[Lord Speaker] Second oral question, the Earl of Clancarty.
[Earl of Clancarty] My Lords,
I beg leave to ask the question standing in my name on the order paper.
[Lord Benyon] My Lords, I declare my interests as set out in the register.
The government's
response to the landscape review was accompanied by a public consultation.
We will publish a response to the consultation shortly, setting out
plans to support national parks and areas of outstanding natural beauty,
including helping them deliver climate mitigation and adaptation.
Our Farming in Protected Landscapes Programme is a key delivery mechanism
and provides funding for farmers
and land managers to work in partnership with protected landscapes teams
to deliver projects on climate, nature, people and place.
[Earl of Clancarty] My Lords, would the minister agree that the national parks
are flagship assets in the fight against climate change?
But that fight has been made much harder through cuts to funding
of 40% in real terms in the last ten years.
Does the minister believe the national park authorities
and the AONBs together require fresh powers,
as the Glover Review recommended, and new funding
in order to effect nature recovery and crucially increase biodiversity,
and that farmers too need to be a properly effective
ally in this fundamentally important ambition?
[Lord Benyon] I entirely
agree with the noble Lord about the value our protected landscapes
give in terms of our policies, not just on climate change mitigation,
but also on reversing the tragic decline in species.
We have increased spending on areas of outstanding natural beauty by 15%
this year.
I concede inflationary pressures are challenging for all protected landscapes,
but I’d urge him to look at the other areas of funding we're providing.
The Farming in Protected Landscapes that I mentioned earlier, it has 1,800
projects for benefiting climate and nature right across our protected landscapes.
Our £750 million nature for climate fund
will see large amounts of that being spent in our protected landscapes,
because that's where 60% of our peat is, 50% of our SSSIs,
and that's where the focus of that fund will go.
And of course, in addition to that, we've got private and blended finance,
which national parks are very well able to get.
[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering] Does my noble friend accept that
one of the difficulties at the moment is that the “have regard” clause
is actually weakening the potential input that national parks might place.
Could this be amended for the process of the Levelling Up Bill?
And what steps is the government taking to lever in more private
funding to ensure that there are greater powers for, for example, water
companies to fund nature-based solutions going forward?
[Lord Benyon] We are
hugely
admiring of Julian Glover's report,
and we have already implemented large measures of it.
One of which centres around governance, and that is where
it will fit into our green finance strategy,
which is about to be refreshed in March, to bring in all the different players,
different parts of government, and making sure we are responding to the huge potential
that lies in ESG money and other offsets that can benefit our landscapes.
And these are the most treasured landscapes
in these islands, and we want to make sure that they are getting
the lion's share of this kind of finance.
[Lord Teverson] My Lords,
I congratulate actually Defra on the Farming in Protected Landscapes scheme.
It's worked extremely well, but the fact is
that biodiversity in AONBs and national parks
is no better than the rest of the UK as an average,
which is extremely poor in terms of international
examples.
So what is Defra going to do to actually improve
that beyond that particular scheme to make sure there really is a difference?
Surely these days our protected areas should be better
in terms of biodiversity than the rest of the country.
[Lord Benyon] Our ambition is to get them to
reverse any declines in species.
We've got policies that we’ll see across the country
an end to the decline of species by 2030
and an uptick in the populations we're seeing across our islands.
But on a particular point around, for example,
35,000 hectares of peat we want to see restored by 2025
and 280,000 hectares by 2050.
AONBs and national parks will be absolutely fundamental
because that's where most of this lies.
[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch] My Lords, I declare an interest
on national parks as registered in the register.
My Lords, we're turning to the 40% cut in real terms
over the last decade, which the national parks have received,
I should say, at a time when they have never been more popular
and more demands on their services.
The noble Lord the minister has talked about other funds
that are going into the national parks, but does he accept that that isn't
core funding that's going into other organisations in the parks?
It's actually the national parks themselves, the rangers,
the services, the visitors centres that are core to providing
a good visitor experience and encouraging more people to go into the parks.
Does he accept that
we should be more ambitious about the role that national parks can play?
But if we do that, they do need more core funding, not
the supplementary funding the minister is talking about.
[Lord Benyon] I think national parks are very good at getting that money in.
Whether it's from the private sector or blended finance.
There is a very good arrangement called Revere between Palladium,
which is seeing some money going into supporting core
personnel, for example, in national parks
to do projects right across those parks.
But I do think that all areas of government have
challenges at the moment, particularly in light of inflationary pressures.
And I think the national parks have proved themselves very resilient.
And I want to make sure that we can find more money for them in the future.
And that is a key part of our decisions going forward into the next spending
round.
[Lord Bishop of Carlisle] My Lords,
some of our
national parks believe that they could better address climate
and nature emergencies if they were added to the list of authorities
who have a general power of competence
under the Localism Act 2011.
I wonder whether the noble Lord, the minister, could tell us whether
His Majesty's government has any plans to bring that
about?
[Lord Benyon] I think I might have to write to the right
reverend Prelate on that.
But I do think that as we look at implementing
the Landscape Review's recommendations that we can
and through our biodiversity duty that we are imposing on public bodies
through the Environment Act, I think we will address that.
And so I hope we are seeing
the determination of this government to tackle issues
which when national parks were created 70 years ago, simply didn't exist,
climate change wasn't talked about, biodiversity was stable or rising.
Those emergencies need to be reflected in the policies they take forward.
[Baroness Hayman of Ullock] My Lords.
My Lords. National parks across the country
are losing thousands of trees because of disease.
In the Lake District, Forestry England are cutting down large trees
in the Ennerdale Valley and Whinlatter across many hectares of land.
So can I ask the noble Lord, the minister, what assessment
has been made as to the impact on wildlife as to these loss of trees,
including red squirrel populations and what plans are in place,
including the timescales for replanting with native species?
[Lord Benyon] I can't give an accurate assessment of what impacts
tree disease or indeed Storm Arwen in Northumberland, for example, which saw
probably millions of trees being blown down and undoubtedly
it has an effect on wildlife.
Wildlife can benefit from different ages of woodland in a landscape.
So I hope that the replanting schemes that are happening
because of whether it's disease like ash dieback or
events like Storm Arwen
will see those areas planted as quickly as possible.
It's not the national parks doing that.
It's the land owners and the land managers within those areas,
and Forestry England will be assisting them and giving grants
for that to happen.
[Lord Carrington] My Lords,
the Landscape Review recommended that
there should be an upgrade in the current duty
to foster economic and social growth
in the national parks and AONBs.
Please could the minister confirm that the
farmers and other economic activities going on in those areas
is not just limited to tourism and other
sporting and other activities?
[Lord Benyon] The noble Lord is absolutely right
that they should not be just restricted to what one might term
the visitor economy.
It's about keeping people living in these landscapes.
It's about making sure they have the opportunities to conduct businesses
of all kinds and that there are skills and opportunities for young people.
And so when we're talking about levelling up, I always feel we should also
be talking about levelling out into some of the more remote places
and making sure the opportunities for families,
for young people and for entrepreneurs exist in those landscapes as well.
[Member] My Lords --
[Crowd] Order! Order!
[Lord Speaker] My Lords we have a virtual contribution
from Lord Campbell-Savours.
[Lord Campbell-Savours] My Lords, with climate change
being the root cause of flooding of property
in towns like Keswick in the Lake District National Park,
instead of imposing flooding remediation costs on property owners,
why not amend the law by placing legal responsibility on companies
like United Utilities to more effectively manage their water assets
and for them to community block insure
against the risk of flooding damage to residential, commercial and community
assets in areas designated at risk from their companies operations?
Flood Re is inadequate.
[Lord Benyon] As the minister who brought Flood Re into being,
I think it has been an enormous success.
I don’t know the exact circumstances that the noble Lord is
referring to in terms of
that part of the world.
But there are a number of levers on United Utilities to make sure
that they are fulfilling more than just their statutory duty to
provide clean water and get rid of sewage.
But I will look into the matter and if necessary, write to the noble Lord.