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8.6 pm
Mr. Nick Ainger (Pembroke): The previous speech shows why we should try to restrict speeches in such a debate to Welsh Members.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Hon. Members called to speak are chosen by the Speaker. That job will remain with the Speaker and not with Back-Bench or Front-Bench Members.
Mr. Clifton-Brown: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Clifton-Brown: I gave way to the hon. Gentleman.
Mr. Ainger: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will want to intervene after I have corrected most of his mistakes, which were of a factual nature.
It will come as no surprise to hon. Members that I will deal purely with the Sea Empress--by any account, the most serious environmental disaster that this country has experienced, including that of the Torrey Canyon. For Wales and the north Devon and north Cornish coasts, the Sea Empress is potentially one of the most serious economic disasters.
I pay tribute to the individuals and organisations who have played such a great part in the salvage operation. On the night of 17 February and throughout the early hours of Sunday 18 February, individual tug crew members, the Sea Empress crew, the pilots and the salvage crew put their lives at risk. For 12 hours, the conditions were horrendous.
I put on record my appreciation of the enormous effort that is still being made in my constituency and in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Carmarthen (Mr. Williams) by the clean-up teams and by the district and county councils. Hundreds of men are mobilised and many resources are being expended in tackling the horrendous problems on our beaches.
I thank all the volunteers from all over the country who have given their services to assist with the clean-up operation, especially in collecting the oil-affected birds that are constantly washed up on the Carmarthenshire and Pembrokeshire coastlines. The work carried out by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds has been invaluable even though, unfortunately, it will not prevent many deaths from oiling.
Surely the issue is how the accident, which occurred on Thursday night, could have turned into disaster on Monday night and over the following two days. The Pembrokeshire coastline and the offshore islands are important to our world environment and not just to our local environment. Lundy and, more importantly, the Skomer marine nature reserve are now affected. The whole of the Pembrokeshire coastline is about to be designated by the European Union as an area of special conservation and offshore, we have some of the most important bird colonies in the world. There are huge colonies of gannets and Manx shearwaters. The scoters that overwinter in Carmarthen bay are being decimated. Heavily oiled puffins and razor bills are being washed ashore as well. Some 30 sites of special scientific interest are under threat as we debate the issue.
Mr. Gareth Wardell:
In view of the picture that my hon. Friend has so vividly painted, does he agree that to ensure to the best of our ability that such a disaster never happens again, a full and independent inquiry should be set up by the Government as soon as possible?
Mr. Ainger:
Absolutely. That is the point I have made constantly since the vessel ran aground and it became
According to the RSPCA's most recent count, almost 1,700 dead sea birds have been collected. The organisation estimates that there are probably at least four to 10 times that amount of dead sea birds out at sea. Thousands of birds with either light oiling or heavy oiling have been sighted. The RSPCA has managed to clean 3,000 birds.
It should be remembered that when the Government agreed to set up an independent inquiry, under Lord Donaldson, into the Braer disaster, the environmental impact was far smaller than that already caused by the Sea Empress, and we are nowhere near the end of the problem. It is, therefore, even more surprising that the Government still refuse to agree to an independent inquiry.
An environmental tragedy is happening before us, but there are also economic problems. The fishing industry in west Wales has now come to a stop and, as I pointed out to the Secretary of State, the problem is not confined to my constituency. Fishermen right along the Welsh coastline are suffering in the markets of France, Spain and even Billingsgate. I am told that fish merchants in Billingsgate have notices in their stalls saying, "No Welsh fish sold here." That problem will affect areas as far away from the spill as Holyhead, which we know will never be affected. However, that is the line. If it is Welsh fish, there may be a problem so the fish merchants do not want to handle it. I hope that the Secretary of State will take on board my suggestion that to restore order to the market and to try to get across the message that the majority of the Welsh coastline is not polluted, he should impose an exclusion order and then, following testing which will give confidence to the market, lift it.
I take the point made by the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Clifton-Brown) that we must not talk up the disaster because if we do, we shall ruin the tourism industry. However, the media have already done that. Merely by showing the beaches that have been polluted at Tenby, the media have made it clear that we face disaster.
I was contacted by one of the major caravan site operators in west Wales who told me that before the tanker hit the rocks, his caravan site had only 20 per cent. vacancies for August. This is the period when he would expect to fill those vacancies because families are booking their holidays. We had an excellent summer last year and families want to come back to the beauty of Pembrokeshire. In the week after the tanker hit the rocks, instead of having 80 per cent. occupancy, cancellations meant that the operator had only 20 per cent. occupancy
and 80 per cent. vacancies. That is the impact of the disaster, which could not have happened at a worse time. This is the time when families decide where to go on their holidays.
Every time I speak to the media, I tell people that by the summer--in fact by May--the beaches will be clean and children will be able to play on them. There may be a problem in certain areas, but the beaches that we now see on our television screens as heavily polluted will be absolutely clean. We have to get that message across and I welcome the action taken by the Secretary of State and the Welsh tourist board. However, we must not start the campaign too early because it has to have credibility. We should not start the campaign when we know that the media will say, "How can they say this? Look at our pictures." We have to time the campaign correctly.
My call for an independent inquiry has been echoed throughout the world. I have had letters from Canada and Australia calling for something to be done and for there to be, first of all, an independent inquiry. The bulk of the letters have come not from my constituency, but from elsewhere in Wales and the United Kingdom. The pictures on television screens throughout the country and throughout the world have moved people, especially those who know Pembrokeshire and its beauty. Those people are very, very angry and they are especially angry now because the Government have refused to implement an inquiry. Every reasonable person to whom I have spoken says, "Why on earth do the Government not have an independent inquiry?" The reasons given by the Secretary of State just do not hold water.
Mr. Hain:
He has something to hide.
It is worth touching on what happened over those days; I have to correct the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury who got a number of facts wrong. Let us not forget that whatever the reasons for the disaster--I accept that there may well have been human error and mechanical error--an inquiry will establish the truth. In this field, if possibly no other, I have a great deal of knowledge, having worked as a docker at Milford Haven from 1977 until I was elected to Parliament in 1992. I know how the port operates.
The first question must be why the vessel was coming in only an hour and 20 minutes before low water, when the actual tide was 3 ft lower than the predicted tide. It would have had great difficulty getting to the berth at Texaco before the tide turned. Ships of that size have to come in to an ebbing tide and they cannot be swung in the port when they are laden. In fact, the tanker ran aground. It has since emerged that the super-tanker spilled approximately 250 tonnes of oil, ruptured a couple of cargo tanks, ruptured some ballast tanks and took on a list of 19 deg. With assistance from tugs, the vessel floated free within three hours. An accident occurred, for whatever reason, and resulted in the spillage of 250 tonnes of crude oil, which is not to be welcomed.
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