| Fireworks Bill
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Huw Irranca-Davies: I sat down prematurely, Mr. Benton. Subsection (3) gives me the opportunity to ask about consultation with the various groups whose interests will be affected. Mention has been made of fireworks manufacturers. Would he consider it apposite to consult not only groups representing the elderly and organisers of displays—such as local authorities and church groups—but youth groups, which will also have an interest in the legislation? He might also be able to comment on subsection (3)(c), which mentions
It would be useful if he could clarify, now or on Report, who they are. Mr. Tynan: It is important to make progress. I can imagine filling Hampden Park—that is a football stadium in Scotland—with interested parties. It is important for the main players to be involved in the discussion. That includes those to whom I have spoken in the past three or four months; I would not exclude anybody who wanted to take the opportunity to contribute. If we make the consultation too protracted, we may end up with no legislation on the issue of noise, which would be a tragedy. I have spoken to the British Fireworks Association, the RSPCA, the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association, Blue Cross, Help the Aged and other organisations with an interest in the issue. As I am sure the Minister will make clear when she responds, the sensible way forward would be to reach a consensus about the decibel level that has the least effect on animals and the elderly. If we can do that, we shall have taken a major step forward, although we may not have achieved the full loaf. That is how we should proceed on the clause, but the Minister will want to make her position clear. Noise is a major issue. In its ''Quiet Please'' report, the RSPCA recognises the fact that changing the construction of fireworks may result in a lower decibel level. I would hate to see the British Fireworks Association start a lobbying campaign, with Opposition parties asking for opposition to the Bill on the basis that we were injuring the industry. It is therefore important that we reach a consensus, and an attempt has been made to do that as regards the noise level. The clause is a way forward, and I hope that the Minister will listen to the concerns that have been expressed this afternoon. Mr. Weir: I did not intend to say anything about the clause, but I want to support the hon. Member for Hamilton, South. He talked about consensus, and his success in achieving it can be gauged by the fact that he Column Number: 11 has managed to get members of the Labour party in Scotland and members of the Scottish National party to agree with one another on the eve of the Scottish parliamentary elections. That is a major achievement.Clause 2 is the crux of the Bill. We shall deal later with clauses that prohibit supplying young persons with certain fireworks in certain circumstances, but the regulations in the clause will be at the heart of controlling the noise and damage that fireworks may cause. The types of firework that can be supplied to anyone, and the way in which they are used, are the crux of the problem. As has been rightly said, noise is a great problem. I represent Angus, which has a long association with the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association. The association has a centre in Forfar, and the community has many ties to guide dogs. There is great concern about the difficulties that they face, not only once they are being used but during their training. Noise is a year-round problem. The hon. Member for Ogmore (Huw Irranca-Davies) talked about a rocket coming in through someone's window, and I had a complaint from a constituent last week about the misuse of fireworks. It is April, but fireworks are being misused. That demonstrates the extent of the problem—it affects people all year round. I therefore very much support the clause in its present form. I fully recognise that the clause gives the Minister powers. We shall find out how effective it is once we see the regulations, but we must first get to that stage. Like the hon. Member for Hamilton, South, I would be worried if we became bogged down in the nitty-gritty at this stage. Let us get the principle on the statute book—we can argue about the nitty-gritty of the regulations thereafter. Mr. Truswell: I was not intending to speak, but I am concerned that certain hon. Members do not realise that constituents such as mine think that the issue of noise is crucial to the Bill. I may be condemned as a noise zealot throughout our proceedings, but I do not mind that label. It is clear from the correspondence that I receive from constituents, and from campaigns conducted by many newspapers, including the excellent Yorkshire Evening Post in my area, that the crux of the issue is noise, noise and noise again. I fully appreciate that my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton, South wants to make progress; that is absolutely right. His Bill contains a wonderful raft of measures, which will allow us to tackle almost every aspect of the abuse and use of fireworks. I wish him good luck and I thank him for introducing it. At the end of the day, however, people's main concern is noise. I have tried to retain my objectivity, but on far too many occasions through the year my family and I—we have two young boys—are subjected to the activities of an amateur pyrotechnician in our area who sets off unguided missiles and causes enormous problems. Whether the Government introduce curfews or licences, or restrict the period of use, we shall come up against the rocks of experience; and those rocks tell us that enforcement Column Number: 12 will always be difficult. That is why I am a fully fledged zealot on the issue of tackling noise through a statutory noise limit on fireworks that are available for use by the general public. However we try to restrict the way in which fireworks are used, enforcement is always a problem. If we introduce a statutory noise limit, the problem will be tackled at source and we shall not have to rely on the police, environmental offices or whomsoever is given the responsibility for enforcement.Mr. Tynan: Although we could have a debate about the noise levels that we could set, does my hon. Friend accept that if, on the basis of, say, the ''Quiet Please'' report, we set the noise level at 95 dB and we lost the Bill, that would be a major problem in dealing with fireworks? If so, does my hon. Friend accept that everything will depend on the Minister's implementation of the clause to the full, on the basis of the concerns that he and others have expressed? Mr. Truswell: I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. To make my position clear, I do not intend to pursue a specific noise limit in Committee. Rather, I wish to add my voice to those of people who are concerned about the matter, yet who do want a statutory noise limit. I am therefore using the opportunity presented by discussion on this clause to tell my hon. Friend the Minister that when she acquires the powers that are embodied in the Bill she will need to consult widely on reasonable and sensible statutory noise limits. A 120 dB limit is not at all reasonable or sensible. I understand that that level, which the European Union perhaps advocates, is the equivalent of a jet aircraft at 100 m or a loud car horn 1 m. It is far too loud. That is why I am attracted by the RSPCA's ''Quiet Please'' campaign, although that is not because it focuses on 95 dB, but because it gives us a starting point. Our constituents want the control of noise to be the prime consideration of the House of Commons in dealing with fireworks, which is why that campaign should be a starting point. We should at least be able to tell our constituents why 95 dB is not appropriate, reasonable or consensual, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton, South suggested it was not. I shall leave my comments at that. I make a plea to the Minister to err on the side of people in the community and animals when discharging the powers that the Bill will give, and to consider seriously imposing a statutory noise limit that is closer to, if not exactly the same as, the 95 dB limit that the RSPCA advocated in its excellent report than it is to the absolutely nonsensical limit of 120 dB that has been suggested from Europe. Miss Johnson: I welcome the issues that hon. Members in all parts of the Committee have raised on the clause. Noise was mentioned in many contributions. I have met the RSPCA. Indeed, I commended it on producing the document entitled ''Quiet Please—Loud fireworks frighten animals'' and on working to reduce the alarm and distress caused to animals by fireworks, which my hon. Friend the Member for Cleethorpes (Shona McIsaac) and others graphically Column Number: 13 described. We have asked the explosives section of the Health and Safety Executive to consider further the report that was produced and two other recent reports on firework noise that the RSPCA work mentions.I do not want to get technical or be drawn into technical arguments, but my hon. Friend talked about background noise with regard to how loud a noise seems. Other issues include proximity—whether it is a one-off or repeated noise, the environment in which it takes place and whether the noise can escape naturally. I must inform my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey (Mr. Truswell), who by his own description is a noise zealot, that noise and the measurement of it is a complicated matter. It also involves the measurement of the distance between the sound source and the measuring apparatus. We want to look into the issues in more detail. At present, we are not at the stage of debating a decibel limit. However, I hope that we are at the stage where the House of Commons gives us powers to deal with the issues in more detail later by statutory instrument. I therefore advise members of the Committee not to get too hooked on specific figures, but to consider matters objectively. We should bear in mind the wise advice of my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton, South that we must move forward on a consensual basis. I am sure that much improvement can be achieved. We hope to have continuing discussions with the HSE and the RSPCA on those issues. The BFA needs to be involved in those discussions because obviously there are technical questions about the current levels for fireworks, whether those relate to 120 or 95 dB on whatever method of measurement. We must consider these matters in much more detail, based on a clear analysis of the right way of measuring and considering levels and of how we move forward. I agree that noise is perhaps the key issue in the distress that fireworks cause to human beings and animals.
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