Air and Water Pollution: Impact — House of Lords, 2017-10-26
Topic: Environment
Andrew Robathan (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, it is a pleasure to take part in the debate I start by applauding what the noble Lord, Lord Lee, just said about the strides that have been made since we were children. I remember when there were smogs in London; police officers had to wear masks and the buildings were black. They are not black any more, but of course, more needs to be done. What has surprised me, if I may gently say so, is that although this should not be a party political debate in any way, I have heard quite a few party political comments. It was said, "if Brexit does happen"; well, the good people of Britain want Brexit to happen, as we know, and while I applaud the EU for some of the steps it has taken in pushing Britain over the last 30 years into better environmental practice, I heard only yesterday from a former Minister that we are putting forward ambitious programmes in the Council of Ministers but they are being held back, as my noble friend Lord Caithness said, by other countries that do not want to go so fast. This is not a party political debate but something we all wish to see for the benefit of the British people and the world I want to focus on marine pollution—which has been mentioned, particularly by the right reverend Prelate—and especially on plastic. I should declare a sort of interest, in that I have been a member of the World Wildlife Fund—or WWF or whatever it calls itself these days—for a lot longer than I have been a member of the Conservative Party. Some people might work out whatever they like from that. Yesterday, I went to the launch of a pamphlet called Blue Belt 2.0: British Global Leadership in Ocean Conservation. It was written by my good friend, the right honourable Member for Newbury, Richard Benyon—a Minister for Agriculture in the last Government—and launched by the Foreign Secretary. I commend it to everybody in this House, because we are doing an enormous amount. I will briefly quote from it. This is from the Conservative Party manifesto, but I will come to the other parties shortly: "We will champion greater conservation co-operation within international bodies, protecting rare species … the polar regions" We are setting up marine reserves in the next five years around Ascension Island, Tristan da Cunha and other places. The same commitments, I should say, were in the Labour Party, Liberal Democrat and Green Party manifestos. This is really good stuff where Britain is leading the way. I have visited Ascension Island, South Georgia and the Falklands, and I am delighted that this project is going forward. I hope all noble Lords are as well Marine pollution has already been referred to. The sea has been seen as a dustbin for far too long, not just for runoff from agriculture, which is improving with things such as nitrate vulnerable zones—brought in by the EU, I think, but certainly found across the UK—but for sewage, which is of course pretty appalling. Until relatively recently, sewers used to go straight into the water and out to sea; we were dumping sewage sludge in the North Sea only 10 years ago. I do not think we do it any more. We need to look very closely at what we put into the sea. I used to dive a certain amount; I still do from time to time. I took an expedition to Half Moon Caye, off Belize, an awfully long time, perhaps 35 years, ago. I remember a lot of plastic—as well as some fantastic brown boobies, for those who are interested in birds—that had been dumped in the middle of a fantastic reef, where the Great Blue Hole is located. It is a very good dive, by the way. It was fabulous. However, on the island, which was only about half a mile long, there were hundreds and hundreds of flip-flops. The most extraordinary thing was that they were all right-hand flip-flops; I do not know where the left-hand ones went. My point is this: that was 35 years ago, but things have now got an awful lot worse The effects on wildlife of plastics in our oceans have already been mentioned, as have cosmetic beads. Let us get this straight: microbeads are being banned at the end of this year in the UK. We are leaders in this area and we should applaud the Government for that; but we need to go further. Today, there was a report in the Times on plastic microfibres in fleeces, which I did not know about; I am sure we all have fleeces. Those microfibres get ingested by plankton, which then go into the food chain. In fact, it may kill off the plankton anyway There is also a report on coral ingesting microplastics. I am not sufficiently au fait with this, but I think it may mean it gets taken out of the environment and ingested by coral, which I cannot think is much good for the coral. There is also a photograph published today that noble Lords can see online in the Telegraph of a stretch of plastic waste that is five miles long and two miles wide in the Cayos Cochinos marine reserve in the Caribbean, where I went on my trip to Half Moon Caye What do we do about this? It is not exactly easy, but we need to tackle it. The whole world needs to tackle it, so it has to be through international action. In Britain we have brought in a plastic bag charge, which I applaud—I think everybody does. It was not a particularly party-political issue. I backed it well before it was brought in, as did my Labour opponent in my constituency. We are banning microbeads All this is positive, but there is more yet to be done. Education is hugely important. Basic litter is scattered around our roads or thrown into the water. If anybody has not been diving they should try it one day, because the amount of rubbish you see anywhere that people go, on the bottom of our rivers and harbours, is just appalling. It is international action, through the EU but most especially through the United Nations, that will stop unnecessary waste by getting everybody to deal with it, including developing countries that perhaps think they have better or more important priorities. We need to recycle more. I made my maiden speech in the House of Commons some 25 years ago on recycling. We need to research degradable plastic. However, we need to take action now, otherwise the situation will only get worse and we need to make a world fit for future generations.