Tree Health in England

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

Thursday 9th June 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I begin by declaring my interests in the register and explaining that I own some ash trees. One of my abiding memories of the Platinum Jubilee weekend was the obvious impact of ash dieback on the tree cover of Cumbria: everywhere were black, skeletal twigs protruding through the tree canopy. This pandemic predates Covid and moves more slowly, but it is a real pestilence just the same. We have not talked about it as much as Covid-19, fortunately, but the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, has done us a good turn in bringing this debate.

We should not be surprised by something such as this happening. After all, Dutch elm disease occurred in this country’s living memory and, before that, in the 1930s. Pundits have predicted this kind of thing and historians of nature, ecology and the environment have chronicled this kind of happening regularly, from time to time over the centuries. That is not to say it is not sad. We regret that the landscape, as we know it, is losing a very important component and is dying in front of our eyes. But something else will emerge. While it is destroying part of our living world, it is not destroying the world itself.

As other noble Lords have said, I understand that some trees are likely to be resistant. As long as they are spared the woodman’s axe and their natural offspring are allowed to grow, we, in partnership with plant breeders, will be able to replenish our countryside’s ash trees. As has been said, the life cycle of trees is long. It is not the end of the ash, any more than Dutch elm disease completely wiped out the English elm or wych elm.

It seems to be agreed that tree nurseries spread the disease from spores contained in stock raised on the continent. In this context, we need to be clear that we have always had phytosanitary arrangements and being in the single market did not affect that. As others have said, we have to tighten them up. I suspect that, in addition to a number of pernicious plant diseases, we will see more invasive species that are likely to carry out a lot of damage. I put it to your Lordships that the grey squirrel has probably done more damage to British tree cover than ash dieback has. We have to plan for this happening. The problem is that, like generals, we are always tempted to fight the last war. It has also been suggested that spores may have blown over the North Sea. If that sort of thing happens again, it will be rather more difficult to deal with.

What should we do? First, we should breed and propagate resistant ash trees. Secondly, we should replace them but, if that is expensive, with diversified species, as has been said. We should not be too frightened of these alleged non-native species, such as sycamore, beech and Spanish chestnut. The greater the diversity we have, the greater the chance is of some of them dying.

If an outbreak of some disease is discovered, we should monitor it, destroy it and—I add this deliberately —properly compensate for those trees lost. It is much cheaper to spend a bit of money and properly wipe out the disease than for people not to report it and then for it to run out of control.

Finally, we obviously must cut down and destroy the infected trees. It is on this point that I wish to conclude, since many of these trees are on the edge of the highway. For safety reasons, they have to be taken down quickly. For that to be done, it is necessary to have traffic lights, which require a permit from the local authority. These require a payment. I gather that the amount varies significantly from local authority to local authority. It looks to me as if some are profiteering from it. I ask the Minister to look into this and suggest that permits should be issued either free or for a nominal sum. It does not seem right that local authorities look as if they profit from this, in the same way that it was said that some suppliers of PPE did in the Covid outbreak.