§ 3.18 p.m.
§ Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
§ LORD HASTINGSMy Lords, in introducing this Bill to the House, and in asking your Lordships to give it a Second Reading, I feel that it will be as well if I warn your Lordships in advance, 979 and apologise at the same time, that my speech will be somewhat lengthy,. I fear that I must detain your Lordships for some 35 minutes, as the Bill is a very long one and it is also complicated. Furthermore, it is an important Bill, and in some of its details, though not, I think, in its general policy, it may prove to be controversial. If one were to require testimony to the truth of this one need refer only to the list of speakers, numbering 22. Even so, I am afraid I shall have to leave out a number of matters of interest to some of your Lordships, and I can only say that, if I do, it will not be because the Government believe these matters are not important. I think, however, that my noble friend who will be winding up at the end of the debate will refer to some of these matters which I shall inevitably have to omit.
This Bill establishes the new organisation for comprehensive management of our water resources which, by general consent, is badly needed. It brings together several separate strands of legislation which have occupied your Lordships over the years. These have dealt with particular aspects of water. Our object now, as I have said, is comprehensive management, for the benefit of all the many interests which depend on water in various ways.
We have had several Acts of Parliament on public water supply, the most important being the Water Act of 1945, which made the Minister of Housing and Local Government responsible for a national policy relating to water. The Act also equipped water undertakers with the powers necessary for their work and provided for their re-grouping into stronger units. There have been Acts dealing with land drainage and coast protection, culminating in the Land Drainage Act of last year. These have provided all the necessary powers for the drainage of land and the prevention of flooding from rivers and the sea. There has been a series of Acts on the prevention of river pollution, based on valuable work done by subcommittees of the Central Advisory Water Committee. These have gradually provided means of controlling all discharges of trade effluent and sewage into rivers and estuaries.
980 There has not been in recent years major legislation about freshwater fisheries, but the Prevention of Pollution Acts and the River Boards Act which I shall mention in a moment have both, in diverse ways, brought advantage to fisheries. Noble Lords will also know that a major investigation of the situation in relation to Salmon and Freshwater Fisheries was carried out by a Committee under the chairmanship of The noble Viscount, Lord Bledisloe, whose Report is now under consideration.
A substantial step towards comprehensive management was taken by the River Boards Act, 1948, which made river boards responsible for land drainage, prevention of river pollution and administration of fisheries, functions which had previously been discharged by a variety of bodies. The Bill now before the House provides for the dissolution of river boards, or rather for their transformation. Their passing, though we believe it to be necessary, will occasion widespread regret. In the dozen years since they were set up they have made good progress towards better protection against floods, cleaner rivers, and better fishing for the growing numbers who enjoy it. But many who serve on river boards, or who are concerned in some other way with water resources, agree that the present legislative framework is incomplete.
The Water Act, 1945, gave the Minister of Housing the duty of promoting the conservation and proper use of water resources, but, apart from enabling him to control abstraction of underground water in certain areas, it gave him little in the way of powers to discharge the duty. River boards, and many others, are vitally concerned with the level of water in rivers, but neither river boards nor any other public authority have comprehensive powers to control abstraction from rivers. As far as rivers are concerned, it is left at present to the individual user of water to exploit water resources for his own purposes where he can—subject, in the case of statutory water undertakers, to their obtaining the necessary powers from Parliament or from the Minister. But the organisation for positive measures on a comprehensive scale is lacking.
In seeking to remedy the deficiencies brought to light by the growing demand for water, we have been largely guided 981 by the Proudman Report, the Report of the Sub-Committee on the Growing Demand for Water, appointed by the Central Advisory Water Committee. The Government's attitude to the Report was explained in the White Paper on Water Conservation, which was published in April, and debated in your Lordships' House in May. I should like again to express the Government's warm thanks to Professor Proudman, and to his colleagues, who included the noble Earl, Lord Malmesbury. I am delighted that both he and the noble Lord, Lord De Ramsey, a member of the Central Advisory Water Committee, are taking part in our debate this afternoon.
The new organisation which Her Majesty's Government propose comprises 26 river authorities together with the Thames Conservancy and the Lee Conservancy Catchment Board and the Water Resources Board. Each river authority will be responsible for all aspects of the management of the water resources of one or more river basins. The Water Resources Board will be concerned only with water conservation. In the debate on the White Paper there were two main criticisms of this organisation. One concerned the number of river authorities to be established, and the other the part to be played by the Water Resources Board.
The Proudman Report envisaged that the areas of the new river authorities should be based on those of the river boards, but with some amalgamations. The White Paper proposed seven amalgamations of river board areas. Several noble Lords suggested in the debate that this would still leave too many authorities. In the Bill there are, in fact, only six amalgamations, and one modification amongst these six concerning Cumberland and Lancashire. In considering how many river authorities there should be it is necessary to bear in mind that the authorities, in addition to the new work of water conservation for which the Bill provides, will also be responsible for land drainage and flood prevention, control of pollution and administration of fisheries, the functions of river boards now. In this speech I am bound to concentrate on what is new, but these other functions are, and will continue to be, extremely important, and we must take care that their 982 efficient discharge is not prevented by the new form of organisation set up for water conservation. The Bill, in fact, proposes 26 river authorities outside the Thames and Lee catchments. There is, however, power in the Bill—and I would emphasise this to your Lordships—to adjust the areas subsequently if experience shows this to be right.
The criticism of the Water Resources Board—which at the time of the White Paper debate was known as the separate central authority—was that it would not be strong enough. Let us consider in the light of this criticism the various functions which the Board will have under the Bill. First there is the intelligence function; to build up comprehensive information about the water resources of the country, the possibilities of augmenting them, and the demands being made upon them and likely to be made in the future. For this purpose the Board will control the work to be done by river authorities in the measurement of water resources, both surface water in rivers and lakes and underground water.
The Board will have complete powers to require river authorities to furnish it with information which they will obtain in the course of their duties. Second, the Board has the clear duty under Clause 12 to work out, on the basis of the intelligence thus obtained, the action which is needed to augment water resources; to make its recommendations known to the river authorities, and to encourage and assist them in carrying out the recommendations; to check on progress made and to draw attention to deficiencies and delays. This is not a paper exercise. The Bill makes it a duty for the river authorities both to formulate schemes and to carry out schemes implementing the recommendations of the Board. Third, the Board has a research function. It will make known to existing research agents, such as the D.S.I.R. establishments, the questions to which they need answers; it will organise the necessary field work through the river authorities, and it can contribute to the cost of such work which they are called upon to do in excess of their normal duties. The Board can itself carry out research if for a particular project it seems to be the most appropriate agency.
983 My Lords, this, surely, is a body with real strength, and one with the duty of taking the initiative. Though the Board has general powers to give advice, there is no question of its simply waiting until its advice is asked for. The choice of a Chairman and of members will be of vital importance. There must be brought together upon it persons with the experience and skills which are requisite to the taking of the important decisions involved in both formulating and securing the execution of an integrated plan on a national scale. More importance attaches to securing people with those abilities than to providing direct representation of one or other of the interests concerned with water. The Board will have its own staff, including engineers and hydrologists. It will be able to help river authorities by lending staff to them for special projects.
What the Board cannot do, except in the very special case where a river authority has been found to be in default, is itself to build reservoirs and other water conservation works. To give the Board such a power would not be consistent with our conception of the river authority. The river authority is to be responsible for all aspects of water conservation in its area. This includes the execution of works which cannot conveniently be carried out by an individual abstractor of water such as a statutory water undertaker. Conservation projects by river authorities will require the approval of the Minister of Housing. He will not approve any major project without satisfying himself that it accords with the Water Resources Board's ideas. If the Board cannot persuade a river authority to take action which it believes necessary, the Minister has his powers of direction, and he will use them if need be.
The Board has a key rÔle in planning the development of water resources. I cannot promise that there will be no more controversial water schemes like those which we discussed on the Manchester Corporation Bill. But once this Bill is operative there will be a Board able to review alternative ways of meeting a particular need for water and to reach an informed judgment on the practical merits of any particular scheme. The Board, and the river 984 authorities and Ministers with functions under the Bill, are all under the express duty, set out in Clause 93, of taking into account the effect of their proposals upon natural beauty and on other facets of what is known as amenity.
My Lords, I now turn to the Bill itself. It is a Bill of somewhat daunting magnitude. But, in setting up river authorities, we must equip them with powers adequate for their many-sided role, and we must provide safeguards for the diverse interests affected by their work. The Bill repeals the River Boards Act, 1948, and re-enacts much of it with modifications. To have left the 1948 Act on the Statute Book would have meant a somewhat shorter Bill, but it would have been really a monstrosity of legislation by reference.
Part I of the Bill enlarges the responsibilities of the Minister of Housing under existing legislation so as to include responsibility for, broadly, the management of water resources for which the Bill provides the machinery. The Minister of Agriculture is to be responsible for the land drainage and fisheries activities of river authorities, as he is at present for the corresponding activities of river boards. Part II provides for the establishment of the river authorities, and prescribes their functions in broad terms. Clause 4 supplemented by Clause 14, makes it clear that river authorities have a positive duty to estimate future demands for water, to formulate and secure the execution of proposals for "conserving, re-distributing or otherwise augmenting water resources in their area", to meet such demands. The river authorities are to be established by orders, made jointly by my two right honourable friends.
All the authorities come into existence on the same day, referred to in the Bill as "the first appointed day". They will assume their functions a little later, on the second appointed day. We hope that they will be established and in action by early 1965. The size and composition of the authorities will be prescribed in the orders, and will vary from authority to authority, according to local circumstances, within limits laid down in Clauses 6–8. The authorities will normally range in size from 21 to 31 members, but additional members are to be appointed in the cases dealt with in 985 Clause 8, and the normal maximum of 31 can be exceeded in other cases if special circumstances make this necessary.
The members of each authority will be appointed partly by local authorities in the area concerned and partly by the two Ministers. The members appointed by local authorities are to have a bare majority. The members to be appointed by Ministers are to be chosen for their knowledge of land drainage, fisheries, or agriculture—these to be appointed by the Minister of Agriculture; or public water supply or industry—these to be appointed by the Minister of Housing. All authorities will include one or more members chosen for knowledge of each of these five fields, but the proportions will vary according to the circumstances of the area.
So far the provisions of the Bill about the composition of the river authorities have followed the White Paper. But there is a significant change as regards the appointment of members by local authorities. The White Paper proposed appointment by county boroughs and county districts. In our debate last May, the noble Lord, Lord Sinclair of Cleeve, said he thought it would be better if in counties the appointments were made by the county council. The same view was expressed in many other quarters and the Government have decided to accept it. I should like to take this opportunity of explaining why. Our object must be to get people conversant with the problems facing the new authorities. The county councils and county borough councils have for some years been closely concerned with the work done by river boards and it would be unwise to lose this accumulated experience.
In addition, they are the local planning authorities and will be intimately concerned with other aspects of the developments that cause this rising demand for water. In some areas, too, closer examination has shown that the practical difficulties surrounding the arrangements for appointing members from rating authorities, and at the same time ensuring an adequate voice for the rural areas, are too formidable. Unnecessary complications would have arisen in the apportionment of precepts. My right honourable friends have concluded that 986 retention of appointment by the counties and county boroughs will be in the best interests of the new authorities. Nevertheless, there will still be some cases where the relative size of the contribution to the river authority's income made by an individual district council will justify the direct nomination of a member by that Council, and provision for this is contained in Clause 7.
Part II of the Bill also deals with the constitution of the Water Resources Board. It is to comprise not more than seven members, Who will be appointed by the Minister of Housing and some or all of whom may be paid and who may serve full or part-time. The Board is to make an annual report, which is to be laid before Parliament.
Part III deals first with the measurement of water resources. River authorities are required to carry out, and periodically to bring up to date, a survey of water resources and the demands upon them: in other words a "water-use balance sheet". This is the essential preliminary to their basic task of developing water resources in anticipation of future demands. The authorities are also required to submit hydrometric schemes for the approval of the Water Resources Board, and to carry them out when approved. These schemes will provide for the measurement of rainfall, evaporation, and the flow of rivers and streams. Works of this sort will continue to qualify for Exchequer grant which will now be paid under Clause 81.
Part III also places on the river authority the duty of determining for the more important rivers of the area, and with due regard for the character of each river, the minimum flow needed to meet the requirements of all the various uses to which the river is being put at the -present time, including fishing, land drainage, navigation, the dilution of sewage effluents, and water supply. The authority's proposals will be prepared in consultation with the statutory interest affected. They will then be advertised, so that all these affected may have a chance to consider them and make representations, after which the proposals will be submitted for approval to the Minister of Housing, who will be required to hear the objections. The minimum acceptable flow determined in this way will guide the river authority in considering 987 whether to allow further abstraction of water from the river and whether to take steps to increase the quantity of water available.
Part IV of the Bill provides the means by which the proper use of water resources will be secured and the investment in water conservation works safe-guarded. It provides for the control of the abstraction and impounding of water. The basis of the control appearing in Clauses 23 and 36 is that it will become unlawful to abstract or to begin impounding otherwise than in conformity with a licence under the Bill.
The extent of this control may best be outlined by taking surface water and ground water separately. For surface water statutory control has hitherto applied primarily to the taking of water by statutory water undertakers and by the Central Electricity Generating Board, who require large quantities daily for cooling purposes. For the rest, any constraint has derived from the Common Law. Now a more precise and readily applied control is essential, but certain abstractions of surface water will, under Clause 24 of the Bill, be exempted from the need for a licence. Among these is, first, the taking of surface water by a riparian occupier for the domestic purposes of his household or for agricultural purposes other than spray irrigation, on the riparian holding. These abstractions for present purposes are not substantial. Rights to make abstractions of this sort will continue to be based upon the Common Law. Next, the taking of water into canals will be exempted.
As to the abstraction of water from below ground, this is already subject to licensing under the Water Act, 1945, in many parts of England and Wales—the areas which the Minister of Housing and Local Government has defined as "conservation areas". Here the main significance of the present Bill is that it transfers the licensing responsibility from the Minister to the river authorities, and extends the control to the whole of England and Wales, as the Proudman Committee recommended. The control will continue to embrace the construction of wells and boreholes and the installation of machinery, as well as the taking of the water; but again there will be certain exemptions. The taking of water by the occupier of land for the domestic 988 purposes of his household and, secondly, the taking of water where it is necessary to prevent interference with underground workings would require no licence. Extended exemption will be given to the making of boreholes to test the presence of underground water, its quality, or the effect of abstracting it upon other underground water.
For both surface and underground water there is a common-sense exemption from licensing of water taken for fire fighting; and there is a de minimis exemption for the taking of less than 1,000 gallons. The impounding of water must be controlled, essentially because of the interference caused to the natural flow of streams upon which many interests depend. The licensing system replaces Section 26 of the Water Act, 1945, where the water undertaker is concerned; and goes beyond it in bringing impounding by others under statutory control.
I come now to the way in which existing rights of abstraction and impounding are treated. Abstractions which are being made with statutory authority at the time the new system comes into operation, as for example, the taking of water by statutory water undertakers for the public supply, will receive a licence of the same effect as the statutory authorisation, to be known as a "licence of right" under Clause 33. Similarly, a person who has abstracted water without statutory authority at any time in the five years preceding the new system is entitled to receive a "licence of right". The terms of the licence in this case, and in the case of the abstraction governed by a statutory authority which sets no limit to the amount which may be taken, are to be settled by reference to a number of factors laid down in Clauses 34 and 35 of the Bill, the general effect of which is to limit the licence to abstraction of the amounts, and in the manner of past abstractions.
All applications for licences other than licences of right are required to be advertised locally: representations may be made, and the river authority must consider these before taking a decision (Clauses 28 and 29). There is a right of appeal to my right honourable friend the Minister of Housing and Local Government for an applicant who is disappointed by the decision of the river 989 authority, or by its failure to decide (Clauses 39 and 40). A licence may be varied or revoked: and if this is proposed to be done against the wish of the licence holder, the decision will not be taken by the river authority but will be a ministerial decision. The licence holder also will have a claim for compensation for injury sustained (Clauses 41 to 48).
In the White Paper the Government accepted the point of view that conservation of water should be self-supporting, the cost being carried by means of licence fees and charges for water, except that, pending the making and approval of a charging scheme, any deficiency of water conservation account should be met by precept. Parts V and VIII of the Bill give effect to this. It will have been noted that Clause 56 in particular gives scope for that flexibility in charging schemes to which the White Paper referred, enabling rates of charge to vary in accordance with the source of the abstraction, the season at which it is made, the use to which the water is put, and whether it returns to the same source of supply, virtually undiminished in quantity, or not. These charging schemes will be submitted to the Minister of Housing and Local Government for approval: and there will be public advertisement and hearing of objections before that approval is given.
In the interim period before these schemes become operative, which it is hoped, as Clause 57 (3) shows, will be in 1969, new abstractions will be liable to charge settled ad hoc between the abstracter and the river authority; but those who were abstracting previously and hold licences of right will pay no charge until the formal schemes are approved. Clause 58 provides a further measure of flexibility in charging arrangements and reflects the statement in the White Paper that where an abstracter has himself carried out conservation works there will be a case for a lower rate of charge, or perhaps for no charge at all.
Part VIII of the Bill requires the keeping by river authorities of a separate water resources account, for transactions arising from their new functions. No change is made in the methods of financing the functions transferred from river boards, apart from provision relat- 990 ing to the penny rate product which is used as the basis of the precept. Your Lordships will not wish me at this juncture to dilate upon the arithmetical intricacies of this: but I may say that the effect of what is done will be to secure greater fairness all round.
The powers which the Bill confers on river authorities to acquire land and to carry out works are such as river boards and statutory water undertakers already possess. The powers of entry and inspection, the power to take samples of effluents and the power to require information, though apparently extensive, are such as the river boards already possess, and are the minimum requisite to enable the new authorities to discharge their tasks, which range from land drainage and fishery administration through prevention of pollution to the control of abstraction of water, the gauging of streams and the carrying out of works to store and move water.
§ LORD SILKINMy Lords, may I ask the noble Lord if he can say whether I am right in thinking that land can be acquired only by agreement; however necessary it may be, there are no compulsory powers in the Bill?
§ LORD HASTINGSOffhand, I think the noble Lord is wrong, but I will make sure that my noble friend confirms that or otherwise at the end of the debate. I think there are compulsory powers and land is not necessarily acquired by agreement.
§ LORD SILKINOffhand, I think I am right.
§ LORD HASTINGSWe shall see, I hope, at the end of the debate.
The transfer of the undertakings of the river boards to the river authorities, and the dissolution of the river boards effected under Part IX of the Bill involves a substantial number of persons who are the officers and other employees of the river boards. The House may rest assured that the provision made for the safeguarding of the interests of the staff or river boards is in line with the practice in local government generally. Pension rights are fully safeguarded, and the Minister of Housing and the Minister of Agriculture jointly are put under an obligation to make regulations requiring the payment of 991 compensation to persons who suffer loss of employment or diminution of emoluments, as a consequence of the transfer of the river boards' functions.
Special arrangements need to be made for securing the discharge of the functions of a river authority in an appropriate way in those parts of the country to which the River Boards Act, 1948, did not apply; that is, the Thames catchment, above Teddington, and the Lee catchment, together with that part of the County of London not in the Lee catchment and certain adjoining areas. The Bill contains in Clause 112 power for the Ministers of Housing, Agriculture and Transport jointly to apply the provisions of the Bill with suitable adaptation to these areas, alterations in the constitution and powers of the Thames Conservancy and the Lee Conservancy Catchment Board as may be necessary and expedient.
The general purpose of the Bill is to secure that sufficient water is made available for any reasonable use in any part of the country. It does this by providing for a national plan for the development of water resources and national supervision over its execution; but it places responsibility for detail where it should be—in the river basins—where the practical work on all the matters bound up in water management has to be done. The principal effect on all water-abstracting interests will be to help them by both augmenting and improving the reliability of supplies.
This main effect, and indeed the whole object, of this Bill will, I trust, bring relief to the major water abstracters such as statutory water undertakers and large industrial concerns, and among those major abstracters must be included those who use spray irrigation. It has been estimated that 1½ million acres in this country are irrigable, and that the peak daily demand for spray irrigation in a dry season could exceed the daily demand of statutory undertakers for the public supply to the whole of England and Wales. It is the purpose of this Bill to cater for such large increases in demand.
The Bill is of substantial dimensions; so is the job to be done. The Bill establishes a sound organisation, both central and local, and provides for a 992 whole range of tasks from major works to regulate our rivers and transfer water about the country to the much more humdrum business of detailed control of the use of water. It does this with studious regard for the interests of existing users of water, large and small. Her Majesty's Government believe that its passing and operation are essential unless water in large and populous parts of England and Wales in future is to become unnecessarily scarce and unnecessarily expensive. I beg to move.
§ Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Hastings.)