Queen’s Speech — House of Lords, 2015-06-02
Topic: Environment
Michael Nicholson Lord (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I want to speak about a subject that is not specifically mentioned in the Queen’s Speech but is very relevant to large parts of it: trees, particularly urban trees Trees give us their grace and beauty. They improve our air quality, particularly in inner cities, by taking in our carbon dioxide and giving us back their oxygen. They give us shelter and shade, act as barriers to noise and dust, resist flooding, cool our cities and even help to calm traffic. In short, they massively improve the quality of our lives. Whether in building new housing developments, large or small, giving Battersea power station a new lease of life, or massive projects such as HS2 and the huge environmental impact that they are bound to have, it is vital that protecting existing trees and the careful selection, planting and establishment of new ones is given the highest possible priority In all this, the Government will not be short of advice and pressure. The Woodland Trust is determined not just to plant new woodlands but to protect old and particularly ancient woodlands from threats posed by schemes such as HS2. The Trees and Design Action Group, TDAG, is a charity embracing a host of organisations and companies interested and qualified in the planting and care of trees in the urban landscape. The Natural Capital Committee advises the Government on large-scale projects and the national macroeconomic benefits derived from trees. The Arboricultural Association has in its members a wealth of knowledge about the practical aspects of planting and caring for trees and is often the first to spot the signs of disease. The Forestry Commission has now to wear many more hats than that of pure forestry. Just a few days ago, at a London tree awards ceremony, I heard an excellent presentation by its director, Ian Gambles, on the London i-Tree eco project. Time does not permit me to elaborate, but this is the largest tree survey of its kind in the world and is expected to have a transformational impact on how London’s urban forest is recognised and managed This brings me to the question of which Minister has responsibility for urban trees. In answer to a Parliamentary Question that I put down earlier this year I was told that: "No single Government department is responsible for the planting of trees in the urban environment". I believe that the time has come to draw all these threads together and consider having an individual Minister responsible for urban trees I want to say a word about biosecurity and quarantine, as was touched on briefly by the noble Duke, the Duke of Somerset. The ravages of Dutch elm disease, imported on logs from Canada in the 1960s, robbed us of all our great elm trees. Ash dieback is now threatening to have the same terrible effect, with diseased imported trees again involved and no remedy in sight except the depressing policy of "managed decline". We have other problems of foreign origin threatening our native trees, such as the oak processionary moth. A disease of plane trees is now rampant in France. I invite you to imagine London, its streets, squares and parks, without its London plane trees. Box blight, of South American origin, is causing the ripping apart of some of our most famous gardens and has now been found in our woodlands. In southern Italy, a bacterial disease that hails from the Americas is sweeping through thousands of acres of olives Modern trading in and transporting of plants has made the threat to our trees frightening. There are two things that we can and must do. First, we must grow more of what we can grow. Secondly, and more importantly, we must put in place with the utmost urgency a strict quarantine regime that will prevent plants being imported and immediately sold, scattered and planted all over the country. In answer to another Parliamentary Question that I put down last July I was told by Defra that the number of plants, bare root and container, imported into the UK in 2012-13 was 2.5 million. By 2013-14—that is the planting season—this had risen to 3 million, an increase of half a million trees and plants. Unlike our European neighbours, where most of our imported trees come from, we are an island, with all the biosecurity advantages that that gives us. We should use them to the full. I acknowledge that there are some existing rules and regulations, but they are far from watertight. We must have a sensible quarantine system in place without delay. We do not have to devise it from scratch: some nurseries are already implementing their own. Allied to this, we must have rigidly enforced traceability so that any infected plants can rapidly be tracked down and destroyed I acknowledge that the nation’s tree budget is not in the same league as defence, the NHS or education, but it must be substantial and it must be enough. It seems inevitable that, as our country grows, growth now is everything: we must build, build, build. But if we want to keep the heart of our country for future generations and keep the hearts of our towns and cities, we must have the wisdom, the foresight and the funding to plant, plant, plant: to plant our trees and, having planted, care for them.