Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Benyon and Caroline Lucas

Thursday 7th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Richard Benyon)]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend and share his intense frustration. I am glad to say that we are moving forward with one church in Yorkshire, where we think we may have found a resolution, and some churches in Norfolk. It cannot have ever been the intention of those who imposed this directive on us to limit the ability of people to worship in a church that has been there for centuries.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

T5. Last week the Secretary of State said that he was keen to delay European Union proposals to protect essential pollinators from neonicotinoids until new British field data were available. At the very same time, his own chief scientist was telling members of the Environmental Audit Committee that those same trials had been deeply compromised. When will the Secretary of State stop prevaricating and implement a moratorium on the use of neonicotinoids without further delay?

Rio+20 Summit

Debate between Lord Benyon and Caroline Lucas

Tuesday 28th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Richard Benyon]

I will come on to that. I said a little earlier that the hon. Lady had misread the mood of the House—and she still seems to be doing so. I will answer her points later.

A key part of Rio will be an agreement on the sustainable development goals—a priority for the UK, on which we are working closely with our EU and international partners. There is a lot to do on fleshing out SDGs, but we want to lead the way in helping to develop this thinking. The Secretary of State met a group of Ministers in Nairobi last week and the Colombian Environment Minister here today. We need a renewed focus on tackling the major sustainability issues of access to food, sustainable energy and water.

We need to focus on global challenges. Agriculture, water and energy are fundamental to our economy, and provide livelihoods for the world’s poorest people. By 2030, the world will need at least 50% more food, 45% more energy and 30% more water. These are massive issues. We have tried to do our bit in government by reflecting the concerns that we know future generations will face—for example in our water White Paper published just before Christmas, which set out how we will approach the resilience of our economy and natural environment to provide the water we need in the future.

We need a clear course of action on food security and sustainable agriculture, which is climate smart, reduces waste and takes into account water resources. We need to be clear that access to clean and safe water is a prerequisite for green growth. Just last week, we were discussing drought here in the UK—a country famous for its rainfall. In China, which has 20% of the world’s population but only 6% of its water resources, half of which are undrinkable, access to water resources will only become more important. The UN Secretary-General's “Sustainable Energy for All” initiative is an important step towards increasing sustainable energy, energy efficiency and the use of renewables.

We want to see outcomes that will put sustainability at the heart of decision making. This includes a commitment to go beyond gross domestic product so as to account for natural and social values, too. Many hon. Members touched on this issue. It is vital that we articulate it not just in the high-level conversations—or high-falutin’ ones, as one hon. Member put it—but at the local level. Several hon. Members stressed that we have to carry people with us in these arguments. I was particularly impressed with how my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood brought the argument down to the household level, as it is crucial to impact on households now and in the future.

The UK has a lot to share at Rio: through our national ecosystems assessment, through the Prime Minister’s work on well-being and through work stemming from our natural environment White Paper, we can begin to put natural value at the heart of decision making. A number of Members referred to the Government’s agenda in that regard. I was particularly taken by what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice) and by the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion. We are trying to value natural capital in the context of our economic well-being, of which it is a vital element, and we will shortly announce the membership of the natural capital committee. However, it is impossible to value a view: there must still be an element of the spiritual and uplifting benefits of nature that we all experience, and it is important that we articulate that.

The natural capital committee will advise the Government on our natural capital, and our work with the Office for National Statistics will embed it in our environmental accounts by 2020. Our guidance entitled “Accounting for Environmental Impacts” will help Departments to reflect the value of nature in decision making. Our ecosystems market taskforce—led by Ian Cheshire, chief executive of the Kingfisher group—will look at opportunities for businesses in new green goods and services, which form a vital part of our work in the future. Our work with the World Bank on its “Wealth Accounting and Valuation of Ecosystem Services” will pilot new approaches to wealth accounting in developing countries.

As has been said we also need greater resource efficiency and a commitment to reducing inefficient and environmentally harmful subsidies, including fossil fuel subsidies. In the UK alone, resource efficiency could provide £23 billion-worth of savings, or £2.9 trillion globally per annum, and the EU is well placed to lead on that through its “Roadmap to a Resource Efficient Europe”.

As the Government have noted, action by Governments alone will not be enough. Rio needs to engage the private sector actively so that it plays its part in delivering a greener economy through trade, innovation and investment. However, a Government can facilitate the transition by, for instance, reducing environmentally harmful subsidies. A number of Members mentioned fishing. Let me assure my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park that the Government’s agenda on fisheries partnership agreements is right up there in terms of reform of the common fisheries policy. It is entirely wrong that, having failed to put our own house in order, we are now inflicting bad management on some of the people in this world who can least afford it, and I assure my hon. Friend that dealing with that is an absolute priority for me.

We will be able to assist by incentivising research and development and innovation, by increasing resource efficiency, to which we have referred in the context of the water White Paper, by getting price signals right—I have mentioned the carbon floor in that connection—by valuing and accounting for natural resources, by making the best use of standards and voluntary approaches such as labelling and procurement, and by developing indicators of green growth. We have been engaging businesses in relation to possible outcomes from Rio, for example through the Green Economy Council.

[Caroline Lucas]

rose—

[Richard Benyon]

I am sorry; I cannot give way.

We know that UK businesses are world leaders in green growth. Marks and Spencer saved more than £70 million last year through a combination of efficiency savings and new business. That compares with £50 million the year before.

Water White Paper

Debate between Lord Benyon and Caroline Lucas

Thursday 8th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Richard Benyon]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. We hope to legislate in the near future on a number of these matters, not least that of South West Water, which does require primary legislation. The guidance that we are consulting on will be made available when the results of the consultation are known in January—in the new year, to be precise. We will very much take his concerns into account. We want company social tariff schemes that really work and get to those who are in water poverty.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

I welcome the publication of the White Paper, although I am disappointed that in some respects it is not more ambitious, particularly as some of the measures that we need could be very simply achieved. To give one specific example, are there plans to include a mandatory requirement to have rainwater harvesting in all new homes, and if not, why not, given that it is a very simple measure that could nevertheless have a significant impact?

[Richard Benyon]

There are great incentives to be given in the construction of new homes. In terms of the wider debate on development, sustainable development will put the onus on developers to show that the construction of these dwellings will have as minimal an impact as possible on the environment. This will be a real driver towards using water-conserving measures such as greywater schemes, sustainable drainage systems and a whole host of others that we will be bringing forward as this process goes further.

Environmental Protection and Green Growth

Debate between Lord Benyon and Caroline Lucas

Wednesday 26th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Richard Benyon]

With the leave of the House, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will address the House again at the conclusion of this superb debate. The last comments made by the hon. Member for Ogmore (Huw Irranca-Davies) amused me greatly. They sounded desperate. They sounded as if he was in complete denial of the 13 years of failure, of which he was part. I, like my DEFRA colleagues, feel that we are in a Department that deals with emergencies. One of the emergencies we are dealing with is the great sense of failure that the previous Government imposed on the countryside and on the environment. We are having to work our socks off to repair the situation, but it is a challenge that we take and take seriously. We look forward to achieving on it in the coming months.

The Government can show leadership in protecting our environment, which is exactly what this Government are doing. However, the Government alone cannot protect our environment. We believe that having communities, business, civil society and Governments working together is likely to have the greatest impact on protecting and improving our environment. We are providing new opportunities for local people to play a bigger role in protecting and improving the environment in their areas. We have some of the world’s best civil society environmental organisations to help us to protect and improve our natural environment, and we have provided the tools for them to work with us.

[Caroline Lucas]

rose—

[Richard Benyon]

No, I will not give way.

We welcome the “Nature Check” report. It is very important that the organisations that took part in it have an edgy relationship with government. They frequently come to the Department and we work closely with them, and we will get green lights on the items as we progress. When that report was produced we had been in government for 15 months, dealing with abject failures created by the hon. Member for Ogmore and the Labour party in government, for which he has to take responsibility.

Let me deal with some of the excellent points made in the debate. The hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Sheila Gilmore) was missing the point. Just dealing with recycling does not deal with the whole waste problem; we need to look at this the whole way up the waste hierarchy. Unlike her Government, we will introduce proposals to ban wood from landfill next year.

I compliment my hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Rory Stewart) on a customary visionary speech. The leadership he is giving in his community on broadband, on local housing initiatives and on improving mobile coverage for his constituents is matched by this Government’s commitment to do the same for rural areas right across this country.

The hon. Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) again showed that Labour Members just do not get the whole waste issue. I urge him to look at our waste review and see what we are achieving.

My hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey) made an excellent speech in which she pointed out the failure of Labour councils. It is councils that deliver and it is coalition party councils that are achieving.

--- Later in debate ---

[Richard Benyon]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

There have been some excellent initiatives all around the country, not least in my hon. Friend’s constituency, that have shown how we can unlock more money for flood relief and coastal erosion resilience. I commend the points she made. The total environment concept that we are rolling out around the country is showing that we can work with local government, other organisations and the wider DEFRA family to achieve a better result for the rural communities she represents.

I remind the hon. Member for North West Durham (Pat Glass) that when her party was in power it was selling off forests at quite a dramatic rate with very little protection for public access. She said that we have rejected the Pitt report, but nothing could be further from the truth: we have implemented all but one of its recommendations and I had a meeting on that recommendation today.

I appreciated the contribution of my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives (Andrew George). There is much that is consensual about this debate although it might not feel like it at this precise moment. My right hon. Friends and I had a meeting with Sir John Beddington when we took office and he told us that we had to do something that is hard for politicians to do—look beyond the horizon of four or five years that we are accustomed to looking at in the electoral cycle. What is required is a horizon shift to deal with the possible storm that could be approaching from a shortage of energy, water and food. That requires initiative, vision and a proper approach to these issues; that is what we are doing.

The hon. Member for Swansea West (Geraint Davies) made a fascinating speech. It is good to see that deficit denial is alive and well and living in Swansea. What he and others fail to understand is that sustainable development is now mainstream in government; it is not parked in some organisation that is peripheral—it is central to what we do.

I appreciate the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Neil Carmichael). He is right that what we are looking for is joined-up policies across government. The benefits of localism come from an understanding not just in silos, as it was considered in the past, but with support from across government to the benefit of constituents.

I hope that the scepticism of the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) about the green investment bank will wither as we introduce it and she sees its benefits for new green technologies. She talked about business as usual, but this Government are not about business as usual on green technologies. This is about a horizon shift and taking a new approach.

[Caroline Lucas]

Will the Minister give way?

[Richard Benyon]

I do not have time—I apologise.

My hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South (David Mowat) made an excellent point about the failures of the past that have put us 25th out of 27 in the EU on recycling. We have to improve on that. People ask what our ambition is: it is for a zero-waste economy, which is a high ambition indeed.

The hon. Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) talked about dark conspiracies, but I assure her that they do not exist. She should move on from that idea and stop watching those programmes.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Benyon and Caroline Lucas

Thursday 12th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Richard Benyon]

My hon. Friend is to be applauded for standing up and campaigning on behalf of farmers in his constituency. They need to know that they have got a Government obsessed with keeping them competitive against a lot of international and domestic challenges. The Government recognise the value of farmers in producing food, protecting the environment and being the guardians of ecosystem services, and they now have a Government who are on their side.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

12. What recent discussions she has had with the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills on the environmental regulations considered for possible revocation under the red tape challenge.