High Speed Rail (West Midlands–Crewe) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-11-30
Topic: Environment
Barbara Young (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 5, 6 and 7 in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Blencathra and Lord Randall, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, and to Amendment 11 in my name I will start with Amendment 5. You really cannot follow the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra—he laid out the case so clearly and passionately. It is strange that the Government have committed to, and will bring into legislation, a requirement to have 10% biodiversity net gain from all developments other than major infrastructure projects. It is morally as well as environmentally important that these major projects, which are mostly government-sponsored, should not be able to duck this important commitment if the government are trying to get everybody else to commit to it. I would be interested to hear what the Minister has to say on that Of course, there are weasel words in all this. In the case of HS2, the concept of net biodiversity gain would need to be defined very carefully. Any project that impacts adversely on ancient woodland is already not able to achieve net gain fully, as damage to ancient woodland is irreversible and cannot be compensated for in any way. No amount of tree planting or carting woodland soils across the country can recreate or compensate for trees that may be anywhere between 400 and 1,000 years old, and are part of complex webs of biodiversity. That is what ancient woodland is—it is about not just the trees but the soils and all the other species; it is about that ecosystem. So I would support a requirement for 10% biodiversity net gain for HS2 with the exclusion of ancient woodland, where it simply does not work. I am also greatly against HS2 saying that it is delivering biodiversity net gain. As long as it is destroying ancient woodland, it simply cannot make that claim I support Amendment 6. It is a bold and simple amendment not to destroy ancient woodlands. Avoiding ancient woodland in some of these major infrastructure projects is not an impossible dream. However, it needs a couple of things to happen; for example, an up-to-date ancient woodland inventory mapping all the remaining areas so that developers have a sporting chance of seeing where these areas are and avoiding them. That has been done very successfully for such things as sites of special scientific interest, marine protected areas or bird-breeding areas. It is not a new idea but a very simple one The current ancient woodland inventory has existed for a number of decades but is incredibly out of date. I saw a quite laughable example recently where a site on the ancient woodland inventory has actually been a cement works for 15 years; that goes to show how out of date it is. It is out of date, it does not map all the eligible areas, a lot is missing and, as a matter of policy, it does not go down to some of the smaller fragments Natural England is responsible for updating it and is, very slowly, with Woodland Trust help because it simply does not have enough money to do it at the pace that is needed. We really cannot expect developers to do a good job on ancient woodland identification without help. An inventory could avoid much conflict, if there was a good one in place. The simple message for the Minister today on the ancient woodland inventory, as part of Amendment 6, would be: please stump up the money to allow it to be completed and brought up to date. It is bizarre that a charity such as the Woodland Trust, supported by public donation, is paying for a statutory body to do a statutory job The second thing we need if we are to destroy no more ancient woodland is a slower speed HS2, as constantly advocated by my noble friend Lord Berkeley. The TGV goes at 200 mph and the Japanese bullet train goes even slower. Why do we need one at 250 mph? Let us have medium-speed rail rather than high-speed rail; that would give us the ability to wiggle the routes more around sites that are sensitive, for whatever reasons, and reduce the amount of public angst for a variety of reasons. We know, as has been said this evening, that HS2 is more about capacity for passengers and freight than about journey time. Speed is less important; ancient woodland is vital Amendment 7 seeks to ensure that the species used by the HS2 project are all native. This is important for three reasons. Most commercial forestry in this country focuses on non-native softwoods. As we restore the highly depleted tree cover of the UK, which we are going to do because it is vital for us in addressing climate change, the biggest growth needs to be in native trees. Strangely enough, as the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, pointed out, they also support native biodiversity and will help to reverse the tremendous decline in it that has already happened, so we need native trees to be planted by the HS2 project. Sticking to native trees also avoids imports and helps to avoid tree disease. I will speak on that when I come to Amendment 11 I want to challenge the argument at the moment that HS2 needs to plant a substantial proportion of trees from two to five degrees south—as far south as the Loire valley—because they will adapt better to climate change. That argument is simply ceasing to represent what the science is saying. Recent research confirms that native species growing in native soils and living in assemblages of native biodiversity, to which they are accustomed, have more chance of adapting over time to climate change as it advances. They are capable of demonstrating greater resilience, particularly because of the wide genetic variation which we are blessed with in this country, even within individual species and sites. I urge the Minister to tackle Defra to require the Forestry Commission urgently to revise its guidance on the selection of species. What might be just acceptable for non-native species in commercial forestry is absolutely not acceptable for amenity and conservation planting, which is what HS2 is doing Let me turn to Amendment 11 in my name. We desperately need a biosecurity standard for HS2 to reduce the risk of importing potentially devastating tree disease. We all know what happened to English elms. Ash dieback is now rampant, with a prediction that 80% of the more than 2 billion ash trees will die. Now that is what I call a pandemic, and it will change the face of the British countryside. Ash trees are the most predominant trees standing as standards in our hedgerows. They are an archetypal bit of what the English countryside looks like, but they are not going to be around. Lots and lots of other trees, for commercial and amenity purposes, will die as a result of the ash pandemic.