Huw
Irranca-Davies: I can indeed assure the hon. Gentleman
that we have already, in the Bill’s long fruition, engaged
systematically and repeatedly with all those organisations and others,
and we will continue to do so. I also give the assurance that Natural
England will also be involved in that engagement, both nationally and
locally, when those proposals for the coastal path are brought forward.
It is vital to recognise in respect of amendment 47 that future coastal
development that is critical and to which there is no alternative must
be factored in significantly, whether it affects ports, marinas or
other things. However, a fuzzier wish list of areas for possible future
development on an array of alternative sites should also be factored
into the discussions on the routing of the coastal path. As the hon.
Member for St. Ives has said, there are some things that are imminent
and right in front of us and to which there are clearly no
alternatives, and there are others that we do not want to see as a
necessary impediment to the development of the coastal path. I can give
him those assurances.
Mr.
Benyon: I am grateful to the Minister for those
assurances. I hope that the message will go out to planning authorities
that they must not see the coastal path as an inalienable charge on the
land that they cannot be flexible about in terms of planning
applications. With those assurances, I am sure that the hon. Member for
St. Ives will be happy to withdraw the
amendment.
Andrew
George: I beg to ask leave to withdraw the
amendment. Amendment,
by leave,
withdrawn.
Ann
McKechin: I beg to move amendment 59, in
clause 296, page 192, line 16, at
end insert— ‘(2A) The
proposals which may be included in the report by virtue of subsection
(2)(a) or (b) do not include proposals relating to any part of the
English coastal
route— (a) which is
established as a result of waters of a river being treated as part of
the sea by virtue of section 295 of the Marine and Coastal Access Act
2009 (river estuaries), and (b)
the line of which passes over land which, for the purposes of section
3A of the CROW Act (power to extend access land to coastal land etc:
England), is coastal land by virtue of subsection (11) of that
section.’. This
provides that coastal access reports may not propose to draw the
landward boundary of coastal margin or the landward or seaward boundary
of the alternative route strip to coincide with a physical feature
where the coastal route passes over land adjacent to the waters of a
non-tidal
river.
The
Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss
Government amendments 60 and 61.
Ann
McKechin: These are technical amendments to ensure that
the power in the Bill to propose the route beyond the tidal range of a
river on an estuary can work effectively. Clause 295 sets out how the
coastal access duty applies where the coast is interrupted by a river,
allowing Natural England to treat the relevant upstream waters of a
river as though they were the sea. It is necessary because the coastal
access duty in clause 290 applies to the English coast, which is
defined in clause 294 as being the coast of England
adjacent to the sea.
Subsection
(3) says that where the coast is interrupted by a river, the coastal
route may be extended as far upstream as the first public foot
crossing. However, in order to allow access to the route, the land that
it covers must be accessible to the public as coastal margin, which we
intend to define for the rest of the coast through an order under
section 3A as land adjacent to the foreshore. In situations where the
first public foot crossing of a river is upstream of the tidal range of
that river, there will be no foreshore, so the land cannot become
coastal
margin. Amendments
60 and 61 remedy that by treating land at the brink of any non-tidal
waters as part of the foreshore for the purposes of the definition of
coastal land in section 3 of the CROW Act, where waters of a river are
treated as part of the sea under clause 295. We feel that in such
circumstances, the main issue is continuity of the route. It is
important that Natural England has the ability to propose the route
beyond the tidal range of the river where it has taken the decision to
define the sea as extending up as far as the first public crossing
point. We are concerned with the route itself only beyond the tidal
range of the river and do not intend that access will be permitted to
the margin of land beside the route on that part of the river. To
achieve that, the order under section 3A of CROW will create another
category of excepted land to remove from the right of access the land
beside the route on those stretches of
it. Amendment
59 provides that where waters of a non-tidal river are treated under
section 295 as being part of the sea, and the line of the route passes
over land that is coastal land by virtue of section 3A(11) of CROW,
it is not possible to use the powers in section 55D(2)(a) or
(b). Those are the powers enabling Natural England to draw the boundary
of the margin or an alternative route strip to coincide with a physical
feature. We have taken the view that since the main aim of the
amendments is to ensure the continuity of the route, it would not be
appropriate to have the power to widen the route strip to coincide with
a physical feature in those
circumstances. In
essence, the power provides for the land beside a non-tidal river to be
designated as coastal margin so the route can pass up the estuary to
the first crossing point or to a point between the mouth and the first
crossing point. However, it does not enable the route strip to be
widened to coincide with a physical feature. In order to be consistent
with the aim of continuity of the route, we intend to provide that the
land beside the route strip on a non-tidal river is excepted
land. Without
the amendments, we believe that Natural England would not be able to
fulfil the coastal access duty on estuaries and continuity of the route
would not be possible. I commend the amendments to the
Committee.
Mr.
Benyon: The Minister referred to these as technical
amendments, but they are more fundamental than that, because they
redefine what is meant by the term “coast”. My future
amendments will seek to portray, as have my previous amendments, that
different circumstances exist in many of our estuary environments in
relation to the meaning of the term “coast”.
On Government
amendment 59, if the boundary does not coincide with a physical
feature, how will it be defined? Does that mean that there will be no
spreading room on the landward side? We need an explanation, because
the issue is fundamentally important. What constitutes a physical
feature? On
Government amendments 60 and 61, we tabled a number of amendments that
were not selected for discussion, but they reflected the concerns of
many people and organisations that, by including estuaries in the
coastal access provisions, the Government may be going a step too far
by extending the duty beyond the Bill’s original purpose, which
is to improve access to the English
coastline. Moving
inland along estuaries will impose a route that is not necessarily in
the interests of those who wish to follow the coastal path, and that
will draw more businesses, private dwellings and, more importantly,
conservation areas into the scheme. We are forgetting about the vast
majority of people who want to walk in coastal areas. Such people do
not necessarily want to walk the length and breadth of a coastal
region, circumnavigate the whole coastline, or walk along the entire
south-west coast. The majority of such people want to access a point on
the coast by public transport or by car and walk a section of beautiful
coastline before perhaps cutting inland on a right of way to take a
circular route, or they may want to wander back along the same route.
Those are the people that we should be concerned about, and I sometimes
wonder whether our discussions are losing touch with that
fact. Many
estuaries have considerable environmental, developmental and
geographical constraints. The Coastal Access Forum consists of
important organisations, and I will list them for the record: the
Association of Leading Visitor Attractions, the British Marine
Federation, the British Association of Leisure Parks, the British
Association for Shooting and Conservation, the British Holiday and Home
Parks Association, the Central Association of Agricultural Valuers, the
Country Land and Business Association, the Historic Houses Association,
the National Farmers Union, the Tourism Alliance and the Visitor
Attractions
Forum. Those
organisations recognise that estuaries can present different problems
for access provision compared with the coast, and point out that
estuaries are often highly developed with commercial or residential
property, and may be subject to environmental constraints. Most
importantly, the organisations make the valid point that consideration
should be given to the presence of existing public rights of way, the
practicality of establishing a route and the impact of any associated
coastal margin when estuaries are being looked at for coastal
access. Rather
than attempting to redefine estuaries as coast, it would surely be
simpler for the Government to acknowledge that the creation of margin
and route along estuaries is fraught with difficulty, and that it
should not be added to the Bill. Some of the maps towards the end of
Natural England’s excellent draft
scheme show how complicated life becomes when one moves beyond what is
more frequently termed the tidal barrier. The Severn estuary, which is
of interest to my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne, involves the
communities of Weston-super-Mare, Clevedon and Bristol on one side and
parts of Cardiff, Newport and Chepstow on the other. All along the
estuary are a large number of interests, be they residential or
commercial. We have to be extremely careful how we progress this
argument. 10.15
am
Mr.
Roger Williams (Brecon and Radnorshire) (LD): In order
that there be no doubt about the matter, this part of the Bill does not
refer to Wales. Presumably that is for illustration purposes only. The
Welsh Assembly Government are setting out their own
scheme.
Mr.
Benyon: I was once again plucking an example from the air.
Perhaps, to satisfy the hon. Gentleman, I can use the Southend-on-Sea
estuary, which includes Canvey Island, Tilbury and, on the other side,
Sheerness and all the developments around the Medway. He was right to
pull me up on this, but half of the estuary to which I referred was
English coast. The redefinition of estuaries as coast for the purposes
of this Bill does not change the simple fact that estuaries are not
coast.
Ann
McKechin: The hon. Member for Newbury raises legitimate
concerns about the complexity as we go further up rivers and estuaries.
That is why the Bill gives Natural England flexibility to propose the
establishment of routes up the estuaries. We realise that estuaries can
be small, medium and large. They are very different. Each has its own
unique circumstances. Natural England can decide not to run the long
distance route up the estuary and down the other side if the
difficulties of taking the route around the estuary outweigh the
benefits. We
understand that there are challenges. The ability to include estuaries
is bound by a strict set of criteria set out in clause 291. Natural
England must have regard
to: “(a)
the safety and convenience of those using the English coastal
route,
(b) the
desirability of that route adhering to the periphery of the coast and
providing views of the sea,
and (c)
the desirability of ensuring that so far as reasonably practicable
interruptions to that route are kept to a
minimum.” Natural
England must additionally have regard to the matters set out in clause
295(4): “(a)
the nature of the land which would...become part of the
coast...
(b) the
topography of the shoreline...
(c) the width
of the river upstream to that
limit; (d)
the recreational benefit to the public of the coastal access duty being
extended...
(e) the
extent to which the land bordering those waters would, if it were
coastal margin, be excepted
land; (f)
whether it is desirable to continue the English coastal route to a
particular physical
feature (g)
the existence of a ferry
”. The
list is not exclusive. It must be remembered that at all times
when discharging the coastal access duty, Natural England must also
aim to strike a fair balance between the interests of the public in
having rights to
access and the interests, including the economic interests, of owners
and occupiers. That has to be a fair balance of those
interests. Mr.
Walker: Where the route deviates from the coast up an
estuary and perhaps beyond the estuary up the river, was I right in
thinking that it would not necessarily follow the river bank and that
alternative routes may be
found?
Ann
McKechin: There would be flexibility. We are trying to
make sure that we do not end up with a prescriptive path, which will
end up with further difficulties for users. We have made it quite clear
that we do not think that this will cover all estuaries. It would be an
excessive use of powers. We want Natural England to use its discretion,
but to use it fairly and reasonably and practically.
The hon.
Member for Newbury asked about the phrase “physical
feature”. Section 55D(2), which clause 296 would insert in the
1949 Act, enables the coastal margin to be expanded to a physical
feature beyond the normal definition of coastal land. A physical
feature might be a fence, a group of rocks, cliffs or a landmark. I
think that a physical feature is easily defined; I think that it is
obvious to the eye what a physical feature is.
With regard
to the boundary, we simply mean that the route strip will not be able
to be expanded to meet a physical feature. It will just be a route
strip of a specifically defined width. There will be no access to a
margin of land to the landward side of the route strip; there will just
be access to the route strip itself.
Mr.
Benyon: I want to get this matter absolutely clear. So, we
are talking about a different level of designation here, are we? Any
extension of the route that entered the estuary area of a river would
not have spreading room. Strictly speaking, it would be a 4 m path with
no rights of access to either side of that
path.
Ann
McKechin: I am waiting for inspiration on that issue,
because the hon. Gentleman has raised an important point about
clarification and I am keen to ensure that I address
it.
Mr.
Benyon: May I assist the Minister, while she seeks
inspiration, by raising another point? In our debate on clause 295, she
quoted the list in the clause
about: “(b)
the topography of the shoreline adjacent to those
waters; (c)
the width of the river upstream to that
limit;” and
so on. However, that list did not include the legitimate rights of
businesses nor the rights of property-owners. Perhaps she could give us
some assurance that those factors are recognised there
too?
Ann
McKechin: May I just reiterate for the record that I
actually mentioned that taking account of economic interests would be
integral to Natural England making a decision on the fair balance when
it looks at the economic interests of landowners in terms of
clause 291? So I can reassure the hon. Gentleman that
economic interests will be taken into account.
I also
understand that the estuary, after the tidal limit, will be just a
route strip—that is it. It is simply a route strip, which will
be a narrow path.
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