LEE CONSERVANCY CATCHMENT BOARD (NEW FUNCTIONS OF RIVER AUTHORITIES) ORDER 1965 (Hansard, 29 March 1965)

§ LORD MITCHISON

My Lords, I beg to move that this Order be approved. Noble Lords on all sides of the House will remember long debates on the Water Resources Act, 1963. The noble Lord, Lord Hastings, in particular, will need no reminding of the many hours of patient work that he devoted to the subject. The Order now before the House is merely the last stage in the application of that Act.

The Act itself established for England and Wales a new and comprehensive system for the conservation of water resources. It did this by providing for river authorities who will add water conservation functions to the functions which they inherit from river boards. They are fisheries, land drainage and the prevention of pollution. The river authorities were set up by Order on October 15 last, and take on their full functions on April 1. Speaking in the last three days of the life of the river boards, I may perhaps be forgiven for departing from the main line of my speech just to say how much the Government appreciate the work that river boards have done since they came into being about fifteen years ago.

The new system has two aspects. Positively, it charges the river authorities with the duty of surveying and conserving the resources of their own areas, and, where necessary, augmenting them from other 834 areas under the guidance of the Water Resources Board. It safeguards investment in water conservation, and makes sure that a national policy is carried through, by means of a system of licensing the abstraction or impounding of water, so that the use of water is fully controlled. I do not need to persuade noble Lords of the vital importance of the success of these arrangements, for the health of the economy as much as for the health of the individual.

As I have said, river authorities will be based upon river boards, taking over their areas and receiving direct transfer of their functions. There is, however, a special feature. In the Thames and Lee Catchments there have been no river boards as such. Most of the duties carried out by river boards elsewhere have here been carried out instead by the Conservators of the River Thames and by the Lee Conservancy Catchment Board—bodies whose constitutions as well as their powers and duties differ from those of the river boards. It was therefore impossible for the Act simply to confer the new water resources functions on the Conservators and the Catchment Board without more ado, and what it did instead was to give the Minister power to give them to the two bodies by Order, and to amend their constitutions appropriately. This was done for the Thames by Order last July; the present Order does the same for the Lee. It gives the Catchment Board all the new functions that river authorities will be exercising in the rest of the country; and it re-makes the Board's constitution on lines as similar as possible to the constitutions of river authorities. It is an Order full of detail, but these are its two, quite simple, purposes.

As with river authorities, a bare majority of the Board's members—in this case thirteen in number—will be appointed by local authorities. Twelve of these are from authorities on which the Catchment Board precepts the county councils, and the London borough and county borough councils, and the other is to be appointed by the Greater London Council, on whom the Board do not precept, but who have a very great interest indeed in regional development in the Lee Valley.

835 The remaining twelve members are being appointed by the Minister of Housing and Local Government for their knowledge of the public water supply and the use of water in industry; by the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food as similarly qualified in respect of agriculture, land drainage and fisheries; and by the Minister of Transport—the navigation interest on the Lee is important. Here again the pattern is the same as for the river authorities, except that three of the four public water supply members are to be appointed by the Minister from among nominees of the Metropolitan Water Board, which has a predominant interest in water supply in the Lee Valley. The balance of interests and the proposals for representation have won general—though not quite unanimous—assent.

I do not believe I need trouble noble Lords with a detailed exposition of the provisions of the order but I should like to end by referring again to the importance of water conservation and proper management of our resources. The Lee Catchment with its flourishing industry, horticulture and population is an area of heavy and rising demand, and its problems are by no means the least in the country. I am sure all noble Lords will want to join me in wishing the Catchment Board well. Its new task is very large, its opportunities correspondingly great. I beg to move.