Examination of Witnesses (Questions 60
- 79)
THURSDAY 21 OCTOBER 1999
MR PETER
MADDEN, MS
REBECCA WILLIS,
DR PAUL
JEFFERISS AND
MR PAUL
HAMBLIN
60. What sort of other structural changes do
you think might be necessary within the EU, whether it is Parliament,
Commission, Council of Ministers; what sort of structural changes
do you think are needed?
(Ms Willis) To take the Commission, I have highlighted
this central sustainable development unit and strategy. I think
it would also be a useful exercise for the Commission DGs to go
through the same sectoral sustainability strategy processes that
the Councils have gone through, so that each DG is asked to consider
its impact on sustainable development. There is this chance at
the moment, with the Inter-Governmental Conference coming up next
year, and there seems to be political will for quite radical change
in the way that the Commission is run; and this will be a good
chance to look at horizontal issues generally within the Commission,
it is not something that they are traditionally very good at,
they have a very vertical approach. Just to take the Parliament,
quickly, the Parliament, similarly, has no provision at the moment
for cross-cutting issues, it is organised on a committee basis,
and although the Environment Committee can give its opinions to
other committees they do not have any say about taking the lead
on sustainable development issues. I think that there is a real
need to look at integration within the Parliament, especially
given that the Parliament actually could act very proactively
here. One of the things we have suggested is that now that the
Parliament has co-decision it would be quite within its rights
to refuse to consider any Commission proposals which do not have
an environmental appraisal attached to them. The Parliament has
got a real chance here, and it needs to think about its own structures
in order to take advantage of that.
Mr Savidge
61. Would you also favour the suggestion that
has just been made about an environmental audit committee?
(Ms Willis) Yes, I think it is an interesting suggestion.
I think that the European Parliament works in a very different
way from Westminster, and the actual mechanisms by which a committee
like that would be put in place would have to be looked at; as
I say, there is not any way at the moment of getting a cross-cutting
committee into place. I think that such an institution is needed,
yes.
Chairman
62. On this point of who takes the lead amongst
the Commissioners, and you said you would like a Commission Vice-President,
as you have heard, English Nature suggested the President take
the lead. Is there any particular reason why you have suggested
a Vice-President, or is it just because maybe you thought the
President had a lot on his plate anyway, "Let's get a number
two to lead on the environment;" or was there some more specific
reason?
(Ms Willis) We would be more than happy for the President
of the Commission to take that job.
63. So you are quite relaxed about it?
(Ms Willis) If he has the time and resources to do
so; but it will need proactive leadership and that might be better
coming from a Vice-President.
(Mr Madden) But also because I think that the President
may have more of an external role, in a sense, and more of an
ambassadorial role, and the Vice-Presidents may be more focused
on dealing with internal EU politics and institutional change,
and so on, so it might be better to site it with a Vice-President;
but, as I say, we are relaxed.
Dr Iddon
64. Looking next at the legislative framework
that is driving the integration of the environmental agenda forward,
do you think that Article 6 in the Amsterdam Treaty is enough
for that to happen, or should the forthcoming Inter-Governmental
Conference agree further Treaty changes, particularly with a view
to giving individual DGs and Councils some ownership of the total
agenda?
(Mr Madden) We have not recommended Treaty amendments
or changes, for the main reason that we think that since 1987
we have had legal provision in EU Treaties and it has been strengthened
two times subsequently. Our feeling is that the need is not to
get yet more Treaty provisions in place, the need is now actually
to turn those Treaty provisions into action, so we would focus
our attention much more on how we turn existing legal language
into real change.
65. Would that comment apply also to the Treaty
of Rome which deals with the various common policies, or would
you seek changes there as well?
(Mr Madden) Again, I would think that the Treaty wording
largely says that environment must be integrated into all other
policy areas.
66. So you do not see any changes forthcoming
at the next Inter-Governmental Conference?
(Mr Madden) We are not going to be working around
Treaty changes, I think we are going to be focusing more on delivery
of existing obligations.
67. That brings me on to compliance. Do you
think that the framework for dealing with compliance is strong
enough at the moment, or would you seek changes there, or do you
think the framework is okay but the action is not taking place?
(Dr Jefferiss) Certainly, the action is not taking
place, the Birds and Habitats Directives are a supreme example
of that; hardly any Member State has come up with an appropriate
list of SPAs or SACs. That would argue, I would imagine, that
the framework for compliance is inadequate, but we have not developed
specific recommendations for modifications of the compliance framework.
Chairman
68. So, basically, you think that Article 6
is enough, even though it is a free-standing one and is possibly
in conflict with other Articles, other fundamental Articles?
(Mr Hamblin) I think that the key issue comes down
to the policing of the Treaty, what is within it. And that does
mean that, for example, when different parts of the European Commission,
or European Parliament, are asked for their comments, the Environment
section is not simply looking at minor amendments and is this
going to have an impact on the environment, but they are actually
able, in a position, and being supported from more senior figures
to challenge the foundation of policies which are contrary to
sustainable development and Articles which are within the Treaty.
(Dr Jefferiss) I would say also it is a matter of
resource allocation; when once a provision is in the Treaty or
a Directive has passed into law it has been agreed to by the EU
Member States but some of them, on particular issues, find it
quite simply impossible to meet the requirements of Articles or
Directives because adequate funding has not been provided. So,
for example, again on the Birds and Habitats Directives, they
are expensive Directives to implement and very inadequate funding
has been made available to implement them; the same with the Rural
Development Regulation, it provides a nice foundation on which
to build but the foundation will remain shaky as long as funding
is not made available to build on it. I think resource allocation
to the various DGs, to the various Council support staffs and
to the Parliamentary Committee support staffs is also an issue.
There is very little in the way of, environmental expertise or
even sustainable development expertise within those various bodies,
and without ensuring that the various agencies within the European
institutions have the staff capability and the financial resources
to pursue the various requirements in the Treaty, it is unlikely
that they are going to be implemented.
Mr Robertson
69. You heard the answers which English Nature
gave, but what is your view about the Councils which have been
invited to prepare strategies, are those the ones which should
be given the priority?
(Dr Jefferiss) They are certainly important ones,
but, eventually, we think that all sectors should be invited,
or required, to undertake sustainability integration strategies.
A glaring omission at the moment is competition; trade issues
and competition are clearly areas which have significant sustainability
impacts and they should be the first priority for the next tranche
of sectoral strategies. Having said that, I think the nine that
have been called for so far are clearly important. But there are
some, common shortcomings and successes that those strategies
share, and then there are some differences between them. There
is a wide range of generic shortcomings. For example, there is
no consistency of approach between the different sectors, which
makes it very difficult to compare how effective they are. There
is generally no timetable built in for revising the strategies
or ratcheting up the stringency of the requirements that they
contain. And, if the Fifth Environmental Action Programme is anything
to go by, any strategy developed now will very quickly become
out of date; one of the shortcomings of the Fifth Environmental
Action Programme was that it was developed several years ago and
within a couple of years new Treaties had made some of its provisions
no longer relevant. Most of the existing Council strategies are
very cautious and conservative, they contain no long-distance
future thinking and they contain very little that is radical,
there are very few targets and very few specific commitments.
All of them tend to celebrate their existing achievements without
noting that those achievements, laudable though they may be, are
wholly inadequate to deal with the problem; and none of them refer
to the urgent need for funding to carry out the sustainable development
strategies that they propose. Now those shortcomings are after
the Vienna Council had invited stronger strategies from the various
sectors. The one we are particularly concerned about is the agriculture
strategy, it is quite defensive, it still lays a lot of stress
on the need for the agriculture sector to remain competitive,
stressing the economic and social roles of agriculture but relatively
little on the environmental role of agriculture. It is very general
in its aspirations, it is very general in its tactics for reaching
its aspirations, it does not look far into the future, it does
not even explore opportunities like the WTO round for possible
reforms. So agriculture, we think, needs a thorough overhaul.
For energy and transport, we feel that its aspirations are laudable
and progressive; for example, transport notes that "long-term
environmental concerns should play a role equal to other concerns
such as social and economic factors." It also notes that
economic growth and traffic growth could be decoupled; it refers
to the need for environmental assessments of infrastructure, to
road-pricing, to the need for public transport. So it is progressive
in its general thinking, but it is quite short on specific recommendations
for how to achieve those goals. The Development Council's draft
strategy, too, is good in principle but short on specifics. So
I think what we need is more detail in those strategies. For the
other sectors, Fisheries, Ecofin and General Affairs, we have
not yet seen the reports. One other thing it is worth saying is
that there is a relative lack of transparency in the process,
and it would be nice in the future for the public and NGOs to
have a little bit more access to these documents, and, ideally,
some input to them, because we tend to get drafts late, after
the fact, and leaked, in one way or another, rather than simply
delivered to us as a matter of course. So the drafts I am referring
to date from late September; there may have been changes since.
Chairman
70. You probably heard me ask English Nature
what their verdict was on the Fifth Environmental Action Plan;
do you think it was a failure?
(Ms Willis) There were a number of problems with the
Fifth Environmental Action Plan, and just to mention a couple
that English Nature did not, one thing that the Fifth Environmental
Action Plan failed to do was get buy-in from a wider sector, either
from other Commission DGs, it was very much DGXI-focused, or from
the Parliament, who argued long and hard over it, or, in fact,
the wider public. Other actors, both in Member States and at the
EU level, were not asked to contribute to the process and did
not feel ownership of it. We think this is—
71. Sorry to interrupt you; did you say the
Parliament played a role in—argued hard, you said?
(Ms Willis) The Parliament played a role in the legislative
process, but they had a lot of problems with it, they felt that
it was very much led by DGXI and it took several years to agree
on it.
72. Right; that was the view of the European
Parliament, that it was too much led by DGXI?
(Ms Willis) The European Parliament had a lot of problems
with the general direction of the Action Plan, yes, which is why
it took them so long to agree on it.
(Dr Jefferiss) I think it is probably also fair to
say that it lacked really rigorous targets, and that to the extent
that it did contain targets they quickly became out of date as
events in the external world progressed; so building in a review,
a more frequent review, might be appropriate for the next iteration.
(Mr Madden) It was also focused very much on Europe
and it did not look at our place and role in the world and as
a major trading nation and as a member of the international community,
and I think we cannot deal with sustainable development just at
the European level.
73. Would you, nonetheless, like English Nature,
want to see a Sixth Plan?
(Dr Jefferiss) Yes.
74. But a reformed and revised one?
(Ms Willis) We would like to see a Sixth Plan which
contributed to an overall sustainable development strategy, yes;
we think it is important to keep a strong environmental component
in there through the Action Plan, which will lead in to the overarching
Plan.
(Dr Jefferiss) I think the assumption that an environmental
action programme would suffice, in place of a sustainable development
plan, fails to recognise that sustainable development is composed
of three or, arguably, four strands, environment, economic, social
(and natural resources) so environment would be one component.
75. How would you respond to this point that
was made by Mr Gerrard and others in the last session with English
Nature that there is a danger that sustainable development, by
its nature, as a tripartite element, given that you are also plugging
it into the European Union, which is a complex, bureaucratic organisation,
may lose some of the sharpness on specifically environmental matters,
which English Nature was clearly worried about, in relation to
biodiversity, for example?
(Dr Jefferiss) I think, having a Sixth Environmental
Action Programme as well would provide that counterbalance and
sharp focus that could be lost otherwise.
76. So that is the answer, is it?
(Mr Madden) It is going to have both. At the UK level,
I think the Committee has expressed this concern about our own
sustainable development strategy, but at the European level we
will have an overarching sustainable development strategy and
an environmental action programme, and we think that having the
two of those will help to solve that problem.
(Ms Willis) Just looking at this in terms of the institutional
structures, we would see the environmental action plan as being
led by DGXI and focusing on environmental aspects, which is their
job, and the sustainable development strategy being led from the
centre and being overarching.
Chairman: I am always a little worried,
being slightly cynical about governments, that if you give them
two objectives they will try to achieve one and say, "Look,
we achieved one; we didn't achieve the other one, but we achieved
one." And, therefore, you do not actually get the priority
you want. If you give them only one objective, did they or did
they not achieve it, is the question; but, there we are.
Mr Blizzard
77. Can I ask your view on the effectiveness
of the measures brought in by the Commission to ensure better
integration, I mentioned three before but I will add the others
in: screening of all policy and full environmental appraisal,
that is one; green starring, the second; looking at European Union
funding; but also have they appointed environmental integration
correspondence, and are they working, in each DG; what about the
greening of the budget that they committed themselves to; and
training of staff, environmental training of staff? What are they
doing on those?
(Mr Hamblin) There is certainly a plethora of different
initiatives within the Commission, which is encouraging, but I
think that we need to look at, as English Nature highlighted,
the outcomes as much as the process. I have brought along "Policy
Appraisal and the Environment", the guidance produced by
the UK Government, which is an important step forward, but of
particular interest to the Committee is going to be is this being
implemented throughout Whitehall? Similarly, we need to see the
systems being implemented throughout the Commission and by the
different DGs, and I think there is clear evidence that things
such as the green star system are not working effectively. And
the European Commission, DGXI in particular, are quite upfront
in recognising the need for improvement. A paper which they produced
for the Cologne Summit highlighted that the green star system
had a narrow scope, and there have been difficulties in attributing
the green stars due to a limitation of information. So I think
that, in terms of the Commission, as an institution, we need to
be looking at the training that is provided and ensuring that
it is stepped up; because although there are a lot of initiatives
they really need reinvigoration and they need high-level, political
leadership to take them forward. We need to see the effective
use of appraisals and, as has been mentioned earlier, proposals
which are coming forward without environmental appraisals not
being considered either by Commissioners or, indeed, by Council.
And the Council can have a role in helping the different Directorates
General to green themselves by, for exmaple, ensuring that UK
Ministers at different Council meetings ask for the appraisals
which the Directorates General should have produced to accompany
proposals. But we also need to look at the budgeting process,
and I know that the Committee has taken a particular interest
in the Comprehensive Spending Review in this country, and its
scope for ensuring that budgets promote sustainable outcomes rather
than go against them. And, certainly, we can see a role at a European
level to apply similar techniques, so that resource allocation
is consistent with the overarching objectives set out in the Treaty.
And we would also wish to see agreement on the draft Directive
on Strategic Environmental Assessment that the Finnish Presidency
are taking forward and trying to get agreement on.
78. So, did I get it right, in terms of evaluating
and keeping the Commission up to the mark in these areas, you
were saying that the Council of Ministers needs to be doing that,
but is there anything more that needs to be done to keep them
up to the mark, particularly bearing in mind that, arguably, events
have shown that the Council were not particularly good at keeping
the Commission up to the mark, in the sense they suddenly decided
they would sack them all, having put up with it for years?
(Mr Hamblin) I think there is a role for all the institutions,
and that was really what lay behind the proposals at Cardiff,
that every institution had a responsibility and each institution
needed to be giving high-level support to integration. Certainly,
the Council can ensure that proposals which are coming before
it are fully consistent with the objectives of environmental integration
and sustainable development; the European Parliament also has
an important monitoring role; and, as has already been highlighted,
the innovative idea of an environmental audit committee.
79. Is that a realistic proposition, an environmental
audit committee with teeth? I know you said there would be some
difficulties with the way things are currently set up, but is
that a realistic thing to call for?
(Mr Hamblin) I think it is realistic, providing Europe
be open to the changes in the mind set, the attitude, and breaking
down the hierarchical barriers, particularly vertically, within
the Commission, in order to achieve environmental integration
and the objectives set out in the various agreements.
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