Examination of Witnesses (Questions 160
- 178)
TUESDAY 26 OCTOBER 1999
THE RT
HON MICHAEL
MEACHER, MP, MS
GLENYS PARRY
AND MR
TONY BRENTON
160. Is that not a weakness in that everyone
knows what the status of an Environmental Action Programme is,
it is quite clear, and yet we do not know what the status of a
Sustainable Development Strategy is.
(Mr Brenton) We are firmly in the area of hypothesis
here as we do not know. We know what the legal status of an Environmental
Action Programme is because we have had one before. Its legal
status was of a Commission document which the Council had expressed
support of and approval of. There is absolutely no reason why
a Sustainable Development Strategy should not take exactly the
same form, but this is a question for once we have agreed, if
we are going to agree, that there is going to be a Sustainable
Development Strategy.
161. Also, if there is a sixth Environmental
Action Programme, and you are talking about a Sustainable Development
Strategy maybe in 2002, are you not putting the cart before the
horse? Should not a Sustainable Development Strategy come before
an Environmental Action Programme so that there can be the appropriate
trade-offs of the two legs of a Sustainable Development Strategy,
namely economic and social?
(Mr Meacher) No, I would not take that view. I would
see the Environmental Action Programme as feeding into, infusing
the Sustainable Development Strategy, and I take what Mr Brenton
has said that it could be legally based in exactly the same way.
An alternative, and I am just really thinking aloud, an alternative
would be that it could be adopted at a Summit Council, at the
European Council.
162. But not at this one?
(Mr Meacher) No, no, it has not been prepared.
163. Exactly.
(Mr Meacher) But if there is a commitment that we
need a Sustainable Development EU-wide Strategy and if that is
agreed at the Helsinki Council, it would be reasonable to suppose
that when a strategy had been prepared, it would come back to
that Council for endorsement and if it were endorsed, then it
would be mandatory on all the relevant bodies within the Community.
164. I think you were rather kind to the fifth
Environmental Action Programme in what you said.
(Mr Meacher) I am always kind!
165. Be careful—that is maybe a fault
in negotiating terms! But certainly some of the evidence that
we have had has been that the environment has really done rather
badly in the past few years and particularly this year when there
has been all the commotion with the change of the Commissioner
and so on and so forth and very little progress has been made.
You will no doubt obviously be aware of the European Environment
Agency's own analysis in its report, that the Agency marks the
EU environmental score card in 15 policy areas. It finds that
environmental quality has currently changed for the worst in eight
of those areas, while there are some positive developments, but
insufficient, in six more. There is also a legend for unambiguously
positive developments and there is no single sector which merits
that play and indeed Commissioner Wallstrom, when she was being
interviewed by the European Parliament, asserted that more or
less everything needs to be done, and she was not very positive
about what had been done, so it looks pretty bad, does it not?
(Mr Meacher) I do not demur from that. I am not sure
that that is the fault of the fifth Environmental Action Programme.
I think that in the absence of a Sustainable Development Strategy
which feeds into all the relevant councils, we are not going to
see a fundamental improvement and we are still not quite there.
The European Environment Agency report did show some improvements
and you did allude to those—trans-boundary air pollution,
pollution of rivers, ozone depletion—but I agree that in
terms of greenhouse gas emissions, threats to biodiversity and
particularly risks from chemicals, we are continuing, if not to
go backwards, not to make progress. I do think specifically in
those areas that the Kyoto Protocol, the European bubble, the
commitment to achieve our targets, to look at interim progress
by 2005, I do anticipate that we are going to see progress on
greenhouse gas emissions, and that on threats to biodiversity,
again the UK has a very good record which began under the last
Government and it continues now with 400 species and habitat action
plans, costed, quantified, specified now in place, a model for
Europe. The EU Biodiversity Action Plan is now being put together
and I would expect that to be complete in the next year or two
and to begin to have a real impact on biodiversity, I hope, including
on birds in France, and the risk from chemicals, I hope, will
be reduced when we do have in place a European strategy for chemical
assessment. That has never been the case and only a handful of
chemicals, amazing as it may seem, have ever been subjected to
systematic assessment. It has now been agreed with CEFIC, which
is the association of European chemical manufacturers, that over
1,000 of the high production volume chemicals, which includes
some of the most toxic and some of those we are most concerned
about, such as endocrine disruptors, will be subject to full assessment
by the year 2004, so there are already plans in place which within
the next five years, even on the weak areas, I think will begin
to allow for noticeable improvement.
Joan Walley
166. I think we are getting to the stage now
where everything depends on everything else, but if I can turn
a bit towards the sectoral strategies, I think you have told us
that it is going to be important that we get the structure right
and if then everything is all about how we implement and enforce
what the structure pre-determines, how do you think that the sectoral
strategies, which were actually agreed at the Cardiff Summit,
can really now make progress? You mentioned that we have this
wave of sectoral policies, that we have got three first of all
with transport, energy and agriculture, but do you feel that those
are the key areas for the first three that come forward or do
you feel, for example, that all the different sectors should be
taking their priorities at the same time and can we wait for the
other ones to come on board? Do you feel that this process of
the different sectors and the different councils making their
individual progress is now as it should be or that more needs
to be done?
(Mr Meacher) I think it is a sensible way to proceed,
to request each of the councils, and transport, energy and agriculture
are absolutely central in terms of environmental impacts, to address
systematically the environmental impacts that their policy area
has. It is only by getting them to think systematically on that
issue and to make proposals that I think we can make progress.
They have made a lot of progress. The Transport Council report
recognises the need to decouple economic growth without necessitating
an increase in traffic, that greenhouse gas emissions from transport
must be Kyoto compatible and they have said that. They have accepted
that there are constraints in terms of the Air Quality Directive
and the UNECE Protocol on acidification and ground-level ozone.
They have recognised that those are all areas where transport
policy needs to change. If you look at the Energy Council Report,
they have proposed an action plan for energy efficiency, an increased
use of renewables and CHP, combined heat and power, that the Council
should internalise external costs exactly as we would propose
and meet Kyoto Protocol commitments. The Agriculture Council report,
which I think is the least satisfactory of the three for well
understood reasons, nevertheless, recognises the need to reduce
agrochemicals and biocides, the need to assess GMOs on a systematic
case-by-case basis, which is exactly what is now happening, a
promotion of further reductions in methane, which is a greenhouse
gas, and ammonia, which is particularly an agricultural area,
the increased use of renewables from biomass and biofuels, and
the promotion of sustainable forestry management. It is all there.
These are excellent reports in the sense that they recognise what
needs to be done and what we now need to hold them to is the implementation
and enforcement within an agreed timescale.
167. I think that is exactly it. I think that
comes back to Mr Shaw's questions previously about whether or
not these papers that we have now got contain targets, contain
the indicators so that your implementation and enforcement can
actually take place. Do you think that they are sufficiently strong
in targets and timetables or do you think that they are still
bland documents? What role have you got as the Environment Minister
in assessing whether or not they are too bland or whether or not
you can put more targets and milestones into them?
(Mr Meacher) First of all, you are right, that they
are too bland. The timescales are not there in most cases. I think
they are most likely to be in the case of transport, to some extent
in energy, not in the case of agriculture and not, I think, in
the case of the other reports, so you are quite right, that whilst
they have been giving some systematic thought to this, perhaps,
I do not say for the first time, but doing it more thoroughly
than they have done it before, but they have not tied themselves
down to action with a specific timescale. They have just recognised
that there needs to be a change of policy, there needs to be a
change of procedure, that it has not been sufficiently tied down
and not within a timescale.
168. That is what I really want to get at because
given what we had at Cardiff and given the Environment Agency's
report about perhaps progress not going forwards, but going two
steps backwards possibly, how do you think you can really make
these particular sectoral reports be that much more tight and
actually have targets and be able to get the inputs that you have
talked so much about? What role have you got, what role has the
Council of Ministers got? How can they be tightened up? How can
they be more than just bland statements of intent? How can we
keep these targets in there and actually get the targets met and
enforced?
(Mr Meacher) Well, that is a good question and when
you ask what can we do, what can the UK do or through the Environment
Council, not as much as I would like. We come back to Mr Brenton's
Chinese walls. I would be in favour personally of inviting the
President of the Agriculture Council perhaps with the Commissioner
to attend our Committee, to explain what they have proposed and
to listen to what we say, which I think would probably be many
of the things that you are saying, that these things are excellent
objectives, but how actually are they going to deliver these grand
objectives and in what timescale, "Can you do it?",
and if they say, "Well, we have not had a chance yet to work
that out, then to say, "Well, perhaps in six months we could
meet again and you could have a specific implementation plan,
action plan". Now, I think given the Protocol's procedures
of the European Community, I am not sure that we can do that.
Each of the councils and the directorates regard themselves, if
not as a law unto themselves, certainly as autonomous bodies and
they do not like to receive suggestions, proposals, criticism
from other bodies. Nevertheless, the publications of these bodies
means that this is into the general pool of data, of ideas, and
it does permeate. We will find a way of commenting, not, I think,
of systematic calling people to account, asking them to attend,
cross-questioning them like you are cross-questioning me because
I do not think we can do that yet, but it is coming.
(Mr Brenton) An obvious route for dealing with this
deficiency in these strategies is for the European Council, when
it looks at them, to underline the importance of indicators and
timetables and to express the hope that the councils, in pursuing
their strategies, will set themselves timetables and indicators
for their achievement and that is a matter for us to try and negotiate
through the machinery which produces the European Council conclusions.
169. Can I just get back on to that because
I think that one of the questions I wanted to ask in terms of
that machinery is that in terms of the contribution that our own
Committee set up under the Greening Government initiative makes,
as far as I understand it, that does not have a direct say in
the sort of competence as far as what goes on in Europe is concerned,
so how can we get our own Greening Government initiative and our
own Environment Minister to have a greater input into that level
of the setting of policies at that European level?
(Mr Brenton) Well, the Minister does. We in the UK
have Cabinet Office machinery which brings in the views of all
departments into setting European policy.
170. But that is indirect, is it not, not direct?
(Mr Brenton) Well, just to finish, through that machinery
our line for the European Council at Helsinki will be agreed and
put to the Prime Minister, so it is possible for the Department
of the Environment, through that machinery, to put in the idea
that we press for the European Council to press for indicators
and timetables as part of the conclusions of Helsinki. The links
are all there; it is a matter of using them.
171. Can I just ask the Minister, is it actually
possible to access that process through the structure that has
just been outlined?
(Mr Meacher) I think it is. I do not think that is
the only one, but I think it is a very forceful and effective
one. If we can get Heads of Government to endorse the need for
clear programmes of action with timetables, that undoubtedly has
a very great deal of effect. That does not again stop us also
at the lower level of councils or directorates from trying to
improve communication, trying to get more dialogue, and I am strongly
in favour of having that. We have tried to do that, as you yourself
said, Mrs Walley, in terms of the Greening Government initiative
in the UK. We have just issued, as you well know, our first report
which does set down benchmarks with targets for particularly energy
efficiency and waste and transport impacts, and I think we could
say, "This is the way we are doing it in the UK. Is this
perhaps something that we could also follow in Europe? Does this
provide some kind of model?" I think we have to press for
action at all points.
Mr Grieve
172. We have already touched on this in part,
but can we go back to Commission procedures. The process of integration
also clearly involves the Commission developing systems to produce
more integrated policy proposals and I think it is already looking
at one or two things like the Green Star system. There is ample
evidence, you may agree, that it does not work very well, so what
can be done and what is your opinion of what should be done in
order to improve that? I know that there are some suggestions
that there are going to be reforms, greening policy, green starring,
appointing environmental correspondents in each directorate-general,
an analysis of European Union funding, but, firstly, do you see
those as important reforms?
(Mr Meacher) I do, although I think that they have
had a limited impact, but one has to be thankful for small mercies,
I suppose. You have mentioned several things. Global assessment
with regard to the fifth and sixth Environmental Action Programmes,
what that was about was analysing the effectiveness of this programme,
the fifth programme, and I think that they were right to do so.
They were right that there does need, as I keep on saying, to
be more effective implementation and enforcement, and that traditional
environmental legislation is not going to be adequate to reverse
negative social and economic developments, in other words, if
we need more integration. Now, that is basically what came out
of that process and I think that is useful learning, but it does
not take you too far. The Commission's Green Star appraisal system,
which was put into operation after Maastricht, was aimed to integrate
the environment into EU policies, but again it lacked leverage.
I do also note that in 1997 the Commission adopted an action plan
to integrate the environment into the Commission's administration,
again an admirable thing to try and do, for example, in regard
to purchasing policy for the goods and services it needed for
its building policy. It made a report to the Cologne Council and
it said that real progress had been made, but we have not seen
the report and we have got no details, so I think there is movement
in the undergrowth, but in terms of systematic and effective improvement,
I do not think we are there yet.
173. Who should be evaluating improvements in
the Commission? We touched earlier, albeit slightly tongue in
cheek, on the idea of a European Environmental Audit Committee,
but should the Court of Auditors have a wider role in looking
at the environmental impacts as well as their other responsibilities
or the Inspectorate-General or the Financial Control Directorate?
What is the Government's view about how the Commission should
be overseen in that respect?
(Mr Meacher) Well, the Commission in its various formations
should of course be overseen by the ministerial councils, just
as it is Ministers' responsibility to oversee what is done in
their departments. I think that again is not exercised as systematically
as it could be. Of course there is the rather important difference
in the case of the EU, that responsibility for bringing forward
policy lies with the Commission, and some people would say that
it is true of the British Government as well, but in general that
is not supposed to be the case. You mentioned the Court of Auditors.
It is concerned with audit in a rather traditional sense, but
the role does extend to ensuring economy and efficiency and effectiveness
and it can submit observations on specific questions which are
raised with it at any time by one of the Community institutions.
Perhaps the best example, but it is now seven years old and it
is a bit dated, is that it did publish in 1992 a special report
on the environment in a response to a resolution of the European
Parliament and we do think that that may have had some influence,
some beneficial influence in inserting environmental considerations
into the allocation of the Structural Funds, so again I do think
that the Court of Auditors has some relevance and some value,
but I do not think it answers your question and actually I accept
that at the moment, if not a vacuum, there is an uncertainty with
different players playing minor and rather unconnected roles.
(Mr Brenton) The Commission is of course an independent
EU institution with its own functions under the Treaty. Its proposals
to the Council of course are amended and changed by the Council
who have to respond to the wills of Member States. The Commission
has quite a lot of autonomy in how it carries out its key Treaty
roles of making legislative proposals and implementing policies.
The body to which it is probably most politically responsive is
the European Parliament, which has been rather little mentioned
in the course of our discussion here this morning, but I worked
in the European Commission for two and a half years and one thing
that that brought home to me very forcefully is how very sensitive
the Commissioners and their bureaucrats are to currents of opinion
in the European Parliament.
(Mr Meacher) Particularly after being sacked!
(Mr Brenton) They have been more sensitive since then.
It is not a full answer to your question, but to the extent that
there is one body which can exercise an effective oversight function
on the European Commission in this area is probably the European
Parliament.
174. It is interesting because it has been suggested
that the Parliament, from recollection, should refuse to discuss
policies which have not been screened for an environmental appraisal.
Could one do the same for the Council of Ministers and say that
the Council of Ministers should not be discussing matters which
are brought before them by the Commission which are not accompanied
by an environmental appraisal?
(Mr Brenton) The Commission is, first of all, very
conscious of the pressure they are under because of the failure
of the Green Star scheme to come up with a more effective process
of environmental evaluation of their legislative proposals and
their implementing actions. I do not know what ideas they are
going to come up with for Helsinki, but given the pressure they
are under, we would hope that they will come up with a more substantial
and effective system than has so far prevailed in the Community,
and the sorts of checks and balances which you are suggesting
may form part of it for all we know.
(Mr Meacher) To return to your EAC idea, it is not
a joke. I think it is a serious proposal and it is a matter for
the European Parliament and again I think we will advance the
excellent precedent which has been set in the UK. I also think
it is very important that Mr Prodi has established the precedent
that Commissioners should attend Parliament when they are requested
to do so. It is astonishing that that has not been the case up
to now. It is like Ministers skulking in their departments and
engaging in written correspondence. As we all know, face-to-face
presentations are very important and being subjected to detailed
and lengthy cross-examination and I think exactly the same should
apply to Commissioners as applies to Ministers here.
Chairman
175. Just following on from that point, we have
had some evidence from Anita Pollock who was the Labour MEP for
London South-West and on the Environment Committee during her
whole ten years in the European Parliament and she makes the point
that the focus of the European Parliament is legislative, that
there is actually very little means of bringing a Commissioner
to Parliament, except in the rather extraordinary way where you
have got to get the agreement of everyone else and it is quite
difficult to do. Therefore, one thing she believes is that there
is a democratic deficit in this respect at the moment and, therefore,
what she thinks that Helsinki should do is to establish a mechanism
whereby the Parliament can regularly, without undue effort, as
it were, scrutinise progress on environmental matters and maybe,
for example, there should be an annual report, as we have suggested
to you, to the present Government in the UK so that the UK Parliament
can look at it and see what progress has been made, and similarly
for the European Parliament.
(Mr Meacher) I very much support that. I think that
is extremely sensible, and I hope that you may perhaps communicate
what the European Parliament has suggested to them. It is of course
absolutely a matter for them, but there is no doubt that they
can and will exert increasing influence and their demand for particular
procedures and presentations before them is something that I do
not think can be resisted. It is simply for them to exercise it.
176. But if the Helsinki Council Conclusions
included something like an annual report or some kind of regular
thing which Parliament could look at, it would be one step towards
that.
(Mr Meacher) I agree. I think that would be extremely
helpful.
Joan Walley
177. Just to follow that up, I think it would
be useful perhaps for our Committee to consider a recommendation
along those lines also to be included in what you put forward,
but just going back to the idea of a parallel Environmental Audit
Committee at the European level and given what you were saying
about the lack of audit earlier on, I just wonder, if we are thinking
about a model for a European Environmental Audit Committee of
some kind, how that would link in with the European Environment
Agency which I think is doing very useful and sterling work in
actually looking at the whole issue of integration so that we
have got some means of actual measurement as well.
(Mr Meacher) I think they would have a very different
function. The European Environment Agency is a research body.
It is a resource. It prepares the bullets for others to fire if
they so wish, for example, an EAC in Europe. I think they complement
each other. They do not in any way overlap and, as you say, I
do think the EEA is doing extremely good work, very systematic,
very thorough and very clearly presented, and that does make it
more high profile within the Community and I very much hope that
the European Parliament will take it on board and press for progress
in each of the areas where there is a deficiency now, which of
course is exactly what I think Ministers in their various councils,
particularly the Environment Council, ought to do. I have to say,
when we discussed that report, it had a very big impact on Ministers
in the Environment Council, so we intend to invite the EEA back
on a regular basis to examine what has happened, what changes
there have been and the adequacy of policies and to encourage
them to come forward with the policies which they believe are
necessary to address these issues.
Chairman
178. Well, unless my colleagues have got any
further questions, thank you very much indeed, Minister, and we
wish you very satisfactory progress at Helsinki.
(Mr Meacher) Thank you very much, and I look forward
to appearing before the European EAC!
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