What a pleasure it is to be back to continue our consideration of this vital legislation, which will set us on a sustainable trajectory for the future. I know that so many colleagues have been looking forward to today with great anticipation, as indeed have I.
Although the journey of this Bill may have seemed a little lengthy, I assure the House that we have not been resting on our laurels. During this time, there has been a huge amount of constructive, dedicated work, and I will outline some of it: a draft environmental principles policy statement, which will guide the Government in applying environmental principles, was published for consultation on 10 March; and on 24 March we launched consultations on the deposit return scheme and the extended producer responsibility scheme for packaging, and these are two key initiatives in the resource and waste measures of the Bill.
We are working at pace to ensure that the Office for Environmental Protection will be operationally ready to stand up as soon as the Bill receives Royal Assent.
We have also announced that new measures to reduce the harm from storm overflows on our precious aquatic environment will be added in the other place.
At this point, I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Philip Dunne) for his dedicated work on this issue. It has been a tremendous joint effort.