource-scarce world.”
The NCC report is therefore an important document at all levels of policy making: national, local and commercial.
It was particularly welcome that the publication of the NCC report coincided with the launch earlier this year of the GLOBE International natural capital initiative. That is an international policy process driven by national parliamentarians, with the aim of incorporating the valuation of natural capital into policy and economic decision making.
In June this year, legislators from 20 countries participated in the first GLOBE natural capital legislation summit in the Bundestag. The summit considered the international context of the forthcoming UN post-2015 sustainable development goals, and how natural capital accounting should be addressed as a specific goal as well as a cross-cutting theme that affects the delivery of all development goals. For those who are living on less than $2 a day, half of all GDP comes from the environment and its biodiversity. It was therefore encouraging that goal 9 of the recent report of the high-level panel of eminent persons on the post-2015 development agenda, which was co-chaired by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, emphasised the importance of the sustainable management of natural resource assets to poverty eradication.
The GLOBE summit in June called on Governments everywhere fully to incorporate the value of natural capital into national accounting frameworks by 2020. It saw the publication of the first GLOBE natural capital legislation study, which reviewed the measures that eight countries, including the UK, are taking to integrate natural capital into policy and economic decision making. Unquestionably, there is a long way to go before natural capital is incorporated in national and corporate accounting across the world. However, the GLOBE study shows that the direction of travel is clear and that the eight countries covered, including the UK, are leading the way.
Embedding the concept of natural capital could mark a milestone on the road towards a more nuanced and complete understanding of our nation’s resources and the impact of our management of them. I congratulate the Government on the letter sent by the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the former Economic Secretary to the Treasury, my hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Sajid Javid) in response to the report. I welcome its statement that
“The measurement, valuation and good management of our natural capital is crucial if we are to achieve sustainable economic growth and enhanced wellbeing in future.”
However, is that to be the only response from the Government, other than in this debate? My Select Committee insists on a formal Government response to each recommendation that is made in each of its reports. Surely these annual reports deserve just as serious and thorough a response.
Do the Government agree that there is a need for a framework with which to define and measure natural capital? If so, do they think that progress is being made quickly enough? Will they set up a risk register for natural capital, as is recommended in the NCC report, and if so, when? Will they give the Office for National Statistics the “greatest possible support” in its efforts to incorporate natural capital into the nation’s accounts, as recommended by the NCC?
The valuation of natural capital goes to the heart of the biggest question facing humanity: can we adjust our behaviour so as to live within the constraints of living on one planet? Can we live in balance with the natural world, or will we insist on testing its limits?
Joan Walley
As always, the hon. Lady anticipates what I am about to say. This has been a long-standing matter of concern both to myself and to the Environmental Audit Committee, which I chair. It is vital that the mechanism for integrating natural capital values into policy in the UK is reflected in the green book. I understand, as far as the green book is concerned, that a review is currently in progress.
Mr Graham Stuart
The hon. Lady is absolutely right to mention the lack of representation on the Treasury Bench by a Minister from the Treasury. My right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs Spelman) identified correctly the importance of having the Chancellor at the head of this process, so it is essential that we have a Treasury Minister on the Front Bench, too.
Joan Walley
There is agreement on this on all sides of the House. If policy decisions from the Treasury lock us in to investment for many years to come, we will be prevented from including the true value of natural capital in how those decisions are reached. Parliament has to find a way of having shared responsibility reflected in the Chamber. I hope the commitment, which I am sure we will hear from the Minister when he comes to reply, will be reflected in the Treasury, and that the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs understands that the debate is about the economy not just in rural areas, but in each and every part of regeneration policy.
Barry Gardiner
The hon. Lady, whose chairmanship of the Select Committee is redoubtable, is absolutely right that that is clear in certain Departments but not in others. The way we value the input, as a number of Members have already indicated, is precisely the way contained in the natural capital committee’s first report to Parliament. The first thing we have to do—I will move on to this in more detail a little later—is to get each Department to create an inventory stating what capital it owns, what capital it affects and what capital it influences. Once we get Departments to look at it in that way, they can feed that into the Treasury so that better cost-benefit analysis is done and better economic decisions and policies are made.
Some of our political colleagues act as if they are still living in the 19th century. They believe that economic prosperity and environmental protection are destined to be in conflict with each other, but in fact the opposite is true. In 2011 the green economy made up just 6% of the economy, but it accounted for 30% of all growth.
Those on the economic right fall into the trap of thinking that the environment is the enemy of growth, but it is not. Their conclusion is that we must sacrifice the environment in order to achieve growth. But for those of us on the economic left there is an equivalent trap. Some on the left actually seem to agree with the economic right. Their claim is simply put the other way around: that economic growth is the enemy of the environment. Their conclusion is that we must sacrifice growth to achieve environmental protection. Both are wrong, of course, and they are wrong because they are locked into the same language of economic growth and environmental protection. They have failed to move into the new paradigm of economic wealth and environmental sustainability. There is a reason for that: the new paradigm requires a proper understanding of the value of natural capital, and not just an understanding of it, but a proper accounting of it.
What competent business would fail to carry out a proper inventory of its assets? Yet that is precisely what we as a country have done. We have not looked at the stocks and flows of natural capital and properly assessed them. In the UK we are beginning to introduce a fundamental change in environmental policy. Instead of focusing on individual species or habitats, we are pioneering an approach based on whole ecosystems. We commissioned the UK’s national ecosystem assessment, which has established that 30% of the UK’s ecosystems are in decline and that many others are only just holding their own against an increasingly hostile background of rising population, consumption and pollution. However, the Government have not yet taken the important step of instructing all Departments to create an inventory of the natural capital assets they own, utilise and affect. The Minister should speak to his colleagues in Government to ensure that that happens.
Quantifying the problem is the beginning of a solution. In the national ecosystem assessment, we have begun to put a value on the contribution of ecosystem goods and services to human well-being. The market has long known how to exploit the benefits of nature, whether by dumping waste at sea or chopping down rainforests with no thought for the wider damage that it was doing. But now, the most progressive businesses are beginning to understand the importance of sustainable supply chains. They are beginning to see the business imperative to reduce their own corporate risk profile and are now seeing genuine advantage in being net positive for the environment.
The establishment of the natural capital committee in response to the United Nations convention to combat desertification conference of the parties in Nagoya in 2010 is a significant and positive move on the part of the Government. I welcome it. I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Meriden for how she steered the issue through Government. She also established that the committee should report to the economic sub-committee of the Cabinet. Her officials had put to her that it should report to her as Secretary of State, but she decided that it should report elsewhere, knowing full well that a Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs was perhaps less powerful than the Chancellor of the Exchequer. She played a significant role in ensuring that the natural capital committee had the prospect of real success and traction. My hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley) was entirely right to say that we should also have had a Treasury Minister on the Front Bench this evening.
Mr Graham Stuart
The hon. Gentleman no doubt anticipates what I am about to say. He agrees that there should have been a Treasury Minister on the Front Bench tonight. It would also have been extremely helpful if Her Majesty’s Opposition had managed to get a shadow Treasury Minister, who are a great deal less busy than actual Treasury Ministers, to join us.
Barry Gardiner
I heartily endorse that. I will ensure that all these remarks are conveyed to my colleagues on the shadow Treasury Front Bench. I give the hon. Gentleman the commitment that they will get copies of my speech.
Having a Treasury Minister here would have truly shown that the Government were not just paying lip service to the idea of natural capital but were listening to the recommendations of the natural capital committee— namely, that the Government should establish a framework to measure and account better for changes in natural capital assets, and to improve the valuation of those changes and how they are fed into policy decisions.
The natural capital committee points out that the Government need to establish a risk register for natural capital assets that will clearly identify potential resource constraints or tipping points that may arise from the further degradation of our biodiversity. It insists that the implications for business supply chains from the loss of key natural resources must become a fundamental part of national economic planning. It recommends that the Office for National Statistics should include natural capital fully in the UK’s environmental accounts and that we should be working with business to develop guidance on corporate natural capital accounting.
I pay particular tribute to the work conducted by the Prince of Wales’s accounting for sustainability project. A4S has worked with strategic corporate partners to identify $72 trillion of resources and environmental services that classically have been omitted from corporate balance sheets around the globe, to enable those businesses better to understand the risks to their own supply chains and ultimately their future sustainability unless they change their business model for one that respects and properly values natural capital.
The Government should follow the prince’s initiative in involving business in accounting for natural capital. Will the Minister say whether he agrees with the suggestion of asking companies to prepare annual corporate sustainability reports for shareholders as part of their reporting cycle, in line with the business-led corporate sustainability reporting coalition’s recommendations?
Let me say this loud and clear: some things are beyond price. Some values cannot be monetised. It is not just that the aesthetic and spiritual values of a mountain are difficult to quantify; we should not even try. We must recognise that those values should not be traded in any market. They are not directly comparable and we must not attempt to compare them on a like-for-like basis in any cost-benefit analysis. However, to recognise that is not to accede to the demands of the fundamentalists of both right and left that we should not sensibly ascribe a value to the mountain for the tourism benefits that it generates or the watershed services that it provides. These are real economic values and we conduct our policy decision making in wilful and deliberate ignorance if we ignore them. This is not to commoditise nature; it is to ensure that the true value of nature is not ignored and treated as a free good by those who for decades have peddled a false theory of value that has allowed them to trash the environment with impunity.
The proper valuation of our natural capital is a means to its better protection, not a tariff sheet of charges for its destruction. The Secretary of State recently made several remarks that are deeply worrying because they have implied precisely the opposite. In his speech to the Association of National Park Authorities last month, he suggested that the protection of our finest countryside could be traded away to the highest bidder. This is quite simply a disgrace, and an ignorant one at that. Anyone with the slightest understanding of biodiversity offsetting knows that there is a hierarchy of principles that it must follow, foremost among which is that offsetting cannot downgrade or amend the existing levels of protection for biodiversity. The Secretary of State, by his ignorant, unscientific and dogma-driven approach, has shown himself to be incapable of leading the Government’s important work on natural capital and has probably done more to undermine the undoubted benefits that could flow from a proper system of biodiversity offsetting than any of the open-toed-sandal anti-development campaigners whom he so clearly despises .
I am delighted that the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness mentioned the work of the UN Statistical Commission on the system of environmental economic accounting. The UN has adopted SEEA as a new international accounting standard. It is important for the Minister to indicate to the House the Government’s commitment to develop the SEEA proposals and incorporate natural capital fully into their accounting framework by 2020.
I am also delighted that the hon. Gentleman mentioned the work of GLOBE International and its excellent natural capital initiative. I had the honour of chairing the national capital legislation summit that he mentioned which took place in the Bundestag this summer. I agree with the importance that he placed on incorporating natural capital into the first 2015 sustainable development goals. I should like to put on record my thanks and appreciation for the support of the German Government, who have consistently, and with great vision, understood the importance of this work in tackling global poverty as well as in addressing issues of climate change and biodiversity.
It has long been a fundamental principle that the polluter should pay. All too often, though, the polluter has got away with it because nobody has been able to answer the question, “How much?” In the UK we have set up the natural capital committee to ensure that the market and the non-market values of the public goods that nature provides are taken into account in all policy decision making. Our goal must be to incorporate these values into the standard Treasury method of cost-benefit analysis, our purpose being to stop those who seek to exploit the goods and services that nature provides by diminishing her continued ability to provide the essential ecosystem services and public goods that the rest of society needs.
The state of natural capital in the UK is at a critical point. Thirty per cent. of it is in decline, and action now is essential. The natural capital committee has produced an important report, but the Government must listen to what it says and implement its recommendations.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (George Eustice)
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart) for bringing this motion to the House. He has consistently championed the cause of the environment, and he made a number of incredibly important points in his speech. Like many others, I acknowledge the work done by my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs Spelman). It is important to recognise that a lot of the work we are doing now stemmed from the natural environment White Paper. After having been elected, one of the first things I did early in this Parliament was to attend the launch of that document at Kew. I remember it well. It was a very important piece of work, and she is to be commended for it.
To prove that there can be some cross-party consensus on this issue, I acknowledge the work that the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) has done through his chairmanship of the all-party group on biodiversity and his consistent interest in its potential. However, I must take a little issue with his strong criticism of the Secretary of State. I can vouch for the fact that my right hon. Friend believes passionately in these issues, of which he is a real champion. He regularly speaks to Dieter Helm, the chairman of the natural capital committee. I therefore do not agree with the hon. Gentleman’s criticism on that front, but perhaps we can come back to that later.
As every Member who has spoken has said, the state of natural capital is a crucial issue and the scale of the problem is great. Recent studies, such as the national ecosystem assessment and the “State of Nature” report prepared by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and others, drew on the excellent work of experts and volunteers across the country. They have reinforced the Government’s view about the worrying trends in the state of our natural assets.
We are constantly learning more about the complex mutual dependencies that underpin our vital ecosystems, but we are also finding evidence that shows that these intricate systems are, indeed, under threat. As many Members have said, 30% of the UK’s ecosystems are in decline. The numbers of specialist farmland birds, for example, have plummeted.
Although the overall condition of the natural environment is a cause for concern, we should also acknowledge that there have been some significant success stories that demonstrate what can be achieved when there is a will to do so. For example, environmental legislation has helped to transform many of our watercourses, and rivers that were once notoriously polluted now sustain a variety of wildlife. Of course, although these successes are heartening, important aspects of our natural environment are still in decline. The status quo is therefore not acceptable and a concerted effort on the part of Government and society is necessary to turn things around.
As part of their efforts to halt and reverse degradation of our natural environment, this Government have pledged to improve their understanding and measurement of England’s natural capital. It is, therefore, extremely encouraging to hear that the Government’s commitment to advancing the natural capital agenda is shared by Members from across the political spectrum.
A number of Members, including the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley), have said that a Treasury Minister should be present instead of me. All I can say is that I am passionate about this issue and I am here to represent the Government. It is usually only one Minister who responds to this type of debate. Members have said that they would have preferred a Treasury Minister to be present and I will not take that personally, but I am afraid that tonight you’ve got me. It is important to note that the Treasury is heavily involved in this issue. The response to the NCC’s first report was co-signed by the Secretary of State and the then Economic Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Sajid Javid).
A number of Members have asked what we are doing to get the principles into the green book. I have three points to make in response to that important question. First, following the publication of the natural environment White Paper in June 2011, the Treasury and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs published in 2012 supplementary green book guidance on accounting, so consideration has already been given to including environmental impacts in cost-benefit analyses by Government Departments.
Secondly, I reassure Members that the NCC is currently in discussions with the Treasury and DEFRA about developing the green book so that we can take further steps. Thirdly, DEFRA has commissioned a baseline evaluation study to review how well recent impact assessments across government take into account environmental impacts. We are, therefore, taking a number of steps.
Mr Graham Stuart
I wonder whether the Minister took note of my point about the Government response—the letter. He has just laid out how the Government are responding in a serious way, but will he undertake that when the next state of natural capital report is published in nearly a year, it will receive as full a response as that which we would expect for a Select Committee report?
George Eustice
I hope my hon. Friend will find that the remainder of my speech will pick up on a lot of the themes of the 13 recommendations made by the NCC report.
Mr Stuart
I recognise that my hon. Friend is new to his post and that he is in a difficult position, but it really would be helpful if he could commit on the record to provide a full response to next year’s report. This debate was called not by the Government, but by the Backbench Business Committee, and we cannot rely on a debate such as this to ensure that the Government are held to account on something so important.
George Eustice
I take on board my hon. Friend’s point. Lord de Mauley leads on this element of the Department’s portfolio and I speak on it in the House of Commons. I will discuss the point that my hon. Friend has made with him.
It is not surprising that there is a consensus that natural capital matters. It underpins fundamental aspects of all our lives. We rely on natural capital for the air that we breathe, the food that we eat and the water that we drink. It is also a crucial source of energy and well-being. It will play a central role in mitigating the potential impacts of climate change. It may even provide the key to scientific and technological innovations. It is the foundation on which our economy is built. My hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith) gave a fabulous quotation from John Aspinall:
“Nature is the bank upon which all cheques are drawn.”
That is very true.
Despite its importance, we have taken natural capital for granted. For too long, the value of our natural capital has been disregarded and, as a consequence, degraded. In the past 50 years, in spite of growing environmental awareness, many of the pressures on the natural environment have accelerated. Short-term, short-sighted economic gains have been prioritised. Too often, that has come at the expense of the natural environment. It is clear that if the habit of eroding our natural capital assets is allowed to continue, it will ultimately, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden said, be at the expense of future generations and their economic well-being. If economic growth is not sustainable, frankly, it will not be sustained. If we do not actively attempt to understand the true value of natural capital, we will continue to set its value, wrongly, at zero.
Many people in the UK already place a value on nature. Members may well have heard enough about the BBC for one day, but the growth in popularity of programmes such as the BBC’s “Countryfile” demonstrates that we are a nation that cares passionately about the natural environment. The widespread appreciation of nature’s intrinsic value, the importance of which many Members have highlighted, is demonstrated by the large memberships of groups such as the RSPB and the wildlife trusts. To those who say that unless we put a monetary value on something, it is not valued, I say that that is not the way that the public see it. They see a great intrinsic value in our natural environment.
Valuing our natural assets in terms of their worth to the economy in pounds and pence is a challenging exercise. We will have to involve the dedicated efforts of world experts to come up with the right calculations. However, it is important that we do not see valuing nature as just a dry, academic exercise that is performed by accountants. The natural capital agenda must, and will, have a practical application that will lead to real outcomes in our natural environment. If we want to protect nature, we need to make better decisions about how we use it. Those decisions will be better informed when we have properly measured and valued our natural capital.
That is why the Government set up the natural capital committee in 2012. In doing so, we were acting as a global leader. We now lead the way by having an independent group of experts that reports on where our natural assets are being used unsustainably. Ultimately, the committee will advise the Government on how we can prioritise action to address the most pressing risks to our natural capital. That advice will better enable the Government to fulfil their vision, first set out in the natural environment White Paper of 2011, of being
“the first generation to leave the natural environment in a better state than it inherited.”
With that vision in mind, I read with interest the committee’s first state of natural capital report, which was published in April this year. It set out a framework for how the committee would deliver its ambitious work programme. The report highlighted just how high the stakes are for the environment and the economy in work that the committee is doing. The committee argued powerfully that the environment and the economy are not rival priorities that have to be traded off against each other, but that environmental and economic interests can and must be aligned. The report set out how that beneficial alignment can be realised.
Although we have enough data to be confident that our natural assets, for the main part, are being degraded, we do not measure directly changes in their extent or quality on a widespread basis and we do not account for them in national or business accounts. It is therefore not currently possible to identify systematically which natural capital assets are being used unsustainably, but the work of the committee aims to get a better handle on that.
The committee’s first report not only set out the need for a framework to measure and value our natural assets, but contained a number of recommendations to help get that framework in place. When the report was published, the committee promised to follow up in its second and third reports—due in early 2014 and 2015 respectively—with more specific advice about where assets are at risk of not being used sustainably, and what needs to be done about it.
The Government support the analysis set out in the NCC’s first state of natural capital report, as detailed in the joint letter that my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness referred to from the Environment Secretary and the Economic Secretary to the Treasury. The letter stated:
“We welcome the report’s conclusions and we look forward to working with the Committee as they and others advance this agenda.”
I can report that good progress has been made on the recommendations contained in the report, by both the Government and the NCC. For example, in order to determine whether we are on a sustainable path, the NCC has commenced two pieces of work to help understand which assets are in decline—and to what extent—as well as which are most at risk. The NCC will report on its initial findings in its next report. We are interested to see how that might inform other Government policies, such as biodiversity offsetting, which a number of hon. Members—including my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden—have mentioned.
On national and corporate accounting, which was mentioned by the hon. Member for Brent North, good progress is being made. On national natural capital accounting, the NCC is working closely with the ONS and DEFRA to implement the road map to 2020 that the ONS published in December 2012, setting out its timetable for producing natural capital accounts. On the corporate side, the NCC is engaging with a series of major businesses and landowners. It is about to undertake a series of pilot projects with a selection of those businesses in order to trial natural capital accounting in a real-world context and see whether it is an effective tool for encouraging businesses to operate on a more sustainable basis.
Let me touch on some of the points that my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness raised at the end of his contribution. He asked for a response to each of the 13 recommendations, and as I have said, I will take his comments back to my noble Friend Lord de Mauley. A lot of those recommendations are being taken forward by the NCC, and many others are addressed in the good “Accounting for the value of nature in the UK” report by the ONS.
A number of Members asked whether we believe that the framework should be developed, and the Government agree that it should be. That is a task for the NCC, which is working further on that. Importantly, the committee is not doing just a single one-off report that is then placed in the Government’s hands; it is continuing to work on many of these elements. Many hon. Members raised the importance of developing a risk register, and I confirm that the second report from the committee will look further at a risk register and at highlighting those areas where we use our natural environment in an unsustainable way. The next report will contain the first steps in that direction.
In conclusion, we are very much looking forward to the NCC’s second report, due to be published in spring 2014, and to the more specific recommendations we expect it to contain. We are particularly interested in what it might have to say about a proposal for a long-term strategic plan to ensure the preservation and recovery of natural capital in this country.
Mr Graham Stuart
Thank you, as ever, for your strictures, Mr Speaker.
It has been a great pleasure to take part in the debate. We have heard high-quality speeches from hon. Members on both sides of the House. The hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards) followed my speech and showed a strong understanding of the key issues. My right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs Spelman), in so many ways the architect of the current situation, spoke of offsetting and of the economic importance of humble bees and pollinators. The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley) mentioned the green book—the Minister did not mention that, but perhaps we will hear more from him about it in due course—and the role of natural capital in the sustainable development goals. She also referred to other Departments and asked whether the Minister is in touch with them.
My hon. Friend the Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Roger Williams) put his finger on one of the most important challenges that we face. For the most part, we are a group of the usual suspects, talking about natural capital late at night. In the Tea Room earlier, a colleague said, “In eight years in this place, I have never looked at the title of the debate and not known what it was about—until now. Well done, Graham, you’ve got a debate I don’t understand.” My hon. Friend correctly identified the importance not only of the Breconshire young farmers, but of communicating properly with them so they understand what on earth we are talking about. If we do not achieve that, in a few years, the same group of usual suspects will be discussing the topic without wider resonance.
Joan Walley
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that that is one reason why there should be a measure to include the subject in education legislation?
Mr Stuart
I feared the hon. Lady would try to nail me personally on that—I spend my time chairing the Select Committee on Education resisting the forcible addition of financial education and a plethora of other subjects into the national curriculum—but I will bear her remarks in mind and see whether I can reconsider my almost-ideological response.
My hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith) made a powerful speech. He said that reconciling the market with the environment is essential to our survival—one of a few memorable quotes from the debate. He also asked whether the Government as a whole are ready for the challenge, which neatly summed up a question included in many speeches.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Hazel Grove (Sir Andrew Stunell), using his experience of Government machinery, focused laser-like on questioning whether the machinery is in place to ensure that natural capital debates are not a minority sport that take place late at night in the Chamber, and that they begin to influence Government policy in all Departments.
Because of my history with the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner), it hurts me to say that he made a barnstorming and powerful speech. He spoke of not only halting but reversing environmental loss. He spoke with both passion and knowledge and managed to convey them succinctly and effectively. He said that people in the Treasury could be reasonable as long as we speak to them in their language. He gave us two quotes. First, he said that we use nature because it is valuable, but abuse it because it is free, which goes to the heart of the debate. Secondly, in defence of that approach, he said that promoting the concept of natural capital was not to commoditise nature, but to ensure its protection.
We heard an excellent speech from the Minister, who, as he said, has been interested in natural capital for a long time—he was at the launch of the White Paper a few years ago. He and the other Ministers in his Department have a great challenge, but there is a wider challenge across the Government. That is the central issue. My hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park made the point that, in future, we need Treasury Ministers and colleagues who do not habitually focus on this policy on the Treasury Bench in such debates. I am delighted to see my hon. Friend the Minister of State, Cabinet Office, the hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (Mr Hurd), who is the Minister for civil society there as he, too, has long taken an interest in natural capital.
With that, I draw the debate to a close.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House welcomes the Natural Capital Committee’s first annual State of Natural Capital report; and urges the Government to adopt the report’s recommendations and to take concerted action to embed the value of natural capital in the national accounts and policy-making processes as early as possible.
Rio+20 Summit
Graham Stuart Excerpts(13 years, 9 months ago)
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Joan Walley (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab)
I am delighted to have the opportunity to open this debate on behalf of the Environmental Audit Committee following our report on the preparations for the Rio+20 summit. I am pleased that so many members of the Committee are in the Chamber. I am grateful that the Minister is in his place and say at the outset that I acknowledge that the Secretary of State is on other urgent business to do with this topic. We welcome the Minister and look forward to his comments.
All parliamentarians must engage with this issue; those of us on Select Committees are legislators who are there to hold the Government to account. We have already seen, in organisations such as GLOBE International, what a powerful contribution Members of Parliament from different Parliaments around the world can make on these important matters.
The report is the first by our Committee to be debated on an estimates day. The timing of the debate could not be better. This morning, along with other MPs, I was privileged to be able to attend the launch of the report, “Resilient People, Resilient Planet”, which comes from the high-level panel on global sustainability set up by the United Nations Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, and which was presented to us by Janos Pasztor. In their report, he and the panel members make a truly powerful case for global change, and that is what we have to address in the run-up to the Rio+20 summit. This debate also comes after the publication of the zero draft of the United Nations outcome document for the summit.
We began the Select Committee inquiry early, starting last spring, so that we had time to examine what the Government are doing to make Rio+20 a success and so that we could play a part in getting attention for the summit, including the pre-summit events, the actual negotiations and, crucially, the follow-up work that will be needed. If action was needed at the first Rio Earth summit, 20 years on we need solutions more than ever. Governments and politicians the world over need to get their act sorted. Equally, we have to take this to every community around the UK and to the people we live next to and work with. People in countries, towns and cities the world over need to urge the decision makers to do more.
Whatever agreements are reached at Rio, the summit is not just about one country or one negotiating bloc; it is about developing and developed countries, the haves and the have-nots, and not just one generation, but future generations. This Rio conference will affect us all today, tomorrow and in the days and years ahead. We therefore have to make it a high-level event, where we change the way in which we do politics. It is a crossroads. From now on, policies should be formulated and budgets made on the basis of what is right for the long term. We should give notice that we will change course because we believe that following a more sustainable path will enhance human well-being, further global justice, strengthen gender equity and preserve the earth’s life-support systems for future generations.
We all know that it is 150 days to the start of the Olympics. I wonder whether people in Parliament and out there are aware of the countdown to Rio. There is a bit of a paradox here. We have to be cautious and guard against the impression that this summit is the be-all and end-all. We have to remind ourselves that no instant wins or quick fixes are likely to arise from it. Rather, we need a change of direction. Rio+20 must be seen as a starting-off point for new initiatives, rather than a signing-off point to end a process.
The Select Committee report calls on the Prime Minister to attend the summit to show the UK’s commitment. His office informed us that he would not be able to do so because of a clash of dates with the diamond jubilee celebrations. That seems to have prompted the United Nations and Brazil to move the summit to later in June to allow not just the Prime Minister, but other Heads of Government to attend. The response to the report states that decisions about who will attend Rio, apart from the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, will be decided on later, as will the decision on the need for a special envoy. Right from the word go, the Government have to be careful not to be on the back foot. This matter has to be clarified.
I have no quarrel whatever with the Secretary of State going out there. It is vital that she attends. I know that she is very committed and that she has been involved in all the preliminary stages. However, I believe that for the full backing of the team, the Prime Minister needs to be there, as well as the Deputy Prime Minister, the scientists and the business leaders. The UK team have to make their mark. At a time when the world is changing; when environmental debt needs to be as high up the agenda as economic debt; when we face temperature rise and biodiversity loss unless we learn to live within our planetary boundaries; and when we have one opportunity for the international community to frame the new priorities and to work out how we will each, individually and collectively, engage with this matter, we need the UK Prime Minister to be there, actively shaping the new agenda and understanding what alliances are being forged.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
Does the hon. Lady agree that as we are a global leader in embedding natural capital in the national accounts, which I hope will be a central feature of the summit in Rio later in the year, the Prime Minister has a strong story to tell? He will be able not only to boast of our work in that area, but to share it and further strengthen our alliance with the Brazilians, who are an emerging and important power.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow the previous speakers.
The Earth Summit in 1992 was a timely and significant international event that brought together 172 countries, more than 100 of which were represented by their leaders. It led to the creation of the UN conventions on biological diversity, the framework convention on climate change, the principles on sustainable forestry and Local Agenda 21, all of which were designed to tackle the unsustainable use of natural resources and reduce man’s impact on the environment. Twenty years later, however, as leaders are about to meet again in Rio, we have to be honest about where we are. The state of the environment has worsened significantly, with many of the natural resources on which we all depend under ever-increasing strain in many areas, including oceans and forests, biodiversity and rising greenhouse gas emissions. Yes, we can all point to significant advances in parts of the world—for example, the significant decrease in deforestation in Brazil—and to political processes such as the recent outcome of the Durban climate negotiations, but all the scientific indicators are flashing red.
The question is why? It is not that we committed to the wrong policies at Rio 20 years ago and in Johannesburg 10 years later; it is that Governments have failed properly to implement their commitments. If we are to ensure that Rio+20 warrants the participation of leaders again, we need to recognise that three key parts of the Rio jigsaw were missing, so that that implementation was always likely to be difficult. First, there was a lack of domestic legislation to underpin the Rio principles and conventions; secondly, there was a lack of credible and independent international scrutiny outside the governmental processes to monitor and scrutinise governmental delivery; and thirdly, the international community failed to convert the Rio agenda into a language that would hold sway in the most powerful Ministries in each Government—namely, the Treasuries and Finance Ministries.
Perversely, we still focus on GDP as the indicator of national wealth, when clearly it is only a partial measure that does not take into account the stock of natural capital on which we all depend and all economies rely. One reason for the failure to look after and steward natural capital is the absence of effective recognition within the national accounts of what capital there is. A country can grow while becoming poorer as it destroys the natural capital on which its future prosperity depends. If Rio+20 is to be a success, we must address these three challenges. That is why I am so pleased that we have this opportunity to discuss Rio+20.
We should not leave it to Governments, who have not done a particularly strong job. As previous speakers, not least the Chairman of the Select Committee, have said, we need to step up as legislators. We need to ensure that in Chambers such as this across the world, we hold our Governments to account and ensure that they deliver on the promises they make in high-falutin’ speeches at high-falutin’ summits. As the United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said at the formal announcement of the Rio+20 world summit of legislators:
“Parliamentarians have a profound influence. You enact legislation. You approve budgets. You are at the heart of democratic governance. And in today’s increasingly interconnected world, you are also a link between the global and local—bringing local concerns into the global arena, and translating global standards into national action.”
I am not sure that we have been good at translating global standards into national action. The international presidency of GLOBE International rests with the UK parliamentary group, and the right honourable John Gummer, now Lord Deben, is serving as the president of GLOBE. As the president of GLOBE in the House of Commons, I am delighted to say that the Government of Brazil and the United Nations Secretary-General have both recognised that a new process is required at Rio+20 to remedy the underlying weaknesses that I have mentioned. That process will be overseen by the global legislators’ organisation, GLOBE. With the support of the United Nations Secretary-General and the Government of Brazil, as well as the visionary mayor of Rio, Eduardo Paes, the world summit of legislators will be launched. The summit will involve more than 300 Speakers of Parliaments, Presidents of Congresses and Senates, and senior legislators. It will mark the beginning of a new international process for legislators that is dedicated to establishing a mechanism that scrutinises and monitors Governments on the delivery of the original Rio agenda and the conventions on climate, desertification and biodiversity, as well as any further commitments made at Rio+20.
The summit will have three core objectives. The first is scrutiny. Recognising the role of legislators in monitoring and scrutinising the work of Governments, the summit will establish a mechanism at the international level to monitor the implementation by Governments of commitments made at Rio+20. The summit will develop a set of Rio scrutiny principles to strengthen legislators’ capacity to hold Governments to account. The second objective is legislation. Recognising the role of legislators in developing and passing laws, the summit will provide a platform to advance and share best legislative practice, as well as to promote a mechanism in international processes that can recognise national legislation. The third objective is on natural capital. Recognising the role of many countries’ Parliaments in approving budgets and national accounts, the summit will examine how the value of natural capital can be integrated in our national economic frameworks, to enable legislators better to monitor the use of natural capital.
Based on those objectives, the summit participants will negotiate a Rio+20 legislators’ protocol. They will be asked to make a commitment to take it back to their respective legislatures to seek support for, or formal ratification of, the protocol. Legislators will then be asked to reconvene in Rio every two years to monitor progress in implementing the Rio+20 outcomes, as well as to share best legislative practice. It is therefore with great pleasure that, on behalf of the President of the Brazilian Senate, I formally invite Mr Speaker to lead a delegation from this House to attend the summit of legislators. I shall be pleased to present the President’s invitation after the debate.
The world summit of legislators would not have been possible without the commitment of legislators from the Senate and Congress of Brazil. With the support of the President of the Brazilian Congress, Senator José Sarney, and the relentless efforts of the President of GLOBE Brazil and First Secretary of the Brazilian Senate, Senator Cicero Lucena, that process would not be taking place. Likewise, it is with the support of the mayor of Rio, Eduardo Paes, that the summit will have a home in Rio.
In concluding, let me say that the UK has an extremely important role to play at Rio+20. The UK has made a series of significant commitments to incorporate the value of natural capital into its accounts—a radical step, and one that shows that the Prime Minister is delivering on his promise to lead the greenest Government ever. In fact, that step alone has the potential to be one of the most radical changes to the way in which we operate our economy. I am delighted that it is under this Chancellor that the UK natural capital committee build on this experience, which provides concrete and practical actions that can be taken at national level. That radical yet sensible agenda can be presented by our Prime Minister at Rio in person, I hope. I urge him to attend personally, following the G20 in Mexico, and I believe that the international process would benefit from his contribution. I also urge his personal support for President Dilma in that undertaking, as Brazil and the UK have the potential to be much closer allies.
I urge the Government to support the world summit of legislators and ensure that it is appropriately acknowledged and recognised in the leaders’ communiqué at Rio+20. I know that the Secretary of State has been asked to meet GLOBE to discuss the issue. If parliamentarians are properly engaged, we can deliver on our nation’s promises, give weight to the needs of future generations, not just our own, and deliver sustainable development not as a soundbite, but in reality.
Environmental Protection and Green Growth
Graham Stuart Excerpts(14 years, 1 month ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Richard Benyon)
May I thank the hon. Member for Wakefield (Mary Creagh) for tabling this motion? I could not have wanted a better form of words in order to extol the virtues of this Government and to point out the manifest failings of the previous one. If I had a better handle on the usual channels, as I think they are called, I might have got a member of the Backbench Business Committee to produce just such a motion, because it allows me to discuss some of the excellent things that we are doing to make this the greenest Government ever.
I start by apologising on behalf of the Secretary of State for the fact that she is not here. I know that many members of the Select Committee on Environment, Food and Rural Affairs would have liked to be here too. However, there is a courtesy, which the Secretary of State feels very strongly, which says that Select Committees are very important for holding Ministers to account. We took that view in opposition, and now we are in government we intend to ensure that we make ourselves available when Select Committees wish to question us at length.
With her customary generosity of spirit and her sunny nature, the hon. Member for Wakefield made a number of points about the Government, but perhaps failed to mention some of the good things. I hope she and the House will forgive me if I comment on the wording of the motion and on where we are moving forward. On environmental technologies, the hon. Lady did not feel the urge to mention the £3 billion that has been invested through the green investment bank, and she felt unable to talk about the vast amounts that that will generate in the private sector, or about the 26 million homes that will benefit from the green deal, which is the largest retrofit of infrastructure in our homes to benefit those on low incomes and make us a greener country.
The hon. Lady did not talk about the fourth carbon budget, which so many groups recognised and praised us for achieving, or about Ian Cheshire of the Kingfisher Group, who will be leading business opportunities for green growth. In this financial year alone, £1.7 billion has been invested in environmental technologies, creating 9,000 jobs all over the country.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
The Minister is acutely aware of how devastated east Yorkshire was by flooding in 2007. One of the most worrying aspects of the Labour party manifesto was a promise to cut capital spending by 50%. Will he assure us that flood protection will get the required investment, and that this Government are committed to flood protection in a way that the Labour party were not before the last election?
Richard Benyon
Before the election, the previous Chancellor announced that there would be a 50% cut in DEFRA’s capital spend. If Labour had won that election, it might have said that it would not cut flood protection, but in that case, what would it have cut? The hon. Member for Wakefield used the tired old argument that if we are to compare apples with apples, we must compare this Government with the last two years of the previous one. However, in this four years, there is an 8% cut compared with the previous four years. Bearing in mind the cuts across the Government and the appalling legacy that we were left, we have made flooding an absolute priority.
Richard Benyon
I do not want to get into a long economic debate, but the hon. Gentleman is right in one sense. Green growth, if we do it right, could create jobs. I am afraid that I do not agree with the suggestion by the hon. Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) that this is an entirely binary issue involving either growth or the environment. The Government firmly believe that the two go together, and our policies reflect that.
The Government have an ambitious programme to protect and enhance our natural environment. Given the unprecedented financial difficulties, we cannot simply pull the financial levers to deliver change. Instead, we are committed to leading by example, being the greenest Government ever, mainstreaming sustainable development and enabling the value of the natural environment and biodiversity to be reflected when decisions are made. In the past 17 months, we have made good progress. We have a strong track record of environmental leadership, at home and internationally. We have published the national eco-system assessment, the first analysis of the benefits that the UK’s natural environment provides to society and to our continuing economic prosperity. This is ground-breaking research from over 500 UK scientists and economists, and the UK is the world leader in this regard.
Mr Graham Stuart
Does the Minister foresee a time when natural capital will form part of the national accounts in the same way that other capital assets now do?
Richard Benyon
We are consulting DCLG colleagues on that and a variety of different issues. I recently visited the Building Research Establishment at Watford. Amazing work is being done there on grey-water systems and how households can use much less water. We want to take those ideas forward, and we will keep the House informed as we do so.
Mr Graham Stuart
On the green investment bank, may I point out that the largest manufacturing area outside London is Yorkshire? A quarter of the nation’s energy is produced in Yorkshire. Yorkshire stands ready—manufacturers, councillors, universities—to work with the green investment bank. Will the Minister give us more details of what exactly it will be doing, and what role Yorkshire can play in making sure we take forward the green revolution?
Richard Benyon
My experience in this House is that Yorkshire MPs believe that life starts and finishes in Yorkshire, and I am sure the green investment bank will find a way of investing in my hon. Friend’s constituency—and elsewhere. We will come to the House with more details in the near future.
We were talking earlier about whether the concepts of green and growth were complementary or at odds with each other. We firmly believe they are complementary. The environment is an economic issue. Better management of natural resources is a financial and environmental opportunity. That is recognised by the Government and leading businesses. The waste review and the natural environment White Paper underline that by putting resource efficiency and the natural environment at the heart of economic growth.
Broader initiatives either already delivered or in the pipeline include electricity market reform, the renewable heat incentive and the green deal, which is the largest retrofit project. The Government also have an initiative, “Enabling the transition to a green economy”, which is being led by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, DECC and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. It brings together under one heading all of our ambitions and plans for moving towards a green economy.
To help in that, we have set up the Green Economy Council, chaired by the Secretaries of State for BIS, DEFRA and DECC, which brings together more than 20 business leaders from leading businesses and business groups ranging from Ford to Waitrose. It provides an open forum for business to work with Government to address the challenges of creating the green economy and to facilitate growth opportunities.
I wish to highlight two ways in which we are hard-wiring natural capital across government, and I referred to that in passing earlier. We are working with the Office for National Statistics to include natural capital in the UK environmental accounts. We are also setting up a natural capital committee—an independent advisory committee reporting to the Economic Affairs Committee—to provide expert advice on the state of England’s natural capital. We will be advertising for a chair and members this year.
That develops one of the key objectives put forward by GLOBE International—my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness and the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) are such able vice-chairmen for that organisation. We are also establishing a business-led ecosystems market taskforce to review the opportunities for UK business from expanding green goods, services, products, investment vehicles and markets, which value and protect nature’s services.
I shall now move on to more specific issues. Earlier this year, we published our waste review, which is a comprehensive look at prevention, reuse, recycling, recovery and disposal, aiming for a zero-waste economy. It provides a broader picture than recycling targets and sets us on a path towards a greener, more innovative economy that values waste as a resource and an opportunity for jobs.
Rory Stewart
I shall take up that point, as it illustrates the four aspects that I identified. What we need and what the Government are providing is more courage, which goes to bovine TB, more work with communities, more ability to confront vested interests and more creativity.
On courage with respect to bovine TB, what is the fundamental problem with bovine TB in Cumbria? It is not badgers, as the hon. Lady says. It is that for 13 years the previous Government were not prepared to talk honestly to farmers about the fact that the TB getting into our herds is coming from cattle movement. The answer should come from a better attitude towards movement and linked holdings, and a better attitude towards post-movement testing. Scotland has shown the example. We should have had the courage in areas such as Cumbria, which are still safe and where TB is not endemic, to have effectively moved that border south.
That leads to the second element—working with communities. Again, the solution to the lack of affordable housing in our area, the solution to planning in our area, and the solution to renewable energy, particularly hydro-generation, lies in working much more flexibly with communities. We have just built 22 affordable homes in a rural area by allowing the community of Crosby Ravensworth to do its own planning. We are doing barn conversions up and down the east side of Cumbria by listening to communities who want houses for farmers’ children and have been unable to provide them because of rigid centralised planning regulations.
There has been a failure to confront vested interests—a failure to confront supermarkets over contracts, a failure to confront supermarkets over planning, and sometimes a failure to confront certain elements and lobbies within the farming interests, which connects to the issue of bovine TB. The solution is not only to engage with communities and not only to be more courageous, but to be more creative, which brings us to broadband and mobile telephone coverage.
Mr Graham Stuart
There is another problem—the direct and, I suggest, deliberate skewing of Government funding to urban areas in the name of deprivation, and away from rural areas. The average grant per head in rural areas is 50% less than in urban areas at the end of 10 years of Labour, average incomes are lower and the average council tax is 100% higher. People are poorer, they pay more and get less, and that needs to be put right.
Rory Stewart
I agree, but to continue to develop the point, it is not simply a matter of cash. The point is creativity. On broadband, the problem with the Cornish project implemented by the previous Government with enormous generosity was its inflexibility—£100 million spent on a region with half the surface area of Cumbria. Were we to try to pursue broadband on that basis, we would spend £42 billion in this country, instead of which, by using communities that are prepared to dig their own trenches and to waive wayleaves, and by pushing commercial providers to innovate in their technical delivery, whether it is cellular delivery, a point-to-point microwave link or a fibre optic cable, means that in Cumbria, with any luck, and touching wood, we should be able to achieve results at least as good as those in Cornwall for about a quarter of the price.
The same is true of mobile coverage. The Ofcom target of 95%, which was set under the previous Government, was not ambitious enough and the costs to rural communities were extreme. By pushing up the coverage obligation, providing £150 million—not a very large amount—for building more masts and, most importantly, confronting the producer interest, meaning the mobile phone companies, which used to be their stock in trade, and compelling them to provide the coverage that they are reluctant to provide outside urban areas, we should now be able to achieve coverage of 98% to 99%.
The economic benefit of all that to rural areas would be immense. There would be a GDP benefit to small businesses and health and education benefits for remote rural areas. All the health, prosperity and vigour that that would bring those communities would allow the delivery of exactly the environmental projects that the Opposition hold so dear. Prosperous and vibrant rural communities will allow farmers, who are often the people in whom we vest responsibility for the environmental projects, to deliver them.
In conclusion, the fundamental mistake in the Opposition’s motion is not their objectives or what they feel ought to be done, but the methods they propose. I am afraid that those methods are dependent on a large deployment of cash, which is what I call the Cornwall approach. Instead, I believe that this Government have brought, as I am proud to see in rural Cumbria, the right focus on communities, the right creativity and the right ability to confront and to show courage, which hopefully means that the next time I look out of my window in my constituency, when I return there tomorrow, I will see affordable housing being built, broadband going into the ground, mobile coverage emerging, healthier cows and a more prosperous farming community that can support all the environmental targets we hold dear.
Nic Dakin
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. Those are the concerns that a Government who are attempting to be the greenest Government ever should be addressing. Sadly, this Tory Government are out of touch on the environment. The rows over planning, the forest sell-off, a 27% cut in flood defence investment, delays to the water White Paper and a complete lack of ambition on recycling, which the Minister seemed almost proud of, show that the Government are behind the curve on environmental protection and green growth. Their claim to be the greenest Government ever has unravelled in just 18 months. The Tories have a plan for cuts, but no plan for the environment. DEFRA cannot even ban wild animals from circuses, which is not a great deal to ask.
Mr Graham Stuart
I know that beneath the new Whip’s bluster there is a decent, honourable and reasonable person. One of the most pleasant aspects of the Minister’s speech today was that he did not once seek to describe or excoriate the performance of the previous Labour Government, which he barely talked about. He focused almost entirely on this Government’s policies. I ask the hon. Gentleman to throw away the Labour Whip’s handbook, despite his new job, and to be positive by talking about what can be done, rather than focusing endlessly on this negative stuff.
Nic Dakin
I thank the hon. Gentleman, for whom I have great regard. He has added “excoriate” to “prescient” and “canard” in the lexicon that we are being treated to this afternoon, but I fear that he was listening to a different speech from that which I heard.
Twenty-nine leading conservation charities, in their “Nature Check” analysis published this month, have criticised the Government for failing to show leadership on the natural environment. In their fair and balanced conclusion, they say:
“Whilst the Coalition has done well as a champion for the natural environment on the international stage”—
so, ticking the box there—
“at home its commitment to being the ‘greenest Government ever’ is in danger of being undermined. This assessment raises profound questions over the Government’s ability and willingness to deliver its green commitments, let alone to set out a long-term, coherent strategy to reverse biodiversity decline by 2020 and meet the needs of the natural environment alongside economy recovery.”
So, when it comes to delivery, there are serious questions.
Let us look at some key figures, which the RSPB has drawn from recent reports, on the level of the challenge. It states that
“43% of priority habitat and 31% of priority habitats in England are declining; 304 species in England were red-listed in 2007, because of severe decline (more than 50% loss over 25 years) more would be added by an audit today; and less than 37% of SSSIs in England…are in a favourable condition.”
That illustrates the challenge and need with which we are confronted.
Business wants certainty to invest in green jobs and new technology, yet this Tory Government are failing to provide the certainty that industry needs—[Hon. Members: “Coalition.”] I tend to think of the coalition as a Conservative Government. That is what we see all the time when Members go through the Lobbies.
There was much progress under the Labour Government, but there is still much more to make, and that is the challenge for a new Government—to pick the baton up and take the race forward. I am afraid that the Conservatives, however, threaten much of the progress that Labour made on green growth, sustainable development and the environment. They have left a trail of broken green promises. Since the time of the huskies, we have had almost a “For Sale” sign up over many of our natural assets, and support for public access and enjoyment of the countryside has weakened. Things to which people should have a right are challenged and are in danger because of this Government’s position.
Labour created two new national parks, which is great witness of Labour’s commitment. The Tories, on the other hand, have cut funding by 28.5%, meaning that visitor centres will close, parking charges will rise and nature trails will be left unkempt. This is a serious time for the environment, so it is time for the Government to step up to the plate and deliver for it, both in this country and internationally.
Flood and Water Management
Graham Stuart Excerpts(14 years, 2 months ago)
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Miss McIntosh
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that point. I know Workington and Maryport extremely well, and our hearts go out to those colleagues, particularly in Cumbria, who suffered in the floods. If he will permit me, I will mention the role that farmers, landowners and, in particular, internal drainage boards play in dredging and maintenance. In the visits that I have made over time to areas that have been badly affected by flooding in my constituency, other parts of Yorkshire, Cumbria and elsewhere, I have heard anecdotal evidence of an absence of maintenance and dredging. I was shocked to hear recently that Cod beck, which caused the flooding in Thirsk and where flood defences have still not been built—the Minister might put that on the wish list that he will take away with him today; we are still anxious to get the flood defences built in Thirsk—has not had any maintenance for the past two or three years.
I might go further than my Committee colleagues and our conclusions in the report. I would like the internal drainage board to be allowed to agree a programme of maintenance and dredging with the Environment Agency. On the recommendations, it was the wish of Sir Michael Pitt that there would be an annual maintenance and dredging programme on the Environment Agency website, which the public would be able to see. We have established, however, that the moneys given by internal drainage boards to the Environment Agency, not least in my own region, are not being used for dredging, for a number of reasons. I want that money to stay with the IDBs for a programme agreed with the Environment Agency, but for the IDBs to use their resources and their engineers to maintain main watercourses.
I am a vice-president of the Association of Drainage Authorities, which has contacted me to express its disappointment that no new internal drainage boards have been created yet. I know that the subject is close to the Minister’s heart, so when he sums up, will he tell us the position on the creation of new internal drainage boards? All those bodies have a role to play, but it should not be the Public Bodies Bill that sets out the legislative provisions; they should all form part of the water Bill, which we anticipate keenly.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
I support that request and wish to reinforce the recommendation in the Committee’s original report. On IDBs, the Government response says that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is
“considering what changes should be made to funding arrangements”.
I hope that that review will happen sooner rather than later. IDBs do a fantastic job from the ground up, with a real understanding of the topography of areas such as Holderness, which I represent. I want local people to be able to hold the money and commission effective flood protection, whether from the Environment Agency or another body. I am convinced, as is my hon. Friend, that putting it in the hands of local people rather than the agency will be more cost-effective.
Miss McIntosh
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point and for his invitation, which I was able to accept, to visit some of the areas that had been affected in Beverley.
Partnership funding for flood defences, which was introduced only this year, will of course be limited to the amounts that can be raised. The level of funding is the key to the success of our report and the message that we gave, as well as the success of the 2010 Act itself. I have a direct question for the Minister on the business of funding, particularly the levy-raising powers. I and many other hon. Members represent deeply rural constituencies. A concern has been expressed that, where there is not an established local levy, there may be constraints on the amount that can be raised. The Minister must realise that there is a limit to how much any individual local authority can afford because, as we note in the report, budgets have been reduced as a result of the comprehensive spending review.
We welcome the fact that regulations on the transfer of private sewers and lateral drains have proceeded, but the Minister must respond to the concerns expressed in our report, which are reflected across the country, about how we can recover the costs, which are either non-funded or underfunded. It will be helpful if the Minister responds to the water companies’ direct concern about that.
Colleagues would be disappointed if I did not mention sustainable drainage systems. We need to know the commencement date for the relevant provisions of the Flood and Water Management Act 2010. Are we really looking at a delay until 2012, and if so, do we as parliamentarians accept that? I put it to the Minister that we do not. I do not think it would be appropriate to have a phased introduction of sustainable drainage systems. The country is crying out for sustainable drainage systems to be introduced with a specific target date—I hope, by the end of this year. When will the regulations be laid and what consultation period is required? The time needed for preparation makes those provisions coming into effect this year a very tight timetable, and there is concern that they will be postponed until next year.
I want to place on the record my views on misconnections and the ending of the automatic right to connect. Sir Michael Pitt was extremely clear and categorical on that. I am not sure that we have reached an end to the automatic right to connect. I would like to make water companies statutory consultees on the same basis as the Environment Agency is. Many water companies have loose arrangements with the planning authorities, but it is important that we enshrine that in law. Water companies should be made statutory consultees on any future planning applications to limit potential misconnections as far as possible. I touched on the maintenance of watercourses in response to the hon. Member for Workington (Tony Cunningham), but I repeat that we need as many engineers as possible and that we should use the internal drainage boards where they exist.
Mr Graham Stuart
I wonder whether the Committee looked at bringing in national flood protection standards. As soon as flooding moves out of the public eye, and in the face of financial difficulties, funding tends to be cut, with a long-term deleterious impact. Holland has statutory national flood standards, which trigger investment and ensure that standards are maintained. Do we not need some fundamental reworking of protections in law to force Governments and funding bodies to ensure that we have a sustainable system? I fear that if we go for a period without severe floods, we will create the conditions for worse floods in the future.
Miss McIntosh
My hon. Friend pre-empts my next point. Why has there been a delay in the consultation on and implementation of national standards for SUDS? Many have expressed to me their real concern about that. When will the provisions on SUDS be implemented?
Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Walker, and a great pleasure to follow the hon. Lady, who used to be the hon. Member for the Vale of York and is now the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Miss McIntosh). In 2010, we spent many hours together in Committee scrutinising the Flood and Water Management Bill.
For those of us from Wales, the situation is complex, particularly in the context of devolution. Many hon. Members will remember that there were various sections in the Flood and Water Management Act 2010 that would be introduced when the then Welsh Assembly Government had had the chance to make the necessary measures in the process of what were then known as legislative competence orders. Since then, Wales has had a referendum and the Welsh Assembly Government have enhanced powers.
I am pleased to say that one of the first measures under those new powers has been the enactment of the adoption of private sewers, which was announced by the Welsh Government Minister John Griffiths and will come into effect on 1 October. We all know how important that is for many householders who, in the past, have often found themselves facing totally unexpected bills because they were unaware that they were on private systems. The adoption of their sewers will be a tremendous bonus for them. Residents in areas such as Cleviston Park in Llangennech, Dolau Fan in Burry Port and Derlin Park in Tycroes will join with many others across the country in being very pleased that they will be brought into the system of adopted sewers and will not have to face bills that people just two streets away do not have to face.
The issue is particularly complex, because the boundaries of the Dwr Cymru Welsh Water area and the Severn Trent area are not coterminous with the border between England and Wales. That presents us with another issue, as there is clearly a need for careful and close working between the Welsh and the UK Governments. Coupled with that, obvious geographical features, such as the Severn estuary, will necessitate continued close working.
On water charges, we are all familiar with the fact that south-west England is in the most difficult position and has the highest charges, but people are not necessarily aware that Wales comes second in all the comparison tables—Welsh Water is the second highest charger. The reasons are complex, are historical and geographical in nature, and go back a long way. Basically, Wales faces problems similar to those in south-west England: it has long coastlines with beautiful beaches, which people from all parts of the UK come to enjoy, and yet there are areas with a relatively sparse population, so it is difficult to make the challenge of meeting environmental standards for those beaches match up with the income that can be generated from the local residents.
I welcome the fact that the Committee has gone into detail in the report on ways forward, but there are no easy options. As the Minister said to the Committee, we cannot end up with a situation in which someone on a very low income in one part of the country subsidises a millionaire in the south-west, and nor is it a straightforward matter of seeing the solution as one for single area or one stretching across several areas. I urge the Government, however, to give the problem of water poverty urgent attention and to take into account the fact that the high prices in Wales are an historical feature and that some discussion is needed about a mechanism that might help consumers in Wales who find themselves in difficulties. For example, some type of national structure, falling under the remit of UK taxation or the responsibilities of the Department for Work and Pensions, would work for a clear-cut case. If it is not so clear-cut, we still need to give the issue special consideration and to think what we can do. The Select Committee on Environment, Food and Rural Affairs in 2009 reported that DEFRA should
“examine how changes might be made to the way water industry investment is paid for when it is directly and expressly for the purpose of improving environmental standards for national benefit.”
My constituency is on the northern side of the Burry inlet—the southern side will be more familiar to many people as the Gower peninsula, an area of outstanding natural beauty. Our difficulties in the inlet have resulted in infraction procedures on EU water directives on waste waters, shellfish waters and habitats. The fact that the UK is not in compliance with EU directives is clearly of national significance.
In areas where we have a national responsibility and where we must protect our heritage, we must provide investment to maintain the standards that everyone wants to enjoy on cleaner beaches, with better water quality in our inlets, particularly where we have a precious shellfish industry, as we do in the Burry inlet. We need to ask at what point something should be dealt with on a national scale, rather than on a local water company-area scale. I make an urgent plea for the White Paper to provide a clear indication of how the Government will manage the challenge of providing enough income for the necessary investment in infrastructure at the same time as ensuring that families who find it difficult to pay their water bills do not face even greater bills. The Government must find a way of balancing that extremely difficult sum and, in doing so, take Wales into consideration and work closely with the Welsh Government.
Mr Graham Stuart
In posing that conundrum, does the hon. Lady have any sympathy with the idea of solving it by transferring responsibility for flood protection to water companies? After all, they specialise in raising large sums of money from the markets for long-term infrastructure investment to deliver a guaranteed service level, regulated by a regulator, at the lowest possible cost. Could that be a solution—a way of getting all water-bill payers to contribute to a standard of flood protection that would then be guaranteed and could be regulated to ensure that everyone was given protection in the long term and, hopefully, at the lowest cost?
Nia Griffith
That suggestion would probably exacerbate some of the difficulties. The historical reasons for the current situation would have to be taken into consideration. Are we suggesting, for example, that flooding in certain areas would be the responsibility of particular water companies, although there is inequality in places where the flooding happens and in the amount of investment that has already been put into flood management systems? I am not sure that the suggestion would work well.
The other difficulty, which I was going to mention, is the whole issue of planning. If water companies are to take responsibility, they must first be given some power. The inclusion of their opinion as statutory consultees is crucial to future planning and development, because they know where overload is and where problems are likely to occur. Sadly, we have seen developments on which the companies have not been consulted, and things have gone wrong. However, the problem with the water companies taking complete responsibility at this point is that they are not responsible for what has happened historically, as there has been an enormous amount of development in many areas that are quite unsuited to it. There could be considerable difficulty with the model proposed by the hon. Gentleman.
Mr Graham Stuart
I am trying to understand the objection, which I do not quite get. We recognise that we have haphazard standards at the moment and have had haphazard historic investment bearing no relation to need or risk, and that we want a decent standard for everyone. We need to find a mechanism for delivering that, sharing cost on the most equitable basis that we can, delivering it as quickly as we can while we have a Government who have no money. I do not see that the hon. Lady’s objection is an objection to the proposal. If we could bring it in, if it was politically acceptable, everyone would be brought up to a decent level in a way that spread the burden across bill payers. Is that not desirable?
Nia Griffith
The idea would merit further examination, but we need to look at the quite considerable sums that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has put into some flood management schemes in the past few years, and ask ourselves whether, if they were to fall on one particular water company, they would work. We would need to look at that in more detail. At present, I do not have the necessary expertise to go into it, so I shall leave it to the hon. Gentleman to prove his case and produce the statistics to show what he wants to suggest.
Moving on, insurance is immensely important, for everyone in Wales as well as in England. For people who have been affected, who face difficulties and who have suffered repeated occurrences of flooding, we need to ensure that appropriate discussions are held with insurance companies, who should do everything that they can. I urge the Minister, when he introduces the White Paper, to go into that issue in considerable detail. I would be pleased to hear whether he has had any recent discussions on insurance with the insurance companies for people who live in areas that have been repeatedly flooded.
I have mentioned planning. Not only is it imperative that water companies should have a say in planning, because of the types of connections that can sometimes be made and because of their understanding and knowledge of flooding patterns, but it is imperative that local authorities should have due regard for the flood maps produced by the Environment Agency. I am afraid that far too often local authorities such as my own, Carmarthenshire county council, grant planning permission for areas that are in C2 floodplains, when plenty of other land is available. Carmarthenshire is a large rural county, with some small towns and one large industrial town, my town of Llanelli. There is no excuse in that sort of area, even with a large coastline, for going ahead and building where there will clearly be difficulties for the newly moved-in residents.
Nor is there any excuse for building on slopes, which immediately increases the pressure on people living immediately below them. The increased water flow into the sewerage system creates an additional flood risk for those living a bit further down the slope. When making planning decisions, every local authority has a clear responsibility to avoid increasing flood risk. In 200 or 300 years’ time, people will wonder how on earth we could have been so mad as to build in such places when we already had the maps and the knowledge and had found the infrastructure wanting. It is therefore important that local authorities behave responsibly.
On that note, I look forward to hearing from the Minister how far his thinking has got, when we will see a White Paper and what thoughts he has on charging, insurance, flood prevention and flood defences.
Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)
I am delighted to speak in the debate, and congratulate the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Miss McIntosh) on initiating it. She chairs the Select Committee with great aplomb, and I know that the matter is exceptionally dear to her heart. I was surprised only that she curtailed her remarks as she did. I expected at least an hour from her.
I look forward most of all in the debate to hearing from the Minister about the progress that has been made since the Government responded to the Committee earlier in the year. The Committee’s report was published last year following a series of welcome and ambitious commitments from the Government: safeguarding clean, reliable and affordable water supplies; protecting households and property from the risk of flooding; and reforming the water industry and making it more resilient, efficient, sustainable, innovative and affordable. The report provided the Government with a comprehensive and holistic approach to delivering on those commitments. Of course we should, in this debate, be assessing the progress that has been made. Instead, I am afraid we must reflect on a number of broken promises and missed opportunities.
A water White Paper was promised for June. In April the Minister revised that commitment and promised that it would be published in the autumn. Unfortunately, the latest business plan of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs now promises publication in December, nine months after the Committee’s report, and we are still no clearer on how the Government plans will encourage the retrofitting of sustainable drainage systems, how they will ensure that customers’ views will be taken into account during the price review process, and how investment in the water industry will be better managed to avoid the boom and bust cycle that so badly harms the supply chain. There is also uncertainty about the future of metering and water efficiency in households, social tariffs to reduce the impact of rising bills on low-income customers and the future of competition in the water industry. Publication in December would leave only four months for the Government to meet their commitment to introduce any new legislation required as a result of the White Paper by next April. I hope that the Government’s ambition will not be scaled back in the fight against a tight time scale.
Since our report, the Government have also severely cut capital funding for flood defences. When we consider that we need to increase investment simply to maintain the current level of protection, that is cause for considerable concern. As the Committee pointed out:
“To cut back significantly on flood defence infrastructure spending could be a classic example of short-term savings leading to much greater long-term costs.”
The Government have also failed to provide any assurance on the provision of flood insurance beyond 2013. The natural environment White Paper, which was excellent in many ways—we adverted to some of it earlier in the debate—also missed a valuable opportunity to set out how, for example, agriculture and land management could play a stronger role in reducing flood risk and improving water quality. I hope that the Minister will take the opportunity to update us on each of those issues, so that we may leave this afternoon’s debate with a much clearer idea of Government policy on the future of flood and water management. I shall try to deal with each of those issues.
I also want to discuss some of the priorities for the forthcoming White Paper. Ever since privatisation, capital expenditure in the water industry has been concentrated towards the middle of the five-year funding cycle. That has led to financial and managerial inefficiencies in addition to instability in the supply chain, ultimately resulting in higher costs for consumers. It also leads to the migration of skilled resources out of the sector to more stable industries. That has created a severe and worsening skills shortage in the water industry.
The White Paper must help to bring to an end the effect of that five-year asset management planning cycle. It should also explore the link between the price review and innovation. In the current investment period, companies are looking for tried and tested technologies with payback within three years. Some water companies have disbanded their research and development departments as they are not currently funded by the price review. R and D is now conducted on an ad hoc basis rather than in a co-ordinated way.
The water sector faces a period of huge challenge in coping with the implications of climate change, and in reducing its own carbon emissions. It can ill afford to be locked into a short-term investment cycle that stifles and inhibits innovation. The White Paper must set out how the Government will restructure the water industry properly to incentivise and encourage companies to invest in innovation, particularly in treatment processing, energy efficiency, leakage prevention, and water efficiency.
Competition can help to stimulate that innovation. Competition in the water industry is not an end in itself, but it is a means of improving services for customers, particularly the most vulnerable, and improving environmental outcomes.
In the White Paper, the Government gave a commitment to respond to the Cave review, and I would welcome an update from the Minister on how the White Paper will ensure that greater competition will meet those challenges. It would be helpful if the Minister clarified whether the Government’s one-in, one-out rule, which prevents a regulation from being introduced unless another is scrapped, will apply to any legislation proposed in the White Paper. If so, perhaps he will share the Department’s thinking on which regulations might be scrapped in the event of any legislation coming forward in April 2012.
We talked much about sustainable drainage systems in another area on which the Government gave a commitment in the White Paper. When sustainable drainage systems are successfully implemented, they can make a significant contribution to reducing the risk of flooding by increasing the capacity of land to absorb water. They can also reduce the risk of water contamination, and increase the sustainability of water use. The provision of SUDS for new developments and, where possible, for existing developments is widely supported throughout the House. However, evidence to the inquiry revealed widespread concern among local authorities about their ability to fund the adoption and maintenance of SUDS. The Government’s response to the Committee stated that DEFRA would fund local authorities for the costs of maintaining adopted SUDS and SUDS maintenance in the “short term.” Will the Minister say how long he expects that “short term” to be? That is important for local authorities.
In November, the Prime Minister said that flood defence spending would be protected, and would be “roughly the same” as under Labour. In fact, capital funding for flood defences to protect homes has fallen from a baseline figure last year of £354 million to £259 million. We now know the meaning of the phrase, “roughly the same”. It means give or take 30% according to my mathematics. In fact, it is a 27% cash cut to the budget, and a 32% real-terms cut when inflation is taken into account.
Mr Graham Stuart
After the floods in 2000, the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, had people from Norfolk and other areas to No. 10 Downing street and made expansive commitments on flood protection. However, the pressures of political life being what they are, flooding moved out of the spotlight and those promises disappeared along with the floodwater. It is an historic happening for Governments slowly to cut long-term infrastructure investment when it is not in the spotlight. Does the hon. Gentleman have any thoughts on how to create a long-term sustainable structure which, regardless of the political cycle, ensures that our constituents are properly protected from flooding?
Barry Gardiner
The hon. Gentleman points out that at various periods during the previous Labour Administration the flood budget was raided, but he must acknowledge that overall there was both a real-terms and a cash increase in that budget. He is absolutely right that from time to time that budget was raided and cut as necessary in the political cycle, but overall it was increased. The Minister knows that I have the greatest respect for him and the work that he is trying to do in this area, and I know that he understands the importance of the matter. The hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart) talked about small cuts, but this is not a small cut. It is a 27% cash, or a 32% real-terms cut in this period. That is a huge amount.
Mr Graham Stuart
The hon. Gentleman is being generous in giving way. I was not trying to suggest that he is not being proper in challenging the Government. My point is that historically Governments tend to raid the flood budget when under the pressure that they inevitably suffer. The last Government was much better at spending money than the present one, but it turned out that so much of that money could not be sustained, and we could not afford it. He should not boast about that too much. What we should focus on is how to create a long-term situation so that whoever is in government and whatever the state of public finances our constituents will have a guarantee that that political cycle will not get in the way of sensible, stable support for flood defence in their homes.
Barry Gardiner
I absolutely agree with the hon. Gentleman. We have talked about introducing minimum standards, and we must move towards consensus, because that is in everyone’s interest.
The Government have given a commitment to deliver 15% efficiency savings in Environment Agency flood defence budgets, but that leaves an overall reduction in those budgets of 17%. I would be grateful if the Minister provided us with an update of his assessment of the impact of that reduced funding settlement in relation to the Government’s flood programme, and the flood defence work that the Environment Agency has programmed for the next three years. Will he also provide an indication of how the 15% of efficiency savings in the Environment Agency has impacted on that work?
Despite those funding reductions, the Committee noted the Government’s commitment fully to fund local authorities in their new roles under the Flood and Water Management Act 2010, and that they would provide direct grants of up to £36 million a year to lead local flood authorities. That is welcome. Each lead local flood authority would receive at least £110,000 a year, with the authorities tackling the highest levels of local risk receiving up to £750,000 a year. However, the communities and local government special grants settlement for 2011-12 highlights that the most that any lead local flood authority received this year was not £750,000, but £260,000—that was in Kent. Of the 152 lead local flood authorities, 144 received less than £200,000. To allow for local flexibility, those grants are not ring-fenced. On average, central Government funding to councils will fall by 26% over the next four years. I understand the constraint under which the Government are operating.
Barry Gardiner
Indeed, I take on board the party political knockabout that we can have. Local authorities have been put in an extremely difficult position. By not ring-fencing the funds, the Government cannot be sure that they will go into flood defences. It is therefore important to find out from the Minister how the Government plan to review local authority spend on flood management, and how they propose to hold local authorities to account for the money they have been given to spend in that area.
I acknowledge that that is not just a matter for central and local government. The Committee concluded that it was right for beneficiaries such as developers to help fund new flood defence schemes. In light of that, will the Minister confirm how funding through the new flood and coastal resilience partnership funding arrangement will be focused on those communities at greatest risk? How will the Government identify those communities and ensure that their protection is achieved in practice? As discussed earlier, the Government’s draft national planning policy framework should also be amended to address how planning should apportion the costs of providing flood defences for new developments between public agencies and private beneficiaries.
The Labour Government’s statement of principles guaranteed universal flood insurance coverage for homes in affected areas. That guarantee runs out in 2013, and was based on the understanding, following the Pitt review, that Government should have
“above inflation settlements for future spending rounds.”.
We know that that will no longer be the case.
The Government’s response to the Committee’s report committed to updating the Committee on progress with implementing
“a roadmap to take us beyond 2013.”
I would be grateful if the Minister took this opportunity to update hon. Members on precisely what the roadmap beyond 2013 might look like.
Water saving through greater efficiency will become increasingly important, especially in parts of the country where climate change and population growth will lead to significant constraints in supply. The Building Regulations 2010 introduced a new minimum water efficiency standard for new homes. The potential consumption of potable water by persons occupying a dwelling should not exceed 125 litres per person per day. Will the Minister confirm whether the Government have plans to increase the minimum water efficiency standard in future revisions of the Building Regulations 2010?
As the Committee noted, metering plays a key role in helping to reduce water demand. More widespread introduction of metering will mean that there are winners and losers and some, including groups of vulnerable customers, could see significant rises in their water bills. Social tariffs can help to ameliorate the impact of rising bills on low-income customers. The Government’s response to the Committee stated that they were preparing
“guidance on company social tariffs under Section 44 of the Flood and Water Management Act 2010.”
Will the Minister confirm when that will be published as it is of great interest and importance to many poorer constituencies? The regulatory framework under which water prices are set must also be reformed to include stronger water efficiency targets for water supply companies. The water White Paper should be clear on how that will be taken forward.
In giving evidence to the Committee, the Environment Agency estimated that costs associated with implementing the water framework directive up to 2027 could be between £30 billion and £100 billion, depending on the approach taken. Despite that level of investment, the UK was likely to see only 26% of rivers achieving “Good Ecological Status” by the water framework directive target date of 2015. The Government’s response to the Committee highlighted that it was possible, within the terms of the directive, to set lower standards of compliance. Will the Minister confirm whether the Government have plans to make use of that option? If so, it would be extremely deleterious. Do the Government have any plans to implement the “polluter pays” principle more accurately, so that customers do not have to foot the bill for cleaning up pollution for which they are not responsible? Domestic water customers currently pay some 82% of the costs of implementing measures to meet WFD requirements.
Together with other members of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, I welcome the focus placed by the Government on flood and water management. They seem, however, to have lost their way over the nine months since the report was published. An ambitious water White Paper and the commencement of provisions in the Flood and Water Management Act that have not yet been effected, must be a priority. I look forward to hearing from the Minister about how the Government plan to move the issue forward.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
It is a pleasure to participate in this debate and to follow speeches that are as excellent and thoughtful as those we have heard so far across the Chamber. I pay tribute in particular to my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Miss McIntosh) and her Committee for the excellent report that has been produced.
On 25 June 2007, this country suffered some of the worst flooding in modern history, and my constituents in Beverley and Holderness were some of the worst affected. All four towns in my constituency, Beverley, Hedon, Withernsea and Hornsea were affected, and at one stage Hornsea was cut off by the floods. Almost every hamlet and village was affected; thousands of my constituents had their homes flooded and were forced out. Although Hull attracted press attention as it too was devastated, the East Riding of Yorkshire was equally appallingly hit.
Although we are discussing the technicalities of the floods, the human cost must never be forgotten. Let us consider from a historical point of view how we, the country and the media would view a catastrophe that saw thousands of people removed from their homes, for months if they were lucky, and years if they were not, and how seriously we would regard such an event if it were caused by something other than floods. In a way, the country and the media failed to recognise just how devastating were the floods in east Yorkshire in 2007 and elsewhere.
The memory of people living with their marriages on the edge as they sat in a tiny caravan—I shall not name the place as that may identify the people involved, but I saw people who were absolutely haunted for months afterwards, with their lives wrecked by the flooding as they sat in a tiny caravan and stepped out into mud. They were involved in permanent disputes over their house with changing underwriters and people from the insurance companies. Notwithstanding the fact that insurance companies in general did a good job, that human picture stays in my mind and makes it important that we get things right.
That is why I am keen to try to find a way of providing long-term solutions. The nature of politics, not least the pressures faced by the coalition Government, given the financial catastrophe that they inherited, mean that funding for long-term issues such as flooding tends to get reduced. It gets reduced even in good times. When the previous Government were spending like there was no tomorrow, after there had been no flood events for a few years, the spending got cut. In a tougher time, we can expect that pressure to be even greater. How do we create a situation with the guarantee of stable, solid and sensible investment to protect people? That is my central question. I have tried to think about the issue, bearing in mind the many people whom I met in my constituency in 2007. The answer I came up with is that what we have now is not suitable. It is not simply about getting new documents, unless that involves legislation and setting down a definitive standard that can be enforced in court. Unless we have something like that, we will see the same cycle again—the money will not be put in place, and when a one-in-50, one-in-75 or one-in-150-year event comes to an area, people will suffer in the same way they did in the area I represent.
As the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee makes clear, when all costs are considered, it makes no sense from an economic point of view not to make such an investment. However, because of the silos of departmental budgets and the pressures in the political cycle, that money is not invested and we pay a higher price as a result. We therefore owe it to our constituents, not just from the human point of view, but from a basic, sensible economic management point of view, to create a structure that does not allow the money to be pulled away as soon as the spotlight moves on. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister may be able to discuss that today.
I have not done detailed work on what the implications would be of a transfer to water companies. It just seems to me that water companies such as Yorkshire Water, which has plant, people and responsibilities all over my constituency and all over Yorkshire, are capable of raising money from the markets for long-term investment in order to deliver a standard that a regulator ensures is met and to do that in a way that does not impinge on public finances. They are in a better position to deliver that certainty for the lowest possible cost than other models that immediately present themselves. I urge the Minister to think about that, because notwithstanding the good work that went on under the previous Government, albeit that it was a little slow, and the good work that is going on under the present Government which, funnily enough, also seems to be rather slow, I am not convinced that my constituents will not be affected badly again in future.
On the positive front, I would like to praise the Environment Agency. Craig McGarvey, whom I have dealt with a great deal in my local area, has been open. I certainly expressed a lot of criticism of the Environment Agency and the way in which it behaved, the way in which it treated people and the way in which it talked to them, as well as what it did from a practical point of view. However, people from the agency have worked hard to listen to people, to come out and be available. They have given up their evenings to talk and engage with people; and from Pasture terrace and Willow grove in Beverley to Burstwick, Hedon and a number of other places, serious improvements have been made to reduce flood risk.
I pay tribute to East Riding of Yorkshire council, which did not rush to judgment but set up a flood review panel. It spent months doing the work; it thought about it deeply; and it has encouraged parishes to come up with their own emergency plans and to think deeply about how they can minimise risk. Much good work has happened in Beverley and Holderness, and I am delighted that that is the case.
[Mrs Anne Main in the Chair]
I also pay tribute to the fire service. Again, I had been extremely critical. The floods happened on 25 June. Fire officers were doing 12 or 14 hours in floodwater, rescuing people. That happened to be in June. It happened to be the case, when they went in with fire kit on, which was completely unsuitable for flood work, that they did not freeze. If it had happened in February, they would not have been able to stay in the water as they did so heroically, doing 12-hour stints, looking after people. They would have had to come out, possibly after 40 or 45 minutes. People would have died simply because they did not have the kit to go in the water. I was ferocious in my criticism of how we got ourselves in that situation then, and the service listened and has invested and trained up its staff and they have the kit. We can be assured that if such an event happens again, we will have trained firefighters, with the right equipment, who can go in, effect rescues and protect people’s lives. If the floods had happened in February instead of June, people would have died as a result. That will not be the case in future.
Many positive things have occurred. If we do not look at a transfer to the water companies, I would like the Minister to reflect on the situation in the Netherlands, which has larger regional boards as opposed to our internal drainage boards. I visited the country once with the all-party coastal and marine group. People there have tax-raising powers, as I recall, but they have to deliver statutory protection standards. When we visited, we found that their rural areas had a higher guaranteed standard than central London. They looked for one-in-1,250-year flood protection for their rural areas and one-in-10,000-year protection for their urban areas. Of course, they have a completely different history and culture around flooding, given that the whole country is pretty much at risk of flooding and they carved it out of the sea in the first place. However, if we want people to be given proper protection, we perhaps need to implement such flood protection standards. They might need to be different in different places, but people should know that if they build behind a certain line or they have a house there, they will have protection that is maintained over time, whoever provides it. I hope that that will happen.
I know that, as Opposition Members have said, the Minister has spent a lot of time considering and understanding this issue. Across the Chamber, we have enormous confidence in him. We not only hope but expect that he will introduce a long-term settlement that means that the people who suffered so much in 2007 and in years before and after that will not suffer in that way again. That will be because of the Benyon settlement. Whatever the cynicism of people about the motives of those of us who come into public life, we do so in the hope that we can make a significant positive difference that affects the lives of thousands of people for the better. What better monument to the career of my hon. Friend than that he should provide the long-term Benyon settlement on flood protection and prevent the misery that blighted the lives of my constituents in 2007 from happening again in the future where it can be avoided?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Richard Benyon)
It is good of you to chair our proceedings, Mrs Main, albeit for only part of our debate. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Miss McIntosh) and her Committee on the priority that they have given the issue, particularly the matter of flooding. I also congratulate them on their report and on raising it so eloquently here today. There is no doubt that these issues are of importance to hon. Members from all parties.
The Government’s response to the report has been published and I hope that my hon. Friend and her Committee will accept that the Government are taking full account of all its recommendations. As she has acknowledged, the Government are in the process of implementing the Flood and Water Management Act 2010 in a proportionate way, having due regard to the need to ensure that the regulatory burden on businesses and citizens is justified. We have already provided much-needed clarity on the roles and responsibilities of regulatory authorities, local authorities and others in flood and water management. We are in the process of developing secondary legislation to address the remaining key elements of the Act: sustainable drainage systems, private sewers and reservoir safety. We will consult widely on our proposals once they have been fully developed.
The Flood and Water Management Act covered all of Sir Michael Pitt’s recommendations that required primary legislation, except for producing consolidated floods legislation, which it would not be sensible for us to do in advance of the red tape challenge, where we will seek to repeal any unnecessary legislation. We are aware that other parts of the draft Flood and Water Management Bill were included in the subsequent Act. We are looking again at the need for primary legislation and will only legislate where necessary. Any legislative proposals will be set out in the water White Paper. I say very clearly to hon. Members that we are committed to publishing that White Paper by December—not in December, but by December. If there is any change to that, I will personally notify the hon. Member for Copeland (Mr Reed), my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton—the Committee Chair—and anyone else concerned. However, that is our commitment today.
The White Paper will focus on increasing the resilience of our water supplies to the pressures of demographic and climate change; on reforming the water industry in the light of those challenges so that it is innovative, efficient and customer-focused; and on ensuring that bills remain affordable. I will come on to address some of the points eloquently raised by a number of hon. Members, not just those in the south-west. We would expect any water Bill to be tightly drafted and to focus on water legislation rather than flood management. The Government are committed to increasing the number of Bills that are published in draft for pre-legislative scrutiny, and we will consider the feasibility of doing so in the time available. I hope that my hon. Friend and her Committee will be able to follow that process.
The Government’s new approach to funding flood and coastal defence projects announced back in May, which has been raised by a number of hon. Members, has already scored a number of successes. Instead of meeting the full costs of just a limited number of schemes, a partnership approach will make Government money available to pay for a share of any potential scheme. Cost savings and local contributions will mean that more communities can enjoy the benefits that flood and coastal defences bring. We expect that, in 2012-13, there will be around £20 million-worth of contributions coming in from local and private sources. The new approach is enabling schemes to go ahead across the country that otherwise would not be able to do so, as the outcomes delivered by those schemes were not sufficient to be fully funded by central Government. Through partnership funding, we have opened the door to enable local priorities to be funded, while ensuring that every pound of Government investment is focused on supporting those who need it most, especially those most at risk and living in the most deprived parts of the country. That answers one of the points clearly made by the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner).
Notable successes include the highly controversial and long-awaited scheme in York and Water End. I hope that that scheme will come to fruition this year. A contribution of £1 million towards the cost from the City of York is, of course, hugely welcome. There is also very good news for Sandwich town, which is an example of how partnership working can bring results. The scheme ran into difficulties as a result of the announced closure of the Pfizer research centre. A significant contribution by Pfizer towards the cost of the flood defence scheme in Sandwich town, along with contributions from Kent county council, has ensured that construction should begin next year.
My hon. Friend and other hon. Members raised the vexed issue of sustainable drainage and sewerage. We recognise the need to encourage and support sustainable drainage. An expanding population, changing climate and urbanisation mean that the drainage infrastructure can come under pressure. That leads to increased flood risk, as there is a fast-flowing conveyance of surface water downstream, with little or none of the slow-moving, filtering characteristics of natural drainage. We intend to consult soon on a package of measures to encourage the use of sustainable drainage systems and to remove the automatic right for developers to connect to the public sewer system. In addition to increased flood risk, the pressure on the sewer system to drain an increasing amount of surface water has a significant negative impact on water quality downstream, for example, through pollution caused by overflowing surface water and combined sewers. We are working to encourage improvements in sewer infrastructure and capability through the transfer of responsibility for private sewers from home owners to water and sewerage companies. I appreciate the point that has been made on that work, which has been 10 years in the waiting. Such an approach will be a massive comfort to many households who face enormous bills.
Before I come on to the more detailed issues that have been raised, I will mention the important matter discussed by my hon. Friends the Members for Stroud (Neil Carmichael) and for Tiverton and Honiton (Neil Parish) regarding the impact of floods on agricultural land and concerns about food security. Those concerns, which have been raised in relation to coastal erosion issues and coastal erosion flood risk management, are absolutely at the top of DEFRA’s priorities. I reassure hon. Members that the impact of flood management and coastal erosion on farmland will remain an important consideration. However, food security is principally about availability, affordability and access to nutritious and sustainably produced food, rather than having an absolute foot-by-foot, acre-by-acre, hectare-by-hectare analysis of what could be produced here and there. Although the matter is an absolute priority for DEFRA, domestic production and a healthy rural economy are also important. Concerns will need to be reconciled with the need to protect people and property.
The hon. Member for Copeland asked whether we have a level playing field between urban and rural communities and mentioned the impact on agricultural land. Flood funding is allocated on a case-by-case basis and each case has to stand on its own merits. In the floods of 2007, there were damages worth more than £3.7 billion. Approximately 4% of that was in agriculture. I am not diminishing the impact on agriculture—I am a farmer and I represent a rural constituency, and we want to protect farmland for all the reasons that I have just stated—but we also want to protect people and property. That is a balance that Governments down the ages have had to make and we will not shy away from doing so. However, it is important that we get it right and that we are fair by people and by the properties in which they live. We also recognise the important contribution that farmers make to our rural life, to our economy and to the very important points I made about food security.
Mr Graham Stuart
At the moment, the benefit-cost ratio gives a weighting to deprivation. That tends to favour urban over rural, as does the application of population density. Is there really a role for deprivation in the allocation of flood defence funding?
Richard Benyon
I think there is, and I will tell my hon. Friend why. I can only speak about this in generalities. My hon. Friend must forgive me if, in doing so, I make it harder for him to apply this, in his mind, across certain communities. We all know that in certain communities, there is a terrific local capacity to take these problems head on. I have communities in which hydrologists live. I have communities that have been flooded where there are water engineers. I have communities flooded where there are people with enormous resources, both financial and intellectual. We have seen communities all around the country with the capacity to put together a partnership funding stream that can work overnight, almost, in terms of flooding schemes. There are other communities where there is not that capacity. That is not to diminish the people who live there at all; they just do not have that capacity. We have to have a system that is mindful that some communities need more help than others.
Richard Benyon
The hon. Gentleman is right, and that relates to the issue of insurance as well. I have been taking forward one measure. Housing associations or council-owned housing stock offer an opt-in scheme on contents insurance. I believe strongly that we should encourage people to do an opt-out scheme. Fifty pence a week can give you £5,000 worth of contents insurance. People would be more likely to have that if it were an opt-out scheme. There is so much that we can do to protect.
Richard Benyon
I am conscious of the time. I will if it is a very quick intervention, and then I must make some progress.
Mr Stuart
I am grateful. The Minister talked about capacity in areas. Through him, may I congratulate Ron Smith and Burstwick United, who worked through early difficulties to forge a big society partnership with the Environment Agency to protect the village? The Minister has been invited to come and open the scheme. There are farmers storing the pumps. We have others manning the pumps. Will he confirm today that he will come to Burstwick and celebrate that community’s response to the floods in 2007?
Richard Benyon
I have developed a habit of agreeing, if any colleague asks me, to go to any part of the country at any time and it causes the people who work in my office palpitations. However, I can assure my hon. Friend that I would very much like to see precisely such schemes where there is flood watch—rather like neighbourhood watch—and where people work together to protect the vulnerable. There are fantastic examples of that around the country. I would be delighted to see that scheme at some stage.
May I quickly address the points that hon. Members have made? The Chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton, made the point, eloquently made by the NFU, that we should not treat farmers as the providers of free storage of floodwater. We take the contribution that landowners and farmers make towards flood schemes very seriously.
My hon. Friend talked about internal drainage boards. Of course, many members of those boards are members of the farming community. They are also members of the local authorities and members of the community and we value bottom-up community engagement. I am a huge admirer of internal drainage boards. They do fantastic work. I had a meeting this week with IDBs from Lincolnshire to understand how they are coping with the extraordinary challenges they have in that area; so much of it is under sea level. The work that they do is enormous. I want to ensure that the Environment Agency works with IDBs to ensure that watercourses are open and flowing, and that everything is at the standard it should be.
I want to see more of what I saw in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey). When I went there a few weeks after I started this job, I did something quite by accident—it was organised by my officials. However, it seemed like a good way of doing government. I got into a car with the local MP, representatives of the local authority, the Country Land and Business Association, the NFU, the Environment Agency and Natural England and locked the door. We drove down, looked at certain features and discussed the problems. When I went back there, I discovered that a different attitude prevailed. The Environment Agency had adopted a “yes, if” approach. Now, one telephone call results in action being taken. My hon. Friend the Member for Witham (Priti Patel) must work as much as she can with me, and with her neighbours in Suffolk, to try to create a Total Environment scheme, and pool activity—and sometimes pool money—to ensure that we can make a similar attitude prevail in her part of the world. It is really exciting to see it working; it means that we have a responsive system.
I have discussed the issue of SUDS. My hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton talked about the impact of the natural environment White Paper, the water White Paper and the timing. I can assure her that we have made a very serious pitch to ensure that there is adequate time in the next Session. I very much hope that we will get that, because important measures will come out in the water White Paper that will need a legislative approach.
My hon. Friend, not surprisingly, raised the issue of Pickering and is right to do so. That is an important issue for her and her constituents. I can assure her that we understand the urgency of her constituents’ concerns. We are working extremely closely to make sure that we meet local concerns about the shelving of the scheme, understand the impact of the Reservoirs Act 1975, and discover whether we can find alternatives that are cost-effective and which can be brought forward as quickly as possible.
My hon. Friend talked about the problem of over-engineered projects. The Environment Agency’s schemes meet the highest industry standards. They are designed to ensure optimum levels of protection and give an average return on investment of seven to one. There are occasions when we can sit and work out whether we need a Rolls-Royce solution, or whether we can actually make do with a reasonably priced family car solution. I can assure her that we are open to all suggestions and that her concerns are being taken forward.
My hon. Friend made a point about local authorities’ finance for flood and coastal erosion risk management. I can reassure her that the money we have put in has ensured good flood and coastal erosion risk management strategies from the local authorities. All have submitted strategies except one—I will not say which one, but it is not represented by anyone present in the Chamber. We provided the funding, and it is important for the work to be carried forward.
I shall come on to insurance in a minute, but in the five minutes I have left I must also deal with the points made by other hon. Members. The hon. Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith) raised the issue of planning and building on floodplains. The Environment Agency—in England, obviously—takes the matter absolutely seriously and gives strict advice on planning applications as they are made, and I will ensure that that continues. The Pitt review is unequivocal on that and we must follow its important recommendations.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stroud raised the issue of the Severn estuary shoreline management plan. I recognise that that is an area where things were not got right, and we want to ensure that we do get them right. I am working closely with him, other colleagues from that area and the Environment Agency. I had a meeting with them this week and I want to make sure that we share information with local farmers on a consultative basis. We are talking about something not for tomorrow but for 20, 30, 40 or 50 years’ time. We must have a plan in place that is understood and that people are consulted on—I assure him that I will ensure that we do that. He eloquently set out the challenges that face us as we tackle the problems, and we will carry that forward.
The hon. Member for Brent North talked about funding, as did the hon. Member for Copeland. I do not want to enter a sterile debate. They know that, if we compare the previous period of the Labour Administration with the current four years, the reduction is 8%. They also know that massive cuts were announced by the then Chancellor just before the election. We could get into that debate about where we are and where we are going. However, I can assure them and the House that we have fought and protected our budget in a way that was out of all proportion to the spending restraint that we have achieved throughout the Department and the Government. The priority goes right to the top of this Government, and we will ensure that it works. With the efficiencies that we are getting out of the Environment Agency, we will be able to achieve our aims of protecting 145,000 homes, and I remain optimistic that we can do better.
Pig Farming
Graham Stuart Excerpts(14 years, 8 months ago)
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Dr Poulter
I thank my hon. Friend for that, and I look forward to the Minister covering that that in his concluding remarks.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
My hon. Friend is making a powerful point about the need for a level playing field. Pig farmers in my constituency are not asking to be given any artificial support; they are asking to compete on a level basis. They go to other countries and see farmers putting in new sow stalls when they themselves spent hundreds of thousands of pounds per unit replacing their stalls 10 years ago, and they are rightly upset. Does my hon. Friend agree that other countries should not be allowed a derogation in due course? If our farmers have had to make that investment, so should farmers elsewhere and they should not be allowed to import their meat into this country unless they follow the same rules.
Dr Poulter
My hon. Friend is absolutely right and makes the point very powerfully. The fact is that there is not a level playing field, particularly in the European Union. Stricter EU animal welfare laws for pigs have been agreed, but they will come fully into force only in 2013. As he forcefully argues, we need those standards to be applied in Europe. However, it is not just a question of standards being applied universally; our supermarkets must also show corporate responsibility. If overseas food producers do not produce food to the same high standards of animal welfare and traceability as British farmers, our supermarkets should not buy food from them. We need to see that corporate responsibility from the industry.
Mr Graham Stuart
I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman, from the rural idyll that is his seat, will be able to answer this question. He said that he wants the Government vigorously to act on food labelling. Why was so little done during the 13 years of the previous Administration, although I know he was here for only a little while during that time?
Mr Bain
I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s intervention. I remind him, as I did the hon. Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) during a debate on the Sustainable Livestock Bill some months ago, that there are three arable farms at the very top of my constituency. I am hoping to visit them during the Easter recess. Indeed, I have had a good discussion with the National Farmers Union Scotland on a range of issues in the past few weeks.
The hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart) raises an interesting point. We can bat around what did or did not happen during the past 13 years, but what will certainly be most effective is cross-EU standards in this area. He knows that the food labelling directive is before the European Parliament, and that it may have a Second Reading by early summer. We should focus our efforts and show unity across the House on getting decent standards that will protect the pig industry and other parts of our arable and livestock farming industries.
I want to address the anomaly that the hon. Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich pointed out—that is, food that is processed in the UK can be labelled as produced in this country. We need reform and clarity across the EU through regulations to deal with that issue.
The third area in which we seek Government action is in respect of a plan for the food industry. The previous Government commissioned the report “Food Matters”, under the auspices of the Cabinet Office, and the study “Food 2030”, under the auspices of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, but circumstances have moved on. The Foresight report sets out new challenges for better use of water and soil. It also sets the global challenge of feeding 9 billion people by 2050, but with potentially fewer resources—increasing food production by 50%, but in a sustainable way.
To meet the challenges of sustainable food production, which the pig industry will be involved with, and to show that we can meet our climate change reduction commitments, the Opposition and the NFU call on the Government to adopt a proper plan for food, which should include the pig industry. If there is to be a plan for growth arising from today’s Budget, the UK’s largest manufacturing industry—namely, agriculture—cannot be left out. The plan should contain strong proposals for a groceries code adjudicator with the statutory power to tackle unfairness and inequity wherever they are found throughout food supply chains. As hon. Members have pointed out, such an ironing out and levelling of the market would be enormously beneficial to our pigmeat producers.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
I too, welcome you to the Chair, Mr Bayley. I genuinely congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk (Mr Bacon). During his time here, he has been a stalwart supporter of the pig industry, and I am sure that that is not because of his name. His Bill, to which I shall return, is being presented to the House for the fourth time, which shows his determination. I have attended innumerable breakfast and other meetings that he has hosted on the pig industry, and it is fortunate to have someone who is so determined to support it and the pig producers in his constituency.
On one occasion, most of the Suffolk and Norfolk MPs were in the Chamber, which demonstrated not just the importance of the concentration of the pig industry in those two counties—[Interruption.] My colleagues from east Yorkshire also joined us. Those are the main pig producing parts of the UK, and the fact that so many hon. Members decided to attend demonstrates the importance of the pig industry to them, and it reflects the lobbying that has taken place. As a former pig producer in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich (Dr Poulter), I entirely understand its importance.
As my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk rightly said, the industry is vital. He said that its total value is £8.7 billion, which is a significant sum in the retail sector. Others hon. Members have referred to the collapse of the pig herd since the mid-1990s. It is impossible to say precisely how much of that is attributable to the unilateral ban on stalls and tethers that we introduced, but it is obviously a significant part.
One of the changes over 20, 30 or 40 years has been rationalisation into specialist pig units. Years ago, pigs were one unit on a generalised farm, and a rise in grain prices had less impact, because farmers were feeding their own grain to their pigs, so they lost on one side and gained on the other. Now, more and more farmers are specialist pig producers, and must buy all their feed, so they can only lose from rising grain prices.
I shall try to address some of the issues that have arisen during the debate. My hon. Friends will be aware that there has always been pig a cycle. Pigs have a relatively short gestation and growth period, so the rise or fall in supply is a reasonably short-term phenomenon. They were always muck or money as supply and demand fluctuated slightly, but the level of fluctuation has become much worse, and the £20 a pig loss to which several of my hon. Friends referred reveals a dramatic downside of the cycle. It is unfortunate that the cycle was already beginning to drop off when feed prices were hiked up because of the grain price. That exacerbated the problem, but we are there, and the situation is horrendous.
My hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk referred to some of the costs that our producers incur. Stalls and tethers were first phased out in the early 1990s, and were banned completely by 1999. Tethers were banned in the rest of Europe in 2006, and stalls will be banned by 2013, although, as my hon. Friend correctly pointed out, it will be permissible to keep sows in stalls for up to four weeks after service, and that brings me to the question asked by the hon. Member for Glasgow North East (Mr Bain). I assure him that the Government are absolutely opposed to any extension or derogation. As with battery cages for chickens, countries have known for a long time that the change was coming, and farmers have no excuse for not making the transition.
The hon. Gentleman asked me quite rightly about enforcement, and the fact that farmers will be allowed to have stalls on their farm in which to keep sows for four weeks will create a big challenge. Responsibility for enforcement will rest with the competent authority—usually the Department of Agriculture in member states—and I recognise the issue. We must keep pressing the Commission to ensure proper enforcement, because that is a worrying loophole.
Mr Graham Stuart
Will my right hon. Friend say whether the Government have consistently made the case that there should be no derogation after 2013, and whether he has any idea of when the Commission might publish details on enforcement? The earlier we see the proposed enforcement mechanisms, the more we will be able to influence them before they are introduced, when they will be harder to change.
Mr Paice
The answer to the first part of my hon. Friend’s question is that we constantly tell the Commission that when a rule is introduced, every country should comply with it, and that there should be no derogations. He is right in saying that we have not seen any proposals for enforcement, and I am not aware that we have seen any assessment of what stage other countries are at. There were efforts to do that with conventional battery cages, but there were difficulties. The matter is important, and I will chase it up to see whether there has been any assessment of what other countries have done. To be fair, we know that many countries with a significant number of pig farmers, such as Denmark, which is a major pig producing country, have converted, but I cannot tell my hon. Friend precisely what the proportions are and how many remain to convert.
The hon. Member for Glasgow North East challenged me on whether we would support an intra-EU ban on those countries that have not introduced the measure. I shall be completely honest, as I always try to be. We have not considered that yet, but he makes a valid point. I made the point about eggs, and there is no logical reason why we should not do the same for pigmeat. However, we want everyone to convert, and until we see some sort of assessment, we cannot speculate too much, but I entirely accept the hon. Gentleman’s point.
I have just been passed a note saying that no official information is available about how far EU countries have moved towards complying with the directive. Denmark and the Netherlands have said that they will comply, but the situation in some other countries is different and vaguer. There are different rules on castration and tail-docking in different countries, and there is a competitiveness issue. Some hon. Members referred to supermarket specifications and, as my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk said, claims by Tesco and others about their supply sources. It is reasonable and acceptable, of course, for retailers to ensure that their supply chains comply with British standards, and it is not in the Government’s gift to check whether they do. There is no doubt that tail-docking and castration rules are different in other countries, and it is only right and proper that they should insist on the same standards. I shall return to the supermarket issue.
That leads me to my last point on welfare. My hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey) referred to pigs being kept outdoors. Anyone who drives through Suffolk and South Norfolk will see that tens of thousands of sows are kept outdoors, even through the recent winter and the snow before Christmas. There is no doubt that keeping pigs outdoors is more expensive in production costs. Productivity is lower, there are not so many pigs a year from the sows, and growth rates are slightly affected. Those systems are being adopted because the drive for better welfare from retailers has pushed them that way, but higher management standards are required and farmers do not receive the price for their pigs that that higher standard demands.
I was with a group of Agriculture Ministers in Belgium before Christmas, and we were taken to a modern, highly efficient Belgian pig farm operated in totally enclosed buildings, where the hygiene must have been incredible, as there was no disease. Nevertheless, there were just spartan, bare shelves with a few rubber balls hanging on chains for the pigs to play with. Those pigs compete with our pigs, which are reared outdoors. Apparently, British consumers prefer pigs that have been reared outdoors, but they are not always told about it.
My hon. Friends referred to the overall issue of supply, and to dioxins, which was a problem from Germany that we had in January. The Commission introduced a private purchase scheme for a short space of time, and some pigmeat was taken off the market, which helped for a while. What concerned me was the allegation—I say only that—that certain supermarkets were dropping their British suppliers because the European mainland market was awash with cheap pigmeat as a result of the dioxin scare. To me, that undermines the claims made by my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk about supermarkets looking after our sector.
Public Forest Estate (England)
Graham Stuart Excerpts(14 years, 9 months ago)
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Guy Opperman
Each year, 475,000 cubic metres of timber are felled to supply local wood as fuel and to provide timber-intensive local businesses, such as Egger, which is the largest employer in Hexham. It has more than 400 employees. Kielder is a working forest, unashamed of its clearings and felled areas which, while not always postcard pretty, are replanted to provide a continuous cycle on which much of the employment and way of life and the whole ethos of the area are dependent. It is also the biggest employer in the north Tyne area.
I have worked closely with Northumbria Water, which is responsible for Kielder Water, the largest artificial lake in the UK. It sits at the heart of the forest. The development of these vast resources is already subject to a 25-year investment plan which has outdoor activities and all manner of other aspects of the environment at its heart. I find it hard to believe that that will be undeveloped and not taken forward, with a FTSE 100 company at the heart of the development.
Fundamental to this issue is ongoing access to walkers, cyclists, horse riders and a host of others. I hope that these plans will see an additional £31 million boost to the local economy, and several hundred new jobs in the next 10 years in an area where employment is far from guaranteed. I have genuine concerns that all that will be put at risk. I strongly urge the Minister to look closely at the proposals and to consider the many representations that I have received from my constituents who share my scepticism, and to reflect on the possible effect on this special place at the heart of my constituency.
Mr Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
Like my hon. Friend, I have had many constituents expressing concerns about the Government’s plans and the consultation. Does he agree that access and the maintenance of biodiversity are the crucial components, and we should not have dishonest misrepresentation about the proposals? People deserve to be dealt with honestly. I do not mind opportunism, but I cannot stand dishonesty—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. We have heard quite enough. We need very short interventions. This debate will otherwise be very disappointing for constituents who are affected by the issue that we are discussing. Hon. Members should know better.
John McDonnell
As I have said, we need to recognise that these forests have been preserved for us by staff who have worked for us for generations over the last century. In my view, failure to discuss the staff undermines the Government’s duty of care to those people who have served us so well.
John McDonnell
Will the hon. Gentleman allow me to continue? Other Members wish to speak.
The consultation document contains only one paragraph that deals with staff. It states that the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations will apply to the transfer of any of them. However, as we know from other privatisations and sell-offs, TUPE does not prevent a new employer from laying off staff in due course. It does not protect pay and terms and conditions in the long term.
John McDonnell
No, I will not.
TUPE does not even protect pensions. There is nothing to prevent a new employer from laying off staff while also undermining their conditions and pensions. I urge the Government to address the issue of their future. When I looked at the impact assessment to see whether there was any reference to it, I found that the only reference in the first seven pages related to redundancy costs. It reads as follows:
“Transition costs of redundancy, TUPE and possible further professional fees have not been quantified.”
That is repeated six times. It appears on each of the first seven pages of the document.
There are real anxieties among this group of expert staff about their future. There are anxieties about a transfer to the voluntary sector. Most Members have been involved with charities—most of us have served on their boards—and we know how difficult it is to maintain a charity. In any charitable or voluntary organisation, about 30% of the time is spent on trying to find funds for future years.