Marine and Coastal Access Bill [HL]

In speaking to the two amendments that I have in this group, I first thank the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Holbeach, for supporting them. Earlier in this Committee stage, the noble Lord, Lord Oxburgh, eloquently referred to the need for this sort of research. He laid out, for Members of the Committee, why that would be so important. The MMO, as the Minister has said, will have to perform a balancing act as the holder of the ring, given all the tensions between the various interest groups. As the noble Lord, Lord Oxburgh, said, we can be certain that the commercial interests will have commissioned plenty of scientific research to support their case. That is one reason, among many others, for the MMO needing to be really capable when it comes to research. The Joint Committee on the draft marine Bill dwelt at some length on this matter and the amendments that I have tabled result from its deliberations. It quite unequivocally recommended: "““The MMO should have a duty under the Bill to promote the publicly-funded production of marine data, to collect such data and to make them publicly available””." Further evidence heard by the Joint Committee led me to table Amendment 70B. The committee suggested that there was no power for the MMO to collect data on a cost-free basis from any public body. The noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Holbeach, asked which body will be primarily responsible and whether it will be Natural England or the MMO, for example. Those questions are vital because, depending on the Minister’s answers, Amendment 70B will be more or less important. What we really aim to do with these amendments is, first, to make sure that the research is absolutely required to happen—the designation of MCZs alone depends enormously on the quality of research—and, secondly, to ensure that, if the Bill starts to require a reasonable level of research, that research is not prevented simply on grounds of cost.