My hon. Friend the Member for Northampton South (Mike Reader) mentioned the 4 Cs. I will add a fifth: confidence. One problem that we have as a Government —on this issue and on a number of others—is that we need to instil confidence in the general population that not only are our objectives sound but the methods that we are about to use will be effective. I want to stick to the Bill, but let me use a general example. There has been a trend in Government over the past 17 months of policies being introduced that have not maintained the confidence of the general public or of a number of Members. Having destroyed that confidence, we have then gone through a process of reversing the policies and, as a result, not gaining any benefit from them. We just require a bit more political nous as we consider things, issue by issue.
In this field in particular, I do not think that we have taken people with us. What has undermined confidence for people like me is that when Members honestly expressed their views, concerns and expertise, and moved amendments, they lost the Whip. Then, at a later date—within weeks—the Government adopted those amendments as part of the process in the Lords.
The Government did not accept the amendments on Report, but the reality is that they had to negotiate with the other House and introduce amendments that were in the spirit of the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for North East Hertfordshire (Chris Hinchliff)—it is as simple as that. We need to be honest about that and admit when we make mistakes.
That is why I worry about this. If we introduce legislation of this sort, we need to take people with us. My hon. Friend the Member for Northampton South referred, in a derogatory tone, to the well-funded environmental groups. I have been working with those groups for nearly 50 years. I have never seen a breadth of unanimity across them on an issue such as this. Some of them cannot be described as anything other than mainstream. What they are asking for, in some of these amendments, is relatively limited, so it behoves us, as a listening Government, to go that one step further and see whether compromises can be reached. I congratulate the Government on doing that for clause 3, in which compromises have been reached. For some reason, however, people are digging their heels in, particularly in relation to Lords amendment 40.
Let me deal with Lords amendment 1 on national policy statements. As I said earlier, confidence must be built when dealing with huge developments. My hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury) has mentioned the third runway at Heathrow. The proposal to build a third runway will never have my constituents’ confidence because, as I said earlier, 15,000 of them will lose their homes, whole villages will be wiped off the face of the earth, and 2 million more people in London will suffer from noise and air pollution —so we will not be able to convince them, to be honest. However, on more general topics, including major infrastructure projects, the role of Select Committees has been critical, as they are able to examine those issues in depth, have Ministers before them and present reports to the House, which we can debate.
In many instances, Select Committee reports and the work those Committees have done has been of such a quality that—as my hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr Perkins) demonstrated in his description of the work his Select Committee does—they have influenced Government, enabled policies to be changed and, as a result, built up confidence in the general public. I am concerned about any lessening of the role of Select Committees in this whole process. The Minister has given us some assurances, and we will see how that works out in practice, but we interfere with that democratic process of this House at our peril when we are in government, because this is how mistakes get made.
With regard to the issue of EDPs, I cannot understand why a compromise cannot be made. My hon. Friend the Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan) said very clearly that we are talking about millions of people involved in the organisations that are supporting Lords amendment 40 and asking the Government to think again. There is an argument—and I accept it—that EDPs could be successfully applied to certain issues, but there is also a real scepticism about their use, particularly with regard to individual habitats and species. I do not want to get into dormice, to be honest; we have already had that debate.
I accept that argument, so I ask the Government to think again and see whether, in their discussions with the other House, they could reach a compromise where they accept that the EDP process can operate in relation to those matters set out in the amendment, but before we go any further, there is much more discussion, consultation and maybe research, because some of the research I have seen is quite challenging. We might then be able to move forward, but to try to bash this through now without that element of compromise will undermine what could be a very effective and successful piece of legislation.
I suppose what I am appealing for is just a bit of political nous. Do we have to go through another process where we bash something through, only to realise we have alienated so many people that we have to reverse it, and then people lose confidence in us because of that? I have been involved in so much legislation in this place, and it becomes boring after a bit. I can remember the mad dogs Bill, which went chasing through the House and was regretted within about three months. We are not in that situation here, but if we fail to even consider compromise, we can make bad legislation that we subsequently regret. That is all I am asking for.
If there is ping-pong—which there might well be, since the majorities in the other place were enormous on this amendment—it might give us the breathing space to get that compromise. It would be worth while the Minister bringing together some of the Members who have expressed their concerns, to have another discussion and consultation between the Bill going back to the other place and returning here. I think something could be hammered out, and as a result of that, maybe we will avoid the mistakes we have seen over the last 17 months that have so damaged my own party and my own Government.
I will leave it at that. Maybe I am lost in appealing for rational and reasonable government, but I will continue to pursue that, as I have for the last three decades.