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Marine and Coastal Access Bill [HL]

This is an important group of amendments, as the noble, Lord Tyler, said. I am speaking to my Amendment 33, which covers similar ground to Amendment 33, and to Amendment 179, which appears right at the end of the Bill, in Clause 312, , and in which we are joined by the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone. In the latter amendment we seek to include an interpretation of ““natural environment”” in the key glossary at the end of the Bill. It is a significant omission which should be corrected. On our first day in Committee the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, made it clear that we should not worry because, in addition to the more vague objectives in the Bill, the Marine Management Organisation would have to operate within the new marine policy statement and the guidance given by the Secretary of State. We believe that that is not enough. The Joint Committee report states that by failing to define ““sustainable development”” the Bill, "““leaves undefined a core ethos, by which it proposes that the marine environment be managed””," and that this ““creates uncertainty””. This group of amendments therefore seeks to define the MMO’s functions more clearly and precisely. Amendment 32 is similar to mine but I prefer my drafting as it provides a wider range of more specific duties to which the MMO must have regard. We on these Benches envisage the MMO as the organisation to resolve the inevitable conflicts between groups with different concerns, not as one more lobby group itself. As Amendment 33 makes clear, the MMO will have a huge variety of concerns, functions and objectives. The list, of course, is not exhaustive, and even the desirability of some of the items listed is open to debate. But the list still indicates and serves to show the balance that the MMO must strike in its activities. However, all the items are relevant to sustainable development, and many are specifically mentioned in the Bill. Some—such as paragraphs (b) and (g)—focus on the conservation element. Other criteria make it clear that our marine environment is a dynamic resource that is capable of providing food, energy and recreation. Others highlight promises that the Government have made and targets which they themselves have set. All the criteria are important; the question of which is the most important is impossible to answer. The MMO must be capable of making decisions about the marine environment despite these conflicting concerns. It would be counterproductive for these decisions to be second-guessed and continually challenged by the more narrowly focused lobby groups and stakeholders involved. I should be interested to hear the Minister’s views on this and to hear a fuller explanation of how the MMO will be expected to weigh the different interests in which it will be engaged.