Marine and Coastal Access Bill [HL]

I apologise to the Minister for intervening at this stage and breaking up the flow of his eloquence, but he has kindly given way. The reason why I believe it crucial to have this expression in the duties in Clause 2 is that the scientific obligations on the MMO are of a different order of magnitude from the obligations that it has in relation to all the human activities that may or may not take place in a particular sector. If the Minister glances at our obligations under OSPAR and under the new European Community directives, he will see that this is also the case under those. I know that the draftsmen will be taking into account those obligations as our debate continues. In my submission, the starting point is the scientific position. Until the MMO has established the best available scientific evidence, it cannot go on to make an assessment about the damage or otherwise that particular human activities would do. That is the reason why it is not just a question of having regard to the scientific evidence; the scientific evidence plays a fundamental role in a way that no other evidence pertaining to any particular column of water does.