Examination of Witnesses (Questions 118-139)
SARAH FOWLER,
CHARLOTTE GAULT,
MADDY JAGO
AND BETTINA
LANGE
8 JUNE 2009
Q118 Chairman: Welcome to you
all. You have all sat in and seen the previous session. It would
be really helpful if you could all introduce yourselves in turn.
Sarah Fowler: My name is Sarah
Fowler. I am the Area Manager for the East Area for the Environment
Agency, Midlands Region. I lead all our operations in Derbyshire,
Leicestershire and Nottinghamshire, and I work very closely with
my colleague who covers operations in Northamptonshire, Lincolnshire
and Rutland.
Charlotte Gault: I am Charlotte
Gault. I am Head of Regional Conservation Policy for the Wildlife
Trusts in the East Midlands, and I am here on behalf of East Midlands
Environment Link, which is a grouping of environmental non-governmental
organisations.
Bettina Lange: I am Bettina Lange.
I am a Regional Policy Officer for the Campaign to Protect Rural
England. I am also here to represent EMEL. Virtually since emda
was set up, I have been trying to establish good relationships
with it, with varying results. However, we will come to that.
Chairman: I am sure that we will.
Maddy Jago: I am Maddy Jago. I
am the Regional Director for Natural England in the East Midlands.
Q119 Chairman: Maddy, you are
fairly new in your post, is that right?
Maddy Jago: I am, yes. I hope
that I do a good job today to represent Natural England's views.
Q120 Chairman: Let us start with
the sustainability duty. Nowadays, there is a duty on regional
development agencies to take sustainability seriously as an issue.
I have an impression that perhaps people in the environmental
movement do not think that the agencies are fulfilling that duty.
Is that right? Bettina, perhaps you had better start on this point.
Bettina Lange: Yes, it is quite
true that there is a duty for the RDAs to—I am unsure how
best to put it—situate the regional economic strategies
within a sustainable development context, including the UK's sustainable
development strategy and so on. However, that duty is compromised,
not only by the way that emda has sometimes gone about
fulfilling it but by certain impositions from central Government,
in particular what the RDAs are actually being assessed on in
relation to their performance. The key performance indicators
are not sustainable development indicators; rather, they are an
increase in GVA and GDP, which are very conventional economic
indicators. As far as we understand it, those indicators are structurally
incapable of reflecting whether or not the environmental side
and to some extent even the social side of sustainable development
is being advanced or hindered. So that is the fundamental problem.
Maddy Jago: I would like to take
a step back from that position. When I was preparing for this
session, I wanted to reflect on our understanding of sustainability
at the present time. I went back to the Brundtland Commission,
which provides probably the best-known definition of sustainability
and also provides a useful context for this session now. It is
the definition that calls for development that meets "the
needs of the present without compromising the ability of future
generations to meet their own needs." That definition will
be familiar to all of us. I should also say that our evidence
is very much within the context of understanding where we are
now, but it is also concerned with where we want to get to. The
original definition of sustainability looks at three pillars.
To summarise the view about where we are now, the RES, as it is
constituted, really looks at trade-offs between those three pillars.
There is the idea that, if you take a bit out of the environment,
you can put a bit back somewhere else. I think that a fundamental
rethink is needed to understand the environmental capacity of
the region and what the constraints are within that capacity.
I think that that is where we are in terms of wanting to clarify
that, to go forward with the new regional strategy. I can give
you some examples, but that may come up later.
Q121 Chairman: Give us a couple
of examples now.
Maddy Jago: We know that climate
change is an issue. But in the East Midlands, out of all the regions,
we have the greatest risk of flooding along the coast and river
valleys. In the context of Government policy and all the other
things, what we have to do is to try to combat that. It is reasonable
to expect our regional strategy to have a vision, in terms of
the requirements by which it is constituted, to try to address
that—to bring parts together to engage with that. That gives
us a point of reference as to where we are. At the moment, we
are in a situation of looking at trade-offs—development
and giving something back to the environment. Our position is
that the money in the bank is in deficit—we are not situation
of borrowing, but in a situation where we have to try to repay
the loan.
Q122 Chairman: Sarah, now that
we have heard about flooding, I guess you want to talk about it.
Sarah Fowler: I must comment,
yes. Just to begin, it is important to me that the onus is on
every single one of us, every single public sector organisation,
to consider sustainability and take on that duty. Reflecting
on the earlier conversation you had with the institutions, the
closing remarks about their contribution were about social and
economic well-being. I noted that they did not comment on environmental
well-being. But I see them as essential to help us promote a sustainable
future using their technology, innovation and expertise. Looking
more broadly, the environment shines through in the RES. The environment
is part of the East Midlands brand—when you look back to
when the RES was developed, it was part of that brand. There are
some good elements in there about economic success to deliver
quality of life, which is about a prosperous and sustainable region
and ensuring sustainability. There is also the index of sustainable
economic well-being—all positive in the RES—and we
want to ensure that we work with those. But as Bettina said, we
need to see that in the context of the drivers that emda
is working with. Their licence to operate is around GDP and economic
values. How can we work with them to help them see the broader
picture? Also, the East Midlands is the only region without
a functional sustainable development champion. The RES has got
SD in it, and it is in its implementation and monitoring that
we have to work closely with emda to make sure that success
is achieved. My view is that where there are strong partners,
working at a project level, and using consultants, then we deliver
some very good work with emda on sustainability.
Charlotte Gault: One point Maddy
made was about environmental capacity as a key measure that we
need to understand—about what the region's capacity to support
development of whatever kind is. That gives us the opportunity
to turn around how we look at development, in terms of real environmental
limits, and also the potential to enhance the region's environmental
capacity. I agree that we are in deficit on many aspects of the
environment at the moment, so a degree of enhancement is needed
to reach an acceptable level. In some areas, there is potential
for considerable enhancement, which then improves quality of life. I
agree that there is a lot that is good in the current RES, and
we certainly saw when that was developed that that was a major
improvement on the previous RES. However, we have some concerns
about how that can be delivered, especially in terms of integration
across the three pillars of sustainable development and, so, the
ability to achieve win-win-win outputs. The two points that I
would make about that are that, in the RES implementation plan,
only delivery by statutory sectoral organisations is covered—the
NGO sector was never asked to provide information on its delivery
and, although we have offered to provide that to emda,
it has not been taken up. So there is a real question about how
it is possible for people who might want to deliver in the region
even to be aware that we might be doing something relevant and
could work with them or assist in them in some way. The other
aspect is the lack of active facilitation to enable cross-sectoral
and cross-theme delivery in how the RES is implemented.
Q123 Chairman: Will you take us
on, Bettina and Charlotte, on that? You have made the offer to
emda; it was not taken up—will you describe the history
a bit?
Bettina Lange: The history is
quite long actually. The offer was made by EMEL member organisations—for
example, in their various submissions to the drafts of the regional
economic strategy—but also at specially convened meetings,
which emda did agree to have with us. The meetings were
either on the index of sustainable economic well-being, where
I was the person who specifically made an offer, also making the
point that there are people with some intellectual capacity outside
the universities—they might even be working for environmental
NGOs. That went nowhere. Another meeting that I remember was specifically
about the evidence base—obviously we were concentrating
on its environmental aspect. Again we made a specific offer of
help, because it seemed that emda were, quite understandably,
not really equipped to deal with that side of the evidence base
very well. So we were not criticising them for that, but it was
never taken up. We found later on, and in fact at one point
the people at emda stated this, that they expected what
they called the voluntary sector—that is actually what we
call the social voluntary sector, or in other words, One East
Midlands or Engage, as it was then—to provide input into
the environmental evidence base. They expected that sector to
liaise with us to get the input. That is so indirect, and we had
made a direct offer. We to this day do not understand why emda
wanted to go down that indirect route. Having said that—Charlotte
may want to elaborate—as far as particular areas of the
evidence base are concerned, emda has now moved a little
more in the direction that we think would be more constructive,
particularly in relation to biodiversity.
Charlotte Gault: We found with
the evidence base as developed for the current RES that there
was no understanding or awareness by emda that for the
environment in particular, perhaps in contrast to the socio-economic
sectors, a lot of relevant information is held outside the statutory
sector. For example, information on wildlife biodiversity
is held by local wildlife trusts and individual expert volunteers
who go out and record a lot of those things in the countryside.
They might work with the local wildlife trust or the local biological
record centre, which could then manage that information. However,
not all the information is held in one place through accessible
and simple structures. We are aware of that and have always offered
to work with people and help mobilise as much of that information
as we can. There are structural deficiencies at the moment in
terms of having an infrastructure in place that would allow this
to be mobilised easily, but we are keen to work on that and are
doing so. Last time around, our experience was that a significant
quantity of information outside the statutory sector was simply
not understood. Currently, we are hearing about the development
of an evidence base to support a single regional strategy in the
future. I have been encouraged so far, and the emda has
been willing to speak to us about this, particularly in the context
of the biodiversity factor. It has outlined a timetable of production
for the evidence base and has been open about the limitations
of the information currently available. There was a recognition
of the paucity of environmental information once the previous
evidence base had been put together, and we have to move forward
from there. It has been made clear to us that there will be a
consultation on a draft evidence-based document, to which we are
encouraged to respond. We have an idea of the timetable, and at
this stage, I find that quite hopeful.
Sarah Fowler: When you talk about
the environment, it is worth bearing in mind that this is a broad
sector that covers a broad range of issues. I think that Bettina
and Charlotte commented correctly on the issues regarding biodiversity
and environmental capacity. Charlotte stated that it is difficult
to collect evidence for those issues, because of their broad and
disperse nature, and that is part of the problem. To give another
perspective, our involvement in the RES was on the resource protection
and management side, whether that involved wider resource protection,
water resource management or water quality management. In those
cases, the information is more evident and available. There is
one authoritative voice— ourselves—and we are heavily
involved with emda in providing that evidence. That is
an example of how it can work, and emda is receptive to
that. However, it is also about how we work with emda.
Part of this is about understanding the diverse nature of the
environment agenda and helping emda to understand that.
There is certainty in some places, but not in others.
Q124 Chairman: Sarah, you made
a point earlier saying that there was no champion in the East
Midlands. Who should champion sustainability in the East Midlands?
Should it be emda or another body?
Sarah Fowler: It is interesting.
We have worked closely with the Government Office and with partners
to look at sustainability issues in other regions to see what
happens there. It is stark that, in the East Midlands, there is
no champion body. For example, there is Sustainability North East,
Sustainability South West and Sustainability West Midlands. My
region cuts across to the West Midlands, and there is a strong
body there working on issues at a senior level across the regional
partners, whether that is the Environment Agency, Natural England,
the Government Office or the development agency. A part of what
is lacking in the East Midlands is that senior voice provided
by all partners working together. I do not mind where that voice
comes together, but we need to have a place where that senior
level debate can happen with the emda board and with the
Government Office. That is critical.
Q125 Chairman: Give us a prescription.
How would you do it? What would you advocate?
Sarah Fowler: I want us to be
able to have conversations at senior level about sustainability
issues with the emda board, the Government Office for the
East Midlands and, in the current set up, the regional assembly.
Those discussions should happen on a regular basis at board level.
Q126 Chairman: Is that your view,
Maddy?
Maddy Jago: I would support that.
An example that does not cover the full breadth of the agenda
but perhaps encourages us in the right direction is that of the
Environment Agency, which recently convened a regional climate
change partnership at that sort of senior level. That is the sort
of model needed for sustainability, and through the regional strategy
we have the opportunity to provide the umbrella strategy document.
However, we need the resources and expertise to feed into that.
I want to comment on the evidence if I may.
Q127 Judy Mallaber: I have a last
small point. I am curious. How come a sustainability organisation
has been set up in other regions but it did not happen in the
East Midlands? Do you know how it is set up in the other areas?
Sarah Fowler: I cannot necessarily
comment on the history of the East Midlands. I have moved across
from the Environment Agency in the Anglia region, so I know how
the East of England operates. When the RES was produced in the
East Midlands, the environment was seen as the brand of the East
Midlands, and a core thing that fed through it. It was, probably
therefore, not seen as necessary because it was just dealt with.
As we move towards the implementation of the regional economic
strategy, the need for this senior level engagement has become
all the more important, but does need developing further in the
region.
Bettina Lange: There are number
of reasons for that. One of the reasons is due to the differences
in the regional set up. In the West Midlands, for example, what
was effectively a sustainable development round table was also
the coalition that contained the voluntary environmental sector.
There was more integration than there was in this region. Some
years ago, back in 2000, there was a sustainability round table,
and a report that was done on it said so. It was a useful talking
shop, but that is all it was. With that history, people in the
region, partners perhaps who could have got things moving, were
less keen. Another difference is that, in other regions, the RDAs
were more supportive and part-funded it. That has not been happening
here. I just want to comment on what Maddy has said. I do
not think that our sector—the East Midlands Environment
Link—would be quite so happy simply to take the climate
change steering group model, because that involves exclusively
statutory agencies. There is no voluntary sector involvement at
all. We do not think that that is a good model. It needs to be
much more inclusive than that. The other thing is that it needs
to have a dedicated secretariat, independent of any of the participating
agencies. We would actually regard the Government Office as independent
in that respect. It needs funding and that is another reason it
did not happen in this region. When we started thinking about
it seriously, there were constant messages from the Government
that there would be no funding. Well, if you start from that position,
you are not going to set something up that do not have funding
for.
Q128 Chairman: Maddy. There was
a point hanging in the air.
Maddy Jago: Yes, just on the evidence.
I wanted to stress that Natural England is an evidence and specialist
body providing specialist advice on the natural environment. Our
written submission was rather critical in tone. It drew on the
experience of our founding bodies. You will appreciate that Natural
England was set up in 2006. I did not want to dwell on the negativity
of that. I wanted to use it as a sense of where we want to get
to. The guidance both for the RES and looking forward to the new
strategy makes it quite explicit that Natural England would have
a partnership role, rather than what we have experienced as being
more of a statutory consultee. A partnership role means that we
can use our specialist evidence approach very much to provide
the basis for the new strategy. We have not had any engagement
on that to date, so it is ringing some alarm bells for us. It
is very helpful to have the opportunity to raise that now. Just
a note on our experience, we are just about to launch our state
of the natural environment report for the region. That provides
quite a good example of bringing stakeholders together to look
at the key issues and then to publish the evidence for the region.
We hope that provides an example of where we can fit into the
new integrated arrangements.
Q129 Chairman: Just to take us
forward, Charlotte, you made this point about the history, but
on the new strategy, you felt that things were changing and that
there was a more receptive atmosphere. Is that your and Maddy's
view?
Charlotte Gault: It is my experience
up to the present moment. I could not make any predictions about
how it will continue. What is positive at the moment—especially
following discussion with a member of emda staff who is
working on evidence development—is that there is an understanding
of the complexity of information in the environment sector and
a willingness to work with us on that. Where that takes us will
obviously be absolutely crucial. I think, as I have mentioned,
that it is really key that we move forward on developing the mechanisms
for mobilising what is mostly local data into regionally relevant
information. We have a lot of very useful systems in place
but they are not all perfect. We are working to make them a lot
better. I think we need to be able to work with the regional bodies
to make them better from both ends, so that they function to meet
everybody's needs. Whether or not that happens is yet to be seen,
but we will do our best.
Q130 Chairman: How can we make
that happen? What is the mechanism to make it happen using all
this information and pulling it together?
Charlotte Gault: The key thing
is joint working between emda, the regional observatory
and key stakeholders. There is a basic element of capacity, of
course. I was involved in some work looking at mechanisms for
mobilising biodiversity evidence. We worked up something of a
proposal, but at the time there was no obvious funding source
and, almost more importantly, nobody had the capacity to develop
a bid even if there had been an obvious funding source. That opened
a very useful discussion on, and gained recognition of the need
for, basic development.
Bettina Lange: One quite fundamental
issue is emda's corporate culture, which is often different,
in my experience, from the way in which individual members of
emda staff act. They are quite willing to engage with us
but then the corporate culture intervenes and it does not happen.
We need to achieve a change there. May I just use one example
to illustrate how I see the difference? It concerns my own organisation.
About two years ago, CPRE commissioned research from the university
of Northumbria on people's experience of tranquillity. The research
was qualitative by the nature of the issue. Two different groups
of people gave researchers their experiences of what is most conducive
and most detrimental to tranquillity. You would have expected
to get widely different views but, strikingly, you did not. It
was actually very consistent indeed. Consistently, the top negative
thing was road traffic noise, and there were even really specific
things, like people saying that broad-leafed woodlands are more
conducive to an experience of tranquillity than pine forests.
It was quite interesting. I put those examples to emda
officials to try to get them to see that there is merit in qualitative
evidence—that you cannot put things into numbers immediately.
emda, obviously and quite understandably, employs people
who like number-crunching. If they cannot do that, they are not
quite sure what to do. I tried to get that across but I did not
get anywhere. By contrast, when I mentioned the tranquillity
research at the examination in public of the regional spatial
strategy, the inspector, by the following day, had looked at the
CPRE website, and come back to me with questions.
Q131 Mr Laxton: I want to raise
the issue of the annual reporting mechanism through which you
can inform the economic strategy's progress. Does it happen at
all in terms of feeding into the annual reporting mechanism?
Charlotte Gault: I can give you
a simple answer from the NGO sector. It is simply not something
that we are engaged with.
Sarah Fowler: In terms of the
Environment Agency's involvement, the environment chapter in the
RES talks about a number of indicators to measure progress. One
of the key indicators is about river water quality, so we will
feed information into that. There is a wider debate to be had
as to whether that should be the only indicator, or whether we
should look at wider indicators, but that is how we tend to feed
in.
Maddy Jago: My understanding is
that we would have been involved with an annual stakeholder discussion,
but went away with some frustration about a lack of ability to
discuss in detail progress on environmental health. Stepping back
from that and picking up on Sarah's point, when the RES was being
produced, we suggested and proposed that SSSI condition—site
of special scientific interest—should be a measurement included
as an indicator, which did not get any further. I am afraid that
there is a slight sense of frustration there, but again, I want
to emphasise that rather than dwelling on that, we want to use
it to help us move forward more productively.
Bettina Lange: I have just one
comment, which may or may not relate—there may be a story
in the fact that I am not sure whether it relates. I have often
been asked to participate in what I would call reputation audits,
usually carried out by consultants on behalf of emda. Some
of those conversations have been quite long and some quite open;
some had very closed questions indeed. You were not able to express
what you really thought had gone well, and so on. I thought that
was a separate exercise done annually. It may have fed into the
annual report, but if it was—
Q132 Mr Laxton: It was not made
clear to you that that was the case.
Bettina Lange: No.
Q133 Chairman: May I just pick
up on the SSSI issue? That is a DEFRA target, is it not? Progress
is being made, but the target is not being met. It would make
sense to have such an indicator at regional level, would it not?
Maddy Jago: It would certainly
seem to us to make sense. It would provide the linkage with PSA
targets that is also expressed in the guidance as desirable, and
possibly help in matching some of the expectations in the national
strategy for sustainable development. I do not have the answer
why that was not included. It is certainly something to discuss
for the future.
Chairman: We have talked about the index
of sustainable economic welfare, and I know that Judy wants to
pursue that a bit.
Q134 Judy Mallaber: I would like
to know what it is. I know in broad terms, but there seem to be
different things in the different evidence that we have had from
emda and in what you are all saying about what is good
and what is not. Could somebody say what they think?
Bettina Lange: I am not an economist,
but my understanding—I looked at the various versions, because
I was very interested in it—is that it is an attempt to
translate a wider range of human welfare indicators into something
that can then be measured and aggregated into an index, so that
in the end you can put a figure to it and measure whether a region,
area or whatever is increasing well-being or not. The index was
first developed quite a long time ago—I think it was in
1974 or something like that—in the United States, but the
history in this country is that the New Economics Foundation and
certain academics took it upon themselves to develop a national
one. Then emda had the excellent idea of asking them and
Tim Jackson to develop a regional version, which we greatly welcomed
at the time. We said in our submission that emda did pioneering
work. It went around the country to the RDAs trying to get buy-in,
and it got quite a lot, although it did not extend to all the
RDAs. It then said in its response to the SNR consultation that
that was the way to go. The difference between conventional
economic indicators and the ISEW is that the ISEW is wider and
takes social indicators into account, including factors such as
the importance of community and family. The first version of the
ISEW was quite weak on environmental indicators; it just included
local pollution. They have worked it up a little bit more, so
we are approaching more meaningful indicators. We would like
to be involved in that work, but have not been so far. We would
really like to be involved, and there are ways of doing that—they
are not straightforward, but there are ways. We would like to
see factors such as landscape and so on included, because they
actively contribute to well-being; we know that. Also, in the
long term, we would like to see that sort of framework, provided
it is comprehensive enough, replace conventional economic indicators,
because that way the economy serves people, rather than the other
way around.
Q135 Judy Mallaber: Bettina, you
said that at one point, you had been offered direct involvement
in developing the index. I know that some of the other organisations
are not sure whether, as developed, it covers everything that
we want. Would the others like to comment on where the index has
got to and who is doing what to develop it?
Bettina Lange: Natural England
has been involved.
Maddy Jago: We agree that this
is pioneering work, and it is to emda's credit that it
is taking the lead. I endorse the fact that this work is going
on in the region and that other RDAs are looking at it and want
to pick it up. Our own board has also looked at it with great
interest. So it is at that level of trailblazing. The index is
supposed to provide a composite indicator—a direction of
travel—to give us a closer reference point in terms of sustainable
development than the traditional GVA measurement, which is the
requirement as things stand. emda itself agreed that the
environmental portion of the index was somewhat weak, and we are
working with the agency to scope other environmental factors that
could be brought in. As Bettina says, it is largely a measure
of CO2 at the moment, and we need to bring in some of the positives
that can underpin positive development in the region. That is
work in progress, and a contract is out at the moment, which will
come back shortly. That will give us some idea of how we can go
forward.
Sarah Fowler: For information,
the index currently includes environmental factors such as local
environmental pollutants, loss of agricultural land and natural
habitats, and the costs associated with climate change, so it
is quite narrow, and I endorse the need to look at broadening
the environmental aspects. I also agree that it is trailblazing,
and it is great that this is happening in the east midlands and
that people are looking to the east midlands as the leader on
this. The index has great potential value, but my question is
how far it is driving positive environmental change in terms of
policy and decision making. There is great potential to use it
in that way. I was very pleased that emda, in its response
to the sub-national review consultation, said that it wanted to
use the index, instead of GVA, to provide a wider measure. It
is unfortunate that the other RDAs did not do that. Its great
value can be in looking forward, and it can be used much more
broadly.
Q136 Judy Mallaber: Who has done
the work on it up until now? Has it just been officers in emda?
What input has there been from outside?
Bettina Lange: It has been a collaboration
between the New Economics Foundation and Tim Jackson at Surrey
university, who has been the key academic. Natural England is
also doing work on it now.
Q137 Judy Mallaber: You are asking
for more environmental factors to be put into the index. How does
that tie in with the fact that there seem to be limited indicators
in the RES at present? Will the two match each other at any stage?
You said that there was only one indicator in the RES at the moment.
Paddy asked about SSIs. Is there any crossover at all? Would you
like to see a crossover between the targets in the RES and the
indicators going into the index?
Bettina Lange: There is very little
crossover so far. We would like to see a lot more, and this is
a real opportunity for the new single regional strategy. If we
had a sustainable development champion body, that is the kind
of work that it might want to take on.
Chairman: We have got that message.
Q138 Judy Mallaber: Basically,
are you telling us to tell the Government to make this happen
everywhere, or to take up the East Midlands Model?
Bettina Lange: That would be even
better.
Chairman: That is a positive thing. Let
us turn to another difficult area—aviation. There is a big
airport in the region. Bob, do you want to do this?
Q139 Mr Laxton: Charlotte, your
organisation said in its written evidence that there is: "a
clear tension between emda's welcome sustainable transport
initiatives and its unqualified support for an expansion of activity
at East Midlands Airport and its lobbying in favour of... expensive
road schemes" such as the dualling of the A46 and the A453.
What progress has emda made on sustainable development
since its creation?
Charlotte Gault: May I pass that
question to Bettina, who is our expert in EMEL on transport issues?
Bettina Lange: Is your question
specifically about transport-related issues or is it wider?
Mr Laxton: No, transport-related issues.
Bettina Lange: I would say that
it is a very mixed picture, although there is, of course, an important
national factor in that picture, which emda cannot be held
responsible for. The picture is mixed because, on the one hand,
emda has moved on a lot in its thinking about transport
and travel, particularly in areas such as travel to work. There
is evidence—this is anecdotal evidence; if there are figures
I have not seen them, although I have not searched them out either—that
the travel plan that emda committed itself to seems to
be working, judging from how emda staff get to places when
we have joint meetings with them. emda wrote into the RES
a commitment to manage travel demands. It has also funded a number
of studies in that area and recently it funded a project aimed
at reducing CO2 in transport. emda has also been very
supportive of initiatives to move more freight by rail, or even
by water. I say "even by water", because normally the
response to the suggestion that we should move more freight by
water is, "Well, we did that in the 18th century and that
is no longer relevant". However, emda was prepared
to co-fund quite a comprehensive study into the potential for
water freight. emda also bid through Productivity TIF,
or the transport innovation fund at the time, to get gauge enhancements
from Felixstowe, and it got money. There is a lot of really good
practice. The big hole, or the elephant in the corner, is
emda's unqualified support for the expansion of activity—it
does not necessarily support physical expansion—at East
Midlands Airport, because air travel is a significant and rising
contributor to climate change. Of course, the airport also causes
a lot of road traffic, with people travelling to and from it.
As far as passengers are concerned, I think that more than 90%
of them travel to the airport by car and the figure is similar
for the staff who work there. Given how the transport links work,
it is unlikely, even with the best will in the world, that that
situation will shift substantially. However, you could argue that
is the part of emda's activity that is simply implementing
Government policy.
|
