Andrew Bridgen
Main Page: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Hyndburn (Graham Jones) on his eloquent and passionate maiden speech; I wish him every success representing his constituents.
Localism, we are told, is very important and I agree with that concept. We need to have more powers for local councils in Shropshire—for Shropshire unitary authority and Shrewsbury town council—moving away from Westminster and from regional quangos, so that those who take the decisions can be accountable to local people in Shropshire.
Shrewsbury town council is the largest town council in the United Kingdom. Following the reorganisation of local councils in Shropshire, I very much hope that we can evaluate how more power can be devolved to Shrewsbury town council, but one area in which I think a greater lead, and certainly more advice, is needed from government is waste management. There are proposals for an incinerator to be built in Harlescott, which is a highly residential part of Shrewsbury. The Minister will know that Shrewsbury is an extremely beautiful mediaeval town. The No. 1 income generator for our community is tourism, so local residents are extremely concerned at the prospect of the incinerator being built. As the local MP, I have received many petitions on the matter and have attended many public meetings about it.
Hon. Members will be interested to hear that the issue involves the French operator Veolia, which its chief executive told me when I met him in the House of Commons was originally set up by Napoleon Bonaparte. That company is like an octopus with its tentacles all over the UK. How will the Minister regulate and control that ever-growing, powerful company in its quest to build more and more incinerators throughout the UK? What checks, balances and supervision are the national Government going to put in place? What co-ordination from Government will there be regarding where such incinerators are placed?
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
Is my hon. Friend aware that we, too, have an application for an incinerator in my constituency and that many such incinerators are to be funded through the private finance initiative project? Does he agree that it is tremendously dangerous to fund technology projects with PFI on a potential 25-year payback given that the technology could be out of date within five or 10 years?
Daniel Kawczynski
Yes; I am very grateful to my hon. Friend. I was just about to talk about concerns that the technology will be antiquated by the end of the contract. I want to press the Minister for greater national co-ordination. Councils up and down the country are looking separately, in silos, at incinerators with little regard to national co-ordination in their placement. My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. In our case, the contract would last for 29 years, but the polluting technology involved is already antiquated and should be avoided. Why cannot we have more efficient carbon dioxide-neutral methods of waste disposal? There are many examples in Sweden and other European Union countries that use the most modern and pioneering technology for their waste. Please will the Minister look at them and try to give a greater lead and incentive to councils such as Shropshire not to go with antiquated technology that pollutes our atmosphere? Will he explain the policy and advise that there should be greater co-ordination between councils and more assistance to help them evaluate the best solutions?
I want to draw the Minister’s attention to the fact that Shropshire has exceeded the national recycling targets and is massively ahead of other suggested targets. I am greatly worried that we will be importing waste from other parts of the UK to be incinerated in Shropshire. In the last Parliament, we had many debates in this Chamber and Westminster Hall about incinerators. Labour and Conservative Ministers always come back with the same response on this issue. They say, “This is a local matter and you should take it up with your local council,” but I do not believe that the Minister can wash his hands of this issue, because there needs to be direct Government intervention. For the record, I am extremely upset that the council—a Conservative council, I hasten to add—is proceeding with the incinerator.
My next point to the Minister is that I would like the council to receive greater clarification about house building targets. The previous Labour Administration wanted to foist huge house building targets on Shropshire—almost concreting over it—leading to great concern among villagers, including those in Cressage and Pontesbury, who love their rural way of life. I should like the Minister to clarify the matter and to assure us that local councils will have greater responsibility to decide house building programmes rather than their being imposed by central Government.
Lastly, I shall address my pet subject, about which, as chairman of the all-party group for the continuation of first past the post, I feel passionately. The only three countries around the world that use the alternative vote system are Australia, Fiji and Papua New Guinea. I do not believe that the United Kingdom should be using a voting system that is predominantly used in Papua New Guinea and Fiji.