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5.11 pm
Mr. William O'Brien (Normanton): Most of the remarks of the hon. Member for Faversham(Sir R. Moate)--particularly the second half of his speech--supported what my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) said. My hon. Friend said that there must be a partnership between Government and industry to ensure that the regulations are applied equitably and that changes are made if and when they prove necessary.
In Committee, it was intended that the Environmental Protection Bill should empower the Secretary of State to introduce regulations. I submitted an amendment on Report, insisting that the regulations should come before the House before they were applied. It is vital that we debate important issues such as this, but I believe that the regulations have taken too long to come to this place.
The House must approve the regulations if we are to meet the significant and tight targets set by the European Union, of 50 per cent. recovery and 25 per cent. recycling
by 2001. The industry debated loud and long about finding an equitable basis for sharing the legal obligations across the packaging chain, and arrived at a compromise solution at its meeting on 15 December. The industry commenced consultations in 1993. The present regulations are not perfect but, as the Minister said, they must be passed tonight. They are pioneering measures.
Mr. Nicholas Winterton (Macclesfield):
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way and for agreeing with most of the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Faversham (Sir R. Moate), who spoke from his great experience in the paper and board industry. Should not the hon. Gentleman emphasise that we must not distort the market in respect of these regulations? It would be unfortunate if, as my hon. Friend said, certain large retailers were allowed to use their packaging to subsidise other areas of their recycling responsibility. That would have an unfair impact on other sectors of the paper and board industry.
Mr. O'Brien:
I made that point when I intervened on the Minister. He assured me that the market shares the responsibility to collect or recycle certain materials within the recovery chain. I therefore assume that the issue has been resolved, and I shall address it only briefly in this debate.
We must ensure that all sectors of the industry have a common goal of minimising the total cost of the national recovery scheme. Agreement was reached on 15 December 1995 regarding the four principal areas of concern in the packaging chain: the packaging raw material manufacturers, the converters, the packer/fillers, and the retailers.
Agreement was reached on 15 December on the basis of a majority; it was not a unanimous decision. Concern has been expressed since that meeting, and it was comforting to hear the Minister confirm that the regulations are not set in stone and will be reviewed as and when that proves necessary. The purpose of shared responsibility is to reduce the likelihood of any one group being able to profit at the expense of the rest, thereby inflating the total cost of the scheme. That concern has been expressed on more than one occasion.
Mr. Sheerman:
There is no wicked scenario: companies will make commercial judgments within their sectors. Unless there is regulation to control their activities, the issue will never be resolved fully and companies will continue, quite rightly, to pursue their particular commercial interests. We have a dog's breakfast of regulation because a dog's breakfast is better than no breakfast at all.
Mr. O'Brien:
We must establish who will regulate the regulations. I believe that that is the duty of the Environment Agency, but the Minister and the Department must take some responsibility for ensuring that the regulations apply fairly and equally across the industry.
I remind the House that the all-party group on sustainable waste management has held many meetings to consider these issues and has listened to speakers representing all sides of the industry. We must address this controversial matter. The Minister's assurances are
encouraging, but we must ensure that he delivers on them. Some packaging manufacturers claim that the regulations are inequitable because retailers and supermarkets may carry an unfair and insufficient share of the obligations. Reference has been made to the involvement of retailers and their ability to use transit packaging, predominantly paper and board, to help to discharge their responsibilities. They could easily use the cardboard boxes and paper packaging in their back-yards to fulfil their obligations, whereas, in many instances, those materials should be returned to the supplier in order to distribute the responsibility fairly throughout the industry. Some of the supermarket chains could offset their responsibilities without joining a multi-material collection scheme.
In an Adjournment debate that I secured on 15 January, I suggested that the number of companies excluded from the regulations must be kept to a minimum and that all businesses, people and commercial undertakings involved with packaging must be encouraged to join Valpak or some such scheme. Time will tell whether the £5 million cut-off point is satisfactory. It must be stressed that the regulations should not be a burden on small businesses and that it will be in their interests to join a collective industrial scheme to ensure that their legal obligations are met. The Minister referred to registration. I think that it would be more economical for small businesses to come together for legal advice and in other situations that could develop in the industry.
It is paramount that all kinds of waste must be included in recovery and recycling principles. I refer particularly to plastic and glass. If we are not careful with the regulations, some businesses might have to pick up the most expensive part of recycling and recovery while others will achieve their targets at the least expense. Wood in packaging will also have to be addressed--if not today, in future. That matter was raised in the Adjournment debate, but it has not been settled. As a matter of fact, we have not yet had an interpretation of packaging. The Advisory Committee on Packaging will have to address that, too. Some retailers may find paper and board easier to recover than other materials, and I hope that the advisory committee will monitor that. It must also ensure that the directive's targets, implemented by the regulations, are achieved in a free-market scenario.
The Minister referred to the legislation as pioneering. There may therefore be some conflict in the application of the directive in the market. It would be helpful if the advisory committee were to publish a report from time to time on how the industry is going under the regulations. Is that within its responsibilities? If so, how often could it publish such reports? Would they be available to hon. Members in the Library or the Vote Office?
If the industry is to achieve its goal, it must do so without imposing excessive costs. Reference has been made to some parts of the industry having to meet excessive costs of £40 million or £45 million. Indeed, packaging recovery in some European Union member states has carried excessive costs. The German scheme has been mentioned. I am advised that, in Germany and Austria, citizens pay about £20 a year in inflated product costs so that certain targets can be reached. That point was made in exchanges earlier. The Government are suggesting a cost to United Kingdom citizens of between £5 and £11 a head a year. If such a target is set,
a monitoring exercise must be undertaken to report on progress in achieving it. We should receive progress reports on how the advisory committee is viewing the legislation and the regulations.
My hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours), who was in his place at the beginning of the debate but had to leave, asked me to pass to the Minister a number of questions from his mailbag. Due to the shortness of the debate, I shall not read them out.
Mr. Robert B. Jones:
If I hear from the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours), I shall be delighted to try to assist him in any way I can.
Mr. O'Brien:
I am sure that that will meet my hon. Friend's concern. He had to leave to attend a Committee, so I said that I would make the points on his behalf.
Dame Peggy Fenner (Medway):
My hon. Friend the Member for Faversham (Sir R. Moate) has been hearing from small businesses. I have the honour of being chairman of the all-party retail industry group. My hon. Friends will be aware that, under the regulations--the hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) referred to it--retailers have 47 per cent. of the recovery obligations. With the packers and fillers, that comes to 83 per cent. of the responsibility for recovery of packaged waste.
The British Retail Consortium, the Food and Drink Federation and the alcoholic drinks industry have issued a joint statement in support of the regulations. A number of distinguished members of the all-party sustainable waste management group have worked over the years on how we are to survive, given our packaging methods, and how we are to achieve recovery and recycling. Whatever criticisms and concerns are expressed, everybody must support the regulations. My hon. Friend the Member for Faversham referred to small businesses in the retail industry. I should like to make two points about them.
I, too, have had correspondence with the Association of Convenience Stores which, as my hon. Friend the Member for Faversham said, comprises 1,500 retail member companies. It supports almost 11,000 local stores and 101,000 employees. The association is very worried that the regulations will be a burden on its members. Although businesses that handle less than 50 tonnes of packaging waste a year or have annual turnovers of less than £5 million will be exempt until 2000, the threshold will then be lowered to a turnover of £1 million. In today's market, that is not such a sum, and it could be achieved by a fairly small business. Some concern has been expressed by small retailing groups that burdens will bear disproportionately on small retailers.
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