Mr.
Benyon: The amendment gives the Minister an opportunity to
tell the Committee a little more about the structure of the new
organisation, particularly at the higher levels. We have heard about
the appointment of the chairman, but I do not know what the process was
or what skills he will bring to the job. We have not had time to find
out much about him, and I look forward to the Minister enlightening us.
We also want to know the make-up of the board. We want to be sure that
it has a broad range of skills that reflect the demands made on the new
organisation.
There is
unhappiness among the MFA staff about the degree of consultation on the
move to the new headquarters. That is a matter of great concern, as is
the lack of incentive for the staff to move. It is crucial to the
success of the organisation that as many staff as possible make that
move. They are highly skilled and many have years of experience, but
they are being required to make a major, life-changing move to a
different part of the world—one of which many have no knowledge
and with which many have no connection. It is important that their
concerns are met.
The
credibility of the organisation will be measured largely by its ability
to hit the ground running. I am concerned that we do not have the
correct number of people in place at this stage. Not enough people have
expressed a willingness to move to Tyneside, and we do not know how the
organisation will be structured at the highest level or what more can
be done to encourage the many people who have contributed to marine and
fisheries management over the years to join the new
organisation.
Nick
Ainger: I wish to raise my concerns about the resourcing
of the MMO and its staffing, and about the Welsh Assembly Government
Departments that will take on the responsibilities of the MMO in Welsh
waters. The
hon. Member for St. Ives spoke about the consent process for offshore
wind, tidal and wave power. My local authority area’s coastline
has four projects in various stages of planning or development. There
are
two wave projects and two tidal projects, and they all pose different
problems for the area. I do not say that that will be replicated around
the coast, but it gives an indication of the likely level of
development that will take place, not only with large offshore wind
farms but with a significant number of smaller renewable energy
projects, such as tidal and wave power. I wonder
whether the MMO will have sufficient staffing resources, with the right
skills, to deal with such a series of applications. The worst thing for
the renewables sector is unnecessary delay. It is good to get the
consent process working well, ensuring that the environmental impact
assessments are completed. The sector understands that, but it is
concerned that inadequate staffing resources will lead to unacceptable
delays, particularly when dealing with offshore projects. Time is of
the essence. Basically, we do not want things being built at sea in the
middle of winter, and almost 12 months can be lost if a project
is delayed.
As I said
earlier, the MMO functions will be dealt with by Welsh Assembly
Government Departments in Welsh waters. Is the Minister satisfied that
Wales will have sufficient resources? I have cited the four projects
already on the drawing board or in various stages of development in my
constituency. We should consider what is happening elsewhere in the
world, with offshore wind farms and particularly with renewable energy
tidal and wave power. I know that the Minister is well aware of the
various developments. Will the Welsh Assembly Government have
sufficient resource to deal with such projects?
Finally,
will the Minister comment on the fact that, although the MMO will act
as a one-stop shop for all such developments, as I understand it,
depending on the size of a development, the MMO could become involved
in some parts of the consenting process, and the Welsh Assembly
Government in others?
Linda
Gilroy: I want to make a brief contribution and add to the
various points made by previous speakers. the Joint Committee on the
draft marine Bill raised a point about access to data. The MMO will
need to be funded adequately to enable it to access both
privately-owned and public date alike. When we made our
recommendations, we suggested that it should either be a question of
the MMO being adequately resourced or else having free access. As a
Member representing a constituency with various scientific
organisations collecting data, such as the long-term plankton data
recording set, I know that such institutions will not be particularly
amenable to giving their data for free. That matter needs drawing to
the Minister’s attention. The MMO needs to be adequately
resourced in that
regard.
Huw
Irranca-Davies: Some very good points have been made.
First, however, I reiterate that the chairman of the MMO, Chris Parry,
whom we appointed today, will be an excellent first chairman; I have no
doubt about that. We had a strong field of candidates. Chris Parry has
a very strong record in strategic development and management of
complex, multi-disciplinary maritime organisations. In fact, it has
been difficult to get hold of him over the past few days, because of
the work that he has been doing with other countries on marine
management. He has a fascinating background. With
his agreement—I shall have to clear it with him first—I
shall write to all Committee members next week with more background on
him.
Members asked
about the timetable. The chair designate is now in place, and he will
be appointed as chairman after Royal Assent. If the Bill does not
receive Royal Assent, of course, the appointment will be terminated, so
please keep the good will going! Board recruitment cannot ordinarily
commence until after Royal Assent, which is in line with standard
Treasury guidance on public expenditure. However, in order to keep
things moving, we intend to apply for an advance from the contingency
fund. If successful, it will allow early recruitment of the board. So
we intend to have a chair and board in place in good time to allow the
vesting of the organisation on 1 April
2010. The
hon. Member for Newbury asked about the recruitment process. We will
use specialist recruitment consultants to undertake parts of the
process, including drawing up specifications, executive search
advertising, application sift and interviews. Another point was raised
about the lack of proper consultation with staff at the MFA. I
understand hon. Members’ concerns. The move could have been to
Carrick, Southampton, Liverpool, Tyneside or Plymouth—the latter
was a very favourable location and many were attracted to it. However,
we have worked intensively with MFA staff; I, myself, have met them at
least twice.
We carried
out a staff survey on staff preferences and made staff visits to
Tyneside with a series of presentations on Tyneside, the living
environment, quality of life and so on. Furthermore, a question and
answer facility has been provided on the intranet for staff, and we
also held meetings with coastal staff. We always recognised that some
staff would not want to come—for family reasons and so
on—and we continue to engage with them to ensure that they are
properly looked
after. 2.30
pm
Mr.
Benyon: It would be a great help to know whether the
Department has yet secured a building as an office and when it expects
to announce a shadow chief executive, if not a chief
executive.
Huw
Irranca-Davies: We are looking at two or three possible
locations for the site of the building. A number of factors are
involved, which I do not want to bore the Committee with. They include
the environmental status of the building, which is important in
ensuring that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
estate keeps its commitment to having buildings of the highest
environmental standards. We need to make a decision quite soon. I will
return to the other question about the chief executive in a moment,
when I have some
inspiration. The
MMO will have around 50 more posts than currently and will need to take
on additional strength in depth around enforcement, engagement and
science. We have already mentioned a chief scientific adviser but it is
also about the science base and how it reaches out to other
organisations.
Linda
Gilroy: On the science, and the debate we had earlier
about engineering, what advice will the chief scientist have at his
disposal? How will that be organised? Will it be free-standing? Will
there be a Committee? How will it work?
Huw
Irranca-Davies: The chief scientific adviser will have a
panel to work with that reaches outwards from the MMO. Ultimately, the
MMO will determine the exact nature of the chief scientific
adviser’s role. Lord Hunt said that it would be a very senior
role—the fact of the appointment indicates its importance. The
MMO chief scientific adviser will not sit in a bunker in Tyneside. He
will have to make connections with the marine scientific advisory panel
that we have established and that is already extending its work. The
panel reaches out to all centres of expertise in the UK, including our
own Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science in
Lowestoft and elsewhere, Plymouth, Southampton, the Proudman Institute
and so
on.
Mr.
Swire: We are surprised that the Minister has managed to
hang on to a contingency fund that has not been snaffled to pay for one
of the Prime Minister’s new initiatives. The Minister has just
announced that the MMO will expand on the MFA by recruiting an
additional 40 or 50 new posts. Will he give the Committee an indication
of the range of pay scales of the new posts and what the additional
cost to the taxpayer will
be?
Huw
Irranca-Davies: No; I do not have that information at my
disposal. Ultimately, it will be for the MMO to work within its budget.
As we take this forward in Committee and make obligations, for example,
to appoint a chief scientific adviser, we are revising as we go to
ensure that the MMO has the appropriate resources. When we talk about
engineering, we need to ensure that the MMO has a basis of expertise.
Let me turn to the other two areas that I did not touch on, which
concern statistical analysis and also, crucially, economics and social
science. The MMO will be not an MFA-plus, but a very distinct,
strengthened organisation. I give an undertaking that the resources
will be
there.
Mr.
Williams: A number of people are concerned that only one
and a half people are going to have the knowledge and expertise to work
on the renewable energy responsibilities of the
MMO.
Huw
Irranca-Davies: I think I have made clear that, as the
Bill goes through Committee and on Report, there will be finessing of
the necessary expertise. It is not only to do with one and half, two,
five or ten people working within the MMO. It is also to do with the
expertise that they are drawing on
externally.
Mr.
Williams:
Consultants.
Huw
Irranca-Davies: No. We have a body of expertise in the UK
within the energy industry, organisations, NGOs and academia that
should not be isolated from the MMO; it should be integral to the
functionality of the MMO. The MMO is, as it were, the supreme manager
and strategist on the marine environment and its success will depend on
engagement with other sectors.
Regarding the
chief executive, we will be interviewing from an extremely strong and
powerful field of chief executive-designate positions next week.
Regarding the extra cost for pay, which was mentioned, I can give some
indication. We estimate that the additional cost will be about
£2.1 million. However, it is up to the
chairman and the chief executive to decide the appropriate pay
structures and grades for the expertise that they need. It is not for
me, as the Minister, to do that; that is what the MMO is all
about. I
want to turn directly to the amendment. The members of the Committee
will want to know that the Joint Committee of both Houses, which
carried out pre-legislative scrutiny of the draft Bill last summer,
also raised the issue of staff numbers and expertise. The Joint
Committee specifically wanted to see the importance of scientific input
reflected in the Bill and that issue was extensively debated in the
other place. The Government’s response was as follows:
“We
will revisit our analysis of the expected number of additional staff
the MMO will require in the light of more detailed understanding of the
MMO’s proposed functions and the staff required to deliver them.
In particular, in response to the Committee’s comments we need
to ensure there will be sufficient scientific expertise within the MMO.
In any event, we intend the MMO to evolve, growing into its role - and
have provided flexible provisions in the draft Bill to enable this. As
and when the MMO takes on further functions, we will review the
resources needed to deliver
them.” Members
of this Committee will also wish to note that we established an MMO
implementation team last year to work with the MFA as it prepares for
its transition. Members of that team are currently carrying out a
review of staffing and other resources that will be required for the
MMO. However, it will of course be up to the MMO board, once it is
appointed, to take the final decisions on how the new organisation
should be structured and staffed to ensure that it is fit for
purpose. As
I mentioned earlier, at launch we expect the MMO to comprise about 250
staff posts in total, which is 50 more than the current
number. The MMO will include a range of expertise from the MFA and new
staff with appropriate skills will be recruited. A comprehensive
training and induction programme is being developed, as well as managed
knowledge transfer plans for those staff who are coming from the MFA,
the Department of Energy and Climate Change and the Department for
Transport, as well as for those staff who will not be relocating to
Tyneside. The
structure and format of the new body will not just be the MFA remade.
The MMO will not only need to plan for new functions to be resourced
but to meet the needs of its existing customers, such as aggregate
businesses and offshore renewables. It needs to plan for increasing
demands, which will involve working with the IPC on major projects to
meet the Government’s challenging targets on renewable energy.
As I have mentioned, industry also has a role to play in helping
accurately to forecast the demands on the MMO, to ensure that it can
deliver the service required. So we are listening, and the chairman of
the MMO will be listening and making adjustments as
appropriate.
Andrew
George: The Minister has mentioned the IPC. Is he aware
how many staff the IPC will have to deal with questions about the
renewables
industry?
Huw
Irranca-Davies: I will try to come back to the hon.
Gentleman with some inspiration on that question; I certainly do not
have the facts at the front of my mind.
The
Chairman: Order. Just before the Minister looks for too
much more inspiration, I must draw the Committee’s attention to
the fact that the amendment is about a
report that is yet to be published and whether or not there should be
such a report. I think that I have given a fair degree of latitude to
allow members of the Committee to tease out answers to some of the
questions that they want to ask. I will now draw a
halt.
Huw
Irranca-Davies: Thank you for that guidance,
Mr. Gale. I must say to members of the Committee that
amendment 30 is neither appropriate nor necessary. However, I hope that
I have reassured them that we understand the importance of ensuring
adequate resources. As the MMO evolves and takes on more functions, we
will keep the resourcing issue under review, and we will augment
resources where necessary.
On that
basis, I invite the hon. Member for St. Ives to withdraw the
amendment.
Andrew
George: I am grateful to the Minister and to the hon.
Members for Carmarthen, West and South Pembrokeshire and for Plymouth,
Sutton for their comments and contribution to the
debate. The
Minister has mounted a defence of the MMO’s capacity to cope
with the new demands that will be placed upon it, but the functions
transferred from the MFA to the MMO will be augmented simply by
a 20 per cent. increase in the staffing complement available,
despite the fact that the new organisation is taking on, in my view, a
great deal more than 20 per cent. in additional work load.
Although some
of the Minister’s words were welcome, I had hoped that he would
say more about, for example, the defence of the MMO’s capacity,
on which the industries involved will want reassurance. I had also
hoped that he would cover the consequences of accepting the
amendment—in other words, the problems that would be created for
the organisation were it required simply to make a statement within the
report to reassure the industry that it had the capacity to fulfil its
function, which would not take a great deal of effort. That is all the
amendment asks for, so I do not understand for the life of me why it is
not acceptable. What would be the consequences of ensuring that the
report includes what the renewables industry is concerned about and
wants to be reassured about, namely that the MMO has the necessary
capacity? That should be
included. Having
heard what the Minister has said, and despite the fact that I am not
reassured on the matter, I will not push the amendment to a vote. I
hope that he will reflect outside the debate on the issues that have
been raised, consult the industry and perhaps find other ways to
reassure it before coming back on Report and having another go. I beg
to ask leave to withdraw the
amendment. Amendment,
by leave,
withdrawn. Schedule
1 agreed
to. Schedule
2 agreed
to.
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