Wales: Nature Conservation (Hansard, 12 October 1989)

§ Lord Trefgarne
My Lords, the Government have no plans to issue such a consultation document. The intention to set up a single new body in Wales to undertake the present functions and responsibilities of the Nature Conservancy Council and the Countryside Commission was announced on 11th July. Full and detailed consultations on implementation of this decision are already taking place between the government departments and statutory agencies involved.

§ Baroness White
My Lords, I suppose I have to thank the Minister for that very unsatisfactory reply. With his ancestry he knows that Wales is not only a most beautiful country but a small and vulnerable one. He will also know that concern about environmental issues is becoming ever more widespread both in the United Kingdom and in the European Community. Does he recognise that to isolate the administration of environmental protection in Wales could prove to be a false kindness?
563 Moreover, does he realise that in the opinion of those who have recently sought information on the proposed changes from the Welsh Office the reason that we have had no consultation paper for Wales, as opposed to a very solid publication for Scotland, is that, although inquiries are received in the Welsh Office with the utmost courtesy, neither Ministers nor officials seem to know how to answer them except to say that a political decision has been made? Can he assure the House that, eager as the Government may be to put the greenest of green Bills on the statute book at the earliest possible moment, we shall not be faced with legislation on this issue, which has not been properly thought out? It will not be the first time that this Government have legislated first and thought afterwards.
Finally, does the Minister accept—

§ Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone
The question is too long, my Lords.

§ Baroness White
My Lords, this is an important matter for Wales. I do not often intervene at Question Time whereas the noble and learned Lord intervenes on almost every possible occasion. Does the Minister accept that the Welsh voice should be heard, as of right and not of favour, in the highest quarters of environmental policy-making and that this will not normally be achieved by concentrating concern in a small, isolated and separated administration?

§ Lord Trefgarne
My Lords, I believe that the new arrangements will be more effective in coping with the proper concerns of the noble Baroness rather than less so. Indeed, that view was broadly accepted by the principal parties concerned who called upon my honourable friend the Minister of State in the Welsh Office quite recently and had what I am told was a very frank and satisfactory meeting.

§ Baroness Nicol
My Lords, given the increasingly international approach in wildlife conservation, can the Minister explain how there will be an international voice for the United Kingdom in the future or whether indeed such a thought has been explored?

§ Lord Trefgarne
My Lords, I do not think that there will be any diminution in the United Kingdom contribution to the proper discussion of these matters. Up to now, of course, it has not always involved the bodies that have existed under the old arrangements. For example, government departments attend, by and large, the principal international forums in these matters and those arrangements will continue.

§ Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos
My Lords, is the Minister aware that Wales can do virtually anything if it is given the resources? Will he give an undertaking that adequate resources will be made available to the new committee to enable it to appoint scientific and administrative staff of high quality? Also can he indicate the link that will be 564 created between the new Welsh Committee and its counterpart in Scotland and England?

§ Lord Trefgarne
My Lords, working parties are at present devising the arrangements to meet the circumstances to which the noble Lord has referred. On the question of resources, I agree that it is important that these bodies are adequately resourced so that, for example, they retain the necessary high quality staff. The Government will ensure that that is so.

§ Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos
My Lords, will the Minister give the House the terms of reference of the working parties to which he has referred?

§ Lord Trefgarne
My Lords, I cannot do so without notice.

Lord Hunt
My Lords, does the Minister agree that the very complex and detailed character of the issues which fall under the heading of nature conservation make a case for the retention of a national body which was created for that specific purpose? Can he give the House some reassurance that those detailed issues will not suffer as a result of amalgamation?

§ Lord Trefgarne
My Lords, I am not sure that the best way forward in these matters is to have a supra-national body, if I may call it that. The considerations that apply in Wales compared with Scotland, for example, are often very different. In any event, even the old body did not cover Northern Ireland. The principle is therefore by no means established.

§ Baroness White
Mr Lords, will the Minister indicate how his reply squares with what the Secretary of State for the Environment is reported to have said to Mr. Brian Walden on television on Sunday: that a Great Britain personality on the scientific side is somehow to be preserved? Where does Wales fit in with that?

§ Lord Trefgarne
My Lords: I did not quite hear what the noble Baroness said. However, I can assure her that the new arrangements will be at least as effective as the old ones, if not more so, and in particular that the arrangements in Wales will be very satisfactory indeed, as was confirmed by the parties concerned when they called upon my honourable friend recently.

§ Baroness White
My Lords, the parties concerned have personal interests among other things. Such opinion is by no means universal in Wales. One of the largest voluntary organisations, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, has publicly declared that the proposed arrangements will be a disaster.

§ Lord Trefgarne
My Lords, I can only repeat that the principal voices, when they called upon my honourable friend, were not of that opinion. Indeed one of the bodies represented was one of the bodies with which the noble Baroness is connected.

§ Lord Renton
My Lords, who will be answerable to Parliament for the activities of this new Welsh environmental body? Will it be the Secretary of State for the Environment or the Secretary of State for Wales?

§ Lord Trefgarne
My Lords, my briefing today comes from the Welsh Office. I dare say therefore that it will be my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Wales.