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Contaminated Brownfield Sites

: I would not condone any attempt to exploit loopholes in the law and regulations or to find shortcuts. However, I emphasise that there are clear regulations relating to site management and clearance. Our policy is to encourage remediation of brownfield sites on site and the reuse of rubble, which can be used as hardcore for roads or as building material; increasingly, it is graded. It is for the developer to choose how remediation is carried out, but with landfill tax and the new regulations on hazardous waste, transporting rubble to a licensed hazardous waste site is an expensive option for the developer. I should have thought it would be worth the developer's while to consider the option of on-site remediation and the reuse of building waste. The circumstances vary from site to site, but DEFRA goes to great lengths to encourage on-site remediation. We are seeing major changes in the way in which sites are now remediated on site, as opposed to the dig and dump of the past, and I welcome that. It is important to get the assessments right and to ensure that necessary action is taken. We are arguing about thresholds and about what is acceptable and what is not as it relates to the impact on house prices and the costs of remediation, but we must ensure as part of the evaluation that no shortcuts are taken that cause risks to human health. I know that the hon. Member for North-East Cambridgeshire will agree.