Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1
- 19)
THURSDAY 21 OCTOBER 1999
MS SUE
COLLINS AND
MR RICHARD
LEAFE
Chairman
1. Good morning to you both, and welcome to
the Committee. Ms Collins, you are the Policy Director, I think,
of English Nature, and Mr Leafe you are the Manager of the External
Relations Team; now does that mean external relations to the rest
of us?
(Mr Leafe) It means to everything, and it includes
Europe and the Commission, yes.
2. But us, as well, Parliament?
(Mr Leafe) You, as well, absolutely, yes.
3. Right; you cover the world?
(Mr Leafe) And we have a Parliamentary Liaison Officer
specifically to deal with Parliament, as part of the team.
(Ms Collins) Richard also has responsibility for the
European Project, so he reports to me on those issues.
4. Right, good; well, we are very glad to welcome
you. Is there anything you would like to say in addition to what
you have already set out, very kindly, in your memorandum to us,
before we kick off?
(Ms Collins) Thank you, Chairman. I would just like
to emphasise that English Nature regards this as a very important
time, and one where the European Union could take a path that
will really change what happens on the ground, or it could choose
to smother change with rhetoric, and we want to see real change.
Chairman: Smother change with rhetoric;
it is a good phrase. There is a lot of that goes on in the environmental
world. Thank you very much indeed.
Mr Shaw
5. Good morning. The Helsinki Summit; there
are opportunities there, perhaps, not to do as you suggested,
and the Finnish Presidency has declared that they want to see
the environment central to their Presidency, and the Commission
"are looking to a new millennium". What do you think
that the Helsinki Summit can achieve, and then perhaps you can
follow on by answering how likely is it that there is going to
be real progress?
(Ms Collins) I think the Helsinki Summit could decide
to go for an EU sustainable development strategy at an overarching
level, led creatively by Mr Prodi and heads of government, because
I think that is where it needs to lie, and I think they could
also resolve to have a strong environmental strand to that strategy
in a new Sixth Environmental Action Programme which has goals
and timetables that are very firmly linked in to a sustainable
development strategy. I think we need political will by Ministers
of Agriculture, Fisheries, Trade, particularly to stop doing `business
as usual' and confront the challenges that environmental integration
offers.
6. Can you give some examples?
(Ms Collins) Certainly. The agriculture debate has
been one we have taken a very close interest in, and we have offered
considerable technical and policy-related advice to both the UK
Government and to the European Commission, both as English Nature
and in collaboration with other European Environmental Advisory
Councils. And the current configuration of the CAP is a collection
of perverse subsidies that are not justified, in terms of the
public goods they buy; there is a need to redirect a high proportion,
or at least a third, of the subsidies to explicitly-linked agri-environment
schemes in the countryside. The decisions at the Berlin Summit
will have perverse effects, because the budget decisions destroy
the logic of the second pillar of the CAP by starving it of resources.
The EU is going to argue, in the trade talks, that the Agenda
2000 settlement will achieve environmental goals; at the current
level of funding for agri-environment schemes across Europe, that
will not happen. There is no compulsory cross-compliance, so those
production subsidies will continue until 2006, stimulating environmental
damage, and that requires political will to confront.
7. You do not sound very optimistic. Is the
Summit the key opportunity, if we miss this then we are just going
to continue on the road to ruin?
(Ms Collins) No, not at all. I think that we need
the Summit to take it seriously, and the British Government has
been taking environmental integration seriously for at least five
years and we still have not achieved the results for the environment
we need. So we know it is a very long, slow and complex process,
and, I said at the beginning, I regard the integration process
that the EU has embarked on as a very important and essential
one. I would like to see it go deeper and faster. I support the
process that is set in train.
(Mr Leafe) You asked what the chances of success were.
I think it is worth pointing out that the situation really has
never been better for promoting sustainable development. For a
start, we have a Treaty obligation, in Amsterdam, to put SD at
the heart of environmental policies; we have a new Commission
that has said this is a very important plank in their policy,
indeed, the President and the new Environment Commissioner have
both made it a priority of their own personal agendas. And we
have also got a sort of a process of conversion coming together,
in that the Fifth Environmental Action Programme has come to an
end, they have produced the Global Assessment, which has said,
in its output, that a new sustainable development strategy is
now needed, and there are things like the Rio+10 Conference coming
up, which is going to focus attention. And there is going to be
a need for the Commission to demonstrate that they have done something
along those lines, and put all those things together, the completion
of the Cardiff integration process being an important one, and
I think you have got the ground rules, the basis, for achieving
something really significant here.
8. It is always pleasing to hear that the environment
person is interested and keen to see the environment flourish;
but do you think it will be a watershed or just a stepping-stone?
(Ms Collins) It could be a watershed.
Mr Gerrard
9. In your paper and you said again now that
you think that you ought to be seeing production of a strategy
for sustainable development as an important function, an overarching
strategy; how far do you think that ought to be based around sustainable
development indicators, and if it is going to be indicator-based
who should be developing those indicators?
(Ms Collins) I think indicators have to form an important
element of the strategy and I think there have to be linked goals
and targets. I think there is a lot of work around on indicators,
as we have suggested, and the UK Government's work is quite seminal
on that. The UK Sustainable Development headline indicator set
plus the detailed indicators do cover a lot of very relevant ground
and they do include a biodiversity indicator in the bird indicator,
and we firmly believe that biodiversity is a key test of sustainable
development; so we would support an indicator-based approach.
But also it needs to have a strong focus of impact assessment
linked to that, because we need to diagnose what is wrong and
then find the package of instruments that will change the economic
signals to farmers and others so that they will change their behaviour
over time.
10. If something is going to develop at Helsinki,
alright, the UK has done some work but that is not the case right
across Europe, how far do you think we should try to develop indicators
at Helsinki, what should the scope be, do we need to focus fairly
narrowly on trying to get some headline indicators rather than
get bogged down in detail?
(Ms Collins) I think the framework for indicators
is very important and I think that headline indicators would be
a good start, provided they covered the right set, but they are
not a substitute for a properly constituted broader set of indicators;
but, over time, we have got to walk before we can run.
11. What would you see as the right set, just
in more general terms?
(Ms Collins) From an environmental perspective, something
that recognised the irreplaceability of certain environmental
assets is an important component of sustainable development, I
do not think we have got it quite right in the UK strategy yet.
I think something on wildlife is important, biodiversity indicators.
I think water, air and soil quality are very important. And then
we come to some social indicators, on which we are not experts,
of course, and some economic indicators. But the trick is that
there has to be an integrated set, and we have to find ways of
looking for solutions in terms of growth which respects the environment.
So these are not indicators to be traded off against each other,
and that is quite a challenge, intellectually.
12. If indicators are developed at EU level,
who should be responsible for monitoring, reporting on progress,
how should that be done?
(Ms Collins) I think, the expert sectors. Obviously,
the European Environment Agency has an expertise in relation to
environmental indicators. I think the responsibility should lie
with a sustainable development unit in Mr Prodi's office to review
the indicator, the results.
13. So you would set up a new unit specifically
to do that?
(Ms Collins) I would; to oversee it, yes.
14. How would you see an EU sustainable development
strategy linking with strategies in Member States?
(Mr Leafe) I think it is important that decision-making
is integrated across all levels; in fact, starting at a global
one then a European level and then a national level, and then,
below that, at a regional level, so there should be some synergy
of approach between them. They need to include elements like a
lot of cross-sectoral working, so, within the Commission, for
instance, regular meetings of Environment, Agriculture and Trade
Commissioners and their Directorates, to be mirrored with a similar
institutional structure in the UK or in other Member States. And,
unless you get that flow through and some kind of similarity in
terms of the indicators that people are working on, I think you
will not feel the full force of a strategy; so there needs to
be complementarity at those three different levels.
(Ms Collins) I would say that they need to nest, in
some way, and the EU needs to take a holistic approach across
the whole of sustainable development in its strategic thinking,
so looking at economic, social and environmental goals, and it
needs to apply the principles of sustainability, like the prevention
principle, precautionary principle, transparency, those principles
need to be enshrined in its strategy. But, obviously, it must
go for most detail on the areas in which it is competent, so I
would single out agriculture and fisheries as touchstones, and
trade, as touchstones where it actually needs to make sure that
the decision-making process and decisions made at the EU level
are more sustainable. So it does not want to duplicate everything
that is the responsibility of Member States, as it will be completely
rejected.
15. You have mentioned the possibility of a
unit specifically set up for monitoring, for developing policy;
can you see any other institutional changes that would be needed
within the EU, whether it is Commission, Parliaments?
(Ms Collins) At the Commission level, I think an SD
unit should be set up and it should have some environmental expertise,
it is very important that it is located in Mr Prodi's office.
I think all Directorates General should take advice from experts
on environmental issues and subject new and old programmes and
policies to environmental assessment. We think that to deliver
programmes like the agri-environment programme there should be
a joint DGXI/DGVI unit set up to oversee that; and the same would
apply in some other policy areas. And more openness and transparency
in decision-making would be valuable at the EU level. At the Parliament
level, I think they should set up an environmental audit committee,
as I said in our evidence; it is cross-cutting, it is cross-sectoral,
it can challenge and it has got a focus. The worry I have about
the latest UK strategy is that bringing in economic and social
dimensions and sort of spraying indicators all over the place
will actually miss the point, that to be environmentally sustainable
there are certain trade-offs that you cannot do, some environmental
assets are irreplaceable, and there is a risk that a proliferation—it
is a bit like rhetoric—will obscure the real things that
need to change. We also think DGXI needs to be stronger and it
needs to implement environmental legislation, not only through
infracting Member States but also through ensuring that EU policy
decisions are truly environmental, and that is not deep enough
yet.
(Mr Leafe) And there are some more subtle things in
here, as well, about the ability of the Commission to focus more
on outputs rather than processes; there is the question, at the
moment, over whether the attention to auditing and the need for
probity and careful accounting is actually stifling innovation,
and there are things about better joined-up Commission working,
as I have already mentioned, between the different Directorates
General. Also, I think there are issues around the calibre of
staff that are employed in the Commission to deal with some of
these things, and I understand Mr Kinnock is coming forward with
some proposals to make sure that the brightest and the best are
recruited by the Commission to deal with some of these tricky
tasks. And I think the Commission also needs the confidence to
really plan ahead longer than a one- or two-year window, to make
the most out of these what are very long-term issues.
(Ms Collins) On the Council of Ministers, we think
there should be more Joint Councils to encourage joined-up working.
The heads of government scrutiny is very important, and I think
that they should consider reports from an environmental audit
committee of the Parliament, if one were set up. I think the European
Environment Agency should be allowed to give advice on policies
affecting the environment as well as reporting on the state of
it.
16. If you have Joint Councils, joint working
parties between Directorates, is not there a danger you are just
going to have a proliferation of meetings, and that what you want
is someone central in the Commission who has really got some clout
on this?
(Ms Collins) Clout counts, yes, money, power and decision-making
clout, definitely, is important, but it needs to be underpinned
by excellent policy analysis, and excellent policy analysis that
takes place in a very vertical and bounded space is not going
to deliver sustainable development.
Chairman
17. But is not there, nonetheless, a danger
that, in concentrating on getting the right framework for sustainable
development, which, as you say, includes economic and social matters
and which will, inevitably, to some extent, trade off against
environmental matters, you may lose, as you yourself were saying,
Ms Collins, some of the hard-edged, untradeable, environmental
priorities which a more isolated policy, if I can put it like
that, would have?
(Ms Collins) If there is a weak model of sustainable
development that is pursued at the Prodi level then that is the
consequence, yes. If the courage were there and the political
will were there to promote a stronger model of sustainable development
which recognised the importance of environmental limits as one
of its strands, and the importance of environmental goals, and
there is scope for environmental recovery, then it could be a
powerful force for change.
18. Would you think the Court of Auditors, which
is an existing body inside the European Union, could have a role
on environmental matters?
(Ms Collins) If its expertise were expanded, yes;
as the NAO here has a role, and it is a question of expertise,
I think. Policy appraisal is not the same as audit, in the financial
sense, but environmental audit is very important, and, some of
the same disciplines are relevant. We have mentioned probity,
and so on, earlier, we are very seized of the fact that European
money must be properly spent, but there is a balance to be struck
between this and avoiding the stifling innovation.
19. It is just that I think that, in this area,
the European Union is a complicated enough organisation and a
bureaucratic enough organisation as it is, because, as Mr Gerrard
was saying, there is a danger of this whole thing being enveloped
in process and some of that sharpness being lost?
(Ms Collins) There is, yes; that is why I attach importance
to a Sixth Environmental Action Programme as a strand of an integrated
SD strategy, with clear goals and timetables, and the Finnish
paper on agriculture does start to make a move in that direction,
it talks about milestones.
Chairman: Dr Iddon, you wanted to come
onto Treaty changes.
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