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Mr. Brake: I speak in favour of the amendments that the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, North (Ms Walley) and I drafted. Obviously, I am disappointed that, in response to the question posed by the hon. Member for Ashford (Mr. Green), the Minister has not accepted the full-blown amendment, but I consider it a partial victory that the Government have taken on board some elements of that amendment. That will widen the scope of the available information about emissions, to include, as the amendment suggests, "energy consumption" and "efficiency". At a time when we are discussing climate change and the reduction of carbon dioxide, it is most important that we know those figures.
The amendment will help to identify waste and its destination. The Government are--or should be--pushing hard to reduce the amount of waste that is generated, and to reuse or recycle waste where possible. The information will be helpful in that respect. The information is needed and it will be used. I hoped that the amendment would receive the support of Members on both sides of the House, but that appears not to be the case. I shall support the amendment.
Mr. Gray:
I share the concern expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Green) about some of the implications of the amendments. They fulfil some of the primary requirements of all new Labour measures--to be centralising, to collect information and to be bureaucratic. They go a long way towards providing information that statisticians and the Office for National Statistics may find useful in some future analysis. However, they will not do much to help reduce pollution in the United Kingdom, which is, presumably, the main purpose of the Bill.
There is no upside, but the amendments seem to have some potential downsides. We are talking about quite small businesses, as I pointed out in my earlier intervention, which may be relatively unsophisticated. Some of the pig farmers and chicken farmers in my constituency will be affected by the Bill; they will face significant bureaucratic problems in making available to the Government every piece of information relating to what they have done with the products of their farms. I will not give a graphic account of those products on this occasion. As a result of the Bill, farmers, who may be on their uppers, will already be faced with some bureaucratic interference. The amendments will mean that they have to undertake more paperwork for no particular reason.
We have just debated new clause 1, which tries to put right the anomaly that 12 per cent. of all sites that should have been licensed have not been licensed. The pointwas made that the measure will affect relatively unsophisticated businesses, which--through no fault of their own--have apparently failed to license their site, or have failed to renew their licence. We are now discussing the establishment of a new, bureaucratic and centralised regime that will require those same businesses to produce complicated information for no purpose, apart from satisfying the curiosity of the Office for National Statistics.
There is no upside, but potentially a large downside to the amendments. In that context, I am concerned about the possible costs. Accountants and bureaucrats of all sorts will be involved. People will have to be employed--perhaps lawyers. There will be costs involved in the production of the information. More important, it is worrying that if businesses fail to provide--through some slip, or through overwork, or lack of sophistication--the information that is demanded of them, there might be penalties. What will those penalties be? In years to come, my constituents may find that, if they fail--through no fault of their own--to comply with the requirements of the Bill, they will be taken to court and penalised. That may cost them significant amounts. Unless the Minister can explain the measures more clearly than he did in his introductory remarks--which I found rather difficult to follow--it seems that they will result in considerable costs for my constituents.
Mr. Meale:
I shall respond to hon. Members' queries, the first of which came from the hon. Member for Ashford (Mr. Green), who is leading the debate for the Opposition. He asked why we are introducing a detailed amendment at this late stage. The Bill has always allowed for the extension of the pollution inventory. The amendments respond to specific points made by hon. Members in Committee and cover information about energy and waste.
The hon. Gentleman implied that the pollution inventory simply piles extra burdens on businesses. We are discussing cases in which owners of businesses say to their neighbours, "In the interests of my business, I shall have to put this substance into your home." I accept that, to a certain extent, we tolerate that practice as the price of living and working together as a community. However, it is clearly unacceptable for the same business owners to say that it is too much of an effort for them to be courteous enough even to explain what the substance is. The pollution inventory is a fair and proper initiative which should be introduced.
Mr. John Gummer (Suffolk, Coastal):
I am striving to understand the Minister. I agree with him in principle, so I am not being antagonistic, but if the pollution inventory is so important, why did not the Government originally include it in the Bill? I have come late to the debate, and I apologise to the House for that. [Hon. Members: "Oh."] Well, when the Government table such an amendment this late in the proceedings, many hon. Members who are concerned that they should understand it have to go to a great deal of trouble to be present. Will the Minister explain why the pollution inventory is being included in the Bill so late in the proceedings if it is as important as he says?
Mr. Meale:
It is very simple. We have responded to hon. Members from both sides of the House who urged us, in Committee, to take that action. We listened, we learned and we adopted that proposal.
I turn now to the accusation that the benefits do not justify the costs. Information about energy use could be of great benefit. For example, it could bring best practice to the fore and promote the spread of energy efficiency measures, which would cut costs for businesses and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Similarly, more information about quantities and patterns of waste disposal can only help our efforts to minimise waste, thereby saving money and improving our environment.
Any proposal to use the powers would proceed only in the light of a comprehensive cost-benefit analysis and full consultation with industry and, of course, other interested groups. As I said earlier, we shall proceed with the expansion of the inventory at a sensible pace.
Mr. Green:
With the leave of the House, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I shall speak again. I am impelled to do so by the Minister's non-explanation for the amendments. He
It is not appropriate for Ministers to come to the House with legislation and say vaguely that it will be helpful to business, increase the provision of information and benefit the environment, and then to say casually, "At some time in the future, we shall try to gather the facts that may or may not back up the assertions that we have just made."
Ministers are doing things in completely the wrong order. Not only are the amendments being introduced at a peculiarly late stage in our considerations of the Bill, but Ministers have had several weeks since the Committee proceedings to respond to the suggestions made to them, and they appear not to have gone to the trouble of gathering any facts to back up the sop that they giving to the Liberal Democrats and Labour Back Benchers.
The explanation for the amendments is inadequate, and I invite the House to vote against them.
Question put, That the amendment be made:--
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