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British Waterways

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge (Lynda Waltho) and the numerous hon. Friends who have turned out to support her and the waterways. This is typical of debates on waterways, which are always well attended. These are truly the constant friends of the waterways. I know that my hon. Friend, as the treasurer of the all-party parliamentary waterways group, has been a staunch defender, over a long period, of our inland waterways and a supporter of the sterling work of the Stourbridge Navigation Trust, which has worked so hard to preserve the Stourbridge canal. I am sure that she and other Members will wish to join me in congratulating British Waterways on the rapid and professional way in which it dealt with the 2008 breach in, and closure of, a 2-mile stretch of that canal. That action saw the canal reopen after just 100 days. We saw similar decisive action, although not quite as rapid, in the case of the Monmouthshire and Brecon canal, which is also close to hon. Members' hearts. I shall do my best to deal with all the points that were raised and the many interventions, but I hope that hon. Members will understand it if I am unable to cover all of them in the limited time available. I noted the rare resurrection, in a different context, of the third-way concept by my hon. Friend and by my right hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, South and Penarth (Alun Michael). Since I became the Minister with responsibility for the waterways in 2008, I have made a number of ministerial visits to our inland waterways to see for myself the many ways in which this unique national asset—this treasure—can benefit local communities. I therefore welcome this opportunity to restate the Government's commitment to our waterways, which offer so much potential to contribute to our future well-being, and I would like to take this opportunity to inform the House that an additional £400,000 is being made available to British Waterways this year from the aggregates levy sustainability fund. Those resources will be used to modernise and automate the Lees and Old Mill locks on the River Lea, thus enabling the waterway to become an economically viable transport route, as well as a recreational route, for moving the large volume of aggregates that will be used during the fit-out period of the Olympic park transformation and the Olympic legacy phases.