We are worse off and less safe due to Brexit reducing environmental standards | Letter
Yes, on green laws the UK “is falling behind the EU” (Brexit divergence from EU destroying UK’s vital environmental protections, 19 January). And, contrary to what the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is quoted as claiming in your article, our environmental standards have indeed depended on EU membership.
There was a period in our final decade of membership that the European Commission took the UK government, on environmental issues, before the European court of justice on 34 occasions, winning 30 of them. The remaining four were still in dispute. The UK government had to follow the ECJ decision or otherwise be subject to “infraction” – a financial penalty.
When I was a minister at the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and Defra, we pointed out to the Treasury that it was cheaper to correct the wrong rather than to pay fines. So we got cleaner, safer beaches, as one example.
The environmental governance gap on Brexit was fully explored and debated in parliament, where it was pointed out that while the ECJ could threaten a financial penalty, the then proposed Office for Environmental Protection (OEP) could do no such thing.
The Bingham Centre for the Rule of Law made it crystal clear that the processes and powers of the OEP “does not satisfy the rule of law”. We are worse off and less safe due to Brexit.
Jeff Rooker
Labour, House of Lords
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