§ Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Ifor Davies.]
§ 12.57 a.m.
§ Mr. Bert Hazell (Norfolk, North)After such an exciting night, what I have to draw attention to may seem a very minor matter, but for the authorities charged with the responsibility for protecting our coasts from the ravages of the sea it is a matter of considerable importance.
It was the Labour Government of 1949 who passed the Coast Protection Act, by which local authorities were given the responsibility of protecting and maintaining land and the coast line generally, and under which grants were made available to them for the first time from central funds. They were given a proportion of the cost of capital works, but had to find from their own rates, and still have to find, the remaining amount of money.
I am informed that grants from central funds for capital works range from 40 per cent. to 80 per cent. The basis of each scheme is not a fixed grant, but is negotiable between the Ministry of Housing and Local Government and the local authority having responsibility for the scheme. Responsibility for some sections of the coast rests with river authorities, and the method of financing those authorities is different. A river authority is mainly concerned with low lying agricultural land.
In recent years the country has had a great awareness of the need to protect our coastline, and rightly so. With a continually growing population, we can ill-afford to lose year by year large tracts of land, and thus it is natural that those who live in the areas involved should show greater concern in this matter than perhaps our forefathers did.
I think that the conscience of the nation was substantially awakened during the great floods of 1953. As a consequence of the disaster which affected many parts of the country in January of that year, and the loss of human life and damage to property, land and industrial concerns, there was set up what became known as the Waverley Committee which was charged with the responsibility for 1914 ascertaining whether some new Measures ought to be passed by Parliament to deal with the issue.
The Report, which I have studied carefully, revealed that in January, 1953, about 1,200 breaches occurred around our coastline, 160,000 acres of land were flooded, over 300 lives were lost, 24,000 houses were flooded and damaged, and over 200 industrial premises were inundated. The estimated cost of repairs to the coastline arising from these breakthroughs was about £30 million.
Since then, to those living in the affected areas there has always been the fear of a repetition. They have never forgotten the tragedies that occurred in that year. My constituents in North Norfold have always been conscious of the ravages of the sea. The coastline from Wells-next-the-Sea down to Horsey near Great Yarmouth is protected either by shingle or sand bars or by soft and erodable cliffs. As a consequence, a constant watch is necessary and a substantial amount of money has to be spent on sea defence work.
The Waverley Committee, in its Report, considered the question whether coast protection should become a national responsibility, the provision of the money and supervision being undertaken by the Government, but it came to the view that this was not at that time a wise procedure to adopt. The Waverley Committee suggested that local authorities desired to retain a measure of supervision over work that was being undertaken in their localities. It was felt that a proportion of the cost should still be paid by those who would benefit directly from the protection of the coastline.
However, this Report was published 11 years ago, in May, 1954, and since then there has been a change in public opinion. Local authorities are increasingly veering round to the viewpoint that the financial burden of providing defence works around our coasts is greater than local authorities can be expected to bear, in addition to the grants for which they are responsible together with all the other calls upon local rates.
Many large schemes are contemplated in my constituency and some are being carried out, but the problem even there is not solved by the work in hand or 1915 immediately contemplated. Local authorities in the constituency have approached me on this matter. Sheringham Urban District Council feels very strongly that unless this coastline on each side of its township is protected, at no late date the town will be sticking out as a peninsula along the coast. The council feels that this could be very dangerous for the long-term future of the town.
A shingle bar protects the village of Salthouse from the sea. In December last that bar was seriously eroded and all the marshland behind it substantially flooded. The river board which is responsible for this section brought in large bulldozers to mend the breach, but in February other heavy storms occurred and once again the shingle was affected. Remedial works are being put in hand at present, but I am constantly receiving communications from parishioners and the parish council about their fears that this shingle bar is no real safeguard against the ravages of the sea at that point and that at any time in the immediate future the shingle bar could be washed away and a repetition of 1953 occur.
It is true that a number of houses which were then so badly damaged that they could not be inhabited were rebuilt on high ground, but there are still quite a number of cottages on the low ground and they would be seriously affected if the shingle bar gave way.
At Overstrand, in my constituency, there is a large cliff fall which spreads out over the promenade. It has been there for several months. Although at the moment negotiations have been concluded with the Ministry of Housing and Local Government for aid at this point on the cliff, the work has yet to be started. Those who derive their livelihood by taking guests in the hotels and boarding houses are concerned about the future if some quick action is not taken to make the promenade available to visitors and residents in the approaching summer days.
I said earlier that there is a general tendency now for local authorities to veer round to the view that coast protection should become a national responsibility. At the same time, I must admit that local authorities would prefer to 1916 supervise the work. If the Ministry or the Government could not accept responsibility solely for finding the necessary money and undertaking the work, the local authorities would be prepared to supervise the work if the Ministry were prepared to make a 100 per cent. grant in each case of capital works.
The Ministry might take the view, expressed in the Waverley Report, that local authorities should still carry a small percentage of the cost. If this should be the view, local authorities have urged me to ask the Government to fix a percentage grant similar to that provided, as I understand, to the river board. The river board, when taking on responsibility for capital works on its section of that coastline is, I am informed, in receipt of 85 per cent. grant from central funds and 15 per cent. from precepts that it makes from the ordinary collection of river rates. If the local authorities knew in advance what their percentage of grant was to be, and if it could be in the region of 85 to 90 per cent., this would relieve them of a great financial burden. They would wish for 100 per cent. grant. But, if that is not possible, I put forward the suggestion of a compromise basis that would be welcomed by the local authorities.
The problems are not confined entirely to the coastline in my constituency. They are borne almost the whole way around Britain. In Yorkshire, Suffolk and on the West Coast, the problem literally is the same. In view of the urgent necessity for continuing to tackle this job, a suggestion has been made—and I put it forward for consideration by the Government—that perhaps the time has come for a Dutch consultant, versed in sea defence work, to be called to Britain to prepare a report on the whole of the coastline to ascertain what is required and how defence works can be conceived to protect our shores. At the same time, perhaps he could advise the Government on works of reclamation that could well be undertaken in some parts of Britain. I think that more works of reclamation might be underaken in The Wash than has been the case in recent years.
I have seen thousands of acres of the Humber Estuary that could easily be reclaimed if the money were forthcoming 1917 As we have lost, and are continuing to lose, so much of our coastline to the ravages of the sea, surely we ought to try to reclaim areas that could be made available if appropriate schemes were devised.
It has been suggested that the responsibility is not really one for the nation. I suggest that the whole nation secures benefit by the efforts made by our coastal areas. The coastal areas are not just problems for the district, urban and county authorities in the localities. They are the responsibility of the whole nation and the nation as a whole should pay its full contribution. This is my reason for putting forward these suggestions.
We may not be able to call on our waves to halt, as King Canute, in years gone by, did, but, because we are a small island, and our population continues to increase, we as a nation should face up to our responsibilities for protecting our shores and should not have to call on the immediate areas affected, out of their limited resources, to meet the responsibility for the costs. The nation should meet the major responsibility for costs by the Exchequer contribution to the general rate funds.
§ 1.15 a.m.
§ The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government (Robert Mellish)I am sure that the House is indebted, as will be his constituents, for the way in which my hon. Friend the Member for Norfolk, North (Mr. Hazell) has presented his case to the House. Since he has been a Member, he has proved his value to his constituents and they can take pride in the way in which he presents cases on their behalf.
This is not a subject which frequently exercises the mind of the House. It is probably fair to take this as an indication that the Statute which governs the matter is, on the whole, working well and that the various parties which have functions under it are doing their jobs properly. My hon. Friend has reminded the House that the governing Statute is a good one. It was passed, as he rightly said, under a Labour Administration in 1949.
Although, as a maritime nation, our problem is widespread, it is not the only danger which the coast experiences from the sea. As my hon. Friend reminded 1918 us from our experiences 12 years ago, the sea can cause dangerous flooding where the land near the coast is low lying. But although the problems of coast erosion tend to be less dramatic, they are, nevertheless, real and, in some places, serious.
The Act which enables the maritime local authorities to deal with coast erosion is the Coast Protection Act, 1949, which was passed by a Labour Government. This enables the authorities, among other things, to carry out schemes to prevent erosion and to make orders prohibiting the removal of beach material except under licence. To some extent, the exercise of these powers must he regarded as a duty, because Section 29 of the Act enables the Minister to make an order declaring a coast protection authority to be in default if he is satisfied that it has failed to take sufficient measures for the protection of any land in its area.
That is not to say, however, that protection is justified wherever land is being eroded. It would be unrealistic and unreasonable to expect to protect every square foot of land from attack. Coast protection is expensive, as my hon. Friend has reminded the House, and one always has to make some evalutation, although not entirely on an £ s. d. basis, of the risk against which works are proposed. On the one hand, it is easy to visualise circumstances in which protection is clearly not justified and, on the other, circumstances in which it is. In between, there can be some difficult questions both as to the necessity for works and as to when, in the public interest, it is best that they should be carried out.
Where a local authority makes a scheme, it is the Minister's function to examine it and, if it is sound, to approve it. If there are objections to the carrying out of the scheme, it is his duty to adjudicate upon them. It may be of interest to the House to know that since the Act was passed the total value of schemes approved for England and Wales is about £21 million.
With that background and with the mention of that figure, perhaps I might now turn to the question of finance, which worries my hon. Friend. It is not only the incidence of coast erosion which is haphazard. The burden of 1919 carrying out protective works is also by no means uniform. There are coastal districts with high rateable resources and which have little or no protection works to carry out. At the other end of the scale, there are authorities with comparatively small resources which have a great deal of work to do. As my hon. Friend has said, his constituency includes authorities of this kind. It was for this reason that the Coast Protection Act provided for Exchequer grants towards the cost of coast protection works. They are discretionary grants and are not based on any fixed percentage of the cost of the works.
Before I go further, I should, perhaps, remind the House that the general question of the relationship between central and local government finance is, as my hon. Friend knows, now being studied, but I am of necessity basing what I say on the existing law and practice. The Government's policy has been, and is, to pay high grants where financial help is most needed and relatively small grants, or no grant at all, where the coast protection authority is better able to meet the cost itself. The normal maximum grant is about 80 per cent. of the cost of the scheme.
This grant from the Exchequer, however, is not the limit of the financial assistance available to a district council. The Act provides that where the Minister grant-aids a project, the county council must also do so. Where the cost of the work is high in relation to the district council's resources, and the Minister is making a high grant, it is quite common for the county council to meet, usually by way of a contribution towards the loan charges, 50 per cent. of the burden remaining upon the district council after the Exchequer grant has been taken into account. Further, where the council qualifies for rate deficiency grant, this grant is payable on the balance of the cost of the scheme, as it is charged to revenue.
It can thus be seen that the scope for assistance towards the capital cost of schemes is very considerable. Where the Exchequer pays 80 per cent. of the cost and the county council pays half the remainder—that is, 10 per cent.—the district council has to find only the remaining 10 per cent. If the council quali- 1920 fies for rate deficiency grant of, say, 40 per cent.—and the two rural district councils in my hon. Friend's constituency which have coast protection problems qualify for rate deficiency grant of this order of magnitude—the effective burden on the district council in respect of the capital cost of the scheme is only about 6 per cent.
I am not, of course, suggesting that this sort of arithmetic applies in the generality of cases; but it indicates the extent to which the present way of financing schemes does help local authorities. Of course, I realise that where there is much expensive work to carry out, even the small fraction of the cost left for the district council to bear may seem unduly large. I am not persuaded, however, that it would be right to go even further than we do. An 80 per cent. grant from the Exchequer is a very large subvention, when all is said and done.
I might say at this point that the total amount of grants paid or promised in respect of the £21 million worth of schemes which I mentioned earlier is about £11½ million. This works out at an average of about 55 per cent., which shows that the Exchequer is rather more than an equal partner with the local authorities in financing the cost of coast protection schemes.
It is sometimes argued that coast protection ought to be a national charge. The Government do not agree with this view. The Departmental Committee on Coastal Flooding, which considered this matter following the disastrous floods of 1953, came to the conclusion that the principles on which sea defence works—both in relation to flooding and erosion—as at present financed are right; that sea defence does concern the people in areas where defence schemes are undertaken and there is a reasonable case for contributions through the rates from inhabitants of the area. The Committee was perfectly clear in this matter—and we think it is right that the principle should continue—that it is right to keep the grant system flexible so that money goes where it is most needed.
My hon. Friend suggested that there might be a grant from the Exchequer towards the cost of maintaining sea defence works, and he pointed out that this may in some cases be a considerable 1921 burden on the district council. The Government could not agree to specific grants towards this expenditure. Generally speaking, they think it right that the maintenance of capital works should be a local responsibility; and, in fact, one of the reasons why capital grants are allowed to reach such a high percentage is the understanding that the coast protection authority will maintain the works without further aid from the Exchequer. If grants towards maintenance expenditure were introduced we should have to consider reviewing the scale of capital grants to take this into account.
In practice, it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to evolve a satisfactory system for grant-aiding maintenance, especially day-to-day maintenance, without having at the back of it some arrangements for inspection and control of the expenditure. This would be administratively very cumbersome, and I would doubt whether the generality of authorities would welcome it. It is relevant to mention that the river authorities receive only capital grants and not grants towards maintenance in respect of their expenditure on sea defences against flooding. But, of course, where the local authority qualify for rate deficiency grant, that grant is payable on this maintenance expenditure.
My hon. Friend drew attention to the differences between the grants paid to river authorities for defences to prevent sea flooding and those paid to coast protection authorities for defences against erosion. He pointed out that in Norfolk there is one rate of grant for the river authority wherever it carries out works, but there are varying grants to the coast protection authorities. Furthermore, the capital grant payable—85 per cent.—is higher than the maximum ordinarily paid to coast protection authorities.
On the question of the maximum grant, I wonder whether there is any reason which will stand up to examination why the grants should be exactly the same. Different authorities carry out the works. The authorities have a quite different range of problems to meet, and the method of raising money to cover their expenditure is different. Finally, the sea defence works they carry out are to deal with an entirely different problem, and the defences themselves are often different in character.
1922 In the light of these differences I do not think that the difference of 5 per cent. in the maximum grant is really significant. The main point is that they are both very substantial grants. I use the term "maximum grant", in relation to flood defences, advisedly. It would be wrong to assume that all river authorities are paid 85 per cent. for their sea defence works. As in the case of coast protection authorities, the amount of grant is related to their individual circumstances. I am informed that the percentages payable in respect of sea defence works over the country as a whole vary from 35 per cent. to 85 per cent.
My hon. Friend's third point was whether or not we could call in experts from overseas to advise on the problems. It is, of course, perfectly right to point out that, to deal with the problem most efficiently, we should keep abreast of developments overseas, particularly in countries which may have a bigger problem than we have to face. But although the coast protection works are carried out by a large number of maritime local authorities, the design of coast protection works is genuinely recognised as re-requiring specialist expertise and a large number of the authorities engage as consultants for their schemes engineering firms who have specialised in this work. It is through them that experience overseas is brought to bear on the design of our works here.
In speaking of technical assistance available to coast protection authorities, it would be right to mention the work of the Hydraulics Research Station. It is always available to help on special problems which face local authorities.
My hon. Friend has done a great service to his constituents, and, indeed, the House, in calling attention to this matter and I am only sorry I cannot give him a better reply. He knows, though, that in the Ministry we have an open door, and will consider any points which he wants to put to us, but on his point tonight, of the increased Exchequer grant, I am sorry to have to tell him that we do not believe that the case for that is yet made out.
§ Question put and agreed to.
§ Adjourned accordingly at twenty-seven minutes past One o'clock.