Sustainable Seas

Norman Lamb Excerpts

Thursday 17th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mary Creagh]

I absolutely agree with the hon. Gentleman, who was instrumental in getting consensus around the recommendations to the Foreign Office. Ascension Island could benefit from a huge boost from tourism if it was designated. He is right that the Antarctic krill fishing industry is very heavily regulated, but, again, it is in danger of over-exploitation in order to feed our insatiable demand for farmed fish, including salmon. Increasing the no-take areas and protecting them properly is really, really important.

[Norman Lamb (North Norfolk) (LD)]

I congratulate the hon. Lady and her Committee on a very good report. I was struck recently by the Simon Reeve series on the Mediterranean, which highlighted, in particular, the vast areas of plastic greenhouses around Almería in south Spain, where they produce enormous quantities of vegetables and fruit for European supermarkets, including those in this country. I have written to all the supermarkets in this country, but I am not convinced that proper measures are in place to guarantee that the supply chains are meeting high environmental and labour standards. Those chains make use of migrant labour from Africa and have awful working conditions. Does she share my view that the supermarkets have a real responsibility here?

[Mary Creagh]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his question, and I share his concern about the plastics that come off the greenhouses where our tomatoes and cucumbers are grown, which are discarded and then literally chucked into the sea. We treat the sea as a waste disposal unit, and it is not. There is more that supermarkets can do in tackling the full carbon footprint of the fruits and vegetables that they import and making sure that they stamp out any abuse and any forced and slave labour in their fruit and picking supply chains. We know that that they is an area where forced labour and child labour are prevalent.