Examination of Witnesses (Questions 300-319)
7 JANUARY 2004
MR ELLIOT
MORLEY MP AND
MR JOHN
ROBERTS
Q300 Mr Lepper: But it has from time
to time considered issues related to the marine environment?
Mr Morley: When there are departments
who have an involvement in marine, then what the whole principle
of ENV(G) is is to look for the best environmental practice and
to look for the best sustainable practice. Now, some of that will
be in terms of environmental management. It might be involved
in dredging, for example, which is of course an issue which is
about sustainability and good management, and we would have an
interest in that, yes.
Q301 Mr Lepper: You have listed already
for us some of the ways in which a whole range of government departments
do have various responsibilities and interests. The DTI has cropped
up several times in the debate so far.
Mr Morley: Correct.
Q302 Mr Lepper: ODPM obviously, the Department
for Transport, DCMS, et cetera.
Mr Morley: Yes.
Q303 Mr Lepper: So I come back to my
initial question really. You say whenever the need arises, there
will be discussion about issues related to the marine environment,
but does that need arise very frequently? Do departments bring
to the table—
Mr Morley: I will ask John to
come in on this, but before he does I just want to say that the
discussion which is taking place at the present time, for example,
in relation to streamlining and marine, that is an inter-governmental
discussion and that involves government departments in relation
to exchanging ideas and views, so there is internal government
discussion in this case in relation to the range of activities
which take place in the marine environment.
Q304 Mr Lepper: And is ENV, without the
"G", co-ordinating that?
Mr Morley: At this stage it will
ultimately have to go through the ENV Committee, but that can
be by letter. Most of it is by letter rather than by meetings.
Mr Roberts: It may be helpful
perhaps if I can illustrate some issues where we have sought collective
agreement fairly recently. First of all, of course Safeguarding
Our Seas itself was agreed inter-departmentally at ministerial
level by correspondence through ENV. The European Commission in
2002 produced the document which is starting the process of leading
up to the EU strategy and the UK had to agree the line that we
would take on the issues covered in the Commission's communication.
That communication covered a very wide range of issues from offshore
oil and gas, shipping, fishing, nature conservation, so a large
number of departments and the devolved administrations have an
interest in the way that strategy is going, so Defra has the role
of negotiating that strategy in Europe, but the line we took was
negotiated first between the fishing industry to get a common
line and then agreed by ministers through correspondence from
the relevant Cabinet committee to give us a mandate to represent
the whole of government and to an extent it was not too difficult
to achieve an agreed line, but we had to resolve minor issues
between the Department for Transport who might have preferred
it slightly differently, but we took a view and we agreed a common
line to reflect what we would say in Brussels.
Q305 Mr Lepper: That is helpful, but
the fact remains that many of the witnesses who have appeared
before this Committee so far in this inquiry have told us that
they feel that the impression of co-ordination, of collaboration
and of consultation within departments does not always appear
to be happening. Can you understand that that is a perception
outside government?
Mr Morley: I can understand that
that can be a perception. There is more co-ordination within government
departments than people realise, not least because of course it
is mainly carried out internally, so it is difficult for people
to take any judgment on this, so I do not think that there is
a lack of co-ordination, but I would not wish to be complacent
about this and I would not wish to say that there may not be ways
that we can do this better.
Q306 Alan Simpson: Can I press you on
this. The reason that I am becoming increasingly sceptical about
the virtual relationships of sub-committees that meet by e-mail
is that the Committee were treated to the realities of this when
we were looking into the gangmaster operation and we had a whole
line-up of staff here from the different departments and it turned
out that none of them had ever met each other, so I would just
like to question this sort of virtual relationship. I was sitting
here, looking at you and thinking, "Well, it is almost like
one of these sort of blind date adverts: `Good-looking ministerial
lad with long-term interest in birds, looking for compatible relationship
with like-minded minister', and you wait for a reply". You
have met face to face, not virtually, but you have met last year?
Mr Morley: Yes.
Q307 Alan Simpson: So that was a meeting
that you chaired?
Mr Morley: The ENV(G) has certainly
met and so has ENV as well. I have been to ENV meetings last year
as well.
Q308 Alan Simpson: But ENV(G) you have
chaired?
Mr Morley: Yes, absolutely, since
becoming Minister of course.
Q309 Alan Simpson: And in that process
then, in terms of the co-ordination that David was addressing,
do you have a remit that says to people, "Okay, how do we
audit this?"? People have responsibility for being champions,
but do you have an overarching responsibility to audit what that
championing role is?
Mr Morley: The real, the actual
role for the auditing is the Environmental Audit Committee in
relation to the work that we do in Defra. That is their role and
indeed there is a very strong argument for having a separate audit
which is of course made up of Members who can look at the work
that is done by individual departments as well as Defra. The concept
of ENV(G) is really to look at what is being done in delivering
the overall strategy in relation to sustainability and sharing
good practice and good ideas as well, but the idea that you cannot
have effective consultation by e-mail and letter, I think, is
a mistake because it does go directly to the ministers responsible
and it does make sure that they are involved within the actual
decision-making processes and also of course officials do meet
from time to time. If we take gangmasters, we have been discussing
gangmasters quite a lot recently with both the DWP and the DTI.
Chairman: We will have to leave that
one to another time.
Q310 Mr Drew: Could we move on to the
regulatory regime and you have already said that because it is
such a confusing area with the number of different ministers involved,
inevitably there is going to be a lot of overlap. I am aware when
I look at the report, your Annex A[21]with
the sort of work-in-progress, how that goes all the way through
to meeting our obligations which are both international requirements,
but also the national drive.
Mr Morley: Yes.
Q311 Mr Drew: Is it not a little bit
disappointing that we are waiting for the review of the development
to really see how we can get a regulatory regime in place? That
has been delayed for some time and the JNCC, the Joint Nature
Conservation Committee, has been sitting on this for how long
now?
Mr Morley: It is not the JNCC
who have been sitting on it, but there has been work-in-progress
for some time.
Q312 Mr Drew: So why is it delayed? Is
it because it is too difficult to get hold of?
Mr Morley: No, I think it is simply
that it is a big job. It does demand staffing resources in relation
to dealing with this. It is a big area, as indeed you quite rightly
identified. It has not been done before, but I think it is worth
saying that because there is no one body, there is not effective
regulation, I think it is wrong to say that because those departments
which are responsible for areas within their own responsibilities
do regulate, do enforce, do monitor and do have those kind of
audits that you were talking about. What has been under discussion
within government is whether or not there is a more effective
way of streamlining this and dealing with it. That is what has
been under process. Now, that will be consulted on in due course.
Q313 Mr Drew: We had a visit to Southampton
where, as you know, we went to look at not just the oceanographic
centre, but also to talk to some of the port operatives there.
How much consensus is there on the way forward in terms of a regulatory
process? We talked to people about this idea of a marine consents
agency coming into place. Is that a done deal in terms of the
idea or where is that? Is that parked currently while the JNCC
look at the feasibility of it or has it moved beyond that into
how you are going to introduce it?
Mr Morley: It is still under discussion.
It is an option. No decision has been made on this and indeed
it may be one of the options that we will consult on. I am a bit
confused about the JNCC role. I do not think the JNCC have a role.
They do not have a role on this in relation to consents.
Mr Roberts: The JNCC are involved
in the review of marine nature conservation which is a parallel
exercise.
Q314 Mr Drew: So that is parallel?
Mr Roberts: That is parallel.
Q315 Mr Drew: But that surely will impact
on the regulatory regime that you want to put in place?
Mr Roberts: Yes, but the review
of the regulatory regime is about the institutional arrangements.
The review of nature conservation will then help us set our nature
conservation objectives which we want that regulatory regime to
deliver.
Q316 Mr Drew: I think it would be quite
useful to get a paper from you on exactly what that means and
how the two things are in parallel because it sounds a bit like
the reason for the delay in getting a regulatory regime in place
is so that you can keep going on and on and on with the review
of the information you have got, but somebody at some time has
got to make the decision on what is an appropriate regulatory
body, presupposing that you do not believe you are doing that
effectively at the moment or you would give it a clean bill of
health.
Mr Morley: Yes, that is absolutely
right.
Q317 Mr Drew: What are the advantages
then of creating a marine consents agency?
Mr Morley: You would have a one-stop
approach for the various consents that people with an interest
in marine development could call at. You would have one agency
which would have an overview in relation to marine development,
offshore development. It would potentially be useful in terms
of fitting into a spatial planning approach, for example. There
are pros and cons to this kind of approach and it is premature
to decide whether it is the best way forward.
Q318 Mr Drew: So we are expecting the
review to be completed and we are expecting there to be a decision
taken by the Government on whether or not to create a marine consents
agency, so is this going to come to a head this year or next year?
Mr Morley: It will have to come
to a head this year because of course we do not want to drag this
on and we also have to consider the case for a Marine Bill. If
we conclude that there is a case for a Marine Bill, then of course
that would have to be submitted through the normal government
process.
Q319 Diana Organ: In your considerations
about both a marine consents agency and a Marine Bill, you have
already said that what is happening in the marine environment
is very complex and that there is a working together of departments,
albeit in some cases it might be a little bit tentative, but of
course the way that we solve problems on the land is we have planning
legislation, we have spatial planning, so you consent to whether
you can have mineral extraction from the land or whether you can
safeguard a bit of archaeology, and the same could apply to the
marine environment. I just wondered whether you had plans in the
Marine Bill or the marine consents agency development, which seems
a little hazy, to implement spatial planning within the UK waters.
Mr Morley: There may be an argument
for spatial planning. Spatial planning is not as straightforward
at sea as it is on the land, mainly of course because we do lack
as much information in the marine environment compared to the
land environment for all sorts of obvious reasons. Therefore,
it is not quite as neat to say that you can have one particular
development in a bit of the sea and another development in another
bit of the sea, but you cannot have anything anywhere else because
of course gas and oil involves prospecting and there is still
a lot we do not know about optimum areas in relation to offshore
wind. We do of course need this information. The JNCC has carried
out a study on seabed areas, for example. We will expect monitoring
as part of the consents in relation to offshore wind. There are
some parts of the sea which are candidate SPA areas and of course
that will influence what goes on in them and our knowledge is
improving all the time about sensitive areas in relation to the
case for particular areas of protection, so I think yes, we should
take the concept of spatial planning seriously, but it is more
complicated than a land-based approach.
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