Agriculture Bill

Debate between Baroness Young of Old Scone and Baroness Morris of Bolton

Report stage & Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords & Report: 1st sitting & Report: 1st sitting: House of Lords
Tuesday 15th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Morris of Bolton) (Con)]

My Lords, I have received no requests from noble Lords to ask a short question, so I call the noble Baroness, Lady Young.

[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab) [V]]

I thank those noble Lords who contributed to this debate. The majority recognised that there was a real hole to be plugged and that something needed to be done.

I thank the Minister for her remarks, but before I talk about them in a little detail, I want to address the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh. This is not just about soils, and paragraph (j) alone does not provide the required protection. To give a couple of examples—one of which has been raised already—one of the provisions in the GAECs concerns cutting hedgerows in the breeding season. Alas, I see that happen too often these days. If there were no requirement for that to be prevented, other than the Wildlife and Countryside Act, I am not sure that farmers would recognise that issue in all cases. The other example is even more germane, because it can impact on the economic profile of a farm business. At the moment, farmers are required to provide two metres of green cover in each direction from the centre of a hedge. If that provision disappeared, we could see the wholesale ripping-up of farm headlands, which would not be protected by any existing legislation.

I very much welcome the letter from the noble Lord, Lord Gardiner, after Committee on the good agricultural and environmental conditions, but many of the schemes that he outlined in the letter are not statutory requirements but voluntary or guidance schemes—that is, schemes that people need to sign up to. They do not have the statutory and regulatory clout of the GAECs and cross-compliance.

I take the Minister’s point on taking the time needed to get the new regulatory system right, but 2022 is not very far away for the delinking of payments and the abolition of the good agricultural and environmental conditions requirements, so I hope that she means getting it right in terms of both timing and content. Personally, I would welcome the entry requirement for ELM being a statutory provision—as the Minister mentioned—with the maintenance of standards and adherence to a basic range of standards being a requirement for ELM. Of course, the big problem is that ELM is a voluntary scheme and bears down only on those farmers who take up that provision.

There is a lot to be done to get a good regulatory framework. The one thing that we do not want to do is pay for measures that farmers have come to know and love—they have got used to them; they have built them into their farm businesses; they see them as giving them legitimacy in the eyes of public and showing that they are looking after the farmed environment; and they are proud of the fact that they have wildlife and habitats on their farms. We cannot then go back in time and see them as something that farmers must be paid for, rather than the minimal social contract with the nation on how farmers will deliver basic environmental conditions.

I will restrain myself and wait for the consultation in the autumn. I hope that it happens quickly. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.