Agriculture Bill

Debate between Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville and Lord Naseby

Committee stage & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 16th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Naseby (Con) [V]]

My Lords, for me, the impetus to take an interest in the Bill was going back to my constituency—an urban constituency in Northampton, although surrounded by some of the finest pasture in the United Kingdom and with a lot of sheep production. I was reminded by my farmer friends who took me round of the closure of our cattle market, which had been there for centuries, and of our abattoir, so that the animals had to be taken much further to be slaughtered. Having thought about it a bit further, I listened to the noble Lord, Lord Trees, and I say thank you, sir, to him. His was a fine presentation, and I am not surprised that the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, is a leading legal person. They both put the case very strongly. As far as I can see, animal welfare today is ever more important, and it dictates that slaughtering should be as close to the means of production as possible. Secondly, I am in no doubt, having visited a couple of abattoirs, that the ease of handling in a small abattoir is much greater.

I am a little concerned about the high costs of the smaller abattoirs—maybe the Minister will shed some light on this. I do not know what the differential is, and I do not see any reason why a smaller abattoir should be excessively more expensive than a medium-sized or large one. I do not need to say any more on this amendment; it has my support and I wish it well.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville [V]]

My Lords, I have put my name to Amendment 87. The noble Lord, Lord Trees, the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, and the noble Lord, Lord Curry of Kirkharle, have made a compelling case for financial assistance for the slaughtering of animals closer to the farm, which also reduces food miles. On many occasions I have heard the Minister say that animal welfare is extremely important. Over the years, we have seen the closure of many small local and rural abattoirs, which has led to larger abattoirs further away from where stock is reared, as the noble Lord, Lord Trees, said.

The regulations on abattoirs are stricter than they used to be. The installation of CCTV ensures that animals are not distressed at the point of slaughter, vets are present, and paperwork is kept for future inspection. However, this does not assist with the passage of the animal from the farm to the abattoir. The shorter and less stressful this journey, the better for the animal—and for the quality of the meat, as the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, pointed out. I do not subscribe to the view that this does not matter as the animal is about to die, so why worry about its journey to the end? Animals deserve to be treated with compassion at all times. A network of smaller abattoirs serving local communities is essential for the farming community, especially small farming families. It will help them to process their animals on to the food industry or, in some cases, back to the farm for sale in the farm shop, thereby supporting the local economy.

The noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, and the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, made a powerful case for abattoirs on both the islands of Scotland and the Scilly Isles. There will be a cost involved in increasing the number of abattoirs, but they are essential to preventing distressing long journeys for animals. Consumers are keen to support locally grown and fed produce, and wish to buy the meat from a reputable source where they know the animals have been well cared for and fed. Slaughtering has to be included in the list for financial assistance. Concentrating all slaughter in larger, remote venues is not a satisfactory answer to the issues of animal welfare and convenience for the local farmer, whose time is limited. I look forward to the Minister’s response to the arguments raised in this debate.

Fisheries Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville and Lord Naseby

Report stage & Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 24th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Naseby (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I want to raise questions about two amendments. The first concerns the change of name. My understanding is that all official notices in Wales appear in Gaelic, if that is the right word, and English. That is certainly true for road signs, the names of towns and many other things in Wales. While it is entirely proper that the devolved Welsh Government can change their name to Senedd Cymru, I would have thought that after the term is used, there should be in brackets the words “National Assembly for Wales”. Perhaps the Minister would come back on that point.

Amendment 24 refers to leaving out “a calendar year” and inserting

“such year or other period as may be specified.”

Most UK statistics are collected on a calendar year basis, although other statistics may be calculated on another basis. One would need to know the calendar year as well as whatever may be the other period “as may be specified”. Otherwise, when people are reviewing or researching to draw comparability, certainly with other countries, we may find ourselves in some difficulty.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for setting out this extensive list of government amendments. Fifteen relate to the change of name from the “National Assembly of Wales” to “Senedd Cymru”. These amendments do not affect the implementation of the Bill, but they recognise the Assembly’s renaming of both itself and its iconic building.

Six amendments, beginning with Amendment 24, allow the Secretary of State to change the period for fishing opportunities from a calendar year to an indefinite period. A further four amendments cover the same topic, but two of them refer to the English quota for a calendar year and two to the Welsh quota per calendar year. I have listened to the Minister’s reasons for this, but I am still not clear whether this will be a good thing. As the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, has asked, can he confirm that scientific information will be used in the determination for changing the period?

Amendment 27 refers to British fishing boats and quotas. I am grateful to the Minister for his explanation, because I am afraid that the amendment is somewhat opaque. However, I note that Clause 23(10) refers to the provisions in subsection (8) being subject to a negative resolution. Will Amendment 27 be subject to a negative or an affirmative resolution?

Amendment 33 refers to catch quotas and attempts to ensure that they will not be exceeded, but it does nothing for the bycatch, which presumably will be landed and dealt with through other processes. As the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, put it so eloquently, there is a real issue with overfishing.

Amendments 50 and 55 deal with the replacement of Schedule 10. As the noble Baroness, Lady Young, pointed out, this is an extensive amendment and I regret that this matter was not brought forward in Committee so that we could have had a reasonable debate on the issues covered here. However, we have more amendments before us, so at this point I will not bore your Lordships by dissecting this new schedule. We will have to trust that the Government, in moving the EU retained legislation into UK law, will ensure that that does not result in the production of myriad statutory instruments in the near future.

Fisheries Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville and Lord Naseby

Report stage & Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords & Report: 1st sitting & Report: 1st sitting: House of Lords
Monday 22nd June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Naseby]

My Lords, I do not support the amendment, which does not seem practical. Of course, there has to be liaison—that I understand—but not a co-ordinated policy. I will quote one example, because I asked for some briefing about what has happened in the sea with a particular species. As colleagues will know, the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea provides annual catch advice, and gave me an example against the criteria of how much movement there really is in any one particular species of fish. The example it gave me was the north-east Atlantic mackerel situation: in 2017, the catch advice was 944,302 tonnes. That dropped in 2018 to 550,948—a 42% reduction—and in 2019, initial advice, based on the best science available at the time, was 318,403 tonnes, revised in mid-year to 770,000 tonnes—an increase of 140%.

The council has emphasised to me that, while it welcomes enormously the change to scientific advice from the former situation which pertained in the EU, the science has an awfully long way to go and is highly variable. In that situation, it seems that it is a big enough challenge for our own people, particularly the management that is running our fishing fleets and doing the fishing, to get a grip of this and plan for that. It is inappropriate to proscribe in primary legislation to the depth that this amendment seeks. This industry is even more variable than the agricultural industry—I know we have spoken about that on earlier occasions. I also look at the history of the horticultural world, which I know quite a lot about and, my goodness, it does not have to face what the poor fishing industry has to face. On balance, therefore, I am afraid that I find little favour in this amendment.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville [V]]

My Lords, these three amendments all deal with the migration of fish across national boundaries. My noble friend Lord Teverson has made the case extremely well: fish stocks are shared and co-operation is essential with other coastal states. The joint fisheries statement must take account of adjacent exclusive economic zones and territorial waters. Fish are constantly moving across these areas and it is essential that there is co-ordination with non-UK authorities so that these fish stocks are managed in conjunction with others. I am afraid that I cannot agree with the assessment by the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, of the situation.