Agriculture: Global Food Security

Earl of Shrewsbury Excerpts

Thursday 12th May 2011 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Shrewsbury]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lady Byford on securing this important debate today. My noble friend is of course a formidable expert in agricultural matters and a stalwart supporter of the industry and those involved in it. I should declare an interest: I used to farm, very badly, in Shropshire and Staffordshire, and my youngest son is a producer of free-range eggs in Lincolnshire. I agree entirely with all the right reverend Prelate said regarding supermarkets.

It is both right and important that British agriculture should contribute to global food security. Our agriculturalists are renowned worldwide for their expertise. Our methods and practices are the envy of the world. Our standards of animal welfare are among the highest. Yet the UK has allowed her self-sufficiency to decline steadily over the years. Since 2008, Governments of all political colours have realised the need, in the face of high prices and shortages of raw materials and energy supplies, as well as a less benign geopolitical climate, to ensure that the UK has adequate food security. That is to be welcomed but, for example, the proportion of home-grown vegetables fell from 70 per cent in 1997 to 58 per cent in 2007, while self-sufficiency in eggs fell from 87 per cent in 2000 to 80 per cent in 2010. It is the egg industry on which I wish to concentrate today and, as my noble friend Lord Lyell just mentioned, the fowl sector.

Free-range egg production has been one of the few bright spots in agriculture over the past couple of decades, but that star has waned somewhat of recent months. Year-on-year growth has been steady and, most recently, in double figures, which is remarkable in that industry. It has been consistently profitable for producer and packer alike. However, two events occurred last autumn which have made life very difficult for all free-range producers. The first was a massive jump in feed costs—and the industry would very much welcome GM crops—over which the industry has absolutely no control. Secondly, at the same time, the egg market in general was in oversupply both at home and on the continent. The cage sector situation was probably down to some parallel-running of old conventional cages which were closing, with some of the new enriched colony cages already in production. In most cases, the moves on cages have meant building new farms rather than re-equipping existing ones. I understand that the industry has had to invest well north of £400 million in the move to the new colony cages in order to comply with the new EU legislation, which is the welfare of laying hens directive. The oversupply in the cage production sector has been rapidly eliminated by the market conditions and has hastened the closure of the old cage farms.

At this stage, I should like to ask the Minister what message Her Majesty’s Government have for egg producers in the United Kingdom who, at considerable cost to themselves, will have complied with the requirements of Council Directive 1999/74/EC—the welfare of laying hens directive—as against other producers elsewhere in the EU who have not, and will not do so by 1 January 2012, but none the less will still enjoy unfettered market access to the United Kingdom.

Free-range egg production is still suffering. The overexpansion of this sector probably came about by some packers encouraging expansion when they did not have a market for those eggs. Because the market had been growing so well, they simply assumed that they would be able to sell them somewhere to someone. In addition, capital grants available in Scotland and Wales for free-range production have not helped and have encouraged production in areas where the egg is not going to be consumed locally. In addition, because of this glut, the packers have been unsuccessful in achieving a price rise to justifiably cover the increased cost of production. This is where the supermarkets come in. That is a typical example of supply and demand.

Significant changes to the way in which egg production is allowed across the EU threaten to impact on the UK’s egg sector. This new legislation, which prohibits the use of conventional battery cages for laying hens from 1 January next, has already cost UK producers around £25 per hen housed. That is a massive cost for producers to bear. However, while this country will be fully compliant, as we always are, not all producers in the EU will comply with the ban.

What view do Her Majesty’s Government take of a partial derogation, for a defined limited period, of the requirements of this Council directive, which would allow the continued production and sale of eggs and egg products produced from conventional cages not in compliance with the requirements of the directive within the member states producing such eggs and egg products?

In conclusion, the United Kingdom egg industry employs 10,000 people directly, with a further 13,000 indirectly. It has a turnover of some £1.5 billion annually and is a massive user of cereal corn. Ninety per cent of eggs produced in the UK meet the stringent standards of the Lion quality code of practice. British Lion quality eggs are consistently rated the safest in the world and are produced to the highest possible welfare standards. This really is a huge success story for British agriculture and we need to support it.

Dog Control Bill [HL]

Earl of Shrewsbury Excerpts

Friday 9th July 2010 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Shrewsbury]

My Lords, I, too, congratulate my noble friend Lord Redesdale on bringing this Bill to the House. I should declare an interest as an owner and keeper of working dogs, and I am a member of the Countryside Alliance, BASC and a number of other bodies which support field sports.

On 26 June, an article appeared in the Daily Mail. It referred to my noble friend Lord Redesdale and this Bill. I quote part of the article as follows:

“One evening this week he”—

that is, my noble friend—

“was walking home in Tufnell Park … when a Staffordshire bull terrier”—

hold on, I come from Staffordshire—

“leapt from the shadows and made to bite him on the bottom. The dog's owner looked on blithely, while the noble Lord hopped about the place like a cider-fuelled Morris dancer”.

What a wonderful sight that must have been. Since reading that article, I now view my noble friend in a completely different light and I understand fully why he wishes to promote his Bill.

The last time I made a speech, I missed out page 3 and nobody noticed. I shall try not to make that error today.

While broadly welcoming my noble friend’s Bill, I have a number of concerns about how, if enacted, it would work. I recognise that there exists a problem with dangerous dogs—we all know that—and especially status dogs, particularly, but not exclusively, in urban areas. Current legislation is adequate in general to deal with the problem—I agree with my noble friend Lord Mancroft that something must be done about preventing those accidents and attacks. I acknowledge that the real difficulty is in the enforcement of the legislation, a view which I believe is accepted by the police.

The Bill as currently drafted could well have unintended consequences for ordinary, responsible dog owners. For instance, Clause 13 states:

“For the purposes of this Act, a dog shall be regarded as having been involved in an attack if it has bitten, mauled or injured a person or another protected animal”.

What about a sheepdog, which as part of its work nips a sheep on the hock? That sheep is quite difficult to get into a pen, but it is also a protected animal, and under this Bill it will be judged to have been in an attack. What about a Lancashire Heeler, whose method of herding cattle is to nip its heels? Under this Bill, it will be judged to have been in an attack—and so the list widens. For instance, if I am walking my dog along the River Dove in Derbyshire, where I fish, and my dog, Missed, usually impeccably behaved, chases a rabbit, will I be guilty under this Bill of having allowed my dog to be aggressive in a public or private place, as stated in the wording of the offences in Clause 2?

I am certain that my noble friend’s intention was not to incorporate legitimate and lawful activities into the scope of this Bill, but, as drafted, the Bill is far too widely drawn and is in need of very substantial amendment, which your Lordships will no doubt address in Committee, if this Bill receives its Second Reading. Furthermore, this Bill removes all responsibility from the police and places the duty of enforcement on local authorities, while making no provision to allow either the police or other bodies to enforce the law and providing no additional financial support for local authorities. In these days of massive financial constraints, how on earth will local authorities be able to cope with that extra financial burden? Their animal welfare and dog warden services will already be hit hard by cutbacks, even before the consequences of this Bill land on them. The police are the acknowledged experts in this type of enforcement, so I was delighted by what my noble friend said about this in his opening remarks. Under this Bill, too, the courts will be clogged up when they are already under very severe pressure, and with even more financial consequences for the public purse.

I could go on, but it is late, it is a Friday, and I want to get home to my wife and my dogs, absolutely in that order. I finish with a quote from Bertie Wooster, when he recalls Stiffy Byng’s Scotch terrier, Bartholomew. He says:

“Stop me if I've told you this before, but once when I was up at Oxford and chatting on the river bank with a girl called something that's slipped my mind there was a sound of barking and a great hefty dog of the Hound of the Baskervilles type came galloping at me, obviously intent on mayhem, its whole aspect that of a dog that has no use for Woosters. And I was just commending my soul to God and thinking that this was where my new flannel trousers got about thirty bobs' worth of value bitten out of them, when the girl, waiting till she saw the whites of its eyes, with extraordinary presence of mind opened a coloured Japanese umbrella in the animal's face. Upon which, with a startled exclamation it did three back somersaults and retired into private life”.

This Bill needs such an enormous amount of improvement that maybe it should be retired into private life.