Examination of witnesses (Questions 379
- 399)
TUESDAY 7 DECEMBER 1999
LORD MORAN,
MR MARK
HATCHER and MR
CHRIS POUPARD
Chairman
379. Lord Moran, can I welcome you to the third
session this morning on the work of the Environment Agency. Could
I ask you to identify your team, please?
(Lord Moran) I am Lord Moran. I am the Chairman of
the Moran Committee. Do you know what the Moran Committee is?
380. Yes.
(Lord Moran) Fine, then I will not say any more about
that. On my right is Mark Hatcher who is the Secretary of the
Moran Committee and, when he is not doing that, he is Director
of the National Association of Fisheries and Angling Consultatives.
On my left is Chris Poupard who is a member of the Moran Committee
and Director of the Salmon and Trout Association.
381. You have given us your evidence but is
there anything you want to add by way of introduction before we
go into questions?
(Lord Moran) Very little, Chairman, simply that we
came into being as the Moran Committee in order to give evidence
on behalf of the whole fisheries and angling constituency to the
review group whose report we hope to have soon after Christmas.
In doing so we addressed the question of the Environment Agency
and we came to the conclusion, as we said in our evidence to the
group, that we thought there must be a single regulator, that
we thought this had to be the Environment Agency and, therefore,
we thought the Environment Agency should continue and should continue
to be responsible for fisheries but we thought there were various
things wrong with the Environment Agency that should be put right.
We thought, for example, that flood plain management was not very
satisfactory. We were worried about the ring-fencing of finances
which we thought was a serious constraint on what the Environment
Agency can do. We were worried about the lack of the power of
the Environment Agency to influence planning decisions. We thought
that there had been a tendency in the Environment Agency when
it took over from the National Rivers Authority to perhaps give
too much emphasis to matters like recreation at the expense of
their duty to maintain, improve and develop fisheries.
Chairman: Thank you very much.
Mr Randall
382. How successful do you think the Agency
has been in providing a fully integrated approach to catchment
management?
(Lord Moran) I think it has been partially successful.
We do very strongly support the concept of having integrated management
of each separate catchment, we think that is extremely important
and should be preserved, but there are instances in which we think
it has not worked as well. I think I would give them six out of
ten on that.
383. You mentioned just now in your first preamble
about ring-fencing of funds. What evidence do you have that ring-fencing
of funds hinders the Agency's efforts to secure environmental
gains?
(Mr Hatcher) One of the issues which we have been
trying to flag up for some time is that the fishery duty applies
to all functions of the Environment Agency, it is a general duty.
As we understand it other functions, such as flood defence for
example, are not permitted by the financial memorandum to actually
budget for work which is necessary for environmental protection
and for fisheries, particularly where rehabilitation for existing
damage has to be tackled. That is the general impression we get
from talking to flood defence people and our colleagues right
across the country. Would you agree?
(Mr Poupard) Absolutely.
(Mr Hatcher) The evidence is that we are told that
they cannot do what they would like to do because they cannot
allocate the budget from their funds.
384. Do you feel that the Agency have sufficient
relevant expertise available to it to enable it properly to discharge
its responsibilities in fisheries management?
(Mr Poupard) Generally we think that the expertise
within the Agency is good but I would highlight a couple of points
to start with. We think the recruitment policy needs to make sure
that all the vacancies are advertised externally. We have some
evidence that the policy of internal advertising may actually
restrict the flow of promising new talent into the Agency. That
is one thing we are concerned about. The second point we are concerned
about, although this is a tricky one, is the way the career development
structure within the Agency operates. Very often we see very promising
fisheries staff spend two or three years getting to grips with
the problem and then they are immediately promoted into an administrative
function and are lost to fisheries. To a certain extent that is
inevitable. It is not our job but we would like to see some thought
given as to how that might be improved. There are one or two particular
skills the Agency has, if I can just ask Mark to talk about them.
(Mr Hatcher) I think we must also recognise that the
Environment Agency has got unique anti-poaching skills which no
other agency has actually got. The Environment Agency and its
predecessors have spent a lot of time and effort in developing
these skills which are extremely important, particularly when
you consider that salmon is a Habitats Directive species and it
is under great stress at the moment. I think one of the points
we must make is the fact that the Environment Agency's skills
in this respect are extremely good. They do seek the co-operation
of the police but the basic drive does come from the Environment
Agency staff. These are field staff without necessarily very great
academic qualifications but they are extremely valuable. The other
issue is that it could be better focused. There is a certain amount
of confusion within the Environment Agency about what fisheries
duty is about. We take the approach that a fishery is the aquatic
ecosystem in which fish exist or should exist if natural circumstances
applied. There has been a tendency, particularly since the Environment
Agency started, to actually regard the fisheries function as a
recreation support function. This is causing a certain amount
of stress within the Environment Agency and between the Environment
Agency and people like ourselves which needs to be resolved. We
believe that this actually contributes to a lack of effectiveness
which could be overcome. I think the other issue regarding sufficient
expertise is that the financial arrangements for the fisheries
function are based almost entirely on rod licences and grant-in-aid.
Rod licences are a tax on angling, a unique tax on angling, and
grant-in-aid has been eroded over the last ten years by about
getting on for 60 per cent. In 2001-02 another 1.5 million cut
will be made in grant-in-aid from the fisheries budget for England.
These are all going to have impacts on the fisheries function.
One of them, of course, is the Environment Agency does not, in
fact, have sufficient staff to carry out the job as well as it
and other people like ourselves would like. We know that the fisheries
staff work extremely hard, they spend a lot of time outside of
their paid time working with other interests, and I think that
is an issue that needs to be looked at. To make them more effective
they need a decent level of funding.
385. Do you have any evidence to support your
claim that you think the Agency regards its fisheries function
as somewhat of an "anachronism"?
(Mr Hatcher) I can give you a specific example. In
the minutes of the Thames Region REPAC meeting which took place
on 26 October this year, I will quote: "A member said that
he was worried about ring-fencing and felt that the Agency was
being diverted into matters which were not really environmental,
such as fisheries and navigation". This attitude is not uncommon.
386. Would you say that it is prevalent?
(Mr Hatcher) It is not prevalent because there is—not
in-fighting, that is the wrong word—tension within the Environment
Agency about it.
387. Do you think of that attitude as being
on the part of personnel or would it be by region or would it
just be that somebody has got more interest in something else
and it is not anything done at a particular level?
(Lord Moran) I think what has happened is that putting
together all the functions in the Environment Agency, which had
a lot to be said for it, did mean that there was great concentration
on the new functions. I think what has undoubtedly happened is
that the emphasis on fisheries has declined since the Environment
Agency took over from the NRA. There is less emphasis on that
and you get people who do not have fisheries at the front of their
mind at all.
Chairman
388. Is the Agency consistent across its regions?
(Mr Hatcher) I think the answer is no for a variety
of reasons. The Environment Agency is built out of a large number
of different organisations, all of which have got different traditions.
The National Rivers Authority was built out of a number of different
organisations with different traditions. Some of the cultures
of those organisations, as it were, are still in existence. In
one Environment Agency region which used to correspond to an NRA
region, which used to correspond to a Water Authority area, you
have got a certain attitude and in another one you have got a
different attitude. That applies not only to the fisheries function
but also to people like the flood defence function, water resources,
water quality, how they relate to the fisheries function and to
the conservation function. There are definitely discrepancies
and they certainly do need to be addressed. There are different
expectations from the fisheries and angling interests in different
regions which, again, owe much more to historical factors than
to what is happening now. I believe that this has to be recognised
first of all, that this is an issue in relation to the Environment
Agency's efficiency and, secondly, it is something on which the
Environment Agency has to produce, as it were, consistent standards
of performance which are applicable, are transparent and actually
work.
(Lord Moran) I think it is true to say that we do
not want to see consistency achieved at the cost of an increase
in centralisation. There has been a lot of criticism of the Environment
Agency, that it is too bureaucratic, too much run by the head
office. We certainly want to see common standards applied throughout
its area of responsibility but we do not want to see everything
referred to head office.
(Mr Poupard) If I could just add one other important
point. As Mark said, the Environment Agency is an enormously complex
organisation. One of the things that it needs is time. We keep
on having reorganisations. The NRA was in existence for seven
years and the Environment Agency has a huge task to integrate
the various organisations which make up its constituent parts.
It has only been in existence since 1996 and I think by and large
it has not done at all badly in addressing the huge complexity
of issues. It needs time to settle down, not another reorganisation.
Mr Cummings
389. Why do you say that the Agency's fisheries
duty is stronger than its duty to promote recreation?
(Lord Moran) At the moment it is in the statutes.
In the legislation the responsibility for fisheries, to maintain,
improve and develop fisheries, is an unqualified duty whereas
the responsibility for recreation is a weaker one legally. It
is there but it is qualified. Therefore, if the two should clash
then the fisheries duty should prevail. That is the state of the
legislation at the moment.
390. It may be the state of the legislation,
yes, but can you justify your statements regarding the "over-emphasis"
on recreation, given that some other witnesses appear to believe
that the Agency is neglecting its recreation function? Where do
you balance that?
(Mr Poupard) I think the point Mark made earlier on
is that the fisheries duty applies to all the functions. It is
an essential and an integral part of water resources, waste management
and recreation, and applies to them all. It is an important point,
do you want to re-emphasise it, Mark?[1]
(Mr Hatcher) This comes back to some
of the misconceptions about what the fisheries duty is all about.
I have not seen in any of the evidence the complaint about the
conservation duty, as it were, constraining the recreation duty
or anything of that nature. The kind of people who are making
those comments believe that basically the fisheries function is
there to support angling, that is the basic belief, and they are
saying "you are supporting angling, you are spending all
this money and we are not having a fair crack of the whip".
I can certainly appreciate that point of view but the point we
are making is that the fisheries duty is an environmental conservation
function and angling is a recreation which is entirely separate
from that and is the responsibility of the Environment Agency's
recreation function. What we have seen from the recreation function
is that it has been promoting very heavily things like canoeing,
walking and navigation. We have seen very little actual promotion
of angling or, more importantly, the promotion among recreation
interests of the impact that their activity may have on the environment.
It is beginning to improve. I will give you a concrete example.
The Environment Agency produced a recreation strategy for the
River Thames about two years ago and it took an awful lot of arguing
within the Regional Fisheries Advisory Committee, as it was then,
to (a) actually get this document put before the committee and
(b) to put in there a recognition that the development of the
Thames as a recreational resource has actually got to be dependent
on the environmental impact that the recreation might have. It
said that the interpretation of it is difficult and it will have
to be left to those people who understand. We are still finding
it extremely difficult to get across to the recreation function
that it too, like all the other functions, has to give itself
an environmental assessment to see what kind of impact it is having
and whether or not it is able to mitigate that impact and whether
or not it is actually taking active steps to do so. It is a very
powerful, a very popular thing, the recreation function, it is
high profile, there is lots of money flying around. Inevitably
it is easy to get money for capital projects which benefit recreation,
it is easy to drive, whereas the environmental protection function
of fisheries is much less easy to drive. It is an historical fact
that a lot of the Environment Agency's functions were originally
based on fisheries duties which were there to prevent pollution,
to actually persuade local authorities to think about planning
matters and things like that. Recreation is a new issue.
Chairman: I think I will have to stop you there,
we have to be a little careful about our time. John Cummings.
Mr Cummings
391. Can you tell the Committee what evidence
you have of the ineffectiveness of the Regional Fisheries, Ecology
and Recreation Committees?
(Mr Poupard) I would not say evidence of ineffectiveness
is the right way to approach it. We have some concerns. Going
back for a moment, under the National Rivers Authority these committees
were entirely fisheries based. When the Bill was being put together
we supported very strongly the concept that conservation interests
particularly, but also recreation and navigation, should be included
on them. We have come to the conclusion, and it is not entirely
consistent across the regions, it does vary, that fisheries and
to a certain extent conservation are being overwhelmed by these
other interests. One of the main recommendations we made to the
Government review of legislation was that on these committees,
to make them work better, we think the conservation and fisheries
functions should be absolutely paramount and the recreation and
navigation functions, which we consider subsidiary, might be better
off taken by sub-committees. The problem is even if these committees
were to meet all day they have huge agendas and instead of acting
as real consultation fora and taking the advice of the very experienced
people who sit on them, they do not have time to do that and they
end up being presented with documents that they just look at cursorily
and put a rubber stamp on, which is not the way that they were
meant to operate. In terms of ineffectiveness, we do not think
they are as effective as they could be by perhaps changing the
make-up of the committees slightly.
392. How do you believe the Agency could encourage
better co-operation by local interest groups in improving, maintaining
and developing fisheries?
(Mr Hatcher) This is an area which we have addressed
in the evidence to the review group. In discussions with the Environment
Agency we agree fully that there should be, as it were, local
fishery development plans which cover specific areas so they could
look with a statutory requirement to consult local fisheries and
angling interests in those areas. My particular organisation has
got locally based groups specifically designed to consult with
the Environment Agency and with other organisations and authorities
whose work impacts on the Environment Agency.
393. Does the Agency willingly embrace these
groups?
(Mr Hatcher) Very much so. It actually assists them
with a small amount of finance. It provides things like secretarial
support and it also provides premises for meetings and things
like that. It is very, proactive in working with these people.
It varies across the regions.[2]
Christine Butler
394. How well does the Agency co-operate and
co-ordinate its activities with local government?
(Mr Poupard) If I could perhaps start by flagging
up some concerns that we have in this area. The concerns focus
on three main areas. One is the problem of boundaries. I think
the local authorities are very keen to see their boundaries adopted
by the Agency but in practice the Agency has found that in terms
of integrated catchment management it is not sensible and it does
not actually work. After a year of using local authority boundaries
they reverted in practical terms to catchment boundaries. In terms
of your question that is obviously an area of strain. The other
area of strain is this perception that local authorities have,
and I am sorry to keep coming back to it but it is most important,
that fisheries is an angling support function and not a fundamental
environmental protection function, which we think it clearly is.
The third one is in the area of committees. Would you like to
do that one, Lord Moran?
(Lord Moran) I could mention that perhaps. It is obviously
very, very important that the Environment Agency should consult
with local authorities about all matters to do with rivers and
reservoirs and canals in their areas but there is a tendency now
to feel that you must have local authority representatives on
every committee or sub-committee which is sometimes putting people
on committees which are dealing with rather technical matters
that they really do not know much about and it is not really necessary.
395. Do you think that is damaging? Do you think
that it will divert the attention of the Environment Agency from
its just cause?
(Lord Moran) It weakens the effectiveness of the committees
and sub-committees, that is all, it is not damaging.
Chairman
396. It does not educate the councillors?
(Lord Moran) Sometimes.
Christine Butler
397. Do you think that the influence of the
local authorities in these regards, not just the ones you have
mentioned with regard to the committee, is over-weaning and possibly
damaging to the main area of responsibility to be tackled by the
Environment Agency, or—this is possibly a different question—does
the Environment Agency attempt to co-ordinate its efforts well
enough with local government? If we can just exclude the business
of boundaries but in general terms about sustainability issues.
(Lord Moran) I think on your first question "over-weaning"
is too far. I do not think that is true. I do not think influence
is exerted to that extent. The Environment Agency does try to
get it right, and should, and must obviously carry local authorities
with it on a lot of the things that it does.
398. Thank you. How well do you think the Agency
co-operates with English Nature? That is a closer relationship
I would imagine.
(Mr Hatcher) I have seen complaints that the communication
between the Environment Agency and conservation interests is inadequate,
particularly in relation to the work it does on fisheries. This
relates to the misconceptions about fisheries which we mentioned
earlier. One of the big problems which does need to be addressed
is basically the concept which is held of fisheries because if
the ecological concept is adopted it becomes much easier to integrate
approaches towards conservation through fisheries. If we consider
fisheries as all the rivers and natural still waters throughout
the country, fisheries is the biggest wildlife and conservation
resource which we have. I think one of the reasons, as was mentioned
earlier, is that the Environment Agency has been in existence
for a relatively short period of time. There are very grey areas
between statutory roles of some of the different agencies which
need to be addressed. For example, conservation bodies have had
very little to do with actual fish species and they have tended
to fall into a hole where they have not been considered by the
NRA or—
399. So you are saying they are not really looking
sufficiently at biodiversity?
(Mr Poupard) I think what is happening is there is
a much greater realisation that if you actually look at fisheries
as a whole you integrate biodiversity issues, species and habitats
issues with specific fisheries in a much, much more—
1 Note by witness: The statutory duty to maintain,
develop and improve fisheries is also singular and unique to the
Environment Agency. In contrast, other bodies, such as the Countryside
Agency and Sport England, have statutory responsibilities to promote
recreation, including in the countryside, as well as the Environment
Agency, and English Nature has responsibilities for conservation. Back
2
Note by witness: When Lord Moran was Chairman of the Welsh
Region Fisheries Advisory Committee as it was under the National
Rivers Authority, he was instrumental in setting up local fisheries
committees in the principal catchments and regions of Wales to
work with the Authority on local problems, and to offer the views
of local fisheries and angling interests about national issues
to the Regional Committee. The system worked well and the local
committees are still contributing useful work under the Environment
Agency. Back
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