Environment Bill

I thank the noble Baroness for her helpful comments. I hope that in the course of my speech I addressed many of them, on issues such as labelling and so on. I say only that the word “may” is standard drafting practice. I would love to see every “may” become “shall”, but that tends to be the way that things are written. As she noted, we have all the tools we need to deliver very radical change. Combined with the targets we are setting elsewhere in the Bill on biodiversity, waste and a whole range of issues, I do not believe that even a reluctant Government would be able to escape the need to use those tools to their maximum. So I am much more optimistic than she is that Governments, whether they like it or not, are going to have to take advantage and make use of those tools. I hope that that addresses the main thrust of her argument.