Fly-tipping
Earl Russell Excerpts(5 days, 22 hours ago)
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Earl Russell
To ask His Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to reduce fly-tipping and its impacts on natural environments.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Douglas-Miller) (Con)
My Lords, I declare my interests as set out in the register. Fly-tipping and illegal dumping of waste blight our local communities and damage the environment. The Government have given the Environment Agency an extra £10 million a year to tackle waste crime, including illegal waste sites and large-scale illegal dumping, which is often perpetrated by organised crime syndicates. We are also helping councils to take tougher action on local fly-tipping by more than doubling the maximum on-the-spot fine and providing £1.2 million in grants, with a further £1 million to follow later this summer.
Earl Russell (LD)
My Lords, large-scale criminal enterprise fly-tipping is out of control and increased by 13% between 2021 and 2022. In areas such as Hoads Wood it was reported that up to 30 trucks of illegal waste were dumped every day between July last year and January this year, with no effective action taken. Campaign groups estimate that it will now cost £10 million to clear up the waste. Will the Government commit to meeting the full costs of this clean-up and undertake a review into this specific case, to assess the resources and effectiveness of enforcement action against large-scale fly-tipping?
Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)
I completely agree with the noble Earl that the illegal dumping of waste at Hoads Wood is appalling, and a full criminal investigation is under way. I am unable to comment further on the details of that live investigation as I do not wish to prejudice potential enforcement action. However, I assure the House that the Government are determined to bring those responsible to account. Specifically on Hoads Wood, the Secretary of State has written to the chief executive of the Environment Agency, asking him to draw up delivery plans to ensure that appropriate action is taken to resolve this wholly unacceptable situation. As part of that, we will consider how best to support the clearance of waste from the site. The Environment Agency has powers to recover the cost of action to clear the waste from those responsible. The Secretary of State has also asked the chief executive of the Environment Agency to review the agency’s actions in relation to the site, including what lessons it and other agencies involved in the local partnership tackling this can learn.
Water Companies: Licence Conditions
Earl Russell Excerpts(2 weeks, 4 days ago)
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Earl Russell (LD)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that the continuing secrecy and uncertainty surrounding the future of Thames Water is unhelpful and damaging to the water sector and the whole UK economy? When does the Minister expect to fully update the House and provide some certainty on Project Timber, the Government’s contingency plan for Thames Water?
Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)
The noble Earl knows that it would be improper of me to comment on the details about Thames Water. I assure him and the House that we are taking an extremely close and careful look at this. It is in all our interests that the financial resilience of our water sector, as well as the individual players within it, is maintained and enhanced to ensure the level of investment required to improve water and address the issues related to sewage.
Chemicals Strategy
Earl Russell Excerpts(2 weeks, 5 days ago)
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Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)
The noble Baroness is quite right. Forever chemicals are a serious concern. They are linked to a number of different firefighting products—the foam and chemicals that come out of the extinguishers present a particularly serious issue, and not only to those who are using them, for that product gets inextricably linked to the environment around it. A number of issues which will come through in the strategy are in place to address that.
Earl Russell (LD)
My Lords, how long do the Government plan to keep granting emergency exemptions from the ban on neonicotinoid pesticides? When are they planning to ban these dangerous substances permanently?
Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)
My Lords, as the noble Earl knows, restrictions preventing the general use of three neonics in agriculture have been in place for several years. The Government continue to support these restrictions and have no intention of reversing them. A neonic seed treatment, Cruiser SB, is allowed to be used on sugar beet in England only if yellows virus is predicted to pose a threat to that year’s crop. This decision is not taken lightly and is based on a robust assessment of the environmental and economic risks and benefits.
Pollution in Rivers and Regulation of Private Water Companies
Earl Russell Excerpts(2 months, 2 weeks ago)
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Earl Russell (LD)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to speak in this debate. I thank my noble friend Lady Bakewell and all those who are speaking. I will talk about the scale of the pollution problem in our rivers and the causes, and will suggest some possible solutions.
The scale of the Government’s overall environmental ambitions is to be commended. This is the first Government to have set a target to leave nature in a better place than they found it, but there is much to do and time is short. My overall message is that more must be urgently done at scale and at pace to meet the targets that the Government have set themselves. Clear plans, clear policy direction, clear timescales for action, monitoring regimes, and a clear and consistent direction of travel and political messaging are all vital to secure the planning, investment and action needed to achieve these objectives at scale and on time.
Water quality was awful but, thanks mainly to EU measures and their enforcement and monitoring, it improved in the past. Progress is either slipping back or stagnant at best. Nowhere is the scale of the challenge clearer than the daily scandal of raw sewage being discharged into our waterways unabated while water company bosses continue to pay themselves millions in bonuses with seeming impunity from the harm their companies do. Our rivers and inland waterways are in a desperately sorry state. The combined impacts of sewage discharges and pollution from farming and agriculture, chemicals, road networks and urban spaces are taking their toll.
The recently published Rivers Trust State of Our Rivers Report found that, of our rivers:
“0% are in good overall status … 0% are in high overall status … 23% are classed as in poor or bad overall status … 85% of river stretches fall below good ecological standards; only 15% achieve good or above ecological health status”.
The report found that very little had changed or improved since the last full report in 2019. Worryingly, river sampling has also decreased, with nearly 6% fewer river stretches receiving health clarifications compared with 2019.
What a sorry situation this is. From Pooh-sticks to the simple pleasures in life of sitting by a cooling river on a warm day, and for the 7.5 million people who regularly wild swim, our rivers and lakes are precious and life affirming. As the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, said, people care passionately about our rivers, which occupy a deep and sacred place in our natural soul and well-being. Their health is an election-defining issue that this Government need to invest more commitment and energy into.
The Government should be aware that there is a reason for the Liberal Democrats going on—and, at times, on—about sewage in our rivers. It is not just because my party cares about these issues but because we know that the Government’s voters care just as much. My party is committed to protecting our natural environment. That protection will be at the heart of our overall policy approach. Everyone should be able to enjoy access to nature, free of this mess and its risk to their health.
The water companies have failed to invest in water infrastructure, especially at a time when interest rates were historically low. In 2011, for example, Defra’s Water for Life paper found that only 1% of public sewers were replaced between 2000 and 2008. At that continued rate, it would take 800 years, or 10 times longer than a life cycle, to replace them all. This lack of investment has continued until today, with Ofwat finding a £587 million water company underspend for the years 2020 to 2023. At the same time, the shareholders continue to receive record bonuses. Poor regulation and enforcement across several sectors are making things worse. The Environment Agency saw its environmental budget more than halve in 10 years, from £170 million to £76 million in 2019-20.
As a result, it is struggling to monitor and enforce the rules. Ofwat has similarly failed to hold water companies to account. It has prioritised low bills for customers over the need for investment in networks and environmental protections. We have seen a revolving door between Ofwat and the water companies. The question remains: who regulates the regulators? We need clear and enforceable statutory regulations for long-term improvements in overall water health to be added to the Environment Act 2021.
Sewage may be in the public consciousness—and, in too many cases, people’s nostrils—but it is only a small part of the overall pollution problem. Land management practices must change. This is an issue that the Government have failed to tackle. ELMS has been rushed. Too much money is given to big agricultural businesses. Our small farmers are excluded and are suffering. Many more small-scale farmers must be brought into the scheme, and more help must be provided for them to make applications. The programme must adequately compensate farmers for the nature-friendly practices that we all need and depend on. There is far too little monitoring of our waterways and far too little understanding of the dangerous cocktail of chemicals, and for ever chemicals, that are still present. When do the Government plan to bring forward their chemicals strategy, a key call of the recent OEP report?
The impacts of climate change are real and are happening now. The average UK winter has become around 1 degree warmer and 15% wetter over the past century. We are seeing more rain and it must go somewhere. We must work to separate rainwater from our sewerage systems. Climate change puts increased pressure on the systems and overwhelms them. Heat will increase pressure for water abstraction, and floods bring increased risks of pollution events. I warmly welcome the £25 million of government money that was announced last week to work with nature, not against it, to help with flood management. It is a welcome sign of a change of direction, but we could have had £250 million and that still would not have been enough.
We need more whole-catchment-area, nature-based approaches to slow water, hold and release it slowly to protect soils, and to filter rainwater prior to it entering our waterways. We must do more to work with nature, not against it, in an age of extreme weather. We need long-term plans and greater ambitions from this Government. Ambition must be accompanied by consistent political will, determined action, adequate investment and regulatory regimes that are statutory, well-funded, enforced and fit for purpose.
My party is clear: we are determined and committed to real change in these areas. We will transform the private water companies into public benefit companies. Our view is that Ofwat has failed to get to grips with the problems and define solutions, so our policy is to abolish Ofwat and replace it with a more effective regulator with more powers to directly intervene with speed and much-needed enforcement teeth. We will ensure that there is more adequate funding for regular monitoring of all our waterways. The Liberal Democrats are also committed to introducing a sewage tax on water company profits to fund the clean-up of the most polluted inland waterways and our coastline. We will also introduce compensation for swimmers, and others, who fall sick after exercising in water. These are our policies for change. I kindly ask the Minister: what plans do the Government have to offer?
Right to Roam
Earl Russell Excerpts(2 months, 4 weeks ago)
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Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)
As a small farmer as well, I sympathise with my noble friend. Getting the balance right between responsible access and the other legitimate uses of that land is critical. In future, I hope that we can strike that balance correctly.
Earl Russell (LD)
My Lords, a recent survey showed that there were 32,000 blockages on our public footpaths. Further to the points already raised, it is extremely important that our footpaths are clear and accessible. Will the Government therefore consider providing long-term funding to local councils, which have the legal responsibility but not the resources to keep our public footpath networks open?
Environment Agency: Flood Defence Expenditure
Earl Russell Excerpts(2 months, 4 weeks ago)
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Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)
Indeed they do. A significant amount of research is ongoing around this issue. It is obviously very topical. Perhaps, once that research has been published, I can come back to the noble Earl.
Earl Russell (LD)
My Lords, the National Audit Office has noted that the Government have not set targets for the level of flood resilience they expect to achieve, and have not mapped any solid plans beyond 2026 to bridge the gap between their short-term actions and longer-term objectives. When will the FCERM strategy be updated, and are the Government planning to provide longer-term stable funding?
Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)
The Government have a very large budget for this spending period—£5.2 billion—and we are about half way through that process at the moment. The future funding arrangements will be subject to a funding review at the end of this period.
Met Office: 2023 Temperatures
Earl Russell Excerpts(3 months, 1 week ago)
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Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)
As I said, NAP3 marks a step change in the Government’s work on climate adaptation, moving from planning to decisive action and delivery over the next five years. A key element of NAP3 is a much greater focus on monitoring, evaluation and learning than we have ever had before. Government departments will monitor the success of their actions throughout the programme, which will allow us to continually increase ambition in areas where risk reduction is insufficient.
Earl Russell (LD)
My Lords, there were 44,000 wildfires last year, an increase of 72% on the previous year. In the words of the Fire Brigades Union, the UK is “woefully unprepared” for the impact of climate change on wildfires. Does the Minister support the Fire Brigades Union’s call for a national wildfire strategy? What investments are being made in people, better equipment and training to fight against the increased risks of wildfires?
Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)
I thank the noble Earl for his question; it is extremely relevant in the current climate crisis. Wildfire represents a serious threat to large parts of the UK—not just England but the whole of the UK—and the Government are extremely supportive of any measures to address the issue. I will come back to him in writing on his specific question.