Examination of Witnesses (Questions 320
- 339)
TUESDAY 6 JUNE 2000
MR MIKE
WALKER, DR
CHRIS SPRAY
AND MR
PAUL WOODCOCK
Mrs Dunwoody
320. You do need a good image, let us face it!
(Mr Walker) We are working as hard as possible on
our image, I can assure the Committee! We also share experience
among our members. We have a very good network of biodiversity
experts and conservation experts in the industry and we work on
good practice among our member companies, and also in partnership
with national voluntary environmental groups such as the RSPB.
About 18 months ago the industry launched a good practice guide
for its members along with the RSPB, and this has been very positively
received among companies. I think it is also fair to say at the
national level we have not been involved in national policy development,
but we have been involved in sharing experience and best practice
in the delivery of biodiversity.[1]
I would like to ask Chris and Paul to expand on what happens at
the company level.
(Dr Spray) There are four particular
areas where we get involved, both nationally and locally, as my
colleague has said. One is as land owners; some but not all the
water companies are fairly large land owners, and therefore they
have a duty and a role to play in how that land is managed to
promote conservation and biodiversity.
Mr Olner
321. Surely you manage that land in the first
instance to ensure the purity of the water supply.
(Dr Spray) You are quite right, but there are lots
of similarities and opportunities to promote biodiversity along
the way. Secondly, as operators, we obviously deal in an industry
where the raw material is water, the key element of life, so what
we do has an impact on biodiversity, both potentially damagingly
and potentially advantageously. Thirdly, as funders, we have been
very involved both nationally and locally in funding the biodiversity
process, both formally as championing species—not only the
otter, but also individual companies have sponsored nationally
things as diverse as the round-mouthed whorl snail through to
the Roseate tern, pool frog, the spring gentian, and I think you
will find the water industry has taken a key role, a lead role
in funding biodiversity.
322. They all make wonderful pictures in your
annual reports, but what are you doing to tie together all the
things that bring about proper biodiversity?
(Mr Woodcock) I think it is important in the operation
of our business. We are essentially about the environment, because
we return effluents into rivers after they have been treated.
It is very important that we have joined up thinking about how
we manage the environment. Most companies undertake environmental
assessments of the impact of their work, they look at ways in
which they can use the results of those environmental assessments
to improve the quality of biodiversity, as we undertake schemes
to improve sewage treatment works for example, and I think we
can give lots of examples of how that has occurred over the years.
The water industry has been amongst the leaders in terms of taking
forward the process of environmental planning and environmental
assessment ahead of schemes. So there is a lot of joined up thinking
in terms of how we do tackle biodiversity.
323. Do you think these action plans should
have a statutory basis?
(Mr Woodcock) My personal view is that if you look
at the record of an industry like the water industry, it is pretty
good. If you look at the environmental reports we have produced,
we can demonstrate there is a clear upward curve on the graphs
of progress on biodiversity. My particular view of this is that
it should not be a statutory thing at the moment, and it should
be based on a voluntary approach. There are an awful lot of laws
and regulations focused on our activities already which do take
us in the direction of biodiversity anyway.
(Dr Spray) We already have, as you are probably aware,
a code of practice for conservation that has been in operation
since privatisation. That has recently, this year, been modernised
to include biodiversity as a key element of it and, as my colleague
has said, there are probably more Biodiversity Action Plans in
the water industry than in any other sector to date, so we stand
by our record of what we have managed to achieve.
324. If you have done so well, why do you not
want it to be statutory?
(Mr Woodcock) We do not think it is necessary.
Mr Brake
325. Dr Spray, could we perhaps ask you to identify
what you believe is the potentially damaging impact on biodiversity
of your company?
(Dr Spray) The potentially damaging impacts would
fall, as I say, into particular areas.[2]
As a land owner, potentially it is how we manage our land, were
we not aware of the biodiversity interests. So we have carried
out a very detailed audit programme to stop that potentiality
happening. Potentially it could be as an abstractor. I think an
examination of the record of English Nature would show that there
is not a single site in my company's area where there is a wetland
under threat from the operations of our company, so that for us
covers one potential area. Potentially as a discharger of treated
effluent. That is a very interesting one, particularly in terms
of the relationship with biodiversity and the Habitats Directive
in our coastal area, where there are some very interesting clashes
between European Directives, where on the one hand we will actually
be improving the environment and on the other hand we may actually
be removing some of the basis of the nutrient food web upon which
the biodiversity of this same area is reliant.
Chairman
326. Could you explain that. What you are really
saying is if raw sewage goes in the sea, some fish quite enjoy
it. Is that it?
(Dr Spray) At a very basic level, without wishing
to contradict you, yes. Basically, if you think of what most discharges
are, most of it is nutrients, and preliminary screened and primary
screened sewage discharges have high concentrations of nutrients
in them. Research we commissioned from Durham University has shown
that in places up to 50 per cent of the organic content of beach
particles is derived from sewage effluent. In cleaning it up as
part of the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive, we are required—and
we are quite happy to do so; let me make this absolutely clear—to
bring that up to secondary and indeed in some areas to tertiary
treatment levels. That has orders of magnitude impact on the biological
productivity of food webs, and it is an irony that the self-same
ecosystem into which we discharge has in our case been designated
as a conservation site, a Special Area of Conservation and Special
Protection Area by the European Community for populations of species
such as purple sandpipers, who rely upon the base of that food
web for their actual numbers. So there is an irony in the sense
that the European Community requires this Government to maintain
the favourable conservation status of those sites for the key
species, and what we shall be doing in complying with the first
set of Directives is removing the base of that self-same food
web. It is an irony in the examination of which we have invested
a huge amount of money and effort, looking at the science behind
it, and we would hope to report back in about three years' time
on a nine-year study looking at exactly what is happening.
Mr Brake
327. Can I ask you a bit more about abstraction.
First of all, would it be the view of various environmental organisations
that you have not had an impact through abstraction, and can you
explain to the Committee what you have actively done to mitigate
the impact of abstraction on wetland biodiversity?
(Dr Spray) I said in my response to your question
that in Northumbria's area we had not had any damage.[3]
On the one site where we might potentially impact on water levels,
we are undertaking research with English Nature to monitor the
situation. We are in an area that is water-rich, if you like,
in terms of the amount of water that falls. I do not know if my
colleagues would like to pick up on areas where it is more of
an issue.
Chairman
328. Does "water-rich" mean flooding?
(Dr Spray) I could not possibly comment, but I did
manage to get here, just.
(Mr Walker) If I could comment nationally on abstraction
and the scale of the environment programme that the industry is
undertaking nationally, £7 billion has been made available
by OFWAT in the next five years on environmental projects. Twenty-four
of those projects will be tackling abstraction on specific sites.
So it is something that the industry has taken very, very seriously.
However, in abstracting from areas, we have to understand that
the reason companies abstract is to actually supply customers
with the water that they need. So there is a difficult balance
to be met between sustaining levels of water for customers' requirements
and the environment. The industry is having to meet that.
Mr Brake
329. This question is for Mr Walker. How much
has been spent by the industry overall on biodiversity and how
much will be spent over the next five years?
(Mr Walker) That is a difficult question to answer
specifically, because biodiversity impacts on so many of the industry's
activities. As we explained earlier, we are an environmental industry.
We are actually managing the water environment for the public
water supply and to protect the environment. In the next five
years £7 billion has been made available by OFWAT in terms
of environmental spend. Some of that will cover biodiversity.
Many of those projects will have a biodiversity impact. Over the
last ten years £12 billion has been spent by the industry
in England and Wales. If I could break down some of the £7
billion spend, there are 902 wastewater projects, 24 abstraction
projects, 487 river water quality projects that will take place
in the next five years.
Mr Gray
330. Can I focus your attention on other industries,
like leisure, the retail industries, and others. Are they doing
enough to promote BAPs?
(Mr Walker) I am not sure it is for the water industry
to comment on the work of other industries. We think there is
certain potential for all industries, extracting industries, resource
managing industries to have a role in Biodiversity Action Plans.
Construction and development is another industry that has an obvious
role, as has agriculture and other land owners. But we would say
that there is no industry that cannot be involved because there
is always potential to fund local schemes, for local communities.
331. That is with regard to aspirations, but
the question was directed at you, because you as the water industry
are recipients of what other industries might do. We are seeing
the CBI later on this morning. The nature of the question was
this. We know that you are very actively involved in BAPs, but
in your view, from your experience as the recipients of their
"surface water", shall we say, are they doing enough
to promote BAPs?
(Mr Walker) I think generally everybody could do more
at the end of the day in biodiversity action planning. I think
you are right that the water industry is a recipient. We would
welcome initiatives from other industries that would help our
planning in the future.
332. In a similar context, you are very critical
in your evidence of conservation bodies. You say that they have
a lack of professionalism. Can you expand on that?
(Dr Spray) This was really in relation to the negotiation
of funding packages. It is very confusing, especially from a business
background, when different organisations representing the totality
of the conservation bodies come together and offer you a package,
which might be the sponsorship of a species, or the championship
of the species, or "a sponsorship" or "the champion",
or "the regional" or "a regional", and they
do not quite know who is going to give you that permission so
that you will or will not be then quoted by the Minister as "the
champion of the species". It is very confusing. We have had
some very detailed examples. For example, the otter biodiversity
programme took a year to actually bring together, just negotiating,
and there were pretty fraught negotiations at times. It was obviously
due to the lack of rules that the conservation bodies were working
with. Best intentions, I am sure, but it was actually confusing
to people who are more used to negotiating agreements where you
understand where you are trying to get to and how you are going
to get there.
Mrs Ellman
333. Which other industries should draw up Biodiversity
Action Plans?
(Mr Woodcock) I think there are probably three categories
of industry that we would encourage to draw up Biodiversity Action
Plans. They are industries which have large land holdings, industries
which consume resources—so that is the extracting industries
essentially—and finally the construction and development
industries.
334. Do you think it should be made compulsory
to do that?
(Mr Woodcock) From our perspective we have already
said that voluntary agreements are the best approach. We have
had a code of practice in place for many years, and that has been
very effective. I think we would prefer industries to go down
the voluntary route rather than the compulsory route.
335. Do you think enough progress has been made
through the voluntary route?
(Mr Woodcock) I think there is more progress to be
made. What we can do is look at the "champions" scheme
for biodiversity at the moment and see what has been good about
that and what has been bad, because I think we do need to encourage
more industry involvement with championing of biodiversity species,
and close examination of that issue is quite important.
(Dr Spray) One of the other things is the publication
by the Ministry only last month of this new case study document
which was, in fact, sponsored by the water industry, which features
six different sectors of industry, including, interestingly, the
finance industry, the extraction industry and the travel industry,
as examples of how they can get involved in biodiversity from
a very pragmatic point of view.[4]
This is something where we are leading, but there are examples
here, recently published, that can show the way to go.
336. Is there any evidence that the current
codes of practice are actually effective?
(Dr Spray) The code of practice for the water industry
on conservation has a standing committee, upon which I am one
of the people who sit on behalf of the water industry. It is apparently
very effective indeed, in the sense that we get very, very few
complaints whatsoever, and the review and revision of the code
just brought up-to-date what was occurring already. So I think
that code of practice, which, as I said earlier, now has biodiversity
written into it, is being very effective and is being monitored.
Every water company produces an annual report on conservation
access and recreation across the country.
337. There is considerable concern at the moment
that the water companies will cut back on biodiversity efforts
and on community reclamation schemes because they are not now
permitted to make the vast profits that were made before. What
do you have to say about that?
(Mr Woodcock) There is a funding mechanism within
the water industry, which you have touched on, which is the five-year
periodic review. Ofwat have a role in determining where the industry
spends its money. Essentially, at the moment, there is no recognition
by Ofwat of the need for companies to spend money on biodiversity.[5]
I think recognition by Ofwat of the need for that expenditure
is very important in the industry as we move forward. In terms
of cutting back, I do not know. I think we are going to have to
focus on areas where we get best value for money, but most companies
are going down the road of developing sustainable development
strategies in quite a major way now. In fact, Water UK issued
some sustainability indicators the week before last. The biodiversity
elements of these will continue to be very important. There will
still be a spend in that area, and much is down to individual
companies.
338. Should it be left to individual companies?
Would we not feel, with £2 billion pre-tax profits, the water
industry should be obliged to look at biodiversity?
(Mr Woodcock) I think we do look at biodiversity as
part of our day-to-day activities, regardless of the level of
profit. I have already mentioned that all the schemes we undertake
are subject to environmental assessment, which includes a look
at biodiversity to see whether, in undertaking that scheme, we
can actually not only mitigate the effects of that scheme but
create some positive wildlife benefit. I think there is a lot
of joined-up thinking in the industry which will take biodiversity
forward.
339. What would happen if you breached the code
of practice?
(Dr Spray) In itself it is not a requirement of your
licence, but it will be taken into account by the minister in
the next issue of that licence.
1 Note by witness: Dr Spray does sit on the
Department of the Environment's Biodiversity Secretariat England
Local Issues Group. Back
2
Note by witness: Northumbrian Water's Biodiversity Strategy
answers question 325 in detail. Back
3
Note by witness: The List of Wetland Sites of Special
Scientific Interests under threat from overabstraction, produced
by English Nature and the Environment Agency for the Water Industry
Pricing Review, does not contain a single site within Northumbrian
Water's area. Back
4
Note by witness: "Case Studies in Business &
Biodiversity"-published by Earthwatch on behalf of DETR (March
2000). Back
5
Note by witness (Dr Spray): There was a category of permitted
expenditure on Biodiversity included in the theoretical justifications
for expenditure in the OFWAT Period Review. However, it was so
structured that no expenditure could be allowed against it in
practice, and no schemes were included under this category nationally. Back
|
