Environment Bill

Debate between Stephen Farry and Liz Twist

Report stage & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 26th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

I am pleased to be able to speak to the Bill on Report. My constituency is a green and pleasant place, by and large, but we have seen our fair share of environmental damage and change, and we still endure landfill sites and the scars of our industrial heritage. Environmental issues of all kinds are hugely important to my constituents, including the schoolchildren I speak to, such as those at Birtley East Primary School, who told me that they had written to the Prime Minister, as they had to me, to persuade us that we must protect the environment for their sake.

I wish to comment on the group of amendments on oversight and environmental protection. The Bill is welcome, but we have to take the opportunity to make sure that it really hits the spot—that it has the strength to protect our environment locally and nationally and also contributes to environmental protection internationally and globally. From talking to many environmental organisations, it is clear to me that there is widespread agreement that we need to build stronger measures into the Bill. We need targets and we need to build in independence for the Office for Environmental Protection. Most of all, we need to see the Bill become law. It is sad that there is a delay, but we must see this Bill become law urgently, and certainly before COP26 in Glasgow.

I would like to speak briefly about new clause 9. This House has already declared a climate emergency, so it is right that the Bill really tackles that emergency in a consistent and ambitious way. New clause 9, as we have heard from previous speakers, provides that anyone with duties under the Bill must comply with an overarching environmental objective.

On amendment 23, we have already mentioned that the Office for Environmental Protection needs to be independent of Government. As others have said, clause 24, which was added by the Government in Committee, allows the Secretary of State to provide guidance. We really need that independence, so I hope the amendment will be supported.

On amendment 39, I am sure that most hon. Members, like me, have been flooded with representations on the granting of the licence to use neonicotinoids. It is right that we have proper scrutiny when such licences are granted. In fact, we should not be granting them at all. There are difficult decisions to be made on environmental issues, and we really need to step up and try to make them.

Finally, on amendment 25 on air quality, it is becoming more and more important that our air quality is a health and environmental issue, so I support this amendment. There is so much more that I would like to say on different parts of the Bill, but I do not have time today. I hope this debate today will help us to make those tough decisions.

[Stephen Farry (North Down) (Alliance) [V]]

I share with many others the frustration at the delay of this Bill, which started out long before other pieces of legislation, including some incredibly consequential Bills on Brexit that were rammed through with minimal scrutiny. I want to focus in particular on Government amendment 20 and, briefly, new clause 17, and I offer my support for other progressive amendments.

By way of context, arising from the protocol there is a greater ongoing requirement for Northern Ireland to remain aligned to the European Union. This is a good thing. However, governance needs to be considered separately from policy. It should go without saying that independence and an ability to prosecute effectively are critical to the Office for Environmental Protection, but that is not the case.

This Bill grants the Secretary of State in England and the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs in Northern Ireland the power to issue guidance to the OEP on certain matters that must be included in the OEP’s enforcement policy. The Government claim that the new power does not grant the Secretary of State or DAERA any ability to intervene in decision making about civic or individual cases, and that the OEP does not have to act strictly in accordance with the guidance where it has clear reasons not to do so.

While technically correct, it is clear, especially in the context of all the other Government amendments, that the new power will have the effect of allocating Ministers a central role in shaping the basic principles of the watchdog and a severely constraining effect on the OEP’s ability to act independently. This power to provide guidance therefore inverts the intended hierarchy, in which the OEP oversees Ministers, in that it gives Ministers the role of overseeing the OEP. I do not believe that this role has been given sufficient scrutiny in Northern Ireland with respect to the role of DAERA.

I also want to stress that the Office for Environmental Protection is not the summit of environmental governance in Northern Ireland. The New Decade, New Approach agreement, which restored the Northern Ireland Executive this time last year, contained a commitment to an independent environmental protection agency. This will be different in its scope and role from the OEP, and the OEP should not be used as an excuse for not proceeding with an EPA.

Finally, I want to speak very briefly in support of new clause 17. The pandemic has laid bare the need for a new outlook on our economy and wider society. We need to look, therefore, at a new, more holistic and inclusive economic model, including more sophisticated economic objectives and indicators such as environmental regeneration, renewable energy and the UK’s impact overseas, alongside health, incomes, security, equality, inclusion, affordable housing and the wellbeing of future generations.