Buncefield Oil Depot Fire

(South-West Hertfordshire) (Con): On that Sunday morning at 6 o’clock, I, too, was woken in my home a few miles from Buncefield. It is certainly an experience that I shall not forget, nor will I forget the experience of driving past Buncefield on the A41 and seeing the plumes of smoke, or visiting the site with my hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning). He mentioned the subject on which I should like to focus—perfluorooctane sulphonate, or PFOS, traces of which have been found around Buncefield, raising several concerns. It may be useful briefly to consider the issue and give the history of PFOS. The chemical was widely used, mainly as a fabric protector—most famously as Scotchgard. However, it had several other uses, such as in pesticides, insecticides and, of course, firefighting foam. In May 2000, 3M, the manufacturer of Scotchgard, announced that it was phasing out the use of PFOS from 2001. Following that, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development produced a hazard assessment in which the US and the UK took the lead. Several conclusions about health were reached. One was that PFOS was persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic in mammals. It was detected in blood serum of occupational and general populations. There was a statistically significant association between exposure to PFOS and bladder cancer, and an increased risk of tumours of the male reproductive system, the overall category of cancers and benign growths, and tumours of the gastro-intestinal tract. There is quite extensive evidence suggesting that PFOS is persistent, with a human half-life of four to eight years. As for toxicity, tests on monkeys and rats—but not, you will be pleased to know, Mr. Conway, on cats—show that it can kill at 4.5 micrograms per litre on a repeat dosage over a 90-day period. The OECD hazard assessment further concluded, with respect to the environment, that PFOS is persistent and bioaccumulative, that it is highly toxic in honey bees and that it bioconcentrates in fish. It has been detected in the tissues of wild birds and fish, in surface water and in sediment, in waste water treatment plant effluent, in sewage sludge and in landfill. After that assessment, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs commissioned a review of environmental risk. Despite the fact that that use of PFOS has, overall, been substantially reduced since 2001, certain concerns remain. The environmental risk reduction strategy concluded that marketing and use restrictions on PFOS-related substances"““will provide the only effective level of control””." In October 2004 the Government proposed an immediate prohibition on the storage or use of PFOS and PFOS-related substances at or above 0.1 per cent. of mass. It is important to recognise, however, that within the consultation document produced by DEFRA a five-year derogation was proposed for the development of acceptable substitutes and alternate technologies for firefighting foams. However, implementation of the proposals for that quite extensive ban on PFOS usage was prevented. In an answer to my hon. Friends the Members for Hemel Hempstead and for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr. Pickles), the Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, the hon. Member for Basildon (Angela E. Smith), said that"““before consultations had been completed, the European Commission suspended our unilateral action and subsequently issued its own draft Directive to restrict the marketing and use of ""PFOS. In this draft, all current PFOS uses, including firefighting foam, would be allowed to continue. This would not therefore allow the UK to set regulations to ban its use.””—[Official Report, 14 June 2006; Vol. 447, c. 1238W.]" On first reading, that rather rankled with me, given my Eurosceptic instincts. I do not see why that is a matter for the European Commission and why the UK should not be in a position to make a judgment on the dangers of PFOS and to legislate accordingly. I have several questions for the Minister. To be fair to him, I acknowledge that I did not have an opportunity to tell him my questions in advance, and I am conscious that PFOS is a subject not necessarily closely related either to work or to pensions. Any answers that the Minister can give now would be gratefully received, but perhaps he can write to me later. I should be grateful to know the Government’s attitude and what steps they are taking to lobby the European Commission and the EU. Do they fully accept that the matter is something for EU jurisdiction? Having made that point I want to qualify it in two ways. First, on first reading the parliamentary answer that I quoted, one could get the impression that but for the European Union we would have banned PFOS and it would no longer be relevant. However, the two questions that I referred to related to the fire service, and, to be strictly accurate, even if the UK had proceeded down the route that it wanted, it would still have been possible to use PFOS for firefighting foam, because of the five-year derogation. The derogation does not relate to the EU position, under which use will continue. Secondly, there appears to be no reason why a voluntary plan could not be adopted here; indeed, the answer mentioned that. Given that we are talking about public authorities, I cannot imagine that there is anything within the EU draft directive that would stop the UK Government issuing guidance on that point. Reference is made to a voluntary phasing-out and I should be grateful to know where we are in that respect. PFOS has been detected in the rivers near Buncefield and ongoing testing shows sporadic detection of PFOS. The levels are higher than 3 micrograms per litre, the advisory level set by the drinking water inspectorate in environmental monitoring samples, although it has not been detected in drinking water, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead said. However, the samples show quite high levels: 4.8 and 5.9 micrograms of PFOS per litre have been reported, which is higher than the concentration that killed the monkeys and rats. The initial report on Buncefield makes the point that there is apparently a widespread occurrence of trace quantities of PFOS in the Hemel Hempstead area, some apparently unconnected with Buncefield, which raises the question why PFOS was not routinely monitored prior to Buncefield. It clearly is a concern, for the reasons I have outlined. The Environment Agency has been taking samples at 150 sites in the area in the period April to July. We have not yet reached the end of July, but the view is that if PFOS is found to be widespread it is intended to expand the sampling. I should be grateful to know if there is any information on whether sampling has found PFOS to be widespread so that we know where we are.