Environment Agency: East of England

Lewis Cocking Excerpts

Wednesday 4th June 2025 Westminster Hall

[Steve Barclay]

I do share them. Just for the Minister’s benefit, the hon. Gentleman’s constituency will be materially affected by the Wisbech incinerator in terms of transport; when the developers doubled its size in order to take it out of the local planning process, they created a different problem of how to get sufficient waste to run it. Therefore, it has to take in waste from further and further afield. As Wisbech is a market town, accessed by single carriageway roads—the A47 is single carriageway into Wisbech—bringing waste through my neighbour’s constituency will cause huge traffic there, as it will in many other constituencies across the eastern region.

A BBC report highlights the severe environmental damage that would be caused by the proposed incinerator, but the hon. Gentleman also highlights a wider point about lack of transparency. As in the King’s dyke fishing example, as a constituency MP one chases on behalf of constituents to get them some answers, yet organisations feel they are unaccountable.

That brings me to my final point. It will not surprise the Minister that, as a member of the last Government, I quite frequently raised my constituency concerns—before I was in the Department—with relevant Secretaries of State, and I know that they raised those with the EA; yet, as we see with Saxon Pit, it still failed to take prosecution action over seven years while saying to people locally, “It is a priority case.” As Secretary of State myself, I found the organisation so unresponsive that I had to take the unusual step of issuing a ministerial direction. In fact, I issued two in my six months in the Department, where none had been issued in the seven years before. I fear that Ministers now need to look at the accountability to democratic control of not just the Environment Agency, but Natural England—not least given the three interventions we have heard from colleagues across the House.

[Lewis Cocking (Broxbourne) (Con)]

I have an issue in my constituency down White Stubbs Lane, where we have raw sewage going over the road. The Environment Agency is unaccountable, hardly wanting to meet with MPs or engage. It told me during the purdah period, “We can’t meet with you, because there is a local election going on,” which is absolute nonsense. It should engage with MPs. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is completely unaccountable and needs fundamental reform and change?

[Steve Barclay]

It does need fundamental reform. I became Secretary of State very close to the general election, but one of my first acts was to issue an instruction to take more rigorous enforcement action more generally on water pollution. I know that current Ministers want to see a more robust set of actions.

I come to my final point. Not least given the Government’s majority and where we are in the parliamentary cycle, there is an opportunity to look at the Department’s relationship with its arm’s length bodies. The Department of Health and Social Care is going through that exact process with NHS England. I encourage the ministerial team to reflect on that, not least for when in some years’ time they are explaining how, if there is lack of action, that sits with some of their priorities. Irrespective of that, as we heard in interventions from across the House, the EA’s lack of transparency and accountability on its operational performance needs to be addressed. I encourage the Minister to focus some time in her busy schedule on doing that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Emma Hardy]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. In fact, one of the things that comes up in our monthly meetings is how we can improve the issuing of permits and make it quicker. He is completely right, and I hear not just from his constituency but right across the country that there are problems with how quickly permits are issued. I completely hear and accept his point.

We are committed to working in collaboration with the Environment Agency, and with all hon. and right hon. Members, to continue to advance its performance in the east of England and across the rest of the country. We want to continue to support communities in protecting them against pollution and against the horrific example of Hoad’s wood and the other two examples that the right hon. Member for North East Cambridgeshire gave. As I say, I am happy to have a more detailed conversation about those two particular issues from his constituency.

[Lewis Cocking]

The Minister speaks warmly about having meetings with the Environment Agency. It is all well and good having a meeting, but I do not want to go into a talking shop. I feel like the Environment Agency uses the meetings to say, “We’ve ticked that box and we’ve met that MP; that issue is done,” but it does not action anything. We want to see real action for our constituents because they are really fed up with these issues, which take a terribly long time to solve.

[Emma Hardy]

I hear what the hon. Gentleman is saying, and he is completely right: constituents want to action when they see pollution incidents. Of course, if he is not satisfied with the outcome and he feels that action has not been taken to the standard that he wants following the meeting, I am more than happy to pick that up. I will finish on that point.

Question put and agreed to.