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Mr. Atkinson: We have to take the logic of the hon. Lady's remarks to their conclusion. If she takes into account the environmental costs of one form of mining, opencast mining, I assume that she must take into account the costs of deep mining. It is manifest nonsense to say that deep mining is environmentally friendly, as some hon. Members have hinted. Anybody who was brought up in the north-east of England, as I was, and who saw the smouldering pit heaps and the legacy of disease and injury that were caused by deep mining would not say that. We can argue that opencast mining has considerable advantages and that, when the work is finished, the land is generally restored to an extremely high standard. The risk of injuries, accidents and dangers to health of the people in the opencast industry is smaller than it is to those who work in deep mines. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Etherington) said that opencast coal was not necessary. My hon. Friend the Member for Newark (Mr. Alexander)
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made some good points about that. It is manifest rubbish to say that such coal is not necessary. Opencast coal is needed to add to the coal from deep mines to make the deep mines viable. If the hon. Member for Sunderland, North wants to shut Blenkinsopp colliery in my constituency or Ellington colliery in Northumberland his proposal is the way to do it.Mr. Etherington: The hon. Gentleman accuses me of talking rubbish. That is fine, because he is an expert on the subject. I do not mind such comments from him because they are obviously authoritative. If land is as well restored after opencasting as he says--he has many more farmers in his constituency than I have in mine--why does the National Farmers Union not agree with him?
Mr. Atkinson: I can say from first-hand experience that the land in my constituency that has been opencast and restored is in some cases better than it was originally.
Mr. Dennis Skinner (Bolsover): Farmers will vote Labour next time.
Mr. Atkinson: Chance would be a fine thing. I do not think so. Plenmellor, which is being used for opencast mining, was mined in the past. The land was potholed, had shafts and was dangerous. It will be restored to open moorland. We need opencast coal. The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, North spoke about sulphur. I suspect that she is wrong; I think that opencast coal has less sulphur than deep-mined coal. The advantage of opencast coal is that it can be mined completely clean and its calorific value can be determined exactly. Power stations do not blend coal themselves, but buy ready blended coal, so if it was not available here they would buy it from abroad.
It should be borne in mind that, for about every 100 tonnes of material that is mined underground, only 60 tonnes is coal. On average, there is 40 tonnes of spoil, which has to be tipped in the countryside.
I do not see how, if the hon. Member for City of Durham (Mr. Steinberg) took a walk down the Durham beaches, where colliery waste has been thrown for years, he could argue that properly controlled opencast mining is as environmentally damaging as existing deep mines.
Through MPG3, the Government have done a great deal to tidy up and strengthen the planning laws relating to opencast mining. For a start, they have removed the qualification of national interest, which was a great step forward. Before that, opposition to opencast applications could easily be overridden because of so-called national interest and objections to importing coal. The Government are putting in strict controls so that opencast coal mining happens only in areas where it is suitable or where it improves derelict land. That point has not been mentioned either.
The land surrounding opencast workings on the site of the old Orgreave colliery will be restored to a much better standard at no cost to the public purse. If the site had not been opencasted, the work would have cost the taxpayer £10 million or £15 million. There are environmental benefits of properly controlled opencast mining. I sympathise with my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet (Mr. Batiste) since there is not a mineral development plan in his area. He should have one. Most of the country is covered by such plans. Indeed, most county councils or local planning authorities consider
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whether opencasting is possible and where it can be carried out to benefit the mining industry without causing untold environmental damage that affects nearby residents. I congratulate the Government on their stance and on their new rules and regulations in MPG3. 12.31 pmMr. Dennis Skinner (Bolsover): It is very interesting to listen to some Tories complain about opencasting in their areas and about the fact that they are likely to get more opencast applications. With odd exceptions, most of them were there in 1992, shutting the 31 pits with the President of the Board of Trade--who is now, so I am told, Deputy Prime Minister. Most of them went into the Lobby to shut the 31 pits despite the fact that almost every Opposition Member who spoke on the issue said that it would result in more opencast applications in every coalfield in Britain. Now they are crying and whining and whingeing because what has happened is exactly what we forecast.
It is a scandal that the President of the Board of Trade is being promoted when he helped to shut the 31 pits and took part in that--I shall use my words carefully--very smelly deal with R J Budge. There is no doubt that when the President of the Board of Trade knocked that £100 million off R J Budge's contract, he knew that Mr. Budge would make a load of money out of opencasting. Every one of us who work and live in those areas know that an opencast application is a licence to print money. That is the reason for MPG3. This Tory Government wanted to assist their friends, many of whom put money into the Tory party, including Mr. Budge. It is a classic example of the Tory party liaising with others to line their own pockets in return for ensuring the closure of deep-mine pits.
It is an affront that the hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) said that my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Etherington) was on about rubbish. The hon. Gentleman went on to tell us--I think that this is what he implied--that he wanted to opencast Ellington colliery. It is under the sea. I do not know whether they have some new equipment that I have not heard about.
Mr. Atkinson: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Skinner: No. The hon. Gentleman made it clear that he wanted opencast instead of deep mines and he referred to Ellington colliery. I think that I can rest my case.
Mr. Atkinson rose --
Mr. Skinner: The hon. Gentleman has had his chance. Sit down. I know that he voted for Major. Now he has his problems he should not land them on us.
We want to get back to the main question: the blight of the coalfield areas. We know only too well that if any opencast applications were made near Chequers, they would be turned down. The truth is that, with rare exceptions, most opencast applications are made in areas from which spring- -in the main--Labour Members of Parliament, including the First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means. He knows about the subject as much as anybody else.
The Government do not really care. They are not bothered about the outcome. That is why there has been a host of applications recently--to line Mr. Budge's
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pocket so that he can hand over some more money to the Tory party. That is all part of the scene. That is why we have to get back to what can be done.I am not one of those people who say that, when I worked in a colliery, there were no environmental hazards. Of course there were, but they are now developing deep mines such as those at Selby and Asfordby which are not like the old-fashioned pits in Durham, Derbyshire and Lancashire. Although they are not environmental hazard free, they are very different from those that we knew and worked in. In the run-up to the general election, knowing that the Tory Government are not going to do anything to help us, we have to impress on our Labour Front-Bench team the kind of policies that we need for the future. First, we have to tackle this opencast business and get back to what we used to have. I remember a policy of no more green-field sites. We also used to have a policy which was in line with the Flowers commission--allowing, as my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North said, opencast mines only to tick over. That meant that they hardly mined anything at all.
In Government, Labour party energy policy should be to take the remaining pits back into public ownership and then control opencasting. Mr. Budge and his friends would no longer exist. That is the only way. We can play around with MPG3 as long as we like, but we have do something more dramatic.
I will finish on this point because many hon. Members want to speak: there has been an aura around Mr. Budge and Arkwright in my constituency. Everybody is saying that this wonderful new authority is shifting a village from one side of the street to the other, that it is all benevolent and that it wants to do it for the good of the community. I have to tell the House that it is the biggest con trick of all time.
R J Budge closed Arkwright colliery and the methane came pothering out into the village and nearly blew it up. The villagers banded together, with my help and that of others, to take British Coal on. They took it to court, issued writs, and were on the verge of making money out of British Coal when what did it do? It said: "We've got a wonderful idea. We'll opencast all of Arkwright, we'll shift your village and you'll all get a house apiece." It saved itself all that wonderful compensation.
The whole thing was a con trick from beginning to end. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North for giving me an opportunity to put that on the record. Those Arkwright people are really being shifted against their will. They had no option because they were frightened to death of the methane exuding from the old colliery. Now that we have had this debate, it is very important for our Front-Bench team to understand that we need dramatic answers. Pottering about with MPG3 and other such matters is important and I do not disregard it, but we have to take back control to ensure that we can be masters in our own house.
12.38 pm
Mr. Paddy Tipping (Sherwood): I hope that the Minister has listened carefully to the strong opinions of people who represent coalfield communities because there is no doubt that, over recent years, they have had a tough time. Coalfield communities aspire to a better future and that is what this debate is all about.
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In principle, I am not against opencasting, with one big proviso: it has to lift the landscape, enhance the environment and clear up areas of contamination and dereliction. There are some good opencast schemes. I draw the Minister's attention to the Moorgreen site in Nottinghamshire--the site of a derelict colliery which has been opencasted and will be replanted forming part of the new Greenwood forest giving people access to a better future; the recreation of Sherwood forest. Opencasters are not interested in such sites because they are small and difficult. They want the big, new green-field sites.One can contrast Moorgreen and Robinettes just to the south. Robinettes is a mature landscape--the landscape of Lawrence. It is the area where Lawrence was born, where he roamed and where, I suspect, he did other things as well. The Erewash canal runs through it and the village of Cossall lies within it. It is an important site, yet British Coal tried to destroy it. I am pleased that the local campaign group succeeded and that the county council turned down the plan.
I know that RJB (Mining) will come back with another application. The company will be more sophisticated in that it will change the name in the application. Instead of calling the site Robinettes, the company will call it Shortwood Farm, but it is the same application. The company will do that because it believes that it can make money not out of a small derelict site, but out of a big green-field site. I point out to the Minister that the average cost of opencasting is 80p per gigajoule--that is what the opencaster is aiming at. I hope that the Minister realises what is happening now in the deep-mining industry. My hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) talked about the new pits. Coal is being produced at Selby at £1 a gigajoule, and at Asfordby and Welbeck the figure is £1.20. As a result of the restructuring and because many of the overheads have gone, costs are coming down. I tell the Minister straight that, within two to three years, the cost of deep-mined coal will be lower than the cost of opencast.
The real costs of opencast are far greater than the figures suggest. Opencasting destroys landscapes, it destroys the environment and it puts people's health at risk. We need, as we have said before, a more sophisticated way in which to establish the real costs of development. The real cost of opencasting is that it ravages the community. I am no apologist for the deep mining industry. It is bad, tough and rough, but it is getting better.
Mr. Mike O'Brien (Warwickshire, North): The problem is not just what happens when there is opencasting, but the threat of planning applications for opencasting which hang over the community for years.
Mr. Tipping: Opencasting blights the area before and afterwards. We must look for a real energy policy--an energy policy with the deep coal industry as its cornerstone. Unless we have such a policy, I despair about the future. The cost of a new deep coal face is about £30 million. It is clear that, in 1998 and beyond, the new private owners will go for opencasting rather than capital investment. We must get a grip of the situation and give people a new and better future. They have had a tough time and they deserve better.
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12.42 pmMr. Michael Clapham (Barnsley, West and Penistone): I want to deal with the two arguments put by the hon. Members for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) and for Newark (Mr. Alexander). They argued that opencast mining was advantageous to the country and to the local community provided that high- quality restoration followed. I dispute that argument.
The Flowers report, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Etherington) referred, was produced in 1981. It spoke in terms of opencast being taken to tick-over level; opencast coal was not required in the amount that the hon. Member for Hexham suggested was required for technical reasons. The amount required for technical reasons is extremely small. If the hon. Gentleman had read the 1993 report produced by the Select Committee on Trade and Industry, he would have seen that the evidence given to the Committee by the Coalfield Communities Campaign suggested that the amount required for technical reasons could be cut to less than 10 million tonnes. That suggestion was made when 60 million tonnes of coal was deep mined. The Minister will be aware that the Select Committee recommended that opencast mining production be cut to 10 million tonnes.
In 1994, opencast coal production had reached 16 million tonnes and the total amount of coal produced in the United Kingdom was 48 million tonnes. In other words, the proportion of opencast coal has increased to one third of the total produced in the United Kingdom. On restoration, I invite the Minister to visit the Redbrook site in my constituency. It was used for opencast at the end of the 1950s and the beginning of the 1960s. It was a long-term project. The site has been restored, but the land is blighted. It is now just pasture land. There is no arable farming, the woods have not been returned and the streams do not meander as they used to do. It takes up to 100 years after an opencast mine has ceased operation for land to return to the state that it was in before opencasting started.
Will the Minister confirm that, in a letter sent from his Department to RJB (Mining) just after privatisation, 110 opencast sites were identified in an area stretching from Derbyshire to the north-east? Will he confirm that figure? Will R J Budge be able to put in planning applications for sites that have been turned down before privatisation? If so, we in the mining communities can expect many more sites to be proposed for opencast mining.
I suggest to the Minister that there is now a need for insurance and bonding because some schemes may leave great holes with which the local authority will have to deal. R J Budge has already created such a problem at the Orgreave site, which was the subject of a debate in the House on 16 May. Several issues should be considered. I ask the Minister to ensure that he reviews opencast mining and to ensure that it is cut to tick-over level, as suggested in the Flowers report. 12.46 pm
Ms Joan Ruddock (Lewisham, Deptford): I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Etherington) on obtaining this debate, which has been extremely interesting and important. No Labour Member underestimates the nation's need for energy or the inevitability of hard decisions, given that no conventional energy source is unpolluting.
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Opencast mining, however, should be a last resort and not a first resort. The industry should be recognised for what it is--noisy, dirty and destructive--and its economic worth, in terms of jobs and national need, should be judged accordingly. It should be an industry that is developed only when it can clearly serve the community's interests and that means the interests of the whole community.Instead, opencast has been developed as a further expression of the Government's privatisation programme and of their hatred of the National Union of Mineworkers. Of course there are circumstances in which opencast can be tolerated. In some areas, it has a long history and the local community may have found an accommodation. In other areas land with a legacy of dereliction may be appropriately mined as opencast as a prelude to clear-up and restoration. In too many areas, however, as this debate has shown, the effects of opencast on the local community have been appalling.
Much opencast activity could have been avoided. In most cases, the same quantity and type of coal could have been mined from deep mines. When the Tories came to office in 1979, total coal output was 137 million tonnes, of which only 14.5 million tonnes--just 10 per cent.--was from opencast. Today, the proportion from opencast is almost one third, albeit that total coal output is down to 48 million tonnes.
Deep-mined coal production has been massively reduced by direct Government intervention and they have set in train a parallel strategy to promote an increase in coal from opencast mining. They gave guidance to local planning authorities in which they made it clear that
"it would be against the national interest to refuse permission for coal extraction"
by opencast mining. That judgment was reinforced by a series of further measures that, rather than being a response to the changing needs of modern communities, led to opportunities for making private profit by a few of the Tory party's friends.
Opencast mining is one of the most environmentally destructive activities in the United Kingdom today. It has immediate effects on the surrounding neighbourhoods and long-term effects on the landscape. It is Labour's view that, in most circumstances, the damaging effects of opencast far outweigh the economic benefits, and nothing that has been said today will change our mind.
The immediate effects on communities have been graphically outlined by many of my hon. Friends, not least by my hon. Friends the Members for City of Durham (Mr. Steinberg) and for Sherwood (Mr. Tipping). The nuisance of noise, blasting, excavation, vibration, dust and the intrusion of heavy lorries all blight local communities, let alone property values. The long- term effects are more difficult to evaluate. Opencast leads to the permanent loss of mature countryside, and although restoration can grass over an area, it cannot bring back the natural contours.
It would be wholly wrong to believe that such concerns are limited to the ranks of city-dwelling green groups, or even to members of the Council for the Protection of Rural England. I was born and brought up in a south Wales valley. Yes, the miners were hard men, but they loved their countryside and knew every path and contour of the mountains. They loved nothing better than walking on the hillsides or digging their back gardens.
That is why opencast mining such as that found on the Selar Farm site near the village of Cwmgwrach in west Glamorgan is such an abomination. It splits the
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community between those so desperate for work that they are prepared to make the compromise, and those desperate to defend the natural heritage. People should not have to make such choices. Labour is committed to environmentally sustainable development. While recognising the need for jobs, Labour in government will operate a presumption against opencast mining, and permit it only where it would be to the benefit both of the local community and of the local environment. I hope that, in that aim, we might satisfy my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner), because I believe that the green-field sites will eventually be excluded. Labour in government will reverse the process, although we shall do so within a comprehensive energy strategy that puts the needs of the nation, of local communities and of the environment into the same equation. The Minister is the one who must answer questions today. Can he explain how the revised guidance will make any difference? What does he say about the Sharlston application described by my hon. Friend the Member for Normanton (Mr. O'Brien)? Will the provisions in the Environment Bill, inadequate though they are, apply to opencast and the issue of polluting mine water? What is his answer to the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for East Lothian (Mr. Home Robertson) about Blind Wells?As my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley, West and Penistone (Mr. Clapham) asked, will the Minister put on record his response to the idea of bonding? Surely if our holidays can be safeguarded we should be able to safeguard our communities. Surely we cannot allowR J Budge to continue to do what he did in Sheffield, where he put restoration into the hands of a separate company and then allowed that company to go bankrupt.
The Minister must answer those questions today, and we must learn to protect our environment and our communities from the destructive activity of opencast.
12.52 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Sir Paul Beresford): I have had more invitations than a tourist bureau to tour the country, and I would certainly be interested to look at some of the sites. Indeed, I have already agreed to visit some areas.
We had one small interlude with a bit of dramatics--pantomime, perhaps-- from the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner), who reminds me of the three ugly sisters in one go. In general, though, there was a balanced debate in some areas with some Members, and there was acceptance on both sides-- [Interruption.] I must tell the hon. Member for Bolsover that his teeth are still slipping. Positive points were made on both sides and there was recognition, but not by all hon. Members, that there has to be a balance.
I congratulate the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Etherington) on initiating the debate and on allowing various Members to put various points. I shall read the report of the debate tomorrow, because I shall not be able to answer all the questions now. Indeed, I shall be able to do no more than touch on some of them. I understand the environmental concerns that were raised clearly and emphatically by hon. Members on both sides of the House. Letters have come in too. The Government have understood those concerns and taken on board their importance. They have influenced the thinking
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behind the new guidance published last July, which emphasises that development should be allowed only when it can be carried out in an environmentally acceptable way, or where there are overriding benefits, but it is not and should not be the intention to stop all opencast mining. That point has been made by hon. Members on both sides of the House.I was interested to hear the hon. Member for Sherwood (Mr. Tipping) say that opencast can be done satisfactorily from an environmental point of view. The mess can be cleaned up and we can end up with an acceptable, if not environmentally improved, area afterwards. The aim of the guidance is to ensure that the extraction of coal can take place in accordance with the full and proper protection of the environment and within the principles of sustainable development. The new guidance was not produced rashly. It was drawn up after extensive consultation with the industry, planners, environmental groups and local communities, and it responds to many of the concerns that were expressed. I recognise that some of what has been said, especially by the hon. Member for City of Durham (Mr. Steinberg), was about areas that were mined before the publication of the new guidelines, and I hope that they will at least help in such cases in future.
The guidelines emphasise a development plan led approach, with tests of environmental acceptability for individual projects. We have taken a tougher approach to the assessment of factors such as noise, dust and visual impact, and there is an annex that addresses each one in turn. We are committed to monitoring the implementation of the guidance through the research programme.
We also recognise the conflicting views on the characteristics of the coal, and intend to undertake research, starting early next year, to examine whether opencast coal has advantageous or disadvantageous characteristics. Some of the arguments have, therefore, already been taken on board.
The development plan led approach ensures that decisions on land availability and use are debated fully and openly at local level. That must offer the greatest certainty for industry about where coal extraction is likely to be allowed. Similarly, communities where coal reserves exist will have a clearer idea about where such activities are likely to take place, and over what period. That in part answers some of the questions that have been asked.
The new approach, which responded to many of the concerns raised, has been generally well received. I understand that the industry is somewhat concerned, and is conscious of the restrictions, but I recognise that there are difficulties on the other side, too. We intend to enforce the restrictions.
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Green belt policy has been mentioned. It is true that there is no bar on making planning applications for development in the green belt. Nor do we intend to introduce a presumption against mineral working in green belts. [Hon. Members:-- "Why not?"] The simple fact is that minerals can be worked only where they are found, and such workings represent a temporary use of the land. Their extraction need not therefore be incompatible with green belt objectives, but applications for mineral working in green belts should be examined carefully, and development should be allowed only where the highest standards of operation and restoration can be achieved.Nevertheless, MPG3 does not encourage applications for green-field sites but says that priority should be given to proposals involving the clearance of dereliction. If operators wish to work sensitive green-field sites, they will need to demonstrate that real benefits will accrue from their proposals.
Ms Ruddock rose --
Sir Paul Beresford: I shall not give way because I have only one and a half minutes left, and I want to touch on a few more questions.
There are some good examples, one of which was cited by the hon. Member for Sherwood. Any hon. Member who happens to know the Rother valley country park, near Sheffield, will know that it represents another example of considerable success.
The importance of development plans has been touched on. That is a key element in meeting the Government's objectives and in ensuring that development and growth are sustainable. In emphasising a planning-led approach, the Government were responding to the concerns expressed that the 1988 guidance was too centrally driven. We believe that a plan-led approach to the supply of land for coal and colliery spoil disposal will provide more certainty for the industry and for the communities in areas where coal reserves exist.
The plans should set out criteria against which individual proposals will be assessed. The guidance makes clear that the criteria should include consideration of employment and other economics effects of the proposals, any environmental improvements or other material planning benefits likely to result, the effect on landscape and local amenity, the effect on the local environment of transporting coal off the site, the cumulative effects of the proposals on an area, the avoidance of sterilisation of mineral resources and the avoidance of unplanned piecemeal working of deposits, which was a matter about which my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet (Mr. Batiste) complained. The Secretary of State has visited my hon. Friend's constituency, and I intend to do so as well. I may not have the stature of my right hon. Friend, but I hope that my hon. Friend will welcome me nevertheless.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Janet Fookes): Order.
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Military Training (Dartmoor)1 pm
Mr. Anthony Steen (South Hams): I am most grateful for an opportunity to discuss Dartmoor national park, a subject close to my heart and close to your constituency, Madam Deputy Speaker. I raised the subject of Dartmoor in an Adjournment debate in February 1988. I have great a love for Dartmoor. I am a life member of the Dartmoor Preservation Association, and I pay tribute to the association's patron, Lady Sylvia Sayer, who has done more for Dartmoor and the environment than nearly any other person. I also want to recognise the work of my former research assistant Kate Ashbrook. She worked with me on the Dartmoor Commoners Bill, and is now chairman of the Ramblers Association and general secretary of the Open Spaces Society.
My request for a further debate has been prompted by the appalling accident on 18 June this year, when three young children were seriously injured near Great Mis Tor--some 1,700 ft up on the moor and about a mile north of Princetown--when a mortar bomb exploded. The Worrall family was out enjoying an afternoon in the Dartmoor national park. They are letterbox enthusiasts, as so many of my constituents are. I myself am a letterbox enthusiast. In letterboxing, walkers hide boxes on the moor for fellow wanderers to discover. There are books about letterboxing which show where letterboxes may be placed. In the old days, there were five letterboxes in the most remote parts of the moor.
The idea was that, when one got to a remote letterbox, one left a postcard there. The next person who came to the letterbox would stamp the postcard and take the card back to a proper post box at the edge of the moor. Sometimes, one would not get a card for three to six months, such was the inaccessibility of the letterboxes.
There used to be five small post boxes in inaccessible parts of the moor. Today, there are some 3,000 letterboxes. It has become a huge sport, in which competition is fierce and enthusiasts are determined. Children and adults alike engage in a harmless but amusing pursuit, but it means that people rummage in nooks and crannies and upturn rocks and boulders to find their prize. It is an innocent pastime that occupies a good deal of leisure interest throughout the national park. Many thousands of people are now members of a society for letterboxing enthusiasts.
Unfortunately, in her enthusiasm to try to find a letterbox near Great Mis Tor, Jenny Worrall, aged eight, touched an unexploded mortar bomb and was badly injured. I am pleased to be able to tell the House that Jenny-- despite undergoing two operations to remove shrapnel, and having been in intensive care for some time--is now in a general ward in Plymouth, and is making great progress. Her brothers Gary, aged 10, and Ricky, aged 9, have each made a good recovery from their shrapnel wounds.
Apparently, five people have been killed on Dartmoor by mortar shells since 1951, and two civilian injuries have been caused by military activity on the moor as well. The Dartmoor national park was created in 1951 as one of 10 national parks formed principally to provide urban dwellers with open spaces in which to roam, explore and
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escape from it all. The parks were designed to preserve and enhance the natural beauty of the area, and promote its enjoyment by the public.The parks are some of the most guarded areas in Britain, and are protected from intrusion by development, noise or nuisance. The question must be asked--how can the military's use of such a national park for live firing with ammunition be consistent and compatible with the purposes for which the park was established?
There are three principal ranges in the Dartmoor national park--Okehampton, Merrivale and Willsworthy. I remember visiting the Willsworthy range with you, Madam Deputy Speaker, where we saw what was being done there. It is true that the number of days on which live firing takes place is reducing. The data that I have received for 1994 are particularly interesting. While the permitted number of days for firing at Okehampton was 112, the range was actually used on only 50 days. On Merrivale range, the permitted use was 173 days, but only 73 days were used. On Willsworthy, 232 days were permitted, but only 108 were used.
It is clear that the actual use of the ranges is about 50 per cent. less. than the permitted use. If that is a general picture, and if similar spare capacity exists across the Ministry of Defence's estates, there must be scope for priority release of training areas on Dartmoor. Surely we must review the need for so many training sites and the cost of those sites if each is under-used to that degree.
In 1993, the Public Accounts Committee highlighted the shortcomings in the management of available Army training land. There was widespread dismay in 1991 when the licence periods for Okehampton and Merrivale were renewed by the Duchy of Cornwall for 21 years, as opposed to the usual seven years. It was as if the Duchy felt that it had no interest in the fact that the national park should be protected from a further extension of military use.
Agricultural set-aside could provide alternative opportunities and locations for military live firing. What is the point of laying off more and more agricultural land from agricultural use if that land is not used for something beneficial? Why should we pound Dartmoor with more and more live fire? Why should there be military training in the wildest and most beautiful countryside in the nation? Why are 13,340 hectares--7 per cent. of the total area of the Dartmoor national park--designated for military use and live firing?
As more people explore the moor, the more likely it is that there will be a recurrence of the tragic accident of 18 June. Dartmoor attracts 8 million visitors a year, and we know that 357,338 people visited the eight information centres in the national park between 1993 and 1994.
Some people believe that, as Dartmoor has been used for military training since 1870--some 80 years before the national park was set up--and that live firing also took place before the national park was established, live firing should take precedence. They believe that it is not relevant that the Dartmoor Preservation Association was formed 13 years after military training started in 1870, and has been opposing live firing ever since.
The conflict is not so much about military manoeuvres and dry training-- proper uses of a national park--but firing live ammunition. The conflict between military requirements and public access and environmental considerations has been a matter of continuous controversy. It was investigated in the Nugent report, and in the Sharp report, which noted:
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"military training and a national park are discordant, incongruous and inconsistent".It has also been considered in the Edwards report.
I recognise the need to defend the realm and to train our military. I greatly respect the work done in my constituency by the Britannia royal naval college at Dartmouth, HMS Cambridge at Wembury and the marines in Bickleigh. Their manoeuvres involve dry training, firing blanks and physical endurance tests. They do not involve firing live ammunition.
It is interesting to note that the cessation of the cold war seems to have increased the need for live firing in this country. The British Army used to train extensively in Germany, as well as in the United Kingdom. Now that the troops are back from Germany, they are pounding around our national parks in increasing numbers. Part of the Luneburg training area in northern Germany is a national park. The public outcry was so immense throughout Germany at a national park being used for live firing that the German Government were forced to find an alternative site for that type of training. Live firing no longer occurs on the Luneburg training area. The House may be interested to learn that no other European country permits live firing on any area within a national park. When the Minister replies, I hope that he will explain why Britain is the only country in the European Union that allows its national parks to be used for live firing.
While the national park authority pursues its principle towards the ultimate withdrawal of military use and reductions in the restrictions imposed upon public access, another accident is waiting to happen. That is inevitable, and the military know it. Perhaps the Dartmoor national park should be renamed the Dartmoor military park. It is not good enough to say that there have not been many accidents. There are unexploded mortars on many parts of the moor, and more and more are being discharged every week, so it is inevitable that another accident is waiting to happen, especially when that national park provides open access to the public to enjoy the countryside.
It is not good enough for the Government to say that signs are posted to warn people not to pick up items, or they may be blown up. Dartmoor is a national park for the public's enjoyment, not a place of danger where people should guard against everything they do. I call on the Government to review the necessity for live firing and military training in our national parks. They should carry out a full investigation into whether, as a result of the alternative land use policy that the Government have rightly pursued, new areas of land that were formerly used for agriculture could now be better used for live firing and military training. That is the only way in which another terrible accident can be avoided.
What is required of the British Government? They should follow the lead set by the German Government and find another site, unless live firing could be confined to a specific area of Dartmoor which would pose no danger to the public. Without that commitment, people will continue to stumble across unexploded ammunition, particularly if they are letterboxing and looking in nooks and crevices for the boxes.
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Safety procedures could be made more rigorous, but I doubt whether they would solve the problem. Dartmoor should be used to the full, but the more it is used for hunting, hang-gliding, orienteering, or other leisure pursuits, the more likely it is that another accident will happen, however careful the military are.I pay tribute to the meticulous way in which the military decide where and how they fire, but I fear that, when one is dealing with dangerous explosives, people will inevitably stumble across an unexploded bomb. Any accident is one too many.
I am not suggesting that more rules and regulations should be introduced, or that we should have more registers and more bureaucracy. I do not think that that will help. Better signs might be useful, but not more pieces of paper. That would be nothing but an administrative expense. What is required is to use land other than national parks for military firing, and there is other land available.
The tragic accident of 18 June need not have happened. I hope that the Minister will realise that one of the best jobs he could do, as long as he remains in his post, is to find alternative land, so that live firing--not the military--can be confined to certain areas. I am grateful to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for the opportunity to raise this matter.
1.15 pm
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