Reality Attack
Something remarkable has happened in Brussels. A remarkable outbreak of reality has descended on politicians in the European Parliament.
The European Parliament’s environment committee has realized that not all is well. The great strides that this committee has been responsible for any advancing environmental policy and regulation has not led to the intended environmental, social, and economic changes they thought the policies would deliver.
Keeping Quiet
They’ve known for quite a long while why that could be the case. But, they’ve been very reluctant to talk about it publicly. This little secret is that European environmental regulation is not applied that well by governments on the ground.
This is a long-term problem. When I had the privilege of working for an Anita Pollock MEP on air pollution legislation, her intention, if returned, was to work tirelessly to ensure the European air pollution legislation was enforced on the ground. Unfortunately, Anita was not re-elected. The groundbreaking air pollution legislation that she steered through the Parliament in 1999 was often poorly implemented in member states.
Forget the hard work of delivering progress
The reasons for this lack of enforcement, and subsequent lack of meeting ambitious but necessary targets, do not lie mainly at the door of industry, the familiar bogeyman of the environmental movement. The liability lies with government, the commission, and in particular, the NGOs who often did so much to lobby for the legislation itself.
Three Victims
There are three victims from this half asked approach to enforcement.
Rule of Law Sacrificed
First, is the rule of law. Clearly a dull and outdated notion to many today. It was, and is, the heart of Europe’s noble purpose.
As Europe learnt in its past, when we forget the rule of law society, the economy, and political order quickly flounder and descend into chaos.
The failure to address the non-implementation or the lack of implementation of European environmental law, or its enforcement on the ground, has been known for a long time. The UK’s House of Lords looked at the issue in 1992.
DG environment has known about it probably as long as its very existence. It is not a new issue; it just seriously has not been addressed for a long time by the European commission, European Parliament, or many member states.
Public Support Wanes
Second, public confidence and support for after necessary environmental regulation and improves quality of the air we breathe, water we drink, and the soil from which are crops are grown, wanes if nothing is done on the ground.
Indeed, firms who do the right thing, invest in new technology to meet new and often tough standards, are punished if their competitors are left to run scot-free by their failure to do little, or nothing, in reality.
I have personally been surprised at how common it is for companies to bring new products onto the market that are designed to meet new and tougher environmental standards and yet find that there is little or no demand for the product.
Companies producing monitoring and measuring equipment to ensure that the air and water is clean often find no demand from government enforcement agencies or companies. The response from the enforcement agencies and companies often there is open speech marks oh but we don’t really do that we know it’s necessary according to the law but that’s just on paper.
Ministers have known about this and their civil servants from long time. They are simply complicit in ignoring the rule of law and contributing to lower environmental standards by failing to address it.
I most blatantly came across this when I worked on and air pollution directive with Anita Pollack. I was surprised to find out that air pollution legislation had not been transposed to Northern Ireland.
Indeed, it seemed that most European environmental legislation had not been transposed into Northern Ireland. The reason was very simple, a British civil servant in the Northern Ireland Ministry failed, seemingly deliberately, to transpose EU measures into Northern Irish law. Bizarrely, this was an open secret in the British civil service and European Commission.
Only the personal intervention of then Labour environment Minister Michael Meacher led to the issue being addressed.
Environment and Public Health Declines
Finally, the environment and public health suffers. The expected gains do not materialize. Tougher legislation, perhaps tougher than it would be necessary if the legislation were enforced in the first place, often follows. The key is that the environment and public health do not improve and it could all sit easily be avoided.
MEPs Wake Up To Reality
The good thing is that the European Parliament has woken up to this fact. The round committee is taking the issue of no enforcement seriously. Matthias Groote, the chair of the EP’s Environment committee, is hosting a workshop on the issue. The Committee will examine the non-enforcement of waste and water legislation.
I hope to include a link to the hearing when it goes live.