May I wish you a warm and happy new year, Madam Deputy Speaker?
We have had a thoughtful and knowledgeable debate over the past hour and a half or so. I commend two Select Committee Chairmen and a former Minister for their remarks, even if we did not agree with every part of the former Minister’s interpretation of the past three and a half years.
Time is limited, so I hope the House will understand if I restrict my remarks to some of the new clauses. Unsurprisingly, the Opposition agree with the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee about SUDS. I am sure that, as a former member of that Committee, the Minister will agree with himself on the issue. The hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Miss McIntosh), who chairs the Committee, was right to highlight the increasing burden being placed on a network that, in many cases, is struggling to cope. We have heard that the ability to cope with additional development is not always given the consideration that it needs. I hope that the Minister will reflect on the cross-party support on that point that the hon. Lady demonstrated.
There is a broad coalition of opinion on abstraction reform, to which the hon. Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon) alluded, but it is not just made up of what he might describe as the usual suspects—the non-governmental organisations involved. That well known environmental organisation the Food and Drink Federation made a submission to the Public Bill Committee. We welcomed the Minister’s announcement in the Committee. It was disappointing that his colleagues chose to make it to the media before it was made to Parliament, but of course I assign no responsibility for that to him. We welcome the consultation, but we agree with the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee that it is long overdue.
I say to the hon. Member for Newbury that the Government certainly could not be accused of legislating in haste, because after almost four years we simply have not seen sufficient progress on abstraction reform. My hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle) and I look forward as Ministers in the next Parliament to taking such legislation through with due speed, and we look forward to the support of Conservative Members.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley), the Chair of the Environmental Audit Committee, made an incredibly thoughtful and logical speech, and we support her new clause 6. We are clear
that, as she said, this is not a debate about the merits and demerits of fracking technology. It is about trying to ensure that there are safeguards in place. Her constituency is still suffering the fallout from open-cast mining not having had sufficient guarantees in place, so I understand exactly where she is coming from.
Given that time is incredibly short I will bring my remarks to a conclusion, but it is clear that the other place will have an important job to do in the weeks ahead. A number of issues in this group of amendments—and indeed elsewhere—have not been addressed, and my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) is right to say that we must consider Flood Re in some detail. With the greatest respect, the Opposition will not simply go along with the Government because they have come to a deal and say that that is good enough; we need more detail from Ministers. We look forward to the Bill making progress but we will, as I have suggested, press some amendments to a vote.