Select Committee on Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Written Evidence


Memorandum submitted by Alan Simpson MP (A12)

1.  EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

  1.1  The GM Nation? debate intended to be a welcome process, allowing the public to participate in the making of big and controversial decisions. Despite the concerns brought up in the following passages the debate attracted a good response from the public, where they were able to find out how to participate.

  1.2  The central issues focused around the following issues:

    —    the budget and timing of the Debate;

    —    the role of the COI (Central Office of Information);

    —    the adequacy of publicity;

    —    the role played by the FSA;

    —    the Debates themselves;

    —    the issues that were avoided.

  These are the criticisms that this submission focuses on.

2.  BUDGET AND TIMING

  2.1  The amount of time and money allocated for the debate was simply inadequate to facilitate the type of process required by the Public Debate Steering Board (SB), and also of that demanded by the complexity of the issue. Problems were created for the SB when, halfway through the process, the original budget (based on figures from the COI[9]) had to be revised and the time extended. Defra did cover the additional management costs incurred by the COI as a result of the extension and the final budget was double the original amount. However, the amount was still insufficient to fulfil the task that had been set. Yet another factor that hindered public participation was the lack of funding for promotion and advertising. The budget allocation for publicity was non-existent. Organisers of local meetings had to foot the bill for these events themselves. These were often small, unfunded voluntary organisations or even individuals. As a result of the COI failing to follow up requests for assistance, many local meetings were simply inadequately resourced.

  2.2  The GM Nation? stimulus materials (and details of the public debate county and local meetings) were not available until the launch date in June. Potential organisers had no idea what was required or what was available to support them. Requests to extend the debate to allow more local meetings to be organised were rejected by the Secretary of State, adding to the suspicion that the Government was working to "approval timetable" rather than an open consultation.

  2.3  Government guidelines for public consultation exercises allow at least a two or three month period. In this case the public debate was only allowed six weeks. This was grossly insufficient as it meant that many members of the public were only just hearing of the debate as it was coming to an end. Similarly many local authorities found it impossible to participate in the debate within the allotted time frame.

  2.4  The timing of the public debate was defective on two other grounds. Critical information was inaccessible throughout the debate. This was partly because the Strategy Unit Report was only released days before the end of the process and the Science Review was not published until after the debates had finished. Moreover, the results of the Farm Scale Evaluations (an exercise deemed by the Government as critical to the future development of GM crops in the UK) were also unavailable to the participants of the public debate. The public perception was that this was deliberate rather than unfortunate.

3.  APPOINTMENT AND ROLE OF THE COI

  3.1  The Central Office of Information (COI) was appointed as the main contractor to deliver the GM Nation? programme of events and materials. Two factors made this decision controversial: It raised questions about how independent from Government this would be. Additionally there were concerns that the COI lacked both the experience and the competence to manage a public debate of this kind. These misgivings were expressed by both the AEBC[10] and the members of the Steering Board. The SB was not able to consider alternative contractors. It was told that the COI would have to be used due to the limited time and budget. Also, Defra had regular management meetings with the COI beyond that required to ensure budget management. It appeared that Defra were keen to keep control over the debate despite the public suggestion that it was independent of Government.

  3.2  There were certain areas of the debate where the COI demonstrated a lack of experience. This was particularly evident with the design of the open deliberative element of the debate. The guidance needed by the SB was not forthcoming for the creation of a debate which would imaginatively engage the public; especially a public suspicious of GM and of the Government's intentions. The debate failed to provide a public basis for understanding and exploring scientific doubt about GM technologies. It did not enable the public to make their own risk assessments about whether Britain needs GM crops or of alternative choices about secure and sustainable food supplies. The debate was therefore constructed within narrow and limiting terms.

  3.3  Information and materials necessary for participating in the debate were not easily accessible. There are numerous accounts from NGOs and members of the public facing real difficulties in obtaining help via the contact points set up by the CIO. Such difficulties, during the process of the public debate, suggest that the COI lacked the capacity to deal with the administration and organisation of the process. This basic administrative failure will have limited the numbers able to take part in the debate.

  3.4  Further concerns expressed of the role of the COI:

    —  A failure to understand the breadth and scope of the process proposed by the AEBC

    —  A serious underestimate of the budget needed to deliver a credible public process

    —  A failure to develop stimulus materials that had been sufficiently tested prior to the commencement of the debate

    —  A failure to offer local meeting organisers sufficient support

    —  Failure to proactively encourage local meetings especially in areas of the country or communities where the inhabitants had not joined in the long running debate on GM.

    —  Problems with the use of the CD

    —  Problems in distributing response forms (eg one person was posted a form completed by someone else)

    —  The electronic response form was different to the paper version

    —  Poor response time to telephone enquiries.

4.  PUBLICITY

  4.1  In simple terms, there was insufficient publicity given to the process to make it a genuine national debate. Because of the limited budget there was no allocation for advertising and promotion. Publicity was limited to media coverage and this was at best erratic.

  4.2  There was no significant or repeated publicity in either of the main farming publications—Farmers Guardian or Farmers Weekly.

5.  THE ROLE OF THE FSA

  5.1  The Food Standards Agency organised a Citizen's jury, focus groups, a schools debate, video and publication on GM. The FSA's intervention in the public debate has been criticised by the FSA's Consumer Committee as being biased. Outside organisations took the same view. It cannot be helpful for the FSA to be seen as a sales team for the biotech industry when its central role is that of a public watch dog. The FSA spent £110,000 on this and did so without prior consultation with the GM Nation? steering board. It did not appear to be the wisest or best use of public money.

  5.2  The FSA report to ministers on the GM debate was produced before the debate had even concluded. This fuelled public cynicism about their role in the debate.

6.  THE "DEBATES"

  6.1  One major criticism of the debates was the unbalanced pro-GM scientific representation of the speakers. Pro-GM scientists (many supported by the biotech corporations) were out in force but were keen to avoid the awkward issues of scientific doubt and to sidestep key areas of contention. Members of the public raising serious concerns about risk and risk assessment were brushed aside. Public criticism was that the debates were often used to intimidate and discredit opponents rather than subject the science to serious scrutiny. There was also criticism about the biasing of "expert panels for the debates".

  6.2  The Berkshire GM debate, at the University of Reading, was a good example of this. The University has a strong pro-GM stance and local GM companies were strongly represented at the meeting. Those putting a pro-GM case were a principal research fellow at the university and a scientist from Syngenta. Those putting the case against were a member of the University Students' Union and a local anti-GM activist. Nothing in the debate was designed to subject the science to tough scrutiny.

  6.3  In another debate one of the pro-GM speakers introduced himself as a molecular biologist, but not as a member of a biotech company funded by Monsanto. Monsanto representatives arrived with the speaker, conducted a press interview with him and answered difficult questions on his behalf. They also repeatedly sought to challenge the credentials of speakers putting the anti-GM case. The public were left wondering why the biotech industry was allowed such a high profile role in the conduct of the debate.

  6.4  No attempt was made by the COI or the Steering Board to clarify the scientific issues that needed to be addressed in the debate. This meant that misleading claims were able to be repeated without ever being explored. In the debate at Coventry Town Hall the claim that "DNA is DNA is DNA" was used to suggest that GM-DNA is no different from natural DNA and ignoring the fact that integration of transgenic DNA into a cell's genome (rather than its absorption into a cell) is one of the big risk areas that we currently know little or nothing about.

  6.5  Key players were left out of the debate. Despite being the people who would either directly use or have their neighbours' use of GM crops indirectly impact upon their lives, farmers' voices have been surprisingly limited in the overall debate. Recent figures published by FARM[11] reveal that in a sample of 600 farmers randomly selected across England and the Welsh borders 51% disagreed with the development of GM crops would overall benefit farmers, with 11% strongly disagreeing. Farmers, however, were given limited opportunity to voice this opinion during the debate.

  6.6  Although NFU attempted to organise meetings in their own right these did not prove effective in delivering large scale farmer involvement or an interaction between farmers and consumers. The timing of the debate meant that many farmers were unable to become involved as they were busy with silage-making and preparations for harvest. It isn't rocket science to know that if you want to gather farmers together in discussion groups or other meetings, you need to get them before or preferably after harvest (The Royal Show excepted). October through to February is the most productive time to get farmers into a meeting room.

  6.7  Only three official national debates were scheduled across England. This did not include Norfolk, the potential heartland of commercialisation. Why was such a key area ignored? The few large scale farmer proponents of GM are represented in Norfolk and ought to have been required to address the critical arguments of those against the technology.

7.  DEBATING WHAT?

  7.1  To have a useful, informed debate, the key areas of scientific disagreement should have been clearly laid out before the public. The public were asked to debate in an information vacuum, and worse. No critical, relevant scientific evidence on the problems and hazards of GM crops as opposed to the potential benefits was presented.

  7.2  There is a priori and empirical evidence (presented in Annex 1) suggesting that GM is inherently unsafe and unpredictable. There are easily identifiable critical areas of scientific doubt or challenge. These key areas of scientific concern should have been presented to the public and addressed independently. This, rather than the "case by case" approach recommended by the GM Science Review First Report, is what the public have a right to expect of government.

  7.3  There was also a failure to present the many health, environmental and social benefits of sustainable non-GM agriculture as opposed to GM agriculture. The debate failed to address the alternatives to GM—both in terms of crop management techniques and non-transgenic plant breeding techniques, such as Marker Assisted Selection. Any informed decision about GM can not be reached without a full appraisal of costs and benefits and these need to be weighed against those for alternative strategies.

  7.4  The debate did not even attempt to address public concerns over safety of GM crops for health and the environment, the absence of tests about allergenicity, or the social and economic impact of commercial GM crops production already affecting farmers in the United States, Canada, India and elsewhere.

  7.5  Throughout "the debate" the public was faced with a serious lack of critical information on GM. They were also kept in the dark about what use the Government intended to make of the debate. Public scepticism about the Government's intention to take any notice of the outcomes of the debate was a major factor in the public's attitude towards the debate process itself. Deep scepticism based on historic mistrust of Government's actions on this issue and legitimate doubts about the displacement of independent science by "bought" science meant that public perception of the debate was that the process was little more than a PR exercise.

  7.6  The steering board did try to elicit from the Secretary of State assurances that the Government would act on the results of the process. The ambiguity of the government's response inevitably affected the level of public involvement. Never the less we must not detract from the efforts put in by tens of thousands of people around the country to take part in this debate. The demands for involvement that went unmet, indicate both the level of public concern about this issue and the extent to which the government has failed to carry the public with it in it's desire to press ahead with early GM crop commercialisation.

Alan Simpson MP

September 2003

POST SCRIPT

  This submission has been put together following discussions with, and contributions of evidence from, a range of individuals and groups concerned about the conduct of the GM Nation? debate. In particular I would like to thank Clare Devereux Director of Five Year Freeze (also a member of the steering board overseeing the process of the debate), Sue Mayer of GeneWatch, Dr Mae-Wan Ho of the Institute for Science in Society (I-SIS), Robin Maynard of FARM, Pete Riley of Friends of the Earth, Members of Friends of the Earth Wokingham and Caroline Clarke of the Burnhams Group, for the assistance they have given me.



9   Central Office of Information. Back

10   Agriculture and Environment Biotechnology Commission is the Government strategic advisory body on biotechnology issues affecting agriculture and the environment. Back

11   FARM is a campaigning organisation set up by working farmers for working farmers, but its membership is also open to and represented by the wider public. The organisation's overall objective is to fight for a sustainable and diverse food and farming sector in the UK. Its membership is not restricted to membership to any particular sector, system or scale of farming. Back


 
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