I am delighted—as, I am sure, Thames Water will be—to hear that the hon. Gentleman might not take a negative view if it was proposed to build an incinerator in or near his constituency to deal with the sludge from it which now all flows into the North sea.

The technical complexities of dealing with industrial waste and fly ash are also great. We are dealing with large quantities of dilute chemicals. When pressed, the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey said that he did not want to shut down these industries overnight and that his time scales would give some leeway. His new clause would set a time scale of less than eight months, whereas in realistic negotiations with the companies concerned we are setting a time scale that would take us up to 1992, or in two cases a possible continuation into the early months of 1993. That is a demanding time scale and anything else would put jobs and the industries involved at serious risk.

7.30 pm

I emphasise that we are not in breach of undertakings given at the second North sea conference. The industrial wastes being deposited in the North sea are not significantly harmful and we have presented evidence to that effect to the Oslo commission. The hon. Gentleman drew attention to the part of his new clause that calls for zero discharges of harmful substances by 2000. My hon. Friend the Member for Stockton, South (Mr. Devlin) rightly said that that was entirely unrealistic because we are dealing with a wide range of wastes—domestic, industrial and agricultural—some of which contain trace elements of contaminating substances, such as lead from pipes or from roadside dust. We also have a legacy from our past activities in mining.

All that means that whatever we do there will always be small quantities of harmful substances running off land into rivers and, therefore, to the North sea. We cannot simply wave a magic wand to try to get those discharges down to zero. We must patiently negotiate with our partners a realistic series of priorities and time scales to deal with dangerous substances. That is what we signed up to do at The Hague conference and in a few weeks we shall publish a detailed guidance note on how we shall implement The Hague conference declaration.

New clause 55 seeks to deal with pollution from ships. I sympathise with what the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey says, but I assure him that his new clause is not necessary because we already have in place a speedy and effective system for dealing with pollution incidents. Hon. Members may recall the efforts of the French and United Kingdom authorities to recover dangerous substances from the motor vessel Perintis which sank in the western part of the English channel last year. Those efforts showed the effectiveness of the Department of Transport's marine pollution control unit which received advice from the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and dealt with the matter. The Royal Navy managed to recover a major part of the shipment of pesticides. That shows that we have in place the means of dealing with such problems and new clause 55 will not add to the powers that are already available under the Prevention of Oil Pollution Act 1971 as supplemented by the Merchant Shipping (Prevention of Pollution) Intervention Order 1980.

Some hon. Members spoke about the need to protect, and in some cases set up, marine conservation zones. I am sympathetic to that view, but I draw the attention of the House to the procedures that already exist for setting up marine reserves under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. It is not possible to draw lines on maps and say that the area delineated is a conservation zone. Patient consultation with those involved is required.

The hon. Member for Glanford and Scunthorpe (Mr. Morley) complained about the time that it has taken to set up the Lundy island reserve. I think that he will understand that we must take fully into account those who live and work in such areas. In many cases we are talking about fragile local economies and we must get the wholehearted co-operation of fishermen, those who make their living along the shorelines, and those who live in such areas, even if that takes some time. I remind the House that the means exist for protecting our marine environment. I urge the House to reject the new clause.