Environmental Groups

HC Deb 08 November 1989 vol 159 cc985-6

9. Mrs. Margaret Ewing

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list any official engagements he has between the present time and the end of November with environmental groups.

Mr. Chris Patten

I regularly meet a wide variety of environmental groups. My next such meeting will be with the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution on 16 November.

Mrs. Ewing

Has the Secretary of State considered meeting CAND—Caithness Against Nuclear Dumping —an environmentally conscious group? Will he take congnisance of the fact that yesterday, the people of Caithness voted three to one against nuclear waste being stored at Dounreay, thereby ensuring that the people, the district council and the regional council all come out on the same side of the argument? Will he take a more positive attitude than that of Nirex and recognise that the views of the people are ultimately the most important aspect of this debate?

Mr. Patten

I am sure that my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland meets many groups, that he has met many of the individuals referred to by the hon. Lady, and that he has given them effective and robust answers.

Mr. Squire

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his announced willingness to meet a considerable range of environmental groups. Does he agree that his critical role is to ensure that the environmental option is considered in each and every decision, rather than that it should invariably be the option adopted when sometimes other issues will overtake that issue and so make it better for it not to be adopted?

Mr. Patten

That was an interesting question, which I am still following as best I can. I think that my hon. Friend was making the reasonable point that we must be increasingly aware of the environmental impact of every decision that we make both as a Government and as individual consumers. To that extent it is obvious that a sensible environment policy does not stop at the front door of the Department of the Environment. It affects all Government Departments, and that is something to which we shall be drawing attention in our White Paper next year.

Mr. Morley

How does the Secretary of State react to criticisms from environment groups about the Government's reaction to the conference in Holland on global warming? Other European countries are willing to accept target limits for a reduction in emissions from cars, factories and power stations but the British Government, along with the United States, have refused to join other European countries in dealing with the matter. Does this not give the claim that the Government are leading the campaign on global warming a somewhat bogus front?

Mr. Patten

The hon. Gentleman's supplementary question might have been difficult to answer if it had been based on the truth. We accepted emission targets at the Netherlands conference. My hon. Friend the Minister of State played a leading role in brokering a consensus on emission targets at the conference, and he deserves the congratulations of the House rather than uninformed criticism.

Mr. Andrew MacKay

When my right hon. Friend meets environment groups, does he find that they share the views of my constituents that he was wise to say that planning considerations should be left to democratically elected local authorities and should find their way to his desk and the desks of his inspectors only as a last resort?

Mr. Patten

It remains one of my ambitions to take fewer planning decisions myself. I want to see local planning authorities taking decisions as far as possible. Obviously they need to take account of regional and national interests when they are drawing up local plans For example.