Infrastructure Bill [Lords]

Lord Barker of Battle Excerpts

Wednesday 11th February 2015 Commons Chamber

[Tom Greatrex]

If the will of the House is to support the Government amendment this evening and we reach a point at which there must be a definition in secondary legislation, we shall want to ensure that such areas are properly protected, just as we did when we proposed the amendment that the House accepted two weeks ago. [Interruption.] I am talking about the definition that was in an amendment that was supported by the hon. Member for Cambridge. In fact, a Division was not necessary, because everyone supported it. I think it vital for those areas to be properly protected, and we will seek to protect them if we are in a position to do so in the future. I am sure that if the hon. Gentleman can imagine being in that position himself, he may think that he would do so as well.

[Gregory Barker (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Tom Greatrex]

I will not give way again, because I am conscious of the time, and I hope that we can reach the stage at which my amendments are put to a vote.

Let me now deal with what the Minister said about environmental impact assessments. She had previously accepted that they should be mandatory for all shale gas sites, not just those measuring more than 1 hectare. The Government’s proposed new clause, however, would ensure only that

“the environmental impact of the development... has been taken into .account”.

That stops short of a full commitment to an environmental impact assessment.

Like the Minister in the other place, this Minister said that individual notification was impractical. Let me raise a point that I wanted her to clarify earlier, namely the decision to exclude shale gas operators from the need to notify people individually. That requirement still applies to other horizontal activities, such as those involving geothermal energy. Why has the arrangement been changed when it will still apply to operators of another technology? That seems absurd to me.

The Government accepted our amendment on Report, which required that

“site-by-site measurement, monitoring and public disclosure of existing and future fugitive emissions is carried out”.

Their version weakens that wording on two counts. First, it limits the emissions to methane emissions, and to emissions generated during the operation of the site. As the Minister will know, the nature of hydraulic fracturing means that methane and other gases may continue to leak upwards through fractures and the borehole long after a site is decommissioned. Given a greenhouse gas impact about 25 times as potent as a tonne of carbon dioxide, it is vital that those emissions are properly reported.

The Minister seemed to think that amendment (c) was not necessary, because there would be no activity before the deadline of 31 July deadline. If that deadline is placed in law, what reason is there for not ensuring that there is absolute clarity, so that people cannot misunderstand? The Minister gave the impression that she agreed that there would be no activity within that time frame, but I think it important for the law to be properly clarified.

One of the reasons we tabled a number of amendments is that the Government have been unclear about policy in several areas. On Report, we moved an amendment to include hydraulic fracturing under the scheduled list of activities in the environmental permitting regulations. That amendment was not carried, but in the debate the Minister said that

“the Government welcome in principle the sentiment behind the proposed amendment to the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2010 to make explicit reference to hydraulic fracturing”—[Official Report, 26 January 2015; Vol. 591, c. 596.]

However, in answer to a written question from my hon. Friend the Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) on 9 February, her DEFRA colleague the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson) said:

“There are no immediate plans to amend the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2010.”

Will the Minister clarify that? Was she mistaken when she told the House that the regulations were being updated, or was it her colleague in DEFRA, who said there were no such plans? That is just one example and I am going to list another couple where there is inconsistency in what the Government have said even in the last couple of weeks. That hardly helps us to have confidence in the integrity of the regulatory regime, and that is why I believe our amendments are still necessary.

On Report, the hon. Member for Fylde (Mark Menzies), who is in his place, asked whether Health and Safety Executive inspections would be unannounced. The Minister replied:

“The short answer to that is yes.”—[Official Report, 26 January 2015; Vol. 591, c. 589.]

However, in a written answer on 4 February the Minister for Disabled People, the hon. Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper), said:

“Decisions on whether an inspection is announced or unannounced are made on a case by case basis by the HSE inspector.”

Which is it? Are they unannounced or not? Is the “short answer” also the wrong answer, or, again, have we got confusion at the heart of Government about the way in which these regulations will be applied?

The Minister’s colleague, the Minister for Business and Enterprise, the right hon. Member for West Suffolk (Matthew Hancock), was asked whether DEFRA had a role in regulating shale gas, and he said on 10 February:

“DEFRA does not have a direct regulatory role in shale gas operations”.

However, the hon. Member for North Cornwall said on 3 February:

“DEFRA is responsible for the environmental aspects of shale gas policy”.

With this kind of confusion, it is not difficult to see why people accuse the Government of not taking the regulations for shale gas seriously, and why there is a lack of confidence in what the Government are saying this evening and what they have been saying over the past couple of weeks.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Huppert]

I thank the Minister for his intervention, although I am not sure whether he is asking me to answer; I certainly have not modelled what the shadow Minister would like to do.

I am very frustrated that it looks as though we shall have to choose between two options, both of which are deficient, and that we shall not have the chance to vote on the stronger proposals that I would much prefer.

[Gregory Barker]

I rise to support the Government on these crucial amendments and to congratulate the Minister on very deft handling of an issue that is difficult because it is complex and technical, and because there are some extreme opinions on the matter, some of which are based on ideology rather than technology or science. I commend her efforts to try to find a middle way and reach a broad consensus.

I was encouraged by the stance taken by the Opposition through most of the passage of the Bill. They behaved responsibly, taking the important role of opposition seriously and scrutinising the Bill, and offering up amendments and criticisms that they thought were valid. However, I am very disappointed that the Opposition in the Lords and back here again are trying to have their cake and eat it. They are trying to hunt with the hounds and with the hare.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

I had not intended to speak tonight but, having heard the debate, feel that I must contribute. My right hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr Lilley) made the important point that some of the people who are against fracking are patently against it for environmental reasons; I do not associate myself with those people, and neither does he. However, I think that many people in this country have genuine concerns about fracking. In my constituency, where there are a number of test sites, I find that many people are very reasonable, in that they would be open to the option of fracking as long as they felt that the regime was strict enough and that there were enough environmental protections in place.

What concerns me about tonight’s debate is the restricted time, our inability to vote on all the amendments, and what has happened between the Lords and the Commons with regard to what I thought we agreed in the Commons a week or so ago. It leads many people to conclude that the Government are in league with the extraction companies or that there is something to hide. I do not believe that is the case at all, but given our concerns, I think there is a very strong argument indeed for pausing and thinking again about this issue, particularly given what has happened to oil prices internationally. That is why I and other Members on both sides of the House recently voted in favour of a moratorium.

[Gregory Barker]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Andrew Percy]

I will not, because other Members are still to speak.

There is clearly the potential for fracking. I do not pretend to be a scientist—I stopped studying science when I finished my double-award GCSE at the age of 16—so I will not get into the arguments, but clearly there is the potential for an industry that a large number of my constituents would support, subject to those safeguards. That is why I voted the way I did in previous stages of the Bill’s consideration. I do not think that the way the Lords amendment has been drafted, or indeed this evening’s debate, has done a great deal to increase the confidence of residents. I make a plea to the Government that we have to take people along with us on a journey, particularly when there is a new technology that is very controversial—[Interruption.] Hon. Members say that it is not a new technology, but it is new to this country, as we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Miss McIntosh), so people’s concerns about it should be heard, just as concerns about wind farms should rightly be heard.

I urge the Government to think very carefully about this. I reiterate my view that the residents of Brigg and Goole and of the Isle of Asholme are not closed-minded about this technology; they simply want to know that the evidence is there to support it and that their homes, communities and local environment will be sufficiently well protected. That is what I thought we had agreed to with the amendment a couple of weeks ago.

[Christopher Pincher (Tamworth) (Con)]

I am reassured by the words of my hon. Friend the Minister, particularly with regard to groundwater protection. I think that she and the ministerial team have gone out of their way to be as consensual as possibly in order to bring the Opposition with them in support of hydraulic fracturing. Having heard the shadow Minister, who is a decent and knowledgeable man, say that he believes in a bipartisan approach, I think it is a great pity that he has chosen not to adopt such an approach tonight. He and I served on the Energy and Climate Change Committee, and it is worthy of note that the Committee has produced in this Parliament not one but two reports on fracking and shale gas.

It is also worthy of note that except for the hon. Member for Wansbeck (Ian Lavery), not one Opposition member of the Select Committee is here tonight. That seems to suggest that the others are not particularly concerned about the proposals put forward by the Government. Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat members of the Committee all supported the importance, with safeguards, of fracturing for shale gas.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr Lilley), a fellow member of the Committee, made an eloquent speech demolishing many of the myths that surround shale gas extraction. I will not attempt to reheat and rehearse most of what he said. He made a point about aquifers relative to shale layers underground. The hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) has worries, as have others, about the potential pollution of the water table. I think that that is almost impossible as a result of shale gas fracturing. Fracking, in and of itself, cannot cause pollution of the water table, because the shale layer is hundreds, sometimes thousands, of feet below the earth’s surface, whereas the aquifers are just a few feet below the earth’s surface. In between the aquifers and the shale layer are hundreds, sometimes thousands, of feet of solid rock. Firing sand grains into fractures a hair’s breadth wide is not going to cause pollution of the aquifers. That will happen only if the wells themselves are compromised, and given that we have some of the best environmental protection in the world, that is very unlikely. If one drills down thousands of feet—

[Gregory Barker]

My hon. Friend draws attention to the fact that here in the UK we have the best environmentally regulated regime for oil and gas extraction in the world. That is a very important point. We have a terrific record, particularly for onshore drilling. It would be wrong to cast out—