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Marine and Coastal Access Bill [HL]

I always try my best to respond to the noble Lord. I am not going to say what I think is acceptable in terms of the periodic nature of a ferry service because it is very much for Natural England to come to a conclusion about. However, it would not be impossible for a summer ferry service to be used as part of a coastal access route. It is an amenity and enables people to cross the estuary. If the service is not available during the winter, clearly the pathway will have to stop at the ferry point. I do not think that that is a disadvantage, and if it helps to promote the use of a ferry service, perhaps that would make its operation more viable and thus able to offer a more frequent service. All I would argue for at this point is for Natural England to be able to use ferries on coastal access paths, but at the same time we accept that it would be very difficult to guarantee in all cases that the ferry service would operate throughout the year.