Marine and Coastal Access Bill [HL]

My Lords, I am grateful to both noble Lords for their acceptance of the government amendment. It may therefore seem a little churlish of me that I am not too happy about the amendment moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. It is the result of a distillation of representations made in Committee by the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, and others, about this important consideration. I do not decry the importance of the issue. The amendment would add consideration of onward transport links to the matters that Natural England must take into account in reaching decisions on the extent of access along estuaries. The amendment mentions, ""the provision of car parking … linking footpaths … public transport services"," to rejoin the route on the other side of the estuary in cases where it is broken. That is an eminently sensible concept. Where practicable, however, Natural England will link up with routes leading to and from the coast when considering the coastal route itself. It would scarcely fulfil the objective of the legislation—access to the coast—if it did not take this very much into account. Of course it has to have regard to questions such as public transport links and car parking facilities. Having created the route, it is important to ensure that it is accessible to users both along the coast itself and how it should continue when crossing estuaries. Access should be by various means to attract as wide a variety of users as possible. We are conscious of the fact that many different types of people will want to have access to the coastal route. I had the brief pleasure of being on the coastal path in Cornwall for a few days during the Recess and I can say that many and varied are the manners of men and women on that path. They range from people one can espy in the distance, and four hours later glimpse a considerable way behind, to others who in a matter of 20 minutes seem to close a gap of a mile or two and go whizzing past. We are all aware of the variations in pace of people using these routes, which is why there can be problems where the path is narrowly defined. That is also why issues beyond just the footpath have to be considered. However, the Bill is premised on these considerations, and there is no way that Natural England can set about its task of providing access to the coastal route unless it takes into account the points made so graphically in the amendment. It may be that this is expressed in more general terms as regards access and the desirability of continuing the route to a particular physical feature, but, as I say, the legislation is premised on Natural England making sure that access is achieved as readily as possible. I do not think that we need the amendment because the Bill already provides for these matters. I hope the noble Baroness will accept the government amendment in good faith and feel able to withdraw her own.