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Broads Authority Bill

My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. The Norfolk Broads, situated in both Norfolk and Suffolk, is the UK’s most important wetland, a unique landscape with a designation equivalent to a national park. It was only in the 1950s that the origin of the shallow, reed-fringed lakes was discovered. They began as medieval peat diggings at a time when Norfolk was the economic powerhouse of the country. Subsequent flooding has given to later generations, including our own, the network of rivers and broads which so many people know and enjoy today. The local naturalist, Ted Ellis, called the Broads, "““a breathing space for the cure of souls””." There is a spiritual quality to the Broads which a Bishop should recognise. I ought to declare an interest that is unusual even by the standards of this House. The Bishop of Norwich continues to be the abbot of St Benet’s. St Benet’s Abbey is to be found on the river Bure, and on that site I still conduct an open air service every August. St Benet’s was the one monastery which Henry VIII commanded should continue, but it went the way of all the others eventually, and fascinating though the story is, the details are regrettably not relevant to the Bill. I ought also to declare an interest since for six years I was a non-executive board member of the Countryside Agency when it had a role in determining national park funding, the Broads Authority included. It was as long ago as 1947 that Sir Arthur Hobhouse included the Broads in one of the 12 areas of England and Wales which he said should become new national parks, and it was not until 1988, with the Norfolk and Suffolk Broads Act, that his vision was fulfilled. In the mean time, the Broads had come under huge pressure. Water quality had declined and the consequences of phosphate pollution from sewage treatment works, bank erosion by boats and various other factors could have destroyed the special quality of the area for good. Much has been achieved over the past 20 years and the decline not only been arrested, but reversed. The boundary of the Broads area is tightly drawn around the flood plains and the lower reaches of the three main rivers, the Bure, the Yare and the Waveney. It excludes all the small towns around the Broads and actually contains no single whole parish. Instead, the Broads area has parts of 93 parishes and a total resident population approaching 6,000. The navigation area is also defined in the 1988 Act. It includes all the publicly navigable stretches of the rivers Bure, Yare and Waveney, and all their tributaries. The Broads Authority has general duties identical to those of national parks: to conserve and enhance the natural beauty, wildlife and cultural heritage of the area and to promote opportunities for the understanding and enjoyment of the Broads by the public. But there is a third duty, and that is to protect the interests of navigation. The Broads Authority is also a harbour authority. Its responsibilities include public safety provision and the maintenance of all that assists navigation, including moorings, dredging and marking. About a third of the income of the authority comes from the 10,000 people who own a boat on the Broads, and the other two thirds comes from the national park grant through Defra. Promoting a Private Bill has not been a course of action undertaken lightly by the authority, but after years of discussion with government officials, it became clear that this was the only way to ensure that a series of important safety matters would be addressed. Many of the proposals in this Bill reflect those already implemented by British Waterways and the Environment Agency elsewhere, and which clearly need application in the Broads as well. The main purpose of the Bill is to obtain new powers for the Broads Authority to promote boat safety. The requirements of the Port Marine Safety Code as well as some specific incidents in the Broads make additional powers necessary. There are a number of general provisions aimed at improving safety. For example, the Bill gives power to implement the National Boat Safety Scheme which already applies in waterways under the jurisdiction of British Waterways or the Environment Agency. It also gives power to introduce compulsory third party insurance for vessels; it gives powers to regulate better water skiing and wake boarding; it provides the authority with powers to deal with overhanging vegetation that poses a hazard to navigation. These necessary powers can be introduced on the Broads only by means of a Private Bill given the particular one-off status that the Broads possess. The Department for Transport has been consulting on a draft Marine Navigation Bill. It has not yet been allocated any parliamentary time but I mention it as it is likely to contain provisions allowing harbour authorities to make general directions. However, Defra, in its report on this Bill, states: "““There is no conflict between the provisions in the draft Bill and the Broads Authority Bill. In addition, the Broads Authority Bill contains specific provisions which would not be covered in the proposed Bill. Therefore, it would not be appropriate to await the outcome of the consideration of the draft Marine Navigation Bill””." The major issue of principle raised by those with concerns about the Bill is that its provisions are an interference with the public right of navigation. They argue for the right to unhindered use of tidal waterways. But the public right of navigation is already qualified and legally restricted, both under common law and under legislation passed by this House. The objective of public safety is a legitimate ground for qualifying a public right, hence measures introduced for the protection of drivers and other users of public highways. Compulsory seat belts and the ability of local authorities to regulate the way in which roads are used are two examples. The other main aim of the Bill is to update some of the provisions in the original 1988 Act. These include the removal of the necessity to have a separate navigation account dealing purely with navigation income and expenditure. This has proved administratively bureaucratic. It also cuts across the authority’s aim of having an integrated approach to the management of the Broads. There is also some modest change in the Bill to the considerations to be taken into account with regard to the appointments made by the Secretary of State to the authority. Ten of the authority’s current 21 members are appointed by the Secretary of State. At present, three are appointed after consultation with boating interests; two after consultation with farming and land-owning interests. For the future, it is proposed that the Secretary of State must consult with conservation and land-based recreational interests as well as with the boating, farming and land-owning interests, and have regard to the desirability of ensuring an overall balance between all these interests when making such appointments. When the membership of the authority was reduced from 35 to 21 three years ago, English Nature, the Environment Agency and the Countryside Agency all lost places on the authority and so there was some reduction in the extent of the representation of such interests which this provision in the Bill will assist the Secretary of State to restore. Since the first draft of the Bill was published in April 2006 there have been extensive consultations with all who have an interest in the Broads. This has led to many significant changes to the Bill. The national and local boating organisations—the Royal Yachting Association, the British Marine Federation, the Inland Waterways Association, the Norfolk and Suffolk Boating Association and the Broads Hire Boat Federation—are all in agreement with the range of provisions in the Bill as it now stands. It has been a great achievement to get that level of consensus. Fourteen petitions against the Bill have been deposited in this House, of which 12 are from private toll payers—that is 12 out of 10,000 overall—and two are from organisations. The first of those organisations is a boating club concerned about the application of the Bill’s provisions to private waters that connect with public navigation. An agreement has now been reached over the outstanding issues and the authority confidently expects that that petition will be withdrawn. The other petition is from the Norfolk Association of Town and Parish Councils. It seeks to provide direct parish council representation on the authority. The Secretary of State is currently consulting nationally on this issue. The authority is not necessarily opposed to the principle of parish council representation, but the present petition would reduce the number of people the Secretary of State could appoint to the authority from the wider public and those with a primary interest in the Broads as a national asset. The authority also thinks it would be premature to make a change prior to the outcome of the Defra consultation, let alone a decision on the future of local government in Norfolk and Suffolk. These are matters which would be appropriately debated in Committee should the Bill receive a Second Reading. The Broads Authority has got the correct balance between the rights of navigation and improved safety on the Broads for the benefit of all who use these waterways. The majority of the provisions in the Bill already apply to waterways elsewhere in the country and so, in some degree, this is a catch-up measure in relation to one of our great national assets. I commend the Bill to the House. Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(The Lord Bishop of Norwich.)