Environment Bill

Tim Farron Excerpts

Wednesday 20th October 2021 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I would just like to inform the House, further to the points of order raised previously, that I understand that the gallows has been taken down and arrests have been made under the Public Order Act.

[Tim Farron]

I am pleased to hear that, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Let me also say a quick word about James Brokenshire and Sir David Amess. First, their families can be assured of my ongoing prayers for them in the months ahead. We talk about the importance of disagreeing well. Sometimes we think that means that we have to agree and be all mushy and all think the same things. The great thing about Sir David and James is that they held really firm convictions but were able to hold them with grace and kindness. There is a little lesson for all of us in that. In that spirit, I thank the Minister for her engagement on this Bill and how open and accessible she has been. It has been a lengthy affair, but that applies very recently as well, and I thank her for it.

I will quickly rattle through three bits of the Bill: first, the World Health Organisation target set out in Lords amendment 3. As we head out on this new adventure outside the European Union, the aim should be to have higher standards, or at least standards as high as those that we set as members of that union, but it looks as though we are going for those that are lower, and that is very regrettable.

We have already heard about the enormous health impact of poor air quality, and it is not just in big cities. In Kendal—in my community and on the edge of the Lake District—Lowther Street has been rated as one of the 200 most polluted streets in the United Kingdom. It is everywhere that this issue matters. We know the impact on asthma, on lung function and on people being hospitalised for cardiovascular and respiratory conditions. Sadly, we heard accurately about the appalling impact and the loss of life, particularly of Ella, but also of thousands of others each year. I do not see why the Government, much as I respect what the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Aaron Bell) said, would set themselves unambitious targets that they could achieve when they could set harder targets that would be more of a challenge. The Government should not be disagreeing with Lords amendment 3.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ruth Edwards (Rushcliffe) (Con)]

There is a lot covered in this group of amendments, but in the interests of time I will limit my remarks to the three Ps of pollinators, pesticides and poo. We are beekeepers at home. As I speak, my husband is processing the honey from our seven hives in our kitchen. For reasons I have never fully understood, this seems to involve coating every single implement in said kitchen in honey, so I am quite resigned to going back on Friday evening to a kitchen that resembles the aftermath of a house party thrown by Winnie the Pooh. Wish me luck.

Starting with pollinators and pesticides, the UK already has legislation that regulates pesticides that was transferred from the EU. It takes a tougher, hazard-based approach to regulation rather than the risk-based approach that many other countries use. The Bill requires that pesticides have no unacceptable effects on the environment, having particular regard to its impact on non-target species, which of course includes all pollinators, not just bees. Amendment 43 would replicate part of this existing framework, which sounds to me like a recipe for confusion. It also seems to be jumping the gun on the new national action plan for sustainable use of pesticides, which I look forward to seeing before the end of this year.

So, on to poo. Storm overflows designed for emergencies are now being used as a daily method of sewage management. In Rushcliffe in 2020, Severn Trent recorded storm overflows at three points in the village of Radcliffe-on-Trent alone, totalling 6,854 hours, while in the village of East Leake, the sewage treatment works there discharged 58 times for a total of 715 hours. Yet Severn Trent has still not acknowledged the need for a new pumping station. I welcome the measures in the Bill that will require water companies to publish data on storm overflows both on an annual basis and in real time, especially because it took my team months to extract the data that we needed from Severn Trent.

The Bill also puts a duty on water companies to produce comprehensive statutory drainage and sewerage management plans, including how storm overflows will be addressed. Those plans will cover a minimum 25-year horizon, which is crucial, because much of the problem in Rushcliffe comes from investment in drainage and sewerage not keeping pace with development and new homes.

The Bill also puts a duty on Government to produce a statutory plan to reduce discharges from storm overflows next year. I believe that is the right approach, because it acknowledges two things. First, it acknowledges that reducing storm overflows is the responsibility of a wider range of actors than just water companies. As the Rivers Trust has said, delivering a plan will require contributions from the whole of society, and in particular landowners, developers, highway constructors and homeowners, to divert surface water away from sewers. I am concerned that proposed new section 141A of amendment 45 covers only sewerage undertakers, leaving other significant stakeholders off the hook. We need a comprehensive strategy that addresses the problem from all angles.

Secondly, as implied by the first point, and as has been discussed today, this is going to cost a lot of money. Initial estimates, as the Minister said, range between £150 billion and £650 billion, and it will probably require some fundamental changes to how we do things. Neither of those is reason not to tackle the problem. I firmly believe we should do so, and the Bill makes a first, important step towards doing that, but we need to ensure that we understand the costs, the likely customer bill increases and the trade-offs against other areas that we want to see water companies investing in. While I support the aims of the amendment, and I acknowledge and thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Philip Dunne) for all his work in this area and in strengthening the Bill to date, I will not be voting for the amendment tonight. We need to go further, but we need to make sure that is based on data.

The final thought I offer is that although debates such as this naturally focus on what is not in the Bill, I join my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Cherilyn Mackrory) in recognising all the great things that are in the Bill and the huge, fantastic job that the Minister has done, including on strengthening protection for ancient woodlands, the conservation covenants, the scrutiny of forest risk products in the supply chain and a legally binding target to halt species decline by 2030. That is just in the part of the Bill we are discussing now, and I think those things are worth celebrating.

[Tim Farron]

I want to say very briefly that I am deeply concerned that the Government have chosen to disagree with Lords amendment 43. We recognise that there is a gap in the authorisation process for new pesticides, which does not look at the long-term impact of pesticides on bees and other wild pollinators. Others have spoken about the vast importance of bees and wild pollinators to biodiversity and, frankly, to our capacity to feed ourselves as a country. I am yet to be convinced that the Government are acting in the wisest long-term interests of our environment and our agricultural economy by refusing to accept that entirely reasonable amendment from the other place.

Like others, I am about to talk poop—not for the first time, as I am sure others would add, and nor for the last. Lords amendments 45 to 48 are a collection of reasonable amendments that seek to add pressure on the water companies and Ofwat to ensure that we do not see the dumping of untreated or poorly treated sewage into waterways and lakes without significant penalties or the possibility of local communities getting action quickly to rectify those matters.

In my community in south Cumbria, we suffered as a consequence of Storm Desmond. We saw the River Kent polluted so very badly by a storm overflow from the Wattsfield treatment works just outside Kendal, and it basically killed the entire fish population of that river. That was Storm Desmond, which, by the way, was meant to be a one-in-200-years event. I can tell the House that in a 10-year period, we had three at least one-in-100-years events. As other hon. Members have mentioned, the idea that storms are the only time there are sewage overflows is absolute nonsense and the water companies hugely abuse that loophole.