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House of Lords
Monday, 18 December 2006.
The House met at half-past two: the LORD SPEAKER on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Liverpool.
Olympic Games 2012: Costs
Lord Clement-Jones asked Her Majesty’s Government:
What is the current estimate of the costs of the building programme for the 2012 London Olympic Games.
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, we can break down the costs into three distinct budgets: for the London Organising Committee to stage and run the Olympic Games £2 billion, paid for from private funds; for the development of the Olympic Park— the core Olympic costs—£3.3 billion, an increase of £900 million that the Secretary of State announced on 21 November; and what the Government decide to invest in regenerating the area.
Lord Clement-Jones: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reply. As he knows, there has been great cross-party support for the Olympic project, but with the squabbles between the Mayor of London and the Secretary of State about who pays for any overruns, and whether there are any, and the allegations made by the former chairman of the ODA, there is a great risk that the public will lose confidence in the cost control of this project and be concerned about who will finally bear the cost of the Olympics. When will the Government demonstrate that they are clearly in control of the budget and that it is transparent? When will they start to sell the regeneration benefits of the Olympics?
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, there has been bad publicity, much of it caused by Jack Lemley, who went back to America and made a series of announcements that, to put it politely, were completely erroneous. At no time did he say that he was worried about mushrooming costs. He chaired the committee meeting in September at which engineers said that there was nothing in the soil on the Olympic site that they had not anticipated. I believe that a lot of the press comment is centred on the interview that Mr Lemley gave in America. We are now ready to present to the world that the fact that we are having the Olympics here is one of the greatest achievements in recent sporting history.
Lord Berkeley: My Lords, can my noble friend explain why Mr Lemley left? Was it related to the fact that Mr Rumsfeld’s company, Bechtel, did not get the contract for the development of the Olympic site?
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Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I cannot comment on that. However, at the time of his resignation, Mr Lemley said:
“I am keen to return to the helm of my international construction consulting firm in America ... I have every confidence that London will stage a superb Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2012 and leave a legacy that the country can be proud of”.
Coming from somebody who subsequently said what he did, that statement is extraordinary.
Lord Higgins: My Lords, how much of the total cost is now attributable to improvements in transport in London?
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, the final cost on transport has not yet been settled, but it will be a very significant amount—possibly in the region of £17 billion—which will of course be a legacy for a very, very long time.
Baroness Oppenheim-Barnes: My Lords, the noble Lord said that this will be a great achievement to show the world. The people of this country are going to be paying for it—whether or not they wanted it or whether or not they think that it is a grand achievement—and it has certain odours of the Dome about it. Will he make a presentation about it to the people of this country, rather than just the world?
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, many of your Lordships will have heard the noble Lord, Lord Coe, on BBC radio on Friday saying that we are well ahead of any other country that has recently held the Olympics in the way that we have developed things. We are at a very early stage and a lot of groundwork is being done. When the final budgets are announced early next year, we hope, that will be the time when we have a five-year run-in to excite the British public about this great event.
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, can the Minister clarify the position with regard to VAT and how that affects the budgeting process?
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I hope that I can. The London Organising Committee is registered for VAT in the normal way, so it may reclaim VAT. When the bid was submitted, the tax status of the proposed Olympic Delivery Authority was unknown and the necessary legislation was yet to be introduced in Parliament, so the cost estimates included in the file excluded VAT. The problem arises because the ODA is not a trading body, but the Government are currently considering tax costs as part of their wider consideration of the overall budget.
Lord Glentoran: My Lords, the noble Lord will know that we on this side support this great project, but can he give us more confidence on how the expenditure is going? He said that the budget will be ready next year. The board is still waiting for the budget and I would like to know something more precise. Although we believe in the legacy, can he assure the House that expenditure on legacy and regeneration will not be at the expense of the facilities for the world’s athletes?
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Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I can give the noble Lord that assurance. It would be pointless if the Government allowed the legacy of the Olympic Games to be imperilled by movement of money, one way or the other. The legacy has a separate heading; there are great, interesting and exciting plans to make that part of London absolutely terrific, including a park that will be the largest new park to have been built in Europe for 150 years. As I said, a great deal of work is being done on the final budget, which we hope will be ready for presentation to Parliament in the first part of next year.
Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall: My Lords, following the question put by the noble Baroness, Lady Oppenheim-Barnes, will my noble friend remind the House who commissioned the Dome? Would he also agree with me that building the Dome is on rather a different scale from staging the Olympics, which is a significantly greater achievement and potentially will leave a significantly greater legacy?
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for making that point, with which I agree. It may reassure those who are concerned about this venture that we now have a delivery partner. There are three companies in the consortium, all of which have worked on five previous Olympic Games, both summer and winter, and are working on two forthcoming Games. They have also played a key role in the huge construction programme for Terminal 5, which, as noble Lords may have read in the papers yesterday, will be delivered a year ahead of schedule.
The Earl of Listowel: My Lords—
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Rooker): My Lords, we must move on, as we are well into the eighth minute.
Common Agricultural Policy: Single Farm Payment
2.44 pm
Lord Soulsby of Swaffham Prior asked Her Majesty’s Government:
How many outstanding single farm payments are still to be made for 2005; and what proportion are for full or part payment.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Rooker): My Lords, the figure outstanding on 14 December was a total of 1,734 claims. Of those, 480 claims were for full payment and 1,254 had received a part payment and are awaiting a top-up. Once again, on behalf of the Government, I apologise for the delay in making these payments.
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Lord Soulsby of Swaffham Prior: My Lords, I thank the Minister for his reply. I hope he brings a bit of Christmas cheer to the people who have been awaiting their payment since 2005. By comparison, under the devolved Administration in Scotland, 70 per cent of farmers will receive their 2006 payment by Christmas this year. I am aware that the devolved Administrations have a different payment scheme; however, in Germany, which has a similar system to England’s, farmers expect a full payment by the end of December this year. If Germany can do it, why can’t we?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, David Miliband made a Statement about next year’s payments on 7 November in the other place, and I repeated it here. The Statement was about how we would operate for 2006. We are actively working on it daily with the Rural Payments Agency and its staff, and we want to make a success of it so that the system is better in 2006 than in 2005. I am not prepared to go beyond that Statement at present.
Lord Sewel: My Lords, what is the average value of the payments outstanding? By average, it would be helpful if he could give the mode rather than the mean.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I would like to. Of the 480 claims for which a full payment is due—in other words, for which nothing has been paid—the top 10 in terms of monetary value all relate to probate cases. I cannot go beyond that. That is no different from what would have happened under the old IACS payment system. The claims are incredibly complicated, but I cannot give a monetary value. The top-up claims would constitute approximately 20 per cent of the total claim, it being 80 per cent of the initial payment.
Baroness Sharples: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that I received a small payment a few months ago and that this weekend, much to my surprise, I received a further small payment? Should I send it back, or can I expect another payment?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, it could be that the noble Baroness has had her full payment. Whereas 480 claimants were awaiting full payment on 14 December, a week before, on 6 December, the figure was 911. Similarly, the number awaiting top-up claims on 6 December was double the figure I gave for 14 December. The payments are going out. We want to complete the 2005 payments as soon as possible, but because of the complexities of claims, particularly involving business relationships and probate, it will take some time, as was the case under the previous system.
Lord Redesdale: My Lords, the Government have made a great deal of progress, and the situation is much better this year than it was last year. Is the Minister reviewing the damage done to claimants who have put in for higher- and entry-level stewardship? Defra officials have been taken off front-line duty
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Lord Rooker: My Lord, the noble Lord is right. We have had to prioritise staff, time and resources. The single payment was crucial. Of course, there is another consequence: the hill farmer allowance has also been delayed, although few now remain to be paid. Our priority has been to complete the single payments. There is a complication, although we do not want it to be so. We need to close down the 2005 year as quickly as we can because that has delayed the start of the 2006 payments. We do not want a crossover. That has been an overall priority. We need to do better next year than we did this year. If we did not prioritise resources the situation would not be very good, but I accept that it has had a consequence on other schemes.
Lord Marlesford: My Lords, declaring an interest as a client of the Minister’s department and an enthusiastic supporter of his efforts to sort out the situation, I alert him to the fact that various complications have emerged relating to environmental cross-compliance. His officials appear to be seeking to introduce more complications to sort out these difficulties, of which I will give him details outside the Chamber, rather than taking a simplification approach.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, we want to simplify and not to over-regulate, but we have to operate the regulations. There have been failures on cross-compliance, when inspectors have been out to farms to check the cross-compliance rules. In one case they were flatly refused entry to the farm. The situation was crazy. The farmer said, “You can’t do it”. We cannot accept that. However, if the noble Lord has specific problems or difficulties that he wants to draw to my attention, I have no doubt that he will.
Lord Swinfen: My Lords, how many farming businesses have gone bankrupt as a result of this government fiasco?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, it would be impossible to work that out. The cash flow in the farming industry is partly affected by single payments, but it is affected by a lot of other issues. We have paid out £1.519 billion. We paid out the claims within 1 per cent of the legal limit by 30 June. We were required to pay out 96.15 per cent of the money; we have paid out around 94.9 per cent. Everybody knew that the window was from 1 December to 30 June. I agree that farmers were promised the money earlier, and we failed on that. However, we met our legal obligations, and we are paying interest on the claims not met by 30 June.
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Fishing: Fish Stocks
2.51 pm
Baroness Byford: My Lords, I feel, with Christmas good will, that I was slightly cheated there. I had a question on the previous subject, but never mind. I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Rooker): The UK Government are committed to the conservation of fish stocks. The common fisheries policy provides a framework for co-operation at European Union level. The UK Government continue to play an active role in negotiating improvements to the policy designed to provide more sustainable long-term fisheries management. We are working to ensure that depleted stocks are recovered and subsequently conserved, while at the same time delivering, in so far as we can, a viable future for the fishing industry.
Baroness Byford: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that response. What representations are the UK Government making to the European Council of Ministers for greater protection of our fish stocks? First, does that include the continuation of discards and the hoovering of sand eels, a practice that I believe has been banned? Secondly, have the UK Government looked into the effect of climate change on the marine environment? Does the Minister consider that the North Sea has become too warm for cod, or does he believe that the cause of the cod’s demise is the success of other species’ revival?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, on the latter part of the noble Baroness’s question, there is no doubt but that climate change will have a dramatic impact. I understand that only a slight change in temperature—maybe one degree or less—is required, particularly in the North Sea and the Irish Sea, and, before we know it, the fish stocks that we are used to having will have disappeared. They may have gone elsewhere, but the fact is that there will be a massive change if sea temperatures change dramatically. Half a degree to one degree is a dramatic change in temperature. So there is certainly a climate change impact on this.
On what we are trying to do with the European Union, the environment council and the fisheries council are meeting this week in Brussels, as the noble Baroness and the House will be aware. The fishing Minister is there. The European Commission recently published a proposal for the regulation that will set total allowable catches and quotas for 2007. Given the poor status of some of the key stocks, it is likely to be a significant challenge to deliver the necessary stock recovery while ensuring the viability of the UK fleet. As far as possible, we will be guided by scientific advice—we have to be guided by it—but we have to balance that with ensuring that we maintain a viable UK fishing fleet.
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Lord Pearson of Rannoch: My Lords, does the Minister accept that before we joined the European Union, we controlled some 70 per cent of the fish that swam all the year round in all European Union waters? Would it not have been better to have kept control of that great asset, to have nurtured our national fishing industry, and to have leased any surplus fish to other countries?
Lord Rooker: No, my Lords—as I disagree entirely with the premise of the question, I cannot agree. I apologise for not referring to sand eels in the previous answer, because this is important. At the very most, the total allowable catch for 2007 could be 400,000 tonnes. The catch used to be 1 million tonnes and this year the fishery will close completely in August, so efforts are being made to protect sand eels. However, I understand that the system is a bit more complicated this year than the one prevailing last year.
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: My Lords, earlier this year the Minister increased the minimum landing size for sea bass from 36 to 40 centimetres. He also increased the mesh size, so that fewer juvenile fish were caught. Those were both sensible measures for preserving the stock. But does that rule, which applies to UK fishermen, apply to all nationalities fishing in UK waters? The commercial fishermen down in the south-west are concerned, because they believe that the rule does not apply to other people fishing in UK waters, who are able to land fish of the old size of 36 centimetres, thereby undermining the Minister’s decision.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I will have to take advice on that and write to the noble Baroness. However, I understand that those who are allowed to fish in UK waters—for historical reasons, it is not a free-for-all among all European Union members within the six to 12-mile limit—and land in the UK are fishing in competition with our own fishermen. To say that there should be a level playing field may not be quite right, but the mesh sizes ought to be the same.
Lord Barnett: My Lords, my noble friend said that he must rely on scientific forecasts. Is there evidence that they are better than most economic forecasts?
Lord Rooker: Entirely so, my Lords. Having been to the fishing laboratory at Lowestoft, which is unquestionably a world leader in work on both climate and fishing, I know that the information that the scientists get from the sea and from catches is enormously beneficial. The fact is that the stocks are not there as they used to be; we ignore that at our peril. We want to balance and maintain a fishing industry but, if we overfish year after year, we should not be surprised if the stocks disappear. I can tell my noble friend that the science is world-class, but I cannot comment on the efforts or ranking of our economic science forecasts.
Lord Dear: My Lords, the Minister will know that fishing with rod and line for salmon in UK waters brings an estimated £350 million to the rural economy, often in remote country areas. The Irish Government have recently banned drift-net fishing in their coastal waters. What steps will our Government take to follow the Irish example, with particular
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Lord Rooker: My Lords, the noble Lord has got me completely on that. I have a fair amount on deep-sea species, but I do not have the information for a question on salmon as well. I will make it my business, immediately after Questions, to get that information. I will write urgently to the noble Lord and put a copy of my response in the Library.
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