Examination of Witnesses (Questions 280-299)
30 NOVEMBER 2004
LORD WHITTY,
MS OONA
MUIRHEAD AND
MR ROBIN
MORTIMER
Q280 Chairman: Can I welcome Lord Whitty,
Oona Muirhead and Robin Mortimer. This is our last evidence session,
so I hope, Larry, you are going to set it all in context for us.
We hope to produce a report fairly quickly. I think you wanted
to make some opening remarks to the Committee.
Lord Whitty: Just as briefly as
I can. First of all, can I just register that Margaret Beckett
apologises to the Committee, but, on the other hand, she has,
for my sins, given me the responsibility for seeing the legislation
through, so I am probably the appropriate person here. The background
to the Rural Strategy is the basis for our session and it sets
out the progress since the Rural White Paper 2000 and it takes
into effect the report from Lord Haskins, who looked at rural
delivery, and we have accepted the bulk of his recommendations.
The combination of the Rural Strategy and our intentions for legislation
is about all three pillars of sustainable development in the regions
at the local level. It is about economic regeneration in rural
areas and it is to help farmers and other rural businesses to
be competitive and to diversify and we are putting money also
into advice. We are increasing the amount of money in the RDA
single pot up to £72 million this year all for rural regeneration.
It is also about tackling social exclusion in rural areas, so
we are putting money down to the community level, right down to
the parish councils and similar areas, and it is about protecting
and enhancing the natural environment, and it is this area that
the legislation is primarily directed at by the creation of the
Integrated Agency to have a wider range of levers and a wider
remit so as to attract all areas of policy on the natural environment,
biodiversity, landscape and so forth, but at the same time to
recognise that that also contributes to the social and economic
outcomes in rural areas. The RDAs from next year will be put into
a position where they are delivering against a tasking framework
which will ensure that the rural dimension of their work features
high on their primarily economic agenda. We are also involved
in devolving decisions and devolving funding closer to the community
and to the customer. We have set up eight rural pathfinders last
month which are all about delivering at the local level with local
authorities in a lead role. We are carrying out major streamlining
of our funding streams down from nearly 100 at the moment to three
broad schemes which will give us flexibility and the public, clients
and Parliament a much clearer link between the objectives and
where our money goes to and perhaps, above all, it will make life
simpler for applicants and clients. At the regional level, there
will be joined-up activity through the Regional Delivery Frameworks
which will be led by the Government Offices. We are also setting
up the new Countryside Agency by next April and in due course
that, through the legislation, will become an independent NDPB
and its role will be to assess whether government policy and government
actions are making a real difference on the ground in rural areas
and particularly to focus on disadvantage in rural areas, so we
have got quite a major programme of work here. A lot of work has
been done and it is our intention, as you know, at the end of
January or around there to publish a draft Bill to establish the
Integrated Agency and the new Countryside Agency. I will leave
some diagrams of all this with your Clerk if you like, and I do
not want to distract you now, but you may wish, before you reach
your final report, to have some graphic representation of what
we intend to do[39]
Q281 Chairman: That is a big change programme
and it needs careful management. One of the things about governments
of all political parties is that they are pretty good on policy,
they have got lots and lots, and some of them are here today,
of real policy people, but they are not so good at managing change,
implementing change and handling the timetable. Now, you are the
man responsible, Mrs Beckett asked you to do this, so do you have
anxieties about this?
Lord Whitty: I always have anxieties,
Chair, but I think on this I am blessed, if that is the word,
with a lot of expertise around the Department and we are not changing
the functions of what we are trying to do or the objectives of
what we are trying to do, but we are just trying to do it better,
in a better and more integrated structure. I think it is not quite
such a radical change in policy, but it is a fairly substantial
organisational change, you are right, and one that is going to
involve a lot of people and a lot of people will have to be taken
with it and I am pretty confident that we can manage it.
Q282 Mr Drew: As Paddy has just said,
this is a big change in the agenda. In the evidence we have taken
so far, I think it is fair to say that the jury is out on whether
Defra can handle this huge change agenda. In what ways do you
think Defra will work differently with the new Integrated Agency
and with the RDAs than it has been working in the past, given
that Defra has had these responsibilities and is now, if you like,
dispersing them in a wider range of organisations or to a wider
range of organisations?
Lord Whitty: In total, it is not
a wider range of organisations, but it is measures which will
take the work of Defra and the delivery of our schemes, our support
systems and our advice closer to the customer, so it is quite
a substantial degree of devolution involved there. Haskins' main
strategy was the separation of policy and delivery. Now, there
are some grey areas there, but, nevertheless, that central theme
we accept and we are pursuing and it means that those areas which
were previously in core Defra either go to the new Integrated
Agency or are delivered through the regional and local structure
closer to the ultimate consumers and to the societies they are
intended to support. At the same time, we are trying to simplify
the range of instruments that we have, both funding and regulatory,
and the structures that we have for delivering them so that the
different aspects of biodiversity, landscape, soil, air and water
that were dealt with by English Nature and aspects of it by Defra
itself through the RDS and some aspects of the Countryside Agency's
activity are brought together in the new Integrated Agency. So
there is a rationalisation, a simplification, but, above all,
there is a devolution of the way in which we are delivering our
activity and that separation of delivery from policy.
Q283 Mr Drew: So, as a follow-up to that,
Larry, how will we know if this works or not because there are
a lot of fine words, a lot of good intentions, restructuring,
we are looking at thematic diagrams, but where is the proof going
to be, or otherwise, that this really will make a difference?
Lord Whitty: Well, I think it
is three-fold: first, whether we have managed the change effectively,
which is what you and the Chair were querying, and I think we
will see that fairly quickly; secondly, on the response to the
ultimate recipients, the rural businesses and the rural communities,
how they perceive and react to the change; and, thirdly, we do
have certain criteria in terms of addressing rural disadvantage
and ensuring that the least well performing regional areas are
brought up to a higher level of performance in line with our existing
PSA target. On the way there of course there will be performance
indicators by the RDAs and ourselves built into the management
programme, but the ultimate aim is whether the customers are more
satisfied and more effective in doing what they are doing and
whether we have addressed these problems of differential activity
and differential rural area performance. Of course the New Countryside
Agency will be a sort of check on us, a monitoring and quality
control operation on us and indeed other government departments
as to whether we are delivering for rural areas.
Q284 Mr Drew: Would it help you if we
were to say, as part of our report, that the objectives should
be spelled out more specifically so that we can actually measure
those targets?
Lord Whitty: Well, the PSA target
is already spelled out pretty specifically. There is no harm at
all in the Committee underlining that and perhaps making more
clear the disadvantage targets, but of course part of the devolution
is that we need the flexibility to meet local needs and local
requirements, so to have an entirely across-the-board, single
target I think would probably be a bit misleading.
Q285 Mr Jack: Why, Lord Whitty, after
all the work that we were hearing from earlier witnesses that
your colleague, Alun Michael, has undertaken to develop policy
in this area, has it now been subcontracted to you?
Lord Whitty: Well, Alun Michael
in the coming legislative programme has responsibility for the
Clean Neighbourhoods Bill and for the Commons Bill and I would
have very little to do really in the legislative programme if
I was not given this.
Q286 Mr Jack: Ring your Secretary of
State straightaway and say that you have got little to do and
would like more then!
Lord Whitty: I really felt that
I needed a bit more legislation to get my teeth into, so the Secretary
of State decided I would take that on and of course Ben Bradshaw
is taking on the Animal Welfare Bill, so we are spreading the
load and that seems sensible.
Q287 Mr Jack: You mentioned the Defra
PSA. Is that PSA 1?
Lord Whitty: No, PSA 1 is the
sustainable development target. It is PSA 3, I think, and 4.
Ms Muirhead: The sustainable development
PSA target, which is the overarching one, but within that there
are three other PSA targets which are of relevance here, PSA targets
3, 4 and 5, which really take us into environmental, social, economic
and particularly rural regeneration and also farming, sustainable
farming and food, which is PSA 5.
Q288 Mr Jack: So I guess you would say
that those PSAs joined together underpin the work of the new Integrated
Agency because if that is the case, and do correct me if I am
wrong, we have had evidence from Fiona Reynolds, the Director
General of the National Trust, who said, "Defra has made
real progress in changing some parts of the agenda but a joined-up
strategy for managing our land and natural resources is currently
missing and needs urgent attention". She conjectures that
what you have got is a delivery body in search of a purpose, so
I went to your evidence because I could not believe that such
harsh criticism would not be immediately rebutted by all that
you had said to us and under paragraph 18 of your evidence, Integrated
Agency, I find the following: that, "Key improvements will
be a holistic approach to conservation of our natural heritage",
so if that is the case, what does that mean?
Lord Whitty: It is part of the
reason why we are establishing the Integrated Agency, to bring
together what clearly Fiona Reynolds describes as a lack of a
totally coherent strategy in relation to landscape, biodiversity,
natural resources and so on, which are covered by PSA 3 in Defra's
objectives and which we have been working towards, but we think
having an Integrated Agency to deal with all of that would indeed
be a better delivery than we have got at the moment. I think to
that extent I would not entirely disagree with what Fiona Reynolds
said, if only to give greater clarity of how we do it.
Q289 Mr Jack: Just explain to me in this
real world what this little phrase "a holistic approach to
conservation of our natural heritage" means. What is going
to be different in terms of how the Integrated Agency will approach
that from what is there at the moment?
Lord Whitty: Well, English Nature
has a number of responsibilities for biodiversity. There are a
number of schemes which are currently operated by core Defra under
the RDS which affect landscape, affect soil and affect water.
English Nature has a general responsibility for biodiversity,
but all of these things need to be brought together in the way
that you manage the land and that is all that "holistic"
means. It means we are bringing together those areas of policy
and delivery or strategy and delivery which deal with the landscape,
biodiversity and natural resources.
Q290 Mr Jack: And as a result of that
exercise, how will the rural proofing activity within government
be enhanced as a result of the achievement of the objective you
have just described?
Lord Whitty: Which one?
Q291 Mr Jack: If you are going to bring
together all of those things, something will come out of this
exercise that the Agency in a practical sense on the ground will
do certain things and I presume linking into government, because
I wanted to ask about the line of accountability into Defra, so
I presume information from this holistic approach will be moved
upwards and outwards into other parts of government to guide government
policy as it impacts upon the rural agenda. Is that not going
to happen?
Lord Whitty: Not in quite the
way you describe. The Integrated Agency will deal with the management
of, if you like, the physical landscape, biodiversity and natural
resources and its objective will be the enhancement of the landscape,
conservation, the natural resources and biodiversity. In that
respect, it is the body which will advise and deal with all aspects
of government, so if, for example, there are planning proposals,
it will be the adviser, as English Nature is now, on all of those
areas, but with a wider remit taking into account all of those
areas.
Q292 Mr Jack: I looked through the Rural
Strategy 2004 and it is a sort of target-free zone. I am not quite
clear how this new Agency is going to measure either its objectives
or its outcomes. Is it going to publish material later on so that
it will know whether it is sort of achieving its objectives and
so that we will know whether it is being successful and, if so,
how will that be communicated to us? What kind of measures are
we going to look for for targets and success and achievement?
Ms Muirhead: Perhaps I could give
you an example of the way in which the Integrated Agency will
actually take a different approach on the ground. We have heard
evidence from people, a number of your witnesses today, talking
about the Fens and if you look at the Fens and if you look at
the Norfolk Broads area, there are a number of special sites of
different types and designations in that area. If you actually
go and hover above in a helicopter, you will see that there are
different agencies dealing with each of these small bits of land,
sort of islands, if you like. What the Integrated Agency will
do will join up those islands, and I do not want to get too poetic,
but sort of an archipelago, bring them together and really be
able to look in a much wider area, so in the helicopter instead
of, as I say, looking down at sort of spots, you will see a much
bigger area which the Integrated Agency will be managing on that
sort of area basis, so it will be able to take a much more holistic
approach, which Lord Whitty was talking about. I thought that
might just be a little bit helpful.
Q293 Mr Jack: Does that explain the phrase
in the next paragraph of section 18 which says that you are about
"joining up our natural heritage and people, bringing benefits
in both directions. A better knowledge and sense of ownership
of the resource of nature will help harness activity"? I
was not entirely clear what that sentence meant either, but is
that what it means, what you have just described?
Ms Muirhead: I think that is another
benefit actually because we are bringing together the access and
recreation functions of the Countryside Agency, who actually also
of course, just going back to your planning point, are statutory
advisers in that respect, but in relation to landscape, so you
would have two statutory advisers at the moment, English Nature
and the Countryside Agency and they will be brought together,
but in terms of access and recreation, those functions will be
in the Integrated Agency along with landscape, biodiversity and
more general enhancement of the natural environment. This will
mean that it will be much easier for this single body to think,
when thinking about how to enhance the natural environment, about
how we might also benefit people, both this and future generations,
in getting health from visits to the environment, maybe even improving
the use for sustainable tourism purposes, which you were discussing
earlier, so it is those sorts of benefits that bringing it together
in an Integrated Agency will deliver as well as the ability to
look on a much wider area.
Q294 Mr Jack: Finally, can I ask on this
section about sustainability because it is a word that has been
used by all of our witnesses to date and it is a key function,
I think, on the first page of the Rural Strategy 2004 in the first
chapter where you have sustainability as one of the objectives
of the new Integrated Agency. Just tell the Committee a bit about
how the question of sustainability is going to be determined.
Is it going to be quantified in a way again where we can measure
movements towards sustainability or is it simply going to take
all the statements about wanting improved sustainability and try
and help achieve them? Are we going to quantify it or how will
we recognise it?
Lord Whitty: I do not think there
is a single index of sustainability, but clearly a lot of our
rural landscape has at various points in history been maintained
in an unsustainable way and our view is that the Integrated Agency's
role will be to enhance the landscape, but also to ensure it does
so in a way which is sustainable for future generations, so we
are dealing with a system of land management which is sustainable,
we are dealing with a biodiversity which is sustainable and we
are dealing with the economic and social outcomes of that in terms
of the rural community which is sustainable, so all of those are
separately measurable.
Q295 Mr Jack: Bring me down to what I
call "the world of the practical". Could you tell me
what you might regard as, say, three key priority challenges re
sustainability for the new Integrated Agency and perhaps just
help me to understand how the new Agency would be better at tackling
those key issues than the current arrangements. If you cannot
do three, just pick the one that you think is the most important.
Lord Whitty: Well, I do not know
that we would have three single key objectives, single-dimensional
ones, but there are areas on the landscape and biodiversity side,
the protection and enhancement of Sites of Special Scientific
Interest, for example, which have gone backwards in some parts
of the country and that situation needs to be reversed and that
is measurable. You may have measurable indices of the level of
biodiversity in areas which seem to have been subject to pressure
on biodiversity. You will have in some areas, and this will partly
involve the engagement of the Environment Agency as well as the
Integrated Agency, pressures on water quality and on erosion and
on the quality of the soil, all of which are measurable, so I
do not think there are three big ones, but there are a lot of
relatively measurable small ones.
Q296 Mr Jack: I had the pleasure of spending
a morning with English Nature who took me around some of the Sites
of Special Scientific Interest which border along the Ribble estuary
and if there was one clear message which I got, it was the question
of resources, particularly at the level of the local authority
for sustaining the SSSIs. The clear message you have given me
is that the new Agency may be much better, as Ms Muirhead indicated
earlier, at joining together, teasing out, amplifying and developing
the challenges to SSSIs, but unless the resources are there to
respond to the challenges, we do not make progress. Will the new
Agency be able to assist that agenda?
Lord Whitty: Yes, and the measures
which come through our various funding streams now to be made
more broadly available and more tailored to particular examples
will help that as well, as will in a broader sense the changes
in the CAP because the CAP's support for farming will now be based
on maintaining land in good environmental and agricultural condition
and, therefore, there is a further, very powerful lever to reverse
any deterioration in soil, air and water in that respect and of
course there will be substantial help through the entry-level
scheme, Pillar II of the CAP reform, and the higher-grade agri-environment
schemes, so there is a lot of help for land management in various
respects.
Q297 Chairman: I was interested in the
point you just made, Larry, and Oona took us on a helicopter trip
a little while ago, which I did not think was poetic, but of course
one of the bodies that has that kind of wider view of the world
is the Environment Agency through the river basin catchment areas.
Now, I am not entirely clear how the Environment Agency and the
new Integrated Agency are going to link together. Clearly there
is a commonality of interest, particularly, for example, the one
you just referred to in a way, diffuse pollution, so how are they
going to fit into the scene?
Lord Whitty: Well, there will
need to be very close co-operation in these areas between the
Environment Agency and the new Integrated Agency and in some areas
it will be the Integrated Agency, for example, leading on landscape,
and in terms of water management, it will be the Environment Agency
leading, but there are many of the Integrated Agency's schemes
and activities, for example, on soil management and so on which
will contribute towards the Environment Agency's strategy. So
you are absolutely right that there needs to be a very close co-operation
between the two and clarity of who does what, in particular, I
would say, in relation to water and to water pollution, so the
two bodies are already working together in a number of pilot areas
to see how they can work that switch.
Q298 Chairman: Where is that clarity
going to come from? Is that going to be in the legislation or
is there going to be some kind of memorandum of agreement between
the two agencies?
Lord Whitty: Well, both. I think
the Integrated Agency's purposes and functions will be in the
legislation, but in addition there will need to be something like,
and I am not necessarily committing myself to precisely these
terms, a memorandum of understanding as to who does what between
the two bodies.
Q299 Chairman: You accepted or the Secretary
of State accepted most of the recommendations of Lord Haskins.
The one where there was a bit of variation was Haskins' view that
the Countryside Agency should go, full stop, and it should be
disestablished, but the decision has been taken to maintain a
small policy group. Will you just take us through the thinking
that took the Secretary of State to that conclusion?
Lord Whitty: Yes, Haskins was
of course focusing on delivery and he felt, and we agree, that
the executive role, if you like, of the Countryside Agency in
relation to managing schemes itself would best be located in either
a wider body or in a more devolved body and hence the Countryside
Agency's expenditure on schemes will go either to the Integrated
Agency or into the RDAs. Of course Haskins then did see that there
was a need for some national focus for rural matters and suggested
that what exists now as the National Rural Affairs Forum should
effectively do that job. We felt we needed to upgrade that a bit
and the advice role of the Countryside Agency needed to be maintained
somewhat at arm's length and on a more institutional basis than
Haskins foresaw the role for the Forum, and that is why we have
gone for the new Countryside Agency with a strong advice role
both to Defra, to all the agencies within Defra and right across
Whitehall and with the Chair of that, undertaking the role of
rural advocate across government, so it is a variation of Haskins,
although Haskins did see that there was something to be done there
and we have probably strengthened that quite significantly.
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