World Oceans Day 2021

Stewart Hosie Excerpts

Tuesday 8th June 2021 Westminster Hall

[Stewart Hosie (in the Chair)]

I remind hon. Members that there have been some changes made to the normal practice in order to support new hybrid arrangements. Timings of the debates have been amended to allow technical arrangements to be made for the next debate, so there will be a suspension between each debate. I remind Members participating physically and virtually that they must arrive at the start of the debates in Westminster Hall, and Members are expected to remain for the entire debate, although I am aware that one Member has to leave early for an important meeting, which is perfectly understandable.

Members are visible to each other at all times, whether attending physically or virtually. If Members attending virtually have any technical problems, they should email the Westminster Hall clerks at westminsterhallclerks@ parliament.uk. Members attending physically should clean their spaces before they use them and as they leave the room. I would also like to remind Members that Mr Speaker has stated masks should be worn in Westminster Hall unless you are speaking. Members attending physically who are speaking in the latter stages of the call list should use the seats in the Public Gallery and move on to the horseshoe when seats become available, as they can speak only from the horseshoe, where there are microphones.

[Selaine Saxby (North Devon) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered World Oceans Day 2021.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hosie. The Earth is a blue marble. Over 70% of its surface is covered by water, and the algae that live on the surface account for more than 50% of the oxygen we breathe. So far, the ocean has absorbed one third of all human-created emissions, and regulates our climate. Our oceans are too big and too important just to be the domain of MPs such as me, who are blessed with a constituency with a sea shore. The oceans are home to over a quarter of a million known species and another 2 million as yet unknown, and they are the main source of protein for more than 1 billion people.

United Nations World Oceans Day is a celebration of the potential of our sea, and this year’s theme is life and livelihood. Globally, fishing supported some 39 million jobs in 2018, and the UK’s fishing industry alone is worth almost £1 billion to our economy. In my North Devon constituency, many local businesses and families rely on the maritime economy, and we need to revert to sustainable fishing practices to ensure that we use those precious resources in the best way possible. Additional jobs, fish and associated economic benefit could be derived if our fish stocks were restored to their maximum sustainable yield.

Conservative Governments have led the way for the UK to become a global ocean champion, with our extensive network of marine protected areas. However, we could make use of our post-Brexit freedoms to ban bottom trawling. Research suggests that emissions from bottom trawling alone could be as high as those from all UK agriculture.

Why does that matter? Our seabeds are significant carbon stores, or sinks. When they are disturbed by bottom trawling or dredging, or even by anchors being thrown overboard, the stored carbon becomes resuspended in the water, and potentially escapes back to the atmosphere as CO₂. Over 200 million tonnes of this blue carbon are stored on the UK’s ocean floor—a third more than is held in our stock of standing forests.

The role of coastal and marine habitats in drawing down carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and storing it in seabed, sediment, seaweeds, salt marshes and seagrass beds has been somewhat neglected. Increasing blue carbon habitats could result in a reduction of carbon in our atmosphere, while reducing the disturbance of the seabed ensures that it remains stored. As a Marine Conservation Society blue carbon champion, I believe that if we are to meet net zero by 2050, we must consider blue carbon part of the solution, not to mention integrating it in our carbon accounts. Along with other hon. Members, I recently wrote to Lord Deben, the chair of the Climate Change Committee, to ask him to look into the feasibility of making that happen.

My North Devon constituency is home to the first UNESCO biosphere, and today is the 50th anniversary of the Man and the Biosphere programme. Our world-leading biosphere conducts a wide range of ongoing projects, including those investing in seaweeds, seagrass and salt marshes. I am truly fortunate that I spend my weekends in and on the sea, surfing and gig rowing. I live and breathe the ocean. Sir David Attenborough’s legendary “Blue Planet” brought the ocean to all our living rooms, and we now need to link that passion to action to ensure that it is there for future generations.

No wonder 85% of people in England and Wales consider marine protection important to them. Take whales, for example: not only are they delightful to watch when we are lucky enough to see them, but they are brilliant tacklers of climate change. Each great whale sequesters around 33 tonnes of carbon dioxide on average in their lifetime, which is equivalent to the carbon sequestration of almost 1,400 trees.

We need to ensure that we are all aware of the value of our oceans and what lives within them, and be aware that, while the benefits of rain forests are so widely taught, our oceans and blue carbon are absent from far too many curriculums.

I am proud that the UK, through leading the Global Ocean Alliance and co-chairing the High Ambition Coalition for Nature and People, is pushing to protect at least 30% of the global ocean in marine protected areas and through other effective area-based conservation measures by 2030—the 30by30 target.

It is great news that this morning the Government have announced plans to pilot highly protected marine areas in English waters, creating sites where all activities that could have a damaging effect on wildlife or marine habitats would be banned. The independent Benyon review concluded that such HPMAs would have an important role to play in helping the marine ecosystem to recover. The Government have my full support in taking those steps.

Biodiversity is also crucial. With 90% of big fish populations depleted, and 50% of coral reefs destroyed, we are taking more from the ocean than can be replenished. As the UN states when referencing World Oceans Day:

“To protect and preserve the ocean and all it sustains, we must create a new balance, rooted in true understanding of the ocean and how humanity relates to it. We must build a connection to the ocean that is inclusive, innovative, and informed by lessons from the past”.

Connect to the ocean we must. I frequently collect litter on our beaches and am horrified by the volume of plastics, microplastics and nurdles on North Devon’s beautiful beaches. The tragic situation with the container ship in Sri Lanka last week—it caught fire and spilled its cargo into the ocean—has brought nurdles something of an unwanted fame, but it highlights the fact that we are indeed shipping those pellets around the world in containers that end up in our seas. Is that what we want? If not, what are we going to do to change it?

Plastic pollution is visible and tangible, and we feel we can do something about it by picking it up, but so much of what is going on in our oceans is not visible. Sewage pollution is another challenge along my constituency coastline. I was one of the MPs to support the Sewage (Inland Waters) Bill tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Philip Dunne), and I am delighted to see so much of it incorporated in our landmark Environment Bill, which yesterday received its Second Reading in the House of Lords.

I also hope that introducing the debate will reduce the pressure on my inbox, as I receive an abundance of emails from constituents linked to the Surfers Against Sewage campaign each time the water quality is reduced in North Devon. I very much hope further steps will rapidly be taken to reduce the discharge into our rivers, which ultimately reaches our oceans.

Blue carbon is part of the solution, not part of the problem, when it comes to achieving net zero. I hope that today’s debate offers a chance to focus not just on what we have achieved, but on how much more there is still to do to restore our oceans and to optimise their link to our lives and livelihoods.

[Stewart Hosie (in the Chair)]

Before I call Kerry McCarthy, I should say that colleagues will be aware that there are around 10 Back Benchers who want to speak. If Members take five minutes each, we will all get on great.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steve Double (St Austell and Newquay) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hosie, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for North Devon (Selaine Saxby) on having secured this important debate on World Oceans Day. I count myself incredibly lucky that I have been able to see the sea from every house I have lived in, over my whole life—occasionally I had to stand on tiptoe from an upstairs window to be able to see it, but I have always lived in sight of the sea. Some of my happiest memories, both of my childhood and of raising my own family, are of days spent on or beside the water. I grew up with an amazing awareness of what an incredible place the sea and our oceans are, but also with a deep respect for them: not only are they a great place for fun, enjoyment and leisure but they contain incredible power and can, at times, do incredible damage. It is therefore absolutely right that we have this day once a year to remember our oceans and focus on them, and to remind ourselves what a major role they play in our lives and our natural environment.

The UK, as a proud island maritime nation, has always played an important role in global affairs relating to the sea, and it is right that we continue to play a global leadership role now. As others have already said, the UK cannot deal with all of the issues that affect our oceans on its own: it is going to take global co-operation, and it is good and right that the UK plays a leadership role in bringing that together. For far too many years, we tended to see the ocean as this great big dumping ground that we could pour raw sewage into and let our waste end up in, because it was big enough to cope; it would manage; the waste would not have much effect.

However, thankfully, in more recent times we have changed that view, and have come to realise the incredible damage that we were doing to our oceans. As others have mentioned, the BBC’s “Blue Planet” programmes with David Attenborough really brought home to the British public the damage we were doing, and how we needed to change our ways. I am glad that that is happening. Since I was first elected to this place in 2015, I have had the honour of chairing the ocean conservation all-party parliamentary group—which was previously called Protect Our Waves—and working particularly closely with Surfers Against Sewage and other organisations, such as the Marine Conservation Society, to continue to press in Parliament for more action.

In the time I have left, I would like to mention a couple of areas in which I believe we are making progress, but we need to go further; the first is with regard to plastics. We have all been shocked to learn just how much plastic there is in our seas and oceans. The stat that really brought that home to me, which I read some time ago, was that if we did not change our ways by the year 2050, there would be more plastic than fish in our seas. It is good to see the action that is being taken, both by Governments and by other organisations, such as the million mile beach clean that recently took place, through which thousands of tonnes of waste were removed from our beaches. However, we cannot go on relying on beach cleans for ever. We have to address the source, and stop putting as much plastic waste into the seas. That is where a deposit return scheme will play an important part in increasing recycling rates. I am delighted that the Government are committed to that, though we are all a bit disappointed that it is going to take a year longer than we hoped. Let us take that year and ensure that we get a world-beating deposit return scheme; that it is the best we can do to increase recycling rates and reduce the amount of plastic thrown away to end up in our oceans.

The other issue I want to touch on is that of sewage discharged into our seas. It is the reason Surfers Against Sewage began their campaign 30 years ago. We have made great progress, but we still need to go much further. Raw sewage is still far too often discharged into our waterways, ending up in the sea, or is discharged directly into our seas.

I welcome the Government’s agreement to adopt new measures in the Environment Bill that will better enable us to hold water companies to account, but we need to ensure that the legislation has real teeth to hold them to account and take the necessary action to stop discharging raw sewage into our seas. I plead with the Minister to ensure that the Environment Bill enables us to do that in an effective way. I am delighted to have made this short contribution to today’s debate. Let us all continue to work together and provide global leadership, particularly in this year when the G7 summit and COP26 are being held in the UK, to ensure that we work together around the world to nurture and protect our oceans.

[Stewart Hosie (in the Chair)]

We have had a couple of late withdrawals so colleagues can now take up to six minutes.