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Dietary Supplements
9.34 am
Mr. Peter Hain (Neath) : I wish to present a humble petition on behalf of 25,000 citizens of the United Kingdom, including Linda Lazarides of the Society for the Promotion of Nutritional Therapy, which recognises that whereas there are at present available in Britain a full range of vitamins, minerals and other dietary supplements which are important to correct symptoms of nutritional deficiency that cannot be corrected by good food alone, there are now restrictive proposals from the European Community to prevent that free availability.
Wherefore your Petitioners pray that your Honourable House takes due note of this and that you exercise your parliamentary powers as necessary to defeat any attempts by any agencies whatsoever to reduce the public availability of dietary supplements or to impair in any manner whatsoever the public's present right to buy all currently available dietary supplements in all currently available formulations and dosages.
And your Petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray.
To lie upon the Table.
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9.35 am
Mr. Barry Field (Isle of Wight) : I beg to move,
That this House congratulates the Government on bringing forward its Action for the Countryside package of measures to provide for a thriving, living countryside ; especially welcomes the extension of Countryside Stewardship to include historic landscapes and meadow and pasture, the new Parish Paths initiative to encourage local action to assist in bringing the rights of way network into good order by the year 2000, the Rural Action scheme to take action on a wide range of local environmental issues and the Hedgerow Incentive scheme to promote improved management of hedgerows ; and believes that, together with measures to stimulate the rural economy, and give greater protection to the landscape and wildlife, these initiatives demonstrate the importance the Government attaches to integrating development to sustain rural communities with the conservation of the countryside.
I have had the privilege of winning the ballot for the first time since becoming a Member of the House. Also this week, I have been awarded the great honour and extraordinary privilege of being asked to chair the Opposed Private Bill Committee on the Greater Nottingham Light Rapid Transit Bill. And in the same week my hon. Friend the Minister for Local Government has announced that the Isle of Wight is to be the very first local authority area in the country to be considered by the Local Government Commission.
Mr. Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) : You are winning.
Mr. Field : Precisely. It can truly be said, not only for the constituents of the Isle of Wight but for their Member, that the time has come.
The choice of subject for this debate for me, with a name such as mine, was obvious. But like all hon. Members, I faced a dilemma. I also had to decide whether to honour a constituency engagement, an invitation from Chale parish council to attend, and speak at, the unveiling ceremony of the refurbished Hoy monument which was erected by Michael Hoy to commemorate the visit of Tsar Alexander I to this country in 1814. Hoy made his fortune trading with St. Petersburg, now thankfully renamed from its previous name of Leningrad. He was a merchant from London who not only erected the 72 ft high monument on St. Catherine's down but who owned the nearby country house known as the Hermitage.
Among the assembled dignitaries at today's ceremony will be His Excellency the Russian ambassador, Mr. Boris Pankin, and I hope that he and the Chale parish councillors, who have worked hard with the National Trust to restore the monument, will forgive me for the dilemma that I faced, which was whether to address His Excellency the Russian ambassador, whose fellow countrymen have realised that socialism has none of the answers and that only free enterprise and capitalism can truly create freedom, choice and prosperity in the countryside, or come to the House today and address the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner), an unreconstructed socialist of such principle that even now he has no intention of ameliorating his views or becoming an apologist for the outdated ideologies of state and trade union corporatism.
I wrestled with my conscience : would it be His Excellency Boris Pankin or the last of the commissars from
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Bolsover? I mean no discourtesy to the Russian people or their ambassador when I say that the genuine article, the hon. Member for Bolsover, won the day.Mr. Skinner : If the hon. Gentleman will finish his speech and let me get onto the second motion on the Order Paper--"Classless Society"--I will talk about the hypocrisy of the Tory Government and how they have ruined the lives of millions of people by chucking them on the dole queue, about people living in cardboard boxes while the Queen pays no taxes, and about the Prime Minister drawing up citizens charters while three farmers in my constituency have been put out of work because of dioxin, and some go trotting off to Rio. If we can talk about those subjects--the need to build houses, how to end waiting lists in hospitals and stop queue-jumping with tax relief money, how to deal with the spivs in the City and all the rest of it--we shall have one great debate.
Mr. Field : Had the hon. Gentleman contained himself for a moment longer, he would have heard me paying a small tribute to him. His presence here today evokes a poignant memory for me.
The last time I attended a debate on a Friday, it was to listen to Ian Gow. I am pleased that my hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Waterson) has chosen this debate to make his maiden speech--pleased because the people of the Isle of Wight share a common cause with the people of Eastbourne. We too were savagely deprived of a much-loved public figure when the IRA murdered our island governor, Lord Louis Mountbatten. It will not escape our attention today that it was this very week that the security services could reveal that Colonel Gaddafi had supplied and trained the very terrorists who assassinated Lord Louis.
It was the Liberal Democrats who mounted such a vociferous protest about the use of American bases in the United Kingdom to bomb Libya. My hon. Friends will realise that it is a special pleasure, particularly as, later on that Friday, Ian Gow spoke at a dinner on the Isle of Wight, to say to my hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne how pleased we are that what the bastards and their bombing undid, the ballot box and the burghers of Eastbourne put right in their inestimable wisdom. We look forward to his maiden speech. You have been most generous, Mr. Deputy Speaker, as I have strayed from the motion before us. The Hoy monument stands at the end of one of my favourite walks on the island. From the Pepperpot, which was erected as a penance by Walter Goderton, Lord of the Manor for Chale, for having had a hand in disposing of a shipload of His Holiness the Pope's port--one has a job saying that after the second bottle--which was shipwrecked in Chale bay in 1314, lies one of the most breathtaking views in the kingdom. Here, truly, it is possible to get the impression, in the words of the song, that one is "looking down on creation". The whole of the Isle of Wight is laid out below from the Needles to the Nab tower. That brings me to the island's motto, which is simply, "All this beauty is of God."
Forty per cent. of the Isle of Wight is designated an area of outstanding beauty. Our structure plan tells us that 70 per cent. is used for agriculture. Twenty-seven miles of our coastline are designated heritage coast. We have sites of
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special scientific interest, including nature reserves, cliffs and the Brading marsh. Other areas are designated as of great landscape value. The Isle of Wight county council and South Wight borough council jointly support the Countryside Recreational Management Commission. That means that expert advice is given on land conservation, such as at Brading down, Bembridge and Culver downs. I am pleased to note that the newly privatised electricity company is already honouring its commitment to the environment by placing the present overhead cables underground on the top of the down, thereby removing a nasty eyesore that has plagued the skyline for so long. The commission provides advice and help to parish and town councils on managing land in their ownership, such as Afton marsh, and it has built up a good relationship with the National Trust, which owns such a substantial area of the island.Footpaths and bridleways on the island are probably better signposted than in most areas, and definitely feature as a principal tourist incentive. More recently, routes have been identified as suitable for mountain bikes, and maps have been published, with sponsorship from the retailers of those bicycles.
Schemes already in place include sponsorship for the routine maintenance of lengths of footpath from interested groups and individuals, such as my old school, Bembridge school, which looks after the lengths of coastal path adjacent to the school and those passing through its grounds. Help is already given for the upkeep of footpaths by parishes.
Although the Isle of Wight county council will not participate in the parish paths scheme in its first year, there is already co-operation with some of the parishes with the greatest number of rights of way in their areas. A problem is that the ones with the lowest population, and thus the smallest precepts, cannot always contribute so much, but the larger, older parishes have always accepted some responsibility.
Other work is carried out by conservation volunteers. It includes expertise in fence laying and stone wall rebuilding as well as hedgerow planting. The Isle of Wight has a wealth of heritage and includes the remains of two Roman villas at Brading and Newport. English Heritage is responsible for buildings such as Carisbrooke castle, Appledercombe house and Osborne house. The National Trust is in Mottistone manor, the Needles battery, Newtown town hall--one of the rotten boroughs--plus the surrounding area, and Bembridge windmill.
In the 1970s, the Isle of Wight suffered its first major loss of mature trees through Dutch elm disease. That was followed, shortly after my election, by the hurricane of October 1987. I remember so well receiving a letter from a constituent, the contents of which will ring a bell with many hon. Members. It commenced, "Dear Mr. Field, What are you going to do about the disgusting state of Shanklin pier?" Two nights later, the hurricane came and the pier went. My reputation as a man of action has never looked back. In January 1990, there were subsequent storms. Although there have been on-going replanting programmes, it will be many years before the damaged trees are fully replaced and the native species return, particularly our much-loved English oaks.
Also lost was an unusual species for Great Britain, mimosa trees. They grew locally in streets and private gardens, and flowered delightfully in early spring. Indeed,
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we lost the one in our front garden. The Isle of Wight is rich in rare species of butterfly and moth. One of my great campaigns has been for the Glanville fritillary, named after Lady Glanville, whose will was disputed by her relatives on the basis that anybody who chased butterflies was clearly not sane enough to have made a will. It is found only on the Isle of Wight.That is a textbook campaign which shows my new hon. Friends how to ensure that the Department of the Environment sees the error of its ways. That butterfly was missing from the protected species list--a remarkable omission when one considers that the Glanville fritillary is found only on the Isle of Wight.
Mr. Robert B. Jones (Hertfordshire, West) : Is my hon. Friend aware that, for every 100 butterflies found 50 years ago, there is probably only one today? That is a damning indictment of the agricultural and environmental policies of successive Governments over that half-century.
Mr. Field : I was at one time on the point of damning the Department of the Environment and English Nature, the successor of the Nature Conservancy Council, for not including the Glanville fritillary on the protected species list. I fought a hard battle, not only against the Department, but against one or two local natural history societies. I tabled a number of questions and entered into correspondence about the Government's policy on licensing the removal of butterflies from their natural habitat. The replies that I received were unsatisfactory, but I managed to persuade ministerial colleagues that the Glanville fritillary should be protected. On the Isle of Wight the countryside management service has recently commenced an initiative to restore the ancient chalk downlands to their natural state. That will inevitably have a marked effect on the butterfly population which, as my hon. Friend rightly said, is such an important part of the English countryside. The National Rivers Authority recently recognised the need for the preservation and conservation of wetland regions. When the new sluice gates are constructed between the River Yar and Bembridge harbour, they will ensure that the wetlands, which are the breeding grounds of many rare species of wading birds, will be better protected. I pay tribute to the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds for the helpful way in which it has assisted both the National Rivers Authority and Isle of Wight county council in the design of the sluices and in the protection of the birds' habitat. I have learnt from the National Rivers Authority that soon--it is even now advertising the post--it will appoint to the island a flood defence superintendent who will live on the island and manage such issues. Although there are complaints about the lack of verge cutting, conservation has been taken into account in recent years. Many wild flowers are now re-emerging and returning to natural sites. I know that the motion pertains to the countryside of the United Kingdom, but I hope that I may be allowed to mention the Ventnor botanic gardens and the temperate house, which were opened in 1987. The curator is an interesting man who trained at Kew, where he met his wife. He recently made a point to me that I am sure will ring a bell with my hon. Friend the Minister for the Environment and Countryside, who is fresh from Rio.
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The curator said that the politics of botany transcends international politics. He once found himself being taken to one of the islands that was in dispute between Russia and China some years ago when it was a closed military zone. According to the Chinese authorities, it was in order for him to be there as he was in search of a rare plant. Generally, although much divides the House, our knowledge and care of the environment, endangered species, and the future of our globe and countryside brings us together.I wish to highlight a number of successes as well as pressures relating to the countryside. I can do no better than commence with a quotation from a speech made by Lord Shuttleworth, the chairman of the Rural Development Commission, which was referred to in a recent speech of the president of the Country Landowners Association. He said :
"one prospect that I cannot accept is the abandonment of a long-standing tradition of a countryside that works in every sense. To settle for a passive countryside, used only like a carpet on the floor, or a painting on the wall, would be to fail to realise the potential of a national resource. Rural England requires a broadly based economic and social vitality of its own".
I doubt whether any hon. Member present today could put the argument more succinctly.
The entire island is a rural development area, and has been since 1984. I cannot speak highly enough of the Rural Development Commission. When I addressed its conference on the island at the Savoy country club some years ago, I said that never had so few done so much for the countryside with so little. If our civil service were as stuffed full of as much common sense and "can do" mentality as the Rural Development Commission and its island chairman, David Guy, and Robin Cook and his staff, Members of Parliament would want for nothing.
The commission has been of great assistance to me in finding some seedcorn money for the establishment of a survey on a vegetable co-operative in co- operation with the National Farmers Union. The Isle of Wight has a successful salad group, a good potato group and its grain group probably had one of the shortest journeys into intervention in the country as a result of its foresight in establishing a grain intervention store on the island. I am sad that we have not yet succeeded in establishing a vegetable co-operative on the island to enable our excellent produce to be packaged so that it could be sold in local supermarkets, thus enhancing our appeal. The Rural Development Commission has done sterling work in relation to the use of redundant farm buildings. I pay tribute to the island's joint planning unit, which has recognised the need to turn redundant buildings into economic units to provide employment in the countryside. Its policy of flexibility has been widely welcomed. The commission has been most supportive of the island's fine food initiative, which ranges from sweets to venison. We believe that that is a way to get added value out of agriculture and is all part of the island's attempts to encourage tourism. We hope that tourists will buy some of our excellent produce.
The major issue facing the countryside must be the reform of the common agricultural policy. No debate on the countryside of the United Kingdom would be complete without a tribute to my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, especially for the pressure that he successfully exerted against non-rotation
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on set-aside. In order to improve the landscape, it is necessary to withdraw some fields from cereal production for long periods to allow other plants to grow.Unfortunately, the European Community Commission and Agriculture Ministers had opposite concerns. They feared that farmers would withdraw only the least productive land from production, which would not do much to reduce production. Therefore, they proposed that set-aside should be done in rotation, with the field that is set aside one year being returned to production the following year. In fact, that policy has little environmental benefit except to offer more food to the birds.
The Government successfully pressed for non-rotational set-aside to be accepted as an alternative to rotational set-aside, but non-rotational set- aside is to be at a higher rate. The farmer will have to set aside more than 15 per cent. of his total land in non-rotational set-aside. In other words, the Government were pushing in an environmental direction, but were unable to achieve more than a marginal change to a major policy, which was clearly adopted to support cereal prices. I cannot help but feel that the EC as a whole has missed a great environmental opportunity.
The second point relates to planning pressures. The reduction in hectares for a viable unit and the fact that MAFF has now established a new professional planning unit to provide advice to planning authorities on all matters in which it has an interest are to be welcomed. However, I suspect that I shall still strike a chord with all hon. Members when I say that those who represent rural areas are only too familiar with the sight of the derelict caravan that arrives and settles on a few parcels of land--and out come the polythene tunnels.
The council's planning authority is told that the land is not viable unless somebody lives on site to manage it. Then, of course, electricity, water and sewage disposal are connected to the caravan. Before we know where we are, the son or the son-in-law also lives there--so a request is put in for permission for a replacement building. The application is appealed against ; the people say it will be an extremely modest bungalow, but of course once permission is granted it turns out to be a very large house--which the original caravan dwellers have no intention of occupying.
I know that my hon. Friend the Minister will tell me that the new policy planning guidelines and the lower hectare provisions are designed to restrain such nibbling fragmentation of the countryside. I very much hope that my hon. Friend, who comes fresh to his post from MAFF, will bear the problems in mind.
Mr. David Nicholson (Taunton) : My hon. Friend's last point will find an echo in the Chamber, but at least the sort of developer that he has just mentioned would meet some resistance during the various stages of the planning application. If a gipsy were to come along and try to establish the right to build a dwelling, the planning system would discriminate in favour of him. Should not the Government deal with that problem urgently? I believe that there are plans to do so, but they must move more quickly.
Mr. Field : I apologise to my hon. Friend, but I shall give him the same answer that I gave to the hon. Member
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for Bolsover. My hon. Friend is a most sterling and stalwart defender of the countryside. No one has spoken up more than he for the sports that stand in my name. Had he waited just a moment longer, he would have heard me say something on the issue that he raised. I have written to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister about a particular pressure on the countryside. I am obliged to the Isle of Wight county branch of the National Farmers Union for its help. I simply cannot resist making a claim to fame, because I am the only Member who represents an entire county branch of the NFU all on his own. It is a real pleasure.The particular pressure to which I referred is the problem of mass trespass. The individuals involved are invariably non-tax-paying, DSS recipients who damage property, abuse landlords and intimidate walkers and their families. That, together with the nuisance of squatting, must be dealt with urgently. They always leave behind them a trail of destruction and rubbish and they are a blot on the landscape wherever they set up their broken-down encampments. They are not true diddicoys or travelling people-- they are usually anarchists or just plain layabouts. They detract from people's peaceful enjoyment of the countryside.
I am pleased to note that my hon. Friend the Member for Surrey, East (Mr. Ainsworth) has also chosen this debate for his maiden speech. He is to promote a private Member's Bill on hedgerow protection. I hope that later today we shall hear that the Government will give that Bill their full support. Sadly, the Isle of Wight county council is hellbent not only on destroying hedgerows by the extension of a rubbish tip at Standen heath, but, according to some recent press reports, that will include the destruction of an ancient boundary hedgerow of archaeological interest and some mature trees. My hon. Friend the Minister--who I am delighted to see in his place--knows how very angry I am about the rubbish tip. When I was a county councillor, I was given positive and unequivocal assurances that the waste-derived fuel plant would consume more than 60 per cent. of the contents of our dustbins. That figure has now shrunk to between 10 and 20 per cent., which means that every assurance that I was given about no further land sites being needed for rubbish disposal once the waste-derived fuel plant was up and running have proved to be little more than worthless.
I am angry that I have been deliberately misled over the whole matter. I therefore hope that the Bill to be promoted by my hon. Friend the Member for Surrey, East will speed on its way to the statute book and that it will be in time to save the Standen heath hedgerow.
Mr. Robert B. Jones : My hon. Friend is making an extremely important point. Even allowing for the appalling reputation of the Isle of Wight county council in environmental matters, it is disgraceful that it is not taking a lead in this matter instead of waiting for Government legislation to protect hedgerows.
Mr. Field : My hon. Friend is right. However, later I shall cite a number of matters in which I believe the county council does take some excellent initiatives and plays a leading part in the countryside. I am sure that my hon. Friend and other hon. Members know that I was the only member of the county council who voted against the waste-derived fuel plant. A number of similar plants have
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been constructed throughout the county, some of which have shut. I am not aware of any that has proved to be financially viable. Quite frankly, the plant on the Isle of Wight has become exactly what I said it would--a white elephant.Next door to that plant is Dixon's, the postcard printers. Only this morning I learned that its employees have been medically screened and found to be prone to Q fever resulting from the emissions from the plant. That is a serious matter.
Unfortunately, the county council has played a major part in another ecological disaster at Wootton creek. I do not know whether my hon. Friend the Minister can help me, but I shall briefly state the facts.
The council designed a plan to build a footpath over Wootton bridge. The lower half of Wootton creek is tidal. The upper half used to have sluice gates, so that the lower part, which is above the bridge, had a diurnal rhythm, but it was controlled by the sluice gates, which retained a substantial amount of salt and brackish water between the tides. Because of the alterations in the sluice gates and the archways underneath Wootton bridge, the amount of water that can now get into the upper creek during the flood tide is limited. The whole of this delightful area, which was one of the principal heronries on the island, is now a sun-baked Saharan desert with a small trickle of water through the centre. The wading birds and the delightful aquatic life that once existed there have almost totally disappeared.
I have a letter from Dr. Clarke, the RSPB's regional officer for the Isle of Wight, who resides at Shoreham-by-Sea. He has been in touch with the various parties as a result of pressure exerted by Medina borough councillors over this serious problem. I understand that Dr. Clarke has been in touch with English Nature and the Isle of Wight county council. There has been a meeting between officers from the authorities concerned, and we can expect decisions about how this matter can be better mananged in future. I understand that, for the time being, one of the obstacles to a solution is that the authorities are waiting for a response from the owners of the lake side, Wembley plc, which is considering its legal position. The walk through Firestone copse along the side of the upper reaches of lakeside Wootton creek was once lovely, especially for those of us who like to observe bird life. Sadly, there is now hardly any bird life there at all. It was once soft mudland, but it is now almost possible to walk across the lake. The National Rivers Authority has assured me that the new floods officer will be able to manage the situation a little better, but I doubt whether that is possible without substantial alterations to the bridge archways and by allowing more water into the area.
The Minister knows a great deal about the environment and this week the Secretary of State announced a list of green Ministers. The RSPB booklet "Action for Birds and the Environment" welcomes the appointment of green Ministers as an important part of Government machinery in furthering the protection of the environment. One of the great success stories of the Government has been improving access to the countryside. The excellent pamphlet published by the Countryside Commission entitled "Parish Paths Partnership" is an excellent manifestation of the way these policies are being disseminated and encouraged right down to the grass roots
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of our rural communities. But--there is always a "but"--there is still a problem that needs some ministerial intervention. I have been critical of the island's county council, but I praise its policy on the maintenance and signposting of footpaths, which are probably the best in the United Kingdom. However, there is still a problem with the Crown estate. Two weeks ago, at my invitation, the Crown estate with a commissioner held its first public meeting in the United Kingdom on the Isle of Wight. Its presentation made much of its commitment to the heritage coastline and the fact of recently increased access to the coastline between Yarmouth and the Hampstead lodge.For many years, the island's Ramblers Association, the Medina borough council and the county council and I have been campaigning to join up a coastal footpath so that it is possible to walk around the island. One of the biggest stumbling blocks to that is the Crown estate, with its landholdings around Osbourne house and the deteriorating condition of the sea wall around the shore which forms the boundary of Norris castle. I hope that, as a result of this debate, I can enlist the Minister's support in campaigning for the opening up of what will be one of the most delightful walks on the island.
My hon. Friends will not be surprised to learn that my final problem involves the French--or, to be exact, the fear of French invasion. In 1813, the House passed an Act for amending the roads and highways in the Isle of Wight because of the fear of invasion from France. The fact that this legislation may not have been repealed was a great comfort to my constituents in the light of recent events. The passage of the Act required a definitive map, which was produced to the other place in 1812. It detailed all the vehicular rights of way on the island.
Section 54 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 requires that those rights of way be reclassified as a BOAT--that is, a byway open to all traffic--or as a bridleway or footpath. An Appeal Court decision in 1989 places the Isle of Wight in an invidious position, so much so that the Isle of Wight Association of Parish and Town Councils passed a resolution which stated :
"this Association regrets the consequences of Section 54 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 which requires a public right of way used in the past, but not for many years by vehicular traffic to be reclassified as a byway open to all traffic. It fully supports the efforts being made by the Island M.P. and the County Council to have the law changed and considers that where it can be shown there has been no use for vehicular traffic for at least 20 years (apart from farm vehicles) it should be possible for such rights of way to be reclassified as either bridleways or footpaths."
Mr. Tam Dalyell (Linlithgow) : I was on the Committee which spent 100 hours considering the Bill leading to the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, and I recollect the arguments on clause 54. Plainly, the final Act did not have the good will of all the members of that Committee. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that there is a case for some kind of monitoring mechanism to ensure that the Act works in the way it should?
Mr. Field : I am obliged to the hon. Gentleman, because knowledge of the way in which the Bill progressed is helpful. The Act affected the nation's road systems, but the Isle of Wight was especially disadvantaged because every right of way was set down in the 1812 map and there was no room for doubt or manoeuvre. However, most of the other counties affected by the legislation have considerably
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fewer rights of way over which there can be no doubt. When Ministers are pressed on that issue, they invariably suggest that the Haselhurst committee will take care of that problem. Not only does it not do so, but it tends to miss the point, because it concentrates on footpaths and bridleways. It does not get down to addressing the serious problem, to which I shall come in some detail, of the modern use of motorised vehicles. Nobody is suggesting that a horse-drawn vehicle should not continue to exercise these rights--most farmers I know would welcome that. The problem has been created by the infernal internal combustion engine.I know that the Country Landowners Association, the National Farmers Union and the National Trust branches from the Isle of Wight are looking forward to meeting a Minister in the Department of the Environment later next month to discuss these serious problems. While we understand the principle that once a road always a road, the fact is that, apart from the farmers' vehicles, these rights of way were never intended for motor vehicles, two- wheeled or four-wheeled. They were, and should be, for horse-drawn vehicles.
The previous county chairman of the National Farmers Union, Isle of Wight branch, David Jones, was woken up one night at 1 am--
Mr. Henry Bellingham (Norfolk, North-West) : Is he any relation of my hon. Friend the Member for Hertfordshire, North (Mr. Jones)?
Mr. Field : I do not think so.
Mr. Jones was woken up at 1 am by people in a convoy of vehicles who demanded to exercise their rights by driving through the centre of his farm. His reply was unprintable. The wear that such traffic puts on the fabric of the countryside is intolerable, and the law must be changed.
This year, we are celebrating the Tennyson centenary, and we can already see the harm being done to the Tennyson downs by this legal nightmare. It is true that the countryside can be turned into a series of motorway signposts by traffic regulation orders but these are slow and not very effective mechanisms, and are intrusive visually.
No mention of the French is complete without my recounting the problems that the island's fishermen are having off the Needles with Elf Aquitaine, which is searching for oil. I have sought the assistance of my hon. Friend the Minister responsible for energy and, sadly, I have even told the company that, if it does not come up with a serious offer of compensation for the island's fishermen while it carries out its survey, which is disrupting the fishing grounds, I shall have to take my boat from Cowes and join them in the blockade. If necessary, I shall make Elf seek my imprisonment, so strongly do I feel that this company has played fast and loose with the island's fishermen, some of whom are the fourth generation to fish this area. I am very angry. I hope that the action of this French oil company will not deprive the Government of at least one of their majority. I should have liked to debate the £2.5 billion trade gap in temperate foods and the part that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister is playing in trying to get British supermarkets to use United Kingdom farmers as their
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principal source, but I fear that time is against me. We have--when I say "we", I mean the Rural Development Commission, the National Farmers Union, the Country Landowners Association and myself--achieved some notable successes in getting Safeway, Tesco and Gateway to backload their lorries with island produce so that, in our small way, we are exporting to England. That must be good action for the English countryside and for the Isle of Wight.10.23 am
Mr. Tam Dalyell (Linlithgow) : The hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Field) introduced his motion with charm and spiced his speech with humour. I was amused by the story of what happened to the pier. He had had complaints, including a letter saying, "Dear Mr. Field, what are you going to do about the pier?" and two days later, a hurricane came along and the problem of the pier was resolved. The hon. Gentleman raised an interesting issue of principle about the relationship between the Ministry of Defence and other Departments when dealing with ecologically valuable Ministry of Defence land. As ex-tank crew, national service, I got to know the Lulworth area pretty well and Luneburg heath in Germany. As they come out of defence requirements, after 40 years without agriculture, these areas are ecologically valuable treasures which must be preserved. Following what the hon. Gentleman said about the Isle of Wight, I must ask whether a policy on this has been agreed between the Department of the Environment and the Ministry of Defence which, incidentally, issued a good policy document two years ago on this important problem.
The hon. Gentleman spoke about the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, particularly in relation to section 54. The Act has many other controversial sections, such as 28 and 29, the so-called Sandford amendments. Eleven years later, it would be valuable to have a systematic examination of how the Act has worked. Often, the House passes legislation that we do not follow up with proper monitoring of how what we have done in good faith has worked out. I should welcome any comments from the Minister about that.
Mr. Robert B. Jones : Does the hon. Gentleman recollect that the Select Committee on the Environment carried out a review of the operation of part of that legislation and, as a result, made some recommendations, most of which were acted on? Perhaps it would be appropriate if the Committee examined this matter again--after all, this was a few years ago. That might be one of the best ways to deal with the situation.
Mr. Dalyell : That strikes me as a sensible solution. Where Select Committees are prepared to do this kind of monitoring, that is a valuable aspect of parliamentary work.
These debates are not always the most popular subjects for those who report Parliament. I just put it on the record, although I am not prone to criticising the BBC, that I thought that it was a sign of its sense of values that, in the half-hour report on Parliament last night, there was only one reference to our major debate on Rio yesterday. That reference was to the four maiden speeches. There was not a word about the important speech from the Secretary of State for the Environment or to either of the Labour
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Front-Bench speeches. The rest of us may not be able to complain, but it is extraordinary, when the BBC spends half an hour purporting to report the House of Commons and the Secretary of State for the Environment, a senior member of Cabinet, has made a speech of some significance--whether one agrees with it or not is neither here nor there-- lo and behold, the BBC mentions not a word of it.Mr. Win Griffiths (Bridgend) : Is it not salutary to think that the BBC spent a fortune sending people to Rio but could not cover, relatively cheaply, the important debate here last night?
Mr. Dalyell : Exactly! The BBC should understand that if it is to report, it has some obligation to report serious speeches rather than what it may see as "highlights".
There are some experiences in life that remain with us for all time. I shall introduce what I am going to say now by recollecting my visit to the office of the Minister of the North in Brazil in 1989 after the Altimira conference and rally of the Amerindians on the issue of the Amazonian rain forest. Cesar Fernando Mesquita said : "Senator Gore from the United States came to see me last month and you have come to see me this month. Tell me, what have the Americans done with their forests and their countryside in Colorado and Alaska, and what are you doing about your European woods, hedgerows and countryside?" My theme is that in the light of Rio we must get our own house in order. It is no good having the Darwin initiative, which incidentally I am enthusiastic about, and arrangements through the global environment facility and lecturing Malays, people from Zaire or anywhere else, whether it be about rain forests or the savanna, unless we are able to do a great deal better in our own backyard. At the end of my speech I shall make particular reference to the case of Mar Lodge. I do not know how anyone representing the British Government can look others in the face, including their colleagues in other countries, and say, "Let us combine to help you." How can anyone do that when we have not been able to do anything about the south side of the Cairngorms?
Rio was a staging post on an onward journey. It must be considered as an ongoing process and not an event. We shall be judged by what we do in Britain for our own countryside and not only by our actions in respect of tropical forests in other people's countries. It is a case of, "By their deeds ye shall know them." It should not be thought that those whose Ministers will meet at international conferences are uninterested in what is happening here. Those who tell others what they should be doing should have scrutinised what they themselves are doing in their backyard. That applies particularly to the 25 per cent. of the western world that are rich countries. We use 70 per cent. of the fossil fuels, 85 per cent. of chemical products and 85 per cent. of military expenditure and produce nearly 100 per cent. of space waste. There is much else that is attributable to the rich countries.
I shall this morning ask questions about what we in Britain propose to do with our countryside and how we shall give flesh to what we have promised to do at Rio and have asked others to do. I shall also make what I hope will be constructive suggestions.
First, I wish to put on record my personal enthusiasm for the Darwin initiative, though, to put it bluntly, it was not thought out. Those who perhaps should have been
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consulted, both at the royal botanic gardens and at Kew, were not. Their attitude is, "Give us the tools. We welcome what has been done so far and we shall do the work."To be candid, as a Labour politician of the 1960s I have no right to criticise the Government for putting forward initiatives without thinking them through properly. The most important initiative, in retrospect, of the Wilson Government arrived precisely in that way. Harold Wilson had to think of something concrete to say when he was addressing a rally at Green's playhouse in Glasgow in 1963. He produced the idea that became the Open university. He had not consulted anyone else. He produced the idea to give flesh to his speech at the rally. The Open university grew and grew, and I hope that the Darwin initiative will go the same way.
There is nothing dishonourable in taking that approach. It is a fact, however, that Harold Wilson had not thought through his idea, any more than I think the Government have thought through the Darwin initiative. That does not mean that the initiative is wrong. We can latch on to these ideas and help them to grow, provided that we have the resources to water them. I was disappointed last night to be told by Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs that he was not sure whether £5 million or £2 million was available for the Darwin initiative. I ask the Minister this morning, in the cold light of day, whether he can say anything about the money that is available for the initiative.
At Rio there was talk about reporting. I shall quote from the article written by Fred Pearce that appeared in the New Scientist. He had returned from Rio on 20 June. He wrote :
"A central feature of the commission was intended to be a system of regular national reports on progress in conservation and sustainable development. Britain's environment minister, David Maclean, said confidently, early in the summit : The commission will have a total picture of follow-up and implementation of Agenda 21 through national reports.' He added that there was still some limited resistance to satisfactory language in this'. That resistance turned into a rout, leaving a final text which simply invites nations to submit reports if they wish."
I consider this to be such an important matter that I wrote to the Minister, who courteously and promptly replied. I hope that he will excuse me if I quote his letter to put it on the record. I consider it to be a matter of considerable importance for those who read Hansard. On 25 June, the Minister wrote :
"Thank you for your letter of 21 June about reporting to the UN Sustainable Development Commission on the implementation of Agenda 21 and other relevant environment and development issues.
The result which we achieved on the institutional arrangements for follow- up to the Earth Summit were generally highly satisfactory. The Governments agreed to establish a Sustainable Development Commission which would meet at a high level to review progress on the implementation of Agenda 21 and new developments in the area of environment and development.
The UK attaches importance to regular reporting by states and by UN agencies to the Sustainable Development Commission. The institutional chapter of Agenda 21, which describes the functions of the Commission, says that the Commission should consider information provided by governments including in the form of periodic communications or national reports'."
I should like to know what the Minister has in mind for our own national reports. As I have said, it is a matter of setting an example for others. We shall not get very far
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