Environment Bill — House of Lords, 2021-06-23
Topic: Public Lands
Rupert Bertram Mitford (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, in moving Amendment 59, I will speak also to Amendments 61, 72, 102 and 111, which are in my name Before I go through each individual amendment, let me start by saying that these amendments were brought forward by the Heritage Alliance, which is made up of all the bodies that are involved in heritage. There is a very close link between heritage and the environment. The Minister has talked a number of times about the environmental plan. I also listened to a speech about the problem of overgrazing in the New Forest through cattle and ponies; having lived in the New Forest in the past, I can quite see that that is a major problem However, there is also a link between well-managed heritage sites and important habitats, especially for things such as bats and other flora and fauna. Having been on many archaeological sites where there are digs—I speak not as a trained archaeologist but as somebody who took an archaeological degree; there is a difference—I can say that you can see a preponderance of species that are not on many other sites that have been under the plough or suffered a great deal of intensive agriculture. So the purpose of these amendments is to look at how heritage can be included in the Bill The rather depressing fact is that, when we looked at the Bill, we saw that the only mention of heritage was to exclude heritage from it, in the environmental improvement plans. That seems to be the wrong way round. Although I know that the Minister and his officials will fight tooth and nail not to add a single sentence to the Bill if it is avoidable, I believe that there is a problem here with the fact that heritage is often seen as the responsibility of DCMS rather than Defra. I believe that, if there had been discussions between DCMS and Defra at an earlier stage, heritage would have been included in, rather than excluded from, the Bill This is a massive Bill, of course. It has a number of excellent clauses, but drawing a narrow position without including heritage could pose problems. In the amendments, we are looking as much as anything at how to include heritage in the environmental improvement plans rather than excluding it. The Government undertook to include heritage in the environmental improvement plans in goal 6, but the problem is that, by excluding heritage specifically, the environmental improvement plans will have major effects on funding and monitoring. If a scheme comes forward and needs funding or monitoring going forward, heritage could—indeed, will—be excluded, because there would be a cost implication in doing so I very much hope that the Government could look at these amendments. We have set them out at this stage to test whether the Minister is minded to look at accepting them. I would, of course, after 30 years in this place, fall over at that point, because I have never had a Minister accept any of my hundreds of amendments —but one can only hope. And I hope the Minister could think about maybe having a meeting with us to discuss whether it is possible that these proposals could be included, because they have cross-party support, and I think it would enrich the Bill Amendment 59 invites the Government to consider heritage in the environmental improvement plans. Amendment 61 includes heritage in line with goal six of the 25-year environmental plan, and Amendment 111 widens the definition of "natural environment" to include heritage. I ask the Minister if it would be possible to talk to his officials and see whether we can move forward on this. I have no intention, of course, of pressing these amendments tonight, but that is the assurance I would hope he can give. I beg to move.