HC Deb 21 July 1952 vol 504 cc235-44

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Major Conant.]

1.9 a.m.

Mr. Geoffrey de Freitas (Lincoln)

Somewhat after our normal closing time I shall take us from debating beer to debating polluted water. Dr. Johnson had a poor opinion of fishermen. "A fishing rod," he said, "is a stick with a hook at one end and a fool at the other." If he was right about that, we are a nation of fools, because there are between two million and three million fishermen, and fishing is certainly the most popular sport in the land.

We had little pollution of the rivers up to the beginning of the last century, but, as soon as factories were built, and factories started putting their effluent into the rivers, the rivers began to be polluted. But even in the early days of the industrial revolution, it is said that apprentice boys in London and other large cities insisted that they should not be given salmon to eat more often than twice a week. Yet, tonight, in the Dining Room, the charge is 5s. 6d. for a very small portion of salmon. That is due to pollution. [An HON. MEMBER:"The Kitchen Committee."] I will not say anything about our Kitchen Committee tonight. It cannot be disputed that salmon is no longer the poor man's food. That is due to pollution.

The first fishing that I can remember was on the River Lea, in Hertfordshire, and for 15 years or more I have known about the fishing on the Witham in Lincolnshire. Both rivers have deteriorated in relatively few years, and pollution has been the cause of it. Of course, they are not nearly so bad as some rivers in other parts of the country which, in many cases, have lost all fish life and have become nothing more than plain, open sewers. Our standards about pollution are wrong. It is not right that many of us should still call "rivers" those watercourses where pollution is so bad that no fish life exists at all.

Pollution which extracts oxygen from the water is the greatest enemy of the angler, and sewage is one of these. Modern science, sanitation, engineering, bacteriology and chemistry can solve almost every problem of pollution, but in some cases it is not a cheap process. One has to recognise that often it can be done only at great expense. However, we have reached the stage in scientific knowledge, when it can be done. For the last 75 years or so, Parliament has taken an interest in the problem. Since 1876, no fewer than 16 Acts, aimed at the protection of our rivers, have been passed. The most recent, as hon. Members will recall, the Rivers (Prevention of Pollution) Act, was passed only last year. But pollution goes on. It gets worse, as the publications of the British Field Sports Society show; and I am glad to see we have hon. Members on the Council of that Society here in the Chamber tonight.

The Anglers' Co-operative Association, however, is the only organisation which has had some real success in keeping down pollution. It fights on the slow and expensive battleground of the law courts. Few people can risk several thousands of pounds to save fishing rights worth only a few pounds a year, and that is why the Anglers' Co-operative Association was born.

River boards set up by Acts of Parliament are supposed to stop pollution, but many of the members of the Boards are those responsible for pollution; I refer to the representatives of the Town Councils which are pouring sewage into the rivers.

Lieut.-Colonel Marcus Lipton (Brixton)

Will my hon. Friend allow me to remind him of Ledbury Rural District Council, in Herefordshire, where the High Court has threatened imprisonment for its members if no action is taken against pollution? But the villain of the piece is really the Minister of Health, who will not reply to representations which the local council has made.

Mr. de Freitas

That is an important point, and I do not know how we could act if this became general and members of local councils were sent to prison for not obeying an injunction. However, I cannot go into that in the time at my disposal tonight.

I said that on the river boards are the representatives of the town councils, so often busily polluting the river and representatives of large manufacturing firms, the effluent of which also goes into the river. On a typical board of 40 members we often get only one, two or, at the most, three members representing anglers.

Recently, I have had discussions with the Secretary of the Lincoln Anglers' Association, a body of 3,000 members, about the pollution of the Witham, one of the finest fishing rivers in the country. The Witham Angling Committee, which has given its full support to my constituents in the matter, represents 51,000 anglers who come not only from Lincoln and Lincolnshire but all over the North Midlands and farther away. I see the hon. Members for Rotherham (Mr. J. Jones), Brightside (Mr. R. E. Winterbottom) and Grantham (Mr. Godber) here. Constituents of all of us are concerned.

What has happened to the Witham? The river board has decided to allow effluent from a sugar beet factory at Bardney to be discharged into the river. This, in spite of the warning of the chairman that the effluent was poisonous and that there was a danger of killing fish. As fishermen know, effluent from sugar beet is one of the most poisonous forms of river pollution. Although in this case the amount poured into the river at any one time may not be great, and may vary according to the flow of the river, the 50,000 Witham anglers know the river a good deal better than the river board or the factory. They know that in that very flat country the dangers of backing up are great and that this could result in large quantities of fish being killed upstream from the factory.

The factory has agreed to stop discharging effluent if tests show that the river is polluted, but, let us admit it, the factory has to be ready to deal with what is known in the sugar beet industry as the "campaign" which starts in October. So these anglers fear that, whatever happens, their interests will be subordinated to that of the factory, and that they will be paying the river board for the privilege of fishing polluted water. If the Witham were a really pure river, this effluent might not have much effect, but already anglers are worried about crude sewage which enters the river a little below the Bardney factory. The Witham is already polluted and each year it is getting worse.

I want to be brief to give my hon. Friends and the hon. Member for Grantham an opportunity to intervene. I ask the Minister first, what he intends to do to stop pollution generally and, secondly, what he intends to do to stop the sewage and beet effluent pollution in the River Witham in particular. I can find a good excuse for the Minister to come to Lincoln because in the first week in September are the races. As Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture he should see what the National Stud is doing. If he will come to the races, I will gladly take him down the river to Bardney.

Mr. Jack Jones (Rotherham)

I will supply the tackle.

Mr. de Freitas

My hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham will fit him up with tackle.

Thi is a serious national problem and, unless something is done, fresh water fish will be extinct and our children will be taken to an aquarium to see not only the beautiful coloured tropical fish but also our ordinary coarse fish which we now take for granted.

Anglers do not ask much of the community. Their sport does not inconvenience others. As Izak Walton said: God never did make a more calm, quiet, innocent recreation than angling. All anglers want is an opportunity to fish.

1.20 a.m.

Mr. J. B. Godber (Grantham)

I would like for just two minutes to support the remarks made by the hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr. de Freitas). The River Witham circles round a large part of my constituency. Indeed, I think I can say it goes out of my constituency into that of the hon. Member for Lincoln quite pure, comes back and is polluted in its later stages; but I do not blame him for one moment for that.

I speak primarily on behalf of 1,200 members of the Grantham Angling Association, who are very much concerned, like the remainder of the 50,000 anglers, who do, I agree, come down from the Sheffield area and we are glad to welcome them from that area. I implore my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to do everything he can to stop this very serious pollution which is going on, both from the factory and the sewage. I am thinking of places in my constituency, where I am trying to get sewerage schemes going so that we can prevent this raw sewage from polluting the river. I would have liked a very much longer time in which to develop the argument, but I promised to be very brief.

1.22 a.m.

Mr. Jack Jones (Rotherham)

I welcome the opportunity to take part in this debate, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr. de Freitas) on having brought this subject forward.

This is a serious matter. There is more in it than meets the eye. Anglers are honest-to-goodness, simple people. There are many millions of them, and to them their roach, bream and other coarse fish are important. I fished in a competition the day before yesterday, and there were over 1,200 men taking part. The other day 890 people left my constituency to fish in the River Witham—the men who are trying to bring about the economic recovery this Government wants. These men are gravely concerned. They believe that prevention is better than cure. We once had the experience of millions of fish going out of the grand sluice at Boston. It took years to get that river into condition again.

Fishermen put it like this. What would happen if the Tottenham Hotspur or Manchester United football grounds were suddenly closed? Or if Old Trafford were suddenly banned to people wanting to watch a Test Match. The effect is the same on the men who use this river. I know that the hon. Gentleman will tell us that this has not taken place and will not. But it is when the rush peak period is on that we are concerned. It is the overflow beyond the legal amount of effluent that we are concerned about. It does not take much effluent to kill fish.

These fishermen get a sense of real enjoyment from this sport. They go back to work on Monday morning more contented, better fitted and in the frame of mind the Government want them to be in. I plead for the kind of protection the Government can give. There is a thriving industry producing fishing tackle in this country. It sends out the finest tackle. I had a reel come into the House of Commons Post Office today from America. They thought it was the "cat's whiskers," but it cannot compare with what is made here. I was in a shop in my constituency on Saturday which holds £3,000 to £5,000 worth of stock.

It is believed that pollution will lead to a falling off in the fishing tackle industry, and that there will be unemployment. If there is they will blame the Government. The Government has enough already for which to be blamed, and it is up to them to see that they are not blamed for the pollution in this river.

1.25 a.m.

Mr. R. E. Winterbottom (Sheffield, Brightside)

I am not a fisherman and know little about the sport. But I know that every Saturday and Sunday thousands of anglers go from the City of Sheffield to the River Witham. They are the people on whom the economy of the country depends and they are entitled to a certain amount of sport. When one sees them migrating to the river every Sunday one can understand that they are real enthusiasts.

Hon. Members representing Sheffield constituencies have been inundated with letters protesting against this pollution. I do not blame anyone. I do not know sufficient about the matter to apportion blame. But I think something should be done by the Government, if that is possible, to protect the rivers of this country, which are a very precious heritage. I speak for the anglers of Sheffield who believe they are not getting a fair deal. I believe that they have a case which deserves examination by the Government and that action should be taken to see that our rivers are cleansed.

1.28 a.m.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries (Mr. G. R. H. Nugent)

I have great sympathy with fishermen and understand their pleasure. I took a considerable part in the passage through the House last year of the Rivers (Prevention of Pollution) Act which had the support of hon. Members from both sides of the House, and I think that in the course of the Bill we improved it. On my own farm there is a stretch of river, and although there are not many fish I know what tremendous pleasure everyone gets from fishing it.

I would say to the hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr. de Freitas) that in a short debate like this I can hardly deal with the main subject of the prevention of pollution. That is more the concern of my right hon. Friend the Minister of Housing and Local Government. But the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries has a direct interest in the preservation of fishing. With the formation of the river boards under the 1948 Act and the powers under the 1951 Act everything has been done so far as legislation can go. It will now be a gradual process which will, I believe, be followed by the river boards progressively improving their rivers.

On the composition of the river boards, it would not be right for the House to be left with the impression that they are as weak as the hon. Member suggested. The particular river board concerned in this case consists of Sir Arthur Heneage, whose interest in water matters are nationally known and who is appointed by the Minister of Health and 13 members appointed by the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, men who have a general interest in rural affairs and river matters in particular. They include three members with a specific interest in fishery matters. Then there are two members appointed by the Lincolnshire (Parts of Holland) County Council; three by the Kesteven County Council; and six by Lindsey County Council.

These are all county councils with no specific responsibility whatever for sewerage matters. They are not authorities responsible in any way for the drainage function, and, therefore, they could not be said to be themselves polluters. The County Borough of Grimsby and the County Borough of Lincoln, it is true, do have responsibility for the drainage of their cities. But the main body of the river board undoubtedly consists mainly of people who certainly have no direct interests in the discharge of effluents.

To proceed to the facts: the River Witham comes under the control of the Lincolnshire River Board and there are three directly appointed fishery members. There are two pollutions complained of. One is from the sewage effluent from Bardney village, from the Stockshill Drain. It is true the effluent there is not good; it has been bad for some time. The sewerage works are antiquated and the rural district council has made a proposal to put in a new sewerage works. As soon as the capital expenditure position allows they will undoubtedly install a more efficient apparatus.

In the meantime, it is only fair to say that though the effluent is bad there has been no sudden deterioration. It is much the same as it has been for some time, although I do not mean to suggest that that is any justification for its continuing like that, and I hope it will not be very long before they put in a better purification plant.

The more serious complaint of the Bardney sugar beet factory follows these lines: the sugar beet industry was set up in this country something like 25 years ago and at that time it was thought that the effluent would not be harmful. It was very soon discovered that it was—that the organic matter which came into the water in the process of washing sugar beet de-oxygenated the water, which was, therefore, injurious to fish life.

So, quite early on, the sugar beet factories had to install some sort of purification plant. There has been gradual development over the past 20 or so years, and the process they have reached now is the use of the same body of water for the whole of the washing, and they recirculate this washing water so that they can use it many times. By the process of re-circulation they are able to do their washing with about one-tenth of the water, and they are able also to conserve the whole of the effluent throughout the season in large lagoons outside the sugar beet factory.

In these big lagoons they have a huge settling tank where all this water is allowed to stand for some months, which provides to some extent for re-oxygenation of the water. It is usually about the middle of the Summer when they begin to release this effluent of semi-purified water that is standing there. That process has been going on for many years in the River Witham, and, in fact, the condition of the effluent has been very considerably improved over the last 10 or 15 years, and, certainly over the last eight or 10 years, the improved effluent has been exactly the same under this process.

It is fair to say to the House that, when the body set up by the D.S.I.R. to examine the matter looked at this process, they approved it. The discharge of the effluent this year was approved by the river board after an application, and the fishery members did, in fact, oppose the application. The river board, as a whole, felt that it was reasonable that the sugar beet factory should be allowed to discharge the effluent, as in previous years. In fact, from the practical point of view, unless the factory is closed, it is difficult to suggest what else could be done. The effluent was, therefore, allowed to be discharged under very strict conditions and at the rate of not more than 250 gallons per minute, not more than 16 hours a day.

At this time of the Summer, the normal flow of the river is 3,000 gallons a minute, and it can be seen that the amount of dilution of the effluent means that the damage is very small indeed. I think it is fair to put the picture in perspective; the effluent has been discharged in the present condition for many years and is now no worse than before. Maybe, in future, it may be still further improved. Having said that, I should add that more than half the effluent has already been discharged and there has been no sign whatever of fish life being injured in any way. It has been very closely watched during the last five or six weeks. It is fair to recall that, although fishery interests are naturally feeling anxious, they are expressing their anxiety in a way which the facts do not justify, and it is relevant to say that, since the effluent has been coming out, there have been no specific complaints anywhere of damage to fish.

Finally, if it can be found that there are better ways of cleaning this effluent, undoubtedly the British Sugar Beet Corporation will adopt them to make the effluent better. In the meantime, the river board considers it reasonable that the process should continue so as to empty this lagoon in the course of the next month or two, so that the walls of the lagoon can be repaired and strengthened before the next season.

I therefore submit that the process being followed is not unreasonable and that the river board, with the active support of the Sugar Beet Corporation, have acted reasonably, and are taking a responsible view of the extremely important interests of the preservation of fishing in this river, while, at the same time, seeing that one of our most important industries is kept going.

Adjourned accordingly at Twenty-one Minutes to Two o'Clock, a.m.