My Lords, both these amendments are very difficult to argue against. They are telling us to be careful about how we use chemicals designed to kill things. My noble friend beat me to the word “poison”, but that is what they are for: to kill the organic life that we do not want in certain places at certain times.
Having controls about where you can use such substances is fairly basic. The noble Lord, Lord Whitty, describing a farmer effectively getting into a biohazard suit before using them gives a hint that they are potentially dangerous. If can think of examples just from this Chamber. I look across to where the noble Countess, Lady Mar, sat for many years: organophosphates ruined her life and she led a campaign to get rid of them.
Many people have told us that we do not know what we are talking about and to just use these substances sensibly—but we can then discover that they are lethal. Another example is DDT, and I could carry on. The fact that these chemicals cause problems when they get into ground-water is very well established. We should be more cautious and targeted about their use—there is a lot of technology which enables us to be more targeted, and we should embrace this.
I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, on her amendment. I think that something like the study she suggests should be in the Bill. My gut reaction is to say yes to Amendment 221, but unlike the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, I would like it to be more specific, so we know what we are dealing with. Such guidelines probably would depend on work that would be done under the later amendment.
There is potential risk here. We have tolerated a degree of damage to ourselves and to members of our society because we did not know what we were doing in the past. We would not tolerate that now and our standards are probably going to get tighter. Therefore, tightening up the process of observation should be encouraged.
I have one last anecdote: how many people have still got a bottle of blue slug pellets at the back of their garden cabinet which they are not quite sure what to do with? We have discovered that these destroy far more than just the slugs. I have used them in the past, and probably should not have done.
We are tightening our standards and becoming more targeted and smarter all the time with chemicals. It is about time we took this on in a more coherent fashion,
and these amendments are a good step forward. I salute the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, on her amendment.