Recreational Sea Bass Fishing

Heidi Alexander Excerpts

Thursday 11th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Scott Mann]

I am grateful for the opportunity to respond to this exceptionally good debate. I am pleased that the 900,000 sea anglers have had their voices heard today, and that we have had the opportunity to express their concerns. The hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) made some interesting points about ecology, and my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Torridge and West Devon (Mr Cox) spoke eloquently about the benefits of coming out of the EU, and how we might be able to control our own inshore fishing fleet. My hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray) always speaks eloquently about her inshore fleet, and I invite the hon. Member for Dagenham and Rainham (Jon Cruddas) and my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne (Mr Walker) to partake in a charter boat catch-and-release opportunity with Bass Go Deeper, a bass fishing company that works out of Cornwall.

What has come out of this debate is that we must follow the science, because without fish in the water there will be no recreational or commercial fishing. I thank the Minister for his response and for his idea of exploring how tourism could benefit from recreational angling. I urge him to consider the views expressed by hon. Members, as well as those of the angling community, and to fight as hard as he can in future weeks, months and years for the recreational angling community.

Question put and agreed to,

Resolved,

That this House believes that the recent EU restrictions on recreational sea bass fishing are unfair and fail to address the real threat to the future viability of UK sea bass stocks; and calls on the Government to make representations within the Council of the EU on the reconsideration of the imposition of those restrictions.

[Heidi Alexander]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. During today’s oral statement on the junior doctor contract, the Secretary of State for Health said, “Along with other senior NHS leaders…Sir David has asked me to end the uncertainty for the service by proceeding with the introduction of a new contract”. The Health Service Journal has this afternoon contacted the 20 senior NHS leaders the Health Secretary referred to in his statement, and at least five have replied to say that they do not support his decision to impose a new contract. I am concerned that in making this claim the Health Secretary may have inadvertently misled the House. Can you advise me, Madam Deputy Speaker, on how best the Secretary of State can correct the record?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her point of order, but she will appreciate, as the House will, that it is not a point of order for the Chair. She has a point that she wishes to draw to the attention of the House, and she has used this mechanism so to do. I am quite sure that those on the Treasury Bench will have heard what she has said and that her concerns will be conveyed to the Secretary of State. Whatever the Secretary of State says in this House is a matter for him and not a matter for the Chair.

Water Industry (Financial Assistance) Bill

Heidi Alexander Excerpts

Wednesday 14th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Slaughter]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The schemes that he describes, which are collectively known as SUDS—

[Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

Sustainable urban drainage systems.

[Mr Slaughter]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that prompt. Local authorities have woken up to the possibility of SUDS, albeit perhaps somewhat late in the day. Many are now insisting in planning applications that there should be no more paving over, while many are rightly taking enforcement action where those conditions are disobeyed. However, it is quite wrong to think that SUDS on their own will be a solution to the problem; rather, they offer additional assistance. The idea that we can suddenly convert road surfaces and pavements into permeable surfaces across London is highly impractical—look at the problems we had with simply replacing the water mains—and it would also cost four or five times more than the highest estimated cost for the tunnel. However, we must use SUDS, and indeed other measures

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) for his intervention, because he brings me back to the point that I was making. I was pleased to receive an invitation from the right hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark to attend a meeting on 6 March in this place. This perhaps draws attention to the point that the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field) raised, because although probably 140 to 150 MPs would have been invited if the right hon. Gentleman had asked all those with an interest in Thames Water, I think only three turned up—me, the hon. Member for Hendon (Mr Offord), who is in his place, and my right hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr Raynsford), who was here a moment ago. That perhaps shows a certain lack of interest among some of our colleagues. I am sure that the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster would have been there, had he not had a more pressing engagement—I am sure that it was not the Campaign for Real Ale reception that was on at the same time, but there we go.

The invitation asked us to come and listen to Chris Binnie, the engineer who served as the independent chair of the Thames tideway strategic study steering group, which recommended the full tunnel solution. He was going to be present to explain

“why he now believes the costs have exceeded the benefits, and why there are quicker and cheaper solutions that should be considered urgently.”

I am familiar, as many Members are, with Mr Binnie’s proposal, which is what he has called the “Binnie Bubbler”, It is designed to aerate the Thames in a way that prevents the death of the fish and other livestock—if that is right phrase—in the Thames. I have read the arguments for and against the “Binnie Bubbler”, and I have always been rather sceptical about it, because I am not sure that it is suitable for the tidal Thames—it has apparently worked in Cardiff bay in a lagoon area—and also because I do not think it acceptable to allow raw sewage into the Thames at current levels and then simply to try to aerate it and possibly skim off the worst of it.

I therefore went along to the meeting—although I am sorry that I could not stay for the entire time—to see whether Mr Binnie had something more to say on that issue. It would be fair to say that he had something quite surprising to say. I appreciate that I am about to read from a note about the meeting that was written up by a supporter of the tunnel—I had left by this stage—but it says:

“Chris Binnie announced that he had changed his mind again and now supported Thames Water’s view that we should implement the single Thames Tunnel option. Wow! You could hear the gasps around the room and Simon Hughes’ chin nearly hit the floor.”

That might be slightly unfair: the right hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark is unfazed even by things greater than engineers changing their minds, for the second time. However, this issue draws attention to an important point in the argument about the Bill, and brings us back to the financing. I think everybody—certainly everybody present in the Chamber today and most other Members of the House, albeit with certain exceptions, my neighbouring Member of Parliament being one of them—supports the idea that something must be done to relieve sewer flooding of the Thames in a substantive way that will last us, we hope, as long as the Bazalgette solution did.