Select Committee on Environmental Audit Written Evidence


Memorandum from Sea and Water

RESPONSE TO DEFRA'S CONSULTATION ON A MARINE BILL

1.  INTRODUCTION

  1.1  Sea and Water welcomes Defra's consultation on the principles and potential content of a Marine Bill. We support efforts to create "clean, healthy, safe, productive and biologically diverse oceans and seas" and outline the views of the water freight industry in this response.

  1.2  Sea and Water is the national body—sponsored by the UK water-freight industry, the Department for Transport and the Scottish Executive—charged with promoting transport of freight by short sea shipping and inland waterways.

  1.3  Our membership is drawn from all parts of the UK water freight industry including ports, navigation authorities, carriers and related services. Sea and Water was created to pursue current Government policy and aspirations.

  1.4  Water freight makes a major contribution to the economy. More than 95% of freight by volume and around 75% by value is moved into and out of Great Britain by water. Within the UK, 24% of freight (measured in tonne kilometres) is moved by water. The industry employs more than 200,000 people, and contributes at least £6.2 billion to the UK economy.

  1.5  The water freight industry cares about the environment within which it operates. Compared to alternative transport modes, especially road transport, moving freight by water is environmentally sustainable. Emissions generated by water transport are considerably smaller than by road, and by switching to water lorries are taken off the congested road network.

  1.6  Yet the water freight sector faces considerable challenges, and is not able to deliver to its full potential. It therefore needs support from Government—both in terms of resources, but at least as importantly, in policy terms. The freight industry in turn will respond, as it has in the past, by investing in wharves and craft to deliver coastal and inland waterway services.

  1.7  Sea and Water backs plans for a better coordinated, strategic system of marine spatial planning, and simplified regulation that is developed in a way which supports the water freight industry. We welcome the opportunity to respond to this consultation.

2.  WATER-FREIGHT'S CONTRIBUTION TO THE UK

  2.1  Overall, water-freight within the UK achieved 59.4 billion tonne kilometres, 24% of total freight moved in 2004. (DfT: "Waterborne Freight in the UK 2004"). A total of 550 million tonnes of cargo passed through GB ports, of which 76% was international.

Table 1

VOLUME OF GOODS PASSING THROUGH GB PORTS
Volume (million tonnes) Percentage
International42076
Of which unitised1126 23
Other dry goods12522
Bulk liquid16931
Between GB ports1142 21
To/from elsewhere in UK316 3
550100

1  Containers and trailers.

2  That is 57 million tonnes loaded and then discharged at a different GB port.

3  N. Ireland, Isle of Man and Channel Isles.

(Source: Maritime Statistics)

  2.2  The total value of goods shipped through UK ports in 2004 was around £330 billion. Some 438 million tonnes of freight was moved into and out of the UK in 2004. More than 95% by volume and around 75% by value of all international trade goes by sea. In addition, some 130 million tonnes of goods passed through GB ports, reflecting the movement of 73 million tonnes of goods.

  2.3  The UK handles more sea freight through its ports than any other European country. This emphasises the vital link between UK trade and water-freight. Without this movement by sea the UK economy would stagnate and our way of life and standard of living would be very different from today.

Table 2

VOLUME OF FREIGHT MOVED INTO AND OUT OF GREAT BRITAIN BY MODE—2004
Volume (million tonnes) Percentage
Water (ports)42095.8
Air20.5
Road (tunnel)143,3
Rail (tunnel)20.4
Total international438 100.0

(Source: DfT, CAA, Eurotunnel. Excludes coastwise and one port traffic through major ports).


  2.7  Water-freight can be used to extend the length of a sea voyage to make more use of regional ports. This reduces the impact of new infrastructure on the congested south-east and contributes to business growth in the regions.

  2.8  Water transport also plays a vital role in linking the GB mainland with island communities and Northern Ireland. Excluding crude oil, in 2004, GB ports handled over 16 million tonnes of cargo to and from these local economies. The more important the role that coastal shipping plays in overall cargo distribution within the country, the greater the effective connectivity these relatively isolated island communities can enjoy. For example, a port such as Aberdeen enhances the connectivity of the Shetlands (with which it is linked by ferry) and provides good coastal shipping links to English ports as well as to the Continent. Similarly, coastal shipping links along the Irish Sea improve the connectivity of other island communities through ports such as Liverpool.

  Roll-on/roll-off ferries provide "lifeline" freight and passenger services between Aberdeen and the Northern Isles of Orkney and Shetland.

  2.9  Current coastal shipping flows are illustrated in the following maps (Fig 2 and 3) set against cargo flows on the road and rail networks respectively, using the same scales to, illustrate the different modes (source GB Freight Model[1]). Coastal shipping can be seen to play a significant role already. The volume of domestic cargo moved by sea in parallel with the coast can be seen to be comparable with that carried on the most heavily used railway lines and all but the busiest motorways.

  2.10  Shipping offers a low cost mode of transport. Over a distance of 250 kilometres, even a small "coastal" container ship carrying only 100 containers offers a cost per container of half that of road haulage before local road delivery is taken into account. It follows that water-linked locations offer a significant competitive advantage over inland sites for a wide range of commercial activities. While this has been long recognized by heavy industry such as oil refining and steel production, it is less well understood by lighter industry and particularly by the logistics industry. In an increasingly competitive world, it is most important that Britain can offer locations to global industries which not only minimize transport costs but also facilitate low cost onward exports.

  2.11  For this to be achievable requires an appropriate environment: principally adequate development sites, to be available to accommodate the opportunities available. Cost savings can be significant. An inland location which both consumes (a proportion of) imported components and exports (a high proportion) of output will face costs of several hundreds of pounds per container load of production in inland haulage. The average value of a container load of goods through a GB port is around £20,000. A port location might thereby cut overall production costs by 3 to 4%; highly significant in a global economy where different locations compete for business.

  2.12  Water-freight already plays a key role in the economy. A high proportion, perhaps half, of all manufacturing industry, employing 1.75 million people and contributing £58 billion GVA depends upon goods passing through the ports. In addition, based on survey information from five major ports accounting for approximately a third of the total tonnage of dry cargo, the total direct, indirect and induced jobs in water-freight is estimated at some 200,000, or about 0.55% of all workforce jobs, in 2004. Assuming an average estimate of Gross Value Added (GVA) per job, this translates to a contribution of £6.2 billion to the GVA of UK plc. These are believed to be conservative estimates of jobs and GVA and the true numbers may be higher by a factor of 2 to 3.

  2.13  Sea and Water supports the Government's commitment to reform marine licensing regimes to simplify and streamline the regulatory regime. Sea and Water calls on the Government to ensure that changes to the licensing regime do not add unnecessary burden and indeed are not detrimental to the water freight sector. We hope that the Government will make a full assessment of the impact of any new licensing system on the water freight sector, and call on the Government to consult Sea and Water as and when specific proposals are developed.

3.  HELPING THE ENVIRONMENT THROUGH WATER FREIGHT

  3.1  In its report into Transport and the Environment, published in 1994, the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution highlighted the environmental advantages of water freight transport. It called for action "to increase the proportion of tonne-kilometres carried by water from 25% in 1993 to 30% by 2000, and at least maintain that share thereafter".

  3.2  The 1998 White Paper, A New Deal for Transport, also recognised the "useful contribution" that water freight could make to a sustainable transport system. That position was supported in the subsequent "daughter" document, Waterways for Tomorrow, which was centred on the contribution waterways could make to sustainable development.

  3.3  In short, it is widely acknowledged that moving freight by short sea, coastal and inland shipping delivers a number of environmental benefits compared to other transport modes. Principally this is because moving freight by water uses significantly less fossil fuel than other modes.

  3.4  As a result moving freight by water reduces the amount of carbon put into the atmosphere by up to 80%. It reduces the volume of nitrogen oxides put into the atmosphere by about 35%. This is vitally important when carbon emissions from transport are growing, with road transport accounting for 22% of all of the UK's emissions. Almost 40% of CO2 emitted by road transport comes from lorries and buses.

  3.5  Water transport is more sustainable in other ways. The water "network" uses considerably fewer finite resources such as aggregate. A kilometre of motorway consumes more than 100,000 tonnes of aggregate, and UK roads as a whole account for 90 million tonnes of aggregates each year. By contrast coastal waters and rivers are naturally-occurring, and what maintenance is required can be delivered sustainably.

  3.6  If freight is switched to water the need for long distance movement of freight by road is reduced, thereby reducing the demand to widen existing motorways or build new trunk roads. Enhancing water-based transport facilities instead of road infrastructure has the great advantage of being specific to freight and will not be taken up by unregulated growth of passenger car traffic.

  3.7  The consultation proposes new measures for Marine Nature Conservation. Sea and Water is committed to developing sustainable, environmentally sensitive growth of the water freight industry. It is important that any new legislation for the delivery of a network of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) occurs only with full consultation with the water freight sector.

4.  CREATING A SUSTAINABLE, STRATEGIC MARINE PLANNING ENVIRONMENT

  4.1  UK ports deliver their services to the national economy without cost to the public purse. The absence of a UK planning policy framework that recognises the overriding national importance of ports makes it difficult for ports to demonstrate the need for any port development.

  4.2  In addition, the process for obtaining Harbour Revision Orders and other approvals is too slow, too uncertain, overly complicated and costly. As a result, port development is delayed and frustrated—and the UK remains at a disadvantage to European competitors.

  4.3  We welcome the review of ports policy being undertaken by the Department for Transport. It is crucially important that the current difficulties with the planning system are urgently resolved. It is self evident that if inland waterways and coastal shipping are to expand their roles, ports must expand to become distribution hubs and will therefore require the physical developable space to fulfil that role. This approach is entirely consistent with established planning policy.

  4.4  Ports offer ideal locations for distribution activities as they are often rail and waterway connected and well located to serve regional markets. Regional policy guidance implies that the demand for rail/water connected sites will be very extensive as one million m2 of large distribution sheds (requiring around 250 hectares per annum) are built each year in the UK.

Facilitating the expansion of ports to meet demand

  4.5  Ports must be allowed to physically expand if the policy objective to locate such buildings at rail and water linked sites is to be addressed. Water connected sites will promote coastal shipping because the cost of a road leg to reach quayside buildings is eliminated. Port locations can constitute the most competitive locations for industrial development.

  4.6  Sea and Water calls upon ODPM, DfT, and Regional Assemblies to ensure that planning policy allows for the expansion of ports in the UK.

  4.7  Sea and Water also supports proposals for a system of Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) that recognizes the importance of the water freight industry to the UK. Any new system, whether managed by a new Marine Management Organisation (MMO) or other authority, must work with the water freight industry to ensure that marine planning creates a sustainable environmental and economic balance.

May 2006





1   GB Freight Model, developed by MDS Transmodal, audited by DfT and used Inter alia, in National Transport Model. Back


 
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