Ash Dieback Disease

Mary Creagh Excerpts

Monday 29th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mary Creagh (Wakefield) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if he will make a statement on the Government’s policy on tackling ash dieback disease.

[The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr David Heath)]

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State is today in Cannock Chase visiting woodland, so I will reply in his stead. We are taking the threat posed by Chalara fraxinea—ash dieback disease—extremely seriously. We have today imposed a temporary ban on imports of ash and restrictions on its movement, supported by the results of a shortened consultation with industry on our pests risk assessment. The ban will therefore be effective well before the start of the main UK planting season. Before the ban, the Horticultural Trades Association urged its members to follow a voluntary moratorium on imports throughout the period, which is being well observed.

On discovering Chalara in the UK, plant health authorities took immediate action rapidly to assess ash trees for signs of infection at more than 1,000 sites where ash plants from Europe had been grown or planted in the past five years, and this has resulted in the destruction of 100,000 trees.

[Mary Creagh]

I thank the Minister for his reply.

Over the weekend, the risk facing the UK from ash dieback disease has become apparent. Experts fear that it is the biggest threat to British trees since 25 million trees were killed by Dutch elm disease 30 years ago. It is disappointing that the Secretary of State chose to announce the ban in Staffordshire instead of in person to this House.

We welcome the ban, but the question on everyone’s lips is, “Why did it take so long?” Ash dieback was found last February in a Buckinghamshire nursery. Why did Ministers sit back, cross their fingers and wait until the disease was found in the wild in June? Why did the Horticultural Trades Association act before the Government? Why did the Government’s consultation on an import ban on ash start only on 31 August? Can the Minister give a cast-iron guarantee that no infected trees were planted in the spring, especially after the severe winter? Can he guarantee that no infected trees were imported into the UK over the summer while Ministers dithered? How does he know that people did not import saplings into the country in the boot of their car? Why were landowners and local authorities told of the disease just three weeks ago?

How will the ban be implemented and policed, and how much will it cost? On Saturday, the Secretary of State told the “Today” programme that 58,000 trees had been burned since the disease was identified. The Minister said that within that short 48-hour period the number had been revised up to 100,000. Can he tell us what the number will be by the end of the week? Is it possible to treat and store felled wood so that it can be used productively in future? What assessment has he received of the impact of the disease on jobs in the wood services industry?

In autumn 2011, the Forestry Commission’s pathology bulletin carried the headline “One to watch for—Chalara fraxinea”, and stated that it was

“not yet present in Britain”.

On what date was Chalara fraxinea identified as the pathogen that causes ash dieback and when were Ministers informed? They cannot say that they were not warned as an internal Forestry Commission document warned that cuts meant that there would be

“no capacity to deal with the costs of disease or other calamity.”

The Forestry Commission trade unions’ evidence to the Science and Technology Committee stated:

“Forest research in Great Britain is already funded at a minimal level, and will be drastically under-funded as the cuts proceed.”

This Government cut the Forestry Commission’s cash by 25%, closed seven regional offices, and cut 250 staff. They have cut funding for forest research from £12 million a year to £7 million a year. The Forestry Commission’s website details the difficulty that scientists had in identifying the deadly form of the fungal infection, and those cuts reduced the commission’s ability to identify and tackle tree disease.

We welcome the creation of a tree disease taskforce under Professor Ian Boyd to deal with this crisis. We also welcome the app that is being launched to crowd-source the disease—I am surprised that the Minister did not mention it—although with leaf fall already under way this is, again, too little too late. After the forest sell-off fiasco, this incompetent Government have been asleep on the job with ash dieback. Like Nero, Ministers fiddled, and now it is our forests that will burn.

[Mr Heath]

It is sadly predictable that when we have a serious condition that could have enormous consequences with which we are trying to deal as a country, the first thing the hon. Lady thinks is, “How can we blame the Government rather than deal with the disease?” She asked why the Secretary of State was not here today. It is because he is talking to people who are dealing with the disease; he is talking to foresters and making sure that we are taking all necessary precautions.

The hon. Lady asked why nothing was done in February. Of course something was done in February—we acted straight away under the previous Secretary of State. Once the first United Kingdom finding of Chalara was confirmed in March, plant health authorities prepared a pest risk analysis. No previous national or international pest risk analysis existed, partly because until 2010—[Interruption.] The hon. Lady would do well to listen to the background to this. Until 2010, there was widespread scientific uncertainty over the identity of the causal organism. That is actually an international issue, rather than an issue in this country.

Since the disease was intercepted, plant health authorities have been carrying out intensive surveillance and monitoring, chasing forward movements of ash plants from infected nurseries and inspecting trees in the vicinities of infected sites to ascertain where the disease may be present in the wider environment. That enormous ongoing task involves well over 1,000 sites, and it is as a consequence of that that the 100,000 trees have been destroyed.

The hon. Lady asked for a guarantee that no infected material came in during the voluntary moratorium, but of course I cannot guarantee that. I can say that no commercial imports took place, because of the action that we took, but I cannot guarantee that no one brought back a little ash sapling in the boot of their car. I hope that they did not, but I cannot guarantee it.

The hon. Lady may not understand that this is an airborne disease and that the incidence of the disease in mature trees in East Anglia had not previously been suspected—it is likely to have been carried on the wind over the channel. Now that we have discovered it, we have immediately taken the action required.

Finally, the hon. Lady was quite wrong about resources, because there has been no reduction in those for plant health and tree health in this country, as she would ascertain were she to speak to the Forestry Commission.