Cromwell
SOUTHAMPTON, UK. The modern-day story of Southampton’s docks encapsulates the
ever-increasing conflict between the corporate demand for economic growth on the
one hand, and environmental protection coupled with people’s quality of life on
the other.
Associated British Ports, the large company which operates many of the ports
around Britain’s coastline, regards Southampton as the ‘jewel in the crown’,
ripe for expansion to cater for the new breed of large container ships which
criss-cross the world’s oceans. Half of the UK’s trade with the Far East goes
through Southampton. In 1998, the docks handled 850,000 container units and more
than 35 million tonnes of cargo. Over 500,000 new cars pass over the quayside
every year – around 70 per cent of them for export. The port’s position as
number one in cruise shipping was assured in 1997 with the renewal of contracts
with cruise companies Cunard and P&O. Andrew Kent, ABP’s regional manager, said:
‘The port continues to thrive and we are very excited about future expansion.’
An important plank in this major expansion is the ambitious corporate proposal
to build a huge new container terminal. The terminal would be built just outside
the city of Southampton in the so-called ‘Waterside area’ at Dibden Bay,
opposite the current port. The Waterside area lies between the New Forest and
Southampton Water. Dibden Bay is a ‘strategic gap’ between the settlements of
Hythe and Marchwood. It provides an open vista from Southampton, a wildlife
corridor to the New Forest from the Waterside, and one of the few remaining
undeveloped areas on Southampton Water.
Dibden Bay has had virtually every protective designation slapped on it you
could think of. Its 240 hectares of open grazing marsh and mudflats form part of
an internationally important wildlife haven notable for its diversity and number
of birds. The bay forms part of the Solent and Southampton Water Special
Protection Area (SPA) under the European Union Birds Directive, and is a Wetland
of International Importance under the Ramsar Convention.
Hythe
to Calshot Marshes, which includes the bay, has been declared a Site of Special
Scientific Interest (SSSI) because it includes extensive areas of saltmarsh and
mudflats, supports a high number of rare grasses, and provides feeding and
roosting sites for migratory and over-wintering waders and other birds. More
than 1 per cent of the global population of dark-bellied Brent geese frequent
the area, as well as large numbers of teal, widgeon, ringed plover, black-tailed
godwit and many other birds.
The
grassland behind the shore is not part of the SPA or the SSSI, but does support
rare plants, insects and wintering birds, and is a local authority-designated
Site of Importance for Nature Conservation (SINC). The multitude of designations
for environmental protection does not end there. Part of the site is also
included in the candidate Solent and Isle of Wight Maritime Special Area of
Conservation under the EU Habitats Directive.
Bear
with me. There is more. The container terminal would adjoin the New Forest, one
of the most important heathlands in the UK and home to many rare plants, birds
and animals. The area is of international significance for its woodlarks,
Dartford warblers and nightjars. The New Forest, once William the Conqueror’s
hunting preserve and now one of England’s biggest tourist attractions, was even
shortlisted by the British government for consideration as a World Heritage
site.
In
the summer of 1997, ABP unveiled their ambitious plans for Southampton port
expansion at the first meeting of the Dibden Forum, a carefully selected
audience supposedly ‘representing local community, environmental and business
interests’. The total area proposed for development is 325 hectares (ha),
including over 2 kilometres of quayside, 150 ha of hardstanding for containers,
50 ha for a rail marshalling yard with 12 tracks, 40 ha of support services and
administration, and 90 ha of intertidal and seabed dredging.
The
port construction phase would last 10 years and, when complete, would involve
24-hours-a-day, 365-days-per-year operation (including continuous noise and
light pollution), 6,100 vehicle movements per day, an estimated 52 per cent
increase on 1995 traffic flows on local roads by 2011, increased contamination
and pollution from spills and leaks, and total loss of foreshore mudflats,
grazing marsh and the strategic gap between Southampton and neighbouring
communities on the western side.
Despite all of this, ABP promised that port expansion offered ‘real
environmental improvements’. In an interview and 2-page spread putting forward
ABP’s case in the local newspaper, Captain Jimmy Chestnutt, ABP’s deputy port
manager in Southampton, explained: ‘We intend to build … a specially created
tidal creek which will be a great addition to the environment and replace bird
feeding grounds, at present being eroded, with new ones.’ He continued, ‘The
port [authority] has put environmental responsibilities at the heart of its
proposals’.
On
the other hand, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) which,
along with English Nature, had been consulted by ABP, were not convinced that
ABP would ‘improve’ the environment, having already warned that the piecemeal
planning approach to port expansion represented ‘the very real risk of death by
a thousand cuts for the wildlife sites’. According to RSPB senior conservation
officer Chris Corrigan, ‘Changing the mud flats is still a very new science and
we do not know if it will work’. Indeed, a similar case at Felixstowe, where a
new wildlife site was created, did not provide a home for the same types of
birds.
A
major focus of concern for local residents would be the inevitable increase in
port-related traffic congestion and pollution. ABP admit that two-thirds of
containers would come by road or rail rather than via sea routes, the preferred
government option. Port access to Dibden Bay would increase pressure on the
local trunk road which is already snarled-up at peak times. As a sweetener, ABP
offered at one stage to contribute to Hampshire County Council’s existing plans
to upgrade the road, although this offer now appears to have been quietly
dropped. It remains an open question how the council will square Dibden Bay
development with its obligations under the Road Traffic Reduction Act (Local
Targets), which requires local authorities to limit – then reverse – the growth
in local road traffic levels. ABP responded: ‘We’ve studied the traffic
implications for five years and we’re proposing light rail developments and
other environmentally sensitive solutions.’
Environmental concerns for Dibden Bay and the surrounding area may ultimately be
outweighed by the alleged dependence of the regional – and national – economy on
Southampton’s port. ABP claimed: ‘The continuing success of the Port of
Southampton means we’re nearing the time when Dibden Bay will be needed to
support the growth in the UK’s international trade’. Company management
contended on the basis of ‘independent economic studies’ that ‘more than 10,000
jobs are directly related to port business’ and that the new port ‘would create
3,000 new jobs for Hampshire’.
According to Paul Vickers, chairman of the local residents group, which opposes
port expansion, the figure of 10,000 jobs related to the port is ‘misleading’.
Half that number relates to local employers operating within the port authority
area – such as Esso, shipbuilding company Vospers and the military port. The
remaining 5,000 jobs in the port itself ‘include car workers, Martini factory
workers, car component, cruise, grain and fruit workers. None of these have any
relation to the container port.’
Vickers added, ‘We have it in a letter from P&O that the Southampton Container
Terminal supports only 500 full-time jobs.’ As for the 3000 new jobs allegedly
on offer, Vickers pointed out that over one-third of these would be one-off
construction jobs. As for the rest, ‘The number of new full time jobs could be
debated endlessly’. In fact, the spectre of increasing port automation and
increasing efficiency in port operations loomed large, casting doubt on the
large numbers of jobs ABP offered. Ironically, at around the same time, ABP
quietly announced 150 company job losses at their other ports around the
country. The insecurity of dock-related employment, and the extent to which
workers’ rights will be trampled upon when corporate profit is threatened, has
been amply demonstrated by the story of the Liverpool dockers as documented, for
example, by John Pilger in Hidden Agendas.
ABP
argues that without the Dibden Bay scheme, the port of Southampton will decline
and jobs lost. International trade would bypass the city and the UK as a whole.
‘If container vessels were forced into European [sic] ports, the extra cost of
shipping would result in increased prices in the high street and more expensive
exports. Current trade may be taken away, and jobs, too.’
ABP
wishes to see Southampton develop as a ‘hub port’, receiving cargo from deep sea
ships for onward shipment on feeder vessels to a number of smaller ports. The
local residents group has researched ABP’s stated aim towards increased
trans-shipment and remains sceptical: ’75-80 per cent of the containers on ships
entering or leaving the English Channel are related to mainland Europe because
of its larger economy, and consequently more than one call is made at
Continental ports. It is illogical to believe that containers are going to be
landed in Southampton for shipment across to the Continent.’
ABP
is supported in its plans for Dibden Bay port development by Southampton’s
Labour-led city council and the city’s Labour MPs, but not by the politicians
who represent the people in and around the New Forest and the Waterside area; in
other words, the communities most likely to be directly affected by port
expansion. Local residents, who have amassed a wealth of information opposing
ABP’s position, question the need for expansion when the company had until
recently been selling and leasing much of their land.
There
are suspicions that ABP would like to shift some of its existing port activity
to Dibden Bay, freeing up land elsewhere to sell to property developers, as it
has done in the past, and as it is now proposing to do again . A spokesman for
ABP responded: ‘Some years ago our parent company sold some land for development
that was not suitable for port use. The port is busier than ever now. Everything
we have is being used as intensively as possible. We urgently need more land.’
But
there is evidence that Southampton’s port is being used inefficiently. Dr
Caroline Lucas, Green MEP for the south-east of England, wrote to Margot
Wallström, the European Commissioner for the Environment, asking her to
intervene to protect Dibden Bay because of its EU- protected status, and
enclosed figures showing that ‘the existing port is being used at a level of
efficiency far below that which is normal for the industry’.
Local
campaigners also point out that there is sufficient spare capacity at
alternative locations in the UK: ‘Felixstowe and Thamesport both have spare
capacity available or coming on stream, equivalent to Southampton’s current
throughput.’ The possibility of developing an alternative location at the former
Shell Haven refinery site within the Port of London was summarily rejected by
ABP’s Group Chief Executive when it was suggested by Dr Julian Lewis, a
Conservative New Forest MP. The battle lines appear to have been set for a long
drawn-out public enquiry starting in autumn 2001.
ABP’s
argument that port expansion has to go ahead on the edge of the New Forest is
one which local residents are in a strong position to counter. Slowly but
surely, people are becoming aware that economic globalisation is not an abstract
phenomenon, but is a process which hits home if left unchecked. The heartening
news is that people are prepared to learn about the issues, to see that
preservation of biodiversity, local communities and quality of life are
interdependent, and to defend these interests with vigour and, one hopes, some
success.
David Cromwell is an oceanographer and writer based in Southampton. His first
book, ‘Private Planet’, is published in the UK in June (Jon Carpenter,
£12.99). More at:
www.private-planet.com