§ LORD KENNETasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they will be guided in their international dealings about the human environment by the following principles, which were agreed upon in Bonn on June 4 this year by Parliamentarians from 22 countries, seven of them in Africa and Asia:
Government should begin international negotiations to establish appropriate systems for strict pollution controls suitable to individual locations. Such systems should be designed so as not to distort international economic competition, but to develop common environmental standards applicable to the contracting nations. Appropriate use should be made of internationally agreed limits (including yearly mean, 100-day mean, and an absolute daily limit) of intake of specified substances by human beings, animals, or vegetation. Governments should begin international negotiations to establish international health, product, emission and environmental standards applicable to products entering into international commerce. International environmental research programmes, as well as co-ordinated national research programmes, in all aspects of environmental problems should be sponsored by the United Nations system, in close co-operation, whenever appropriate, with the concerned nongovernmental international organisations. Relevant organisational changes of the United Nations system should be carried out in order that these research programmes may be undertaken as soon as possible.
The environmental effects of development assistance and of foreign investment programmes should be carefully studied and considered by all parties concerned before such projects are initiated. Developing countries should be granted technical assistance in training environmental managers and scientists.
The international transport of hazardous or polluting substances should be subject to specific regulations permitting among other things the establishment of liability in case of degradation of the environment. A system of compulsory insurance should be established to cover the risks incurred by the transporter. No international transport of hazardous substances should be authorised unless such substances are accompanied by a notice describing in particular the measures to be taken in cases of danger or accident.
All nations should ratify the International Convention Relating to Intervention 788WA on the High Seas in Cases of Oil Pollution Casualties and the International Convention on Civil Liability for Oil Pollution Damage (I.M.C.O., Brussels, 1969) as well as the amendments to the International Convention on the Prevention of Pollution of the Sea by Oil 1954. A convention setting forth a supplemental compensation fund, which fund is to be established by transporters and owners of oil cargoes, and which increases the limits of liability for oil spills, should be negotiated, signed, and ratified as soon as possible by all nations.
In addition to the subjects spelled out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, there should be added the right to a high quality environment indispensable to Man's physical, mental and social wellbeing, as well as to his cultural development.
§ LORD SANDFORDThe Government will bear in mind this advice, with which they find themselves in general agreement, in forthcoming international discussions, and in particular at the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment arranged for next year. On the specific question of standards, which is a complex one, I am putting in the Library a copy of a paper which we have sent to other interested Governments.