Clause 5 - Alteration of allocations under section 4
Waste and Emissions Trading Bill [Lords]
4:00 pm
Mr Michael Meacher (Minister of State (the Environment), Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs; Oldham West and Royton, Labour)
I have much sympathy with the amendment and I will try to explain the circumstances in which we believe it is right to keep open the power to alter the allowances, although I expect them to be few. The amendment relates to the alteration of landfill allowances and would force allocating authorities to secure the agreement of the relevant waste disposal authority before making changes to any allocation that had already been made.
We do not want to discourage local authorities from making long-term plans because they have concerns about possible changes to their allocations. That is not what we intend—quite the opposite. Clause 5(3) makes it clear that allowances cannot be withdrawn once they have been utilised. It is important that that is made explicit.
Although I cannot speak for the other allocating authorities, I assure the Committee that it is our intention in England to issue each waste disposal authority with its allocation of allowances for each year up to 2020 at the beginning of the scheme. Therefore all waste disposal authorities will know what their allowances are from the first year of the scheme, through to 2020—the final year, if we take advantage of the full derogation in the directive. If we do not, that is one example when we may make use of this provision. I can give an assurance that that will happen only after proper consultation.
The hon. Member for Lewes pressed me for other examples where this power might be used. One example where it might be necessary to alter the allowances set from the beginning of the scheme would be if the European Community made changes to the targets within the landfill directive. That is extremely unlikely; but any legislative body has the right and the power to alter its own legislation. However, in the case of the EU it is dependent upon the agreement, with qualified majority voting of the member states. I think that that is an extremely unlikely eventuality, although the possibility is not totally negligible.