Marine and Coastal Access Bill [HL]

With this amendment and Amendment 81B, we move to a discussion of what should constitute the marine area between low water and MMO’s influence all the way up rivers as far as the high tide reaches. There is quite a discrepancy between what is in the Bill and what is in A Strategy for Promoting an Integrated Approach to the Management of Coastal Areas in England, in which the Government state that, "““marine plan authorities must have regard to other plans prepared by a public or local authority in that marine plan area. This will facilitate integration and include Local Development Plans within the Local Development Framework; Shoreline Management Plans; and River Basin Management Plans. The marine plan authority will be required to ensure, as far as reasonably possible, compatibility with adjacent terrestrial plans””." That is what my amendments go to the heart of. I am very concerned that there is no real mechanism in the Bill for ensuring compatibility. Perhaps noble Lords should think for a moment about the area between high and low water and all the activities that take place there. Those include lifeguarding; games on the beach such as volleyball, which may form part of a local authority’s leisure plans; boating, canoeing and that sort of activity; and perhaps flood defences, in which the Environment Agency and the local authority are very much involved. The area between high and low water is extremely biodiverse; it is where one finds a lot of birds, shellfish and rock pools full of prawns, sea anemones, mussels, seaweeds, and so on. An awful lot goes on between high and low water. My concern is about making this area simply one for which the Marine Management Organisation’s plan is responsible, given that local authorities are not part of the list of eligible bodies that we discussed in relation to Clause 16. I could have chosen to address this issue by including them in that list. However, I thought about all the activities that take place between high and low water and all the activities that local authorities are primarily responsible for in that area, including one that was very recently given to them by the Government—cleaning the beaches—as well as access to beaches, car parking and highway issues on access roads to the beach, some of which are covered by high water. All of these matters have not been adequately thought about, given the way in which the Bill is phrased. The Joint Committee was similarly concerned that there was no mention of integrated coastal management in the Bill. The committee’s report states in paragraph 105: "““The planning and decision-making process at the land/sea interface is particularly important for certain industries, such as ports and offshore developments””." Again, the planning authorities need to think about that. These things all come down to local authorities. Primarily, I am talking not about development control but about the planning in its widest sense that local authorities undertake. That is why I have tabled the first of these amendments. The Marine Management Organisation is concerned with everything that happens at sea, which is not the area between high and low water where a lot of human activity takes place. That should be the rightful domain of the coastal authorities, which have to plan for social and economic issues. Of course environmental issues are already covered by the designations where appropriate by Natural England. If the marine conservation zones happen to fall within that area, as some will, that will be taken into account, but primarily they are areas where a lot of other things happen. The Bill also does not take account of all the issues that I address in my second amendment, as it gives the MMO power up to high water all the way up the rivers. In some cases that is miles inland. I cannot see the reason for that. We know, because the Minister told us on our previous Committee day, that the EA will stay as the competent authority for the water framework directive. I believe that the practical way of deciding where the MMO’s responsibility should stop is, "““the first non-navigable land crossing””." That could be argued in all sorts of ways. However, in the rivers that I know, there are usually, where the estuaries are still wide and there is still a big tidal effect, navigable bridges and crossings, and it is arguable that the MMO should continue its responsibility underneath those and that its responsibility should end on the non-navigable bridges. As the Minister has pointed out in previous discussions, the MMO will have agreements with other bodies and will be able to delegate functions for those upstream parts of rivers beyond those bridges. That would be the appropriate thing to do, as most of the functions on and around those rivers will have nothing to do with the MMO. It has the junior part to play in those upstream rivers. As we go 10, 15 or 20 miles inland, people would find it extraordinary that the MMO had any part to play. The other well expressed Defra strategy on the management of coastal areas is the participatory planning approach from an early stage, as laid down in the statement of public participation. We are talking about marine areas; as we move on to marine plans, I am sure that we will come back to this point, but I should like the Bill to recognise that public participation is very important. I mention that at this stage because planning issues in the area between high and low water will need the greatest public participation. That is the area that the public use and enjoy and the one over which they have an absolute right through their democratic bodies to have a say. I beg to move.