Environmental Protection

Mark Francois Excerpts

Tuesday 18th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Dr Coffey]

Clearly, my hon. Friend is an assiduous constituency MP in raising this issue during our discussion about how penalties can be applied. If he would like to write to me with more details, I could ask the new chief executive of the Environment Agency to investigate the matter further and respond to him directly.

[Mr Mark Francois (Rayleigh and Wickford) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend is being generous in giving way. My constituents, almost by historical accident, have the privilege of paying two water bills rather than one—one to Anglian Water and another to Essex & Suffolk Water—for different aspects of their water usage. They have seen those bills increase considerably in the last couple of years. As well as fining water companies for getting it wrong, since she mentions the regulator, can she please put pressure on Ofwat to do everything it can to make sure that those increases are, first, fully justified and, secondly, as low as practically possible?

[Dr Coffey]

We are straying somewhat from the purpose of the statutory instruments that we are dealing with today, but I have that same situation whereby Anglian Water covers sewerage and Essex & Suffolk Water covers the supply of water. One critical element in the price review process that we have is that Ofwat goes through a mechanism of working through with water companies what they are allowed to invest in and, as a consequence, what the bill changes could be. We have a situation where bills go up with inflation—that has been part of the mechanism so far, and there is a price review process under way, but I have listened carefully to what my right hon. Friend said.

It has always been the case that Ofwat is there to ensure that the investment that is required in our waterways and our sewerage is made, to ensure that we get best value for money. It is important to note that these SIs cover what happens when we see water companies and other operators, having had that ability to invest, breach their permits. We want to make sure that the penalties are uncapped in order to act as an effective deterrent, as I have mentioned.

Hon. Members have asked how some of those penalties will be applied. I expect that, as now, the Environment Agency will use the guidelines for environmental offences, which are published by the independent Sentencing Council, to determine the level of all variable monetary penalties. Thinking particularly of some of the very small businesses covered by the environmental permitting regime, that will also include a number of safeguards to make sure that penalties are proportionate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim McMahon]

Nuance and facts do matter in this type of debate, but the facts speak for themselves, frankly: going by the Government’s figures, there are 800 such discharges each and every day. As we see right across the country, including in my own region, beaches are completely closed off to members of the public, and that has a material impact on the businesses who rely in good faith on tourists coming. That is the lived experience of people there, and we should not decry that either, so let us get the balance right and accept that this issue needs to be addressed.

A responsible Government would undertake an economic impact assessment to truly understand the impact of the problem, but the order itself states that an economic

“impact assessment has not been produced for this instrument as no, or no significant, impact on the private, voluntary or public sectors is foreseen.”

That feels to me as if the Government have their head in the sand.

[Mr Francois]

As the hon. Gentleman will know, there is a great deal of debate at the moment not just about the Government’s spending plans but about those of His Majesty’s official Opposition. Everyone knows that preventing any discharges of any kind would involve the investment of hundreds of billions of pounds. As the Secretary of State has already made plain, the Government are committed to spending billions as it is. If Labour thinks that we are not doing enough, how much more money would it spend on this that we are not already committed to? Give us a number.

[Jim McMahon]

I will check the voting record later, but we presented our plan to Parliament, and Members had the choice to vote for or against it. That plan would have seen sewage discharges ended by 2030. We believe, and the evidence says, that that could be done with the money that is currently being derived from dividends. That is how it would be funded, and that would mean bill payers were protected. I am disappointed that the Government did not support that, but we are where we are.

[Mr Francois]

rose—

[Jim McMahon]

I am going to make some progress.

[Mr Francois]

Perhaps he could tell us, as it is his plan, what the figure is?

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Roger Gale)]

Order.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Elphicke]

I thank my right hon. Friend for those comments, because he is absolutely right. Blunt instruments will not solve the issues that are blocking house building in our communities, and we have not seen a solution from Natural England that will bring those solutions forward. He is correct to comment on the failure of water companies to invest, which has contributed to this issue, in addition to the root cause of agricultural run-off in river pollution. It is estimated that all existing development—residential, commercial and the rest of the built environment—contributes less than 5% towards the phosphate and nitrate loads in our rivers. That means that occupants of any new homes built would make a negligible difference to that issue, yet it has an enormous cost and impact on the communities where those new homes are not being built.

While those much-needed new homes with their negligible impact are blocked by Natural England, the Environment Agency is allowing farmers to pollute with high-nutrient fertilisers, which are themselves a source of nutrient polluting problems. Planning permissions continue to be granted for high-intensity poultry units, for example, resulting in the absurd situation where a developer may be forced to buy a pig farm and close it down, in order to get permission to build homes, only for the now cash-rich farmer to open another new pig farm just down the road. While the rich farmer gets richer, the small and medium-sized enterprise developer goes bust. A delegation of SME builders brought their case to Downing Street this month. The large developer Redrow has just announced plans to close its offices in the Southern and Thames Valley region, which is one of the areas affected by the nutrient issue.

The Secretary of State is aware that I and many other colleagues are gravely concerned about the proposed approach of keeping Natural England in control, as currently set out in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill. That continues to put immense uncontrolled power over the shape and delivery of our homes and communities with an unelected, unaccountable, single-purpose quango in Natural England.

[Mr Francois]

As the House may know, it is not often that my right hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Damian Green) and I agree on much, but on this he is absolutely right. Natural England is becoming an over-mighty regulator, and it is referred to directly in the regulation that we are debating. Does my hon. Friend agree that it should stay in its lane, do what it does well, and not keep trying to expand its empire into areas where it is not best qualified to judge?

[Mrs Elphicke]

I am struggling to think of those lanes where Natural England does things well. An overhaul of these quangos is required, because they are now making decisions about community policy and economic matters without any of the accountability and balance that Ministers would have over these issues. I thank my right hon. Friend for making those points.

Moving on, the water restoration fund is where all these mega fines will be put. The Department’s press release in April 2023 refers to some £141 million in fines that have been collected since 2015. They currently go to the Treasury but will now go to the new water restoration fund. It seems that £140 million in the fund is clearly not enough, so we now have an unlimited amount—perhaps billions of pounds of fines—that will be available for, as set out in the press release, community-led projects. I have visions of an army of green wellies wading through rivers, removing non-native and invasive species, picking up nets and unblocking blockages that would cause barriers to fishes’ natural movement in rivers, as the Department’s press release mentions.

However, the Government already have a proper water regulator, although it needs reform, for the industry. It needs to be the body driving through the change needed to deal with the historical Bazalgette-style water engineering. That change can only happen with big-ticket investment and complex technical solutions. It is not one for the green welly brigade or the orange Just Stop Oil brigade.

To conclude, will the Secretary of State look again at the relationship between Ofwat—the water regulator—the Environment Agency and Natural England in relation to this matter? I have set out a case for the reform of those bodies. In relation to today’s statutory instruments, higher fines will not in themselves lead to solutions. The only solutions to this issue will be detailed, complex, technical and professional, such as those we have pioneered with the Deal Water Action Taskforce with Southern Water, and also those set out by the Institution of Civil Engineers and the National Infrastructure Commission. By failing to keep big quangos in check, I am afraid that DEFRA is responsible for a substantial fall in house building in this country. It is vital that does not happen to investment in our water companies too, and that we see better regulation, effective working and technical solutions delivered on the ground and in the waterways for the benefit of our communities and constituents, and for the natural environment.

[Mr Mark Francois (Rayleigh and Wickford) (Con)]

I want to make only a few brief points. First, the purpose of these regulations is to strengthen the civil sanctions available for environmental regulators in England, including Natural England and the Environment Agency, in order to provide a greater deterrent against environmental offences for operators. A number of colleagues on this side of the House have already expressed concerns about the extent to which those regulators are perhaps expanding their remit—we might call it “remit creep”, for want of a better term—and not necessarily making the best possible decisions as a result. In that context, will the Secretary of State look again at the remits of those regulators, in particular Natural England, and enter into a conversation, perhaps over a cup of tea, about whether they are going beyond the remit that Parliament gave them? As they are mentioned in the regulations today, I take the opportunity to make that request.

Secondly, I notice from the Order Paper that both these statutory instruments—the House has agreed to take them together—have not been cleared by the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments. Before anyone gets overly excited, that is not unknown—there are sometimes good reasons for why they have to be brought to the House before the JCSI has had an opportunity to scrutinise them—but it is slightly unusual. When the Secretary of State replies to the debate, perhaps she could explain to the House why that is the case. I am sure there is a perfectly legitimate reason, but it might be helpful for her to get that on the record.

Thirdly, I can report that I have had quite a lot of emails from my constituents about sewage discharges. People in Rayleigh and Wickford are just as concerned about this issue as anyone else, and no one wants to see sewage—particularly if it is untreated—being discharged into our rivers, our estuaries or, indeed, the sea. On that, I suspect we could achieve unanimity across the House. However, as I intimated in my intervention, there are already billions of pounds going in from the Government to try to reduce those discharges as far as is practically possible so that they would occur only in periods of the most exceptional rainfall.

In fairness, I gave the shadow Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton (Jim McMahon), an opportunity to tell the House how much money Labour would spend on this issue above and beyond the billions of pounds that the Government are clearly committed to. [Interruption.] Well, he did not answer my question.

[Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)]

He did.

[Mr Francois]

No, he did not. Perhaps there is a reason why. On 25 April, the Daily Express reported, “Tories humiliate Labour as they’re forced to abstain on their own anti-sewage debate”. Under the by-line of Christian Calgie, its senior political correspondent, the story stated:

“The Labour Party was left humiliated by the Government in the House of Commons this afternoon …Labour MPs ended up refusing to vote in favour of reducing sewage discharge. It’s claimed a senior Labour MP was overheard saying ‘We’ve been made to look like’”

twits.

I did not want to introduce a partisan element to the debate—[Interruption.] No, no, but having heard the shadow Secretary of State’s speech, in which he did that, I thought it was only fair to reply in kind. I hope that when the Secretary of State replies to the debate, she will try to get elucidation from him on why Labour had this big Opposition day debate, made a big thing of it, briefed the press, told the country and then abstained. There must be some reason. If he is too embarrassed to tell the House of Commons, perhaps she can oblige.

[Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)]

Did my right hon. Friend also note that, as the shadow Secretary of State talked about the passion with which Labour feels on this subject, not one single Labour Back-Bench MP was present, and that while the Government Benches are now almost full, just two Labour Back-Bench MPs have appeared, probably because they want to get warm?

[Mr Francois]

I thank my hon. Friend for that helpful observation. The passion on the Labour Back Benches has almost doubled in the last 15 minutes. The Whips have obviously been around the Tea Room and said, “It’s looking a bit thin at the back there, boys and girls. You’d better get in there quickly.” So now—I want to be accurate—I count seven Labour MPs in the Chamber. Am I short-changing anybody? No. As for the abstention —[Hon. Members: “They’re coming in now.”] Oh, crikey. Keep going; we could be in double figures in a minute.

As for the abstention on 25 April, it is admittedly unusual to table an Opposition day motion and then abstain on it; that is not an everyday thing. Because the shadow Secretary of State said that Labour was so passionate about it, I can only assume that it was a passionate abstention. Labour felt so strongly that it deliberately chose one of its Opposition day debates to raise the issue, and then passionately abstained in person, as someone once famously said. If there is a really good explanation for that, I look forward to hearing it from the Opposition. In fact, I will allow—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Roger Gale)]

Order. Could I gently try to connect the hon. Gentleman’s speech with the motion before the House?

[Mr Francois]

In the interests of equity, I was allowing the shadow Secretary of State to intervene on me. Perhaps he could connect it? He does not want to intervene to explain why Labour abstained on its own motion. Going, going, gone. In that case, perhaps the Secretary of State could help to elucidate, because the Labour party, clearly, is incapable of explaining its own policy. On that point, so as not to detain us further, I conclude my remarks.