Basic Payment Scheme

Debate between Lord Bellingham and Marcus Fysh

Thursday 28th January 2016 Westminster Hall

[Sir Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts. First, I declare my interests in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wells (James Heappey) on securing this debate and on his superb speech. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Chris Davies) for his contribution as well.

North West Norfolk is predominantly a farming constituency. Norfolk and the rest of East Anglia make a massive contribution to food production in this country—to agriculture and food manufacturing—and many people think that places such as North West Norfolk and North Norfolk are the lands of big estates. There are plenty of big estates in my constituency, but there are also many small farmers as well, and many county council smallholders throughout the county. Particularly heading towards the west of my constituency, towards Peterborough and Wisbech, many small farmers are predominantly growers in the horticultural sector and might have a small arable operation as well. Things have not been easy, as the Minister knows. The wheat price has been volatile and is well down on its high. The beet sector, which was one of the absolute stalwart sectors in Norfolk, has been under a great deal of pressure, and a lot of farmers are coming out of beet growing because it is not profitable to stay in it.

The vegetable sector is, again, volatile. I also want to mention the pig sector, which is incredibly important in North West Norfolk. It is the one area that farmers have diversified into either as rearers themselves or as farmers who are letting land for pig production. There are many well-known pig and poultry operators in East Anglia, and the sector, as the Minister knows, has been under a huge amount of pressure. The sector is suffering a lot of difficulties at the moment. In that context, the one thing that is incredibly important for farmers in my constituency is cash flow.

I have had representations from a significant number of farmers and landowners who have pointed out to me that the current state of affairs simply is not tolerable. Some have been paid—I am sure the Minister will in his reply flag the percentages and the numbers that have been paid—but a very large number of people have not been paid. That has a big impact not only on the many farmers who cannot pay their bills and who have invoices waiting to be sorted out but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wells pointed out, on the wider rural economy through the knock-on effect on the small suppliers and small businesses that really cannot themselves put up with any interference with their cash flow. It is not the fault of farmers, because they do not have the money to pay the bills at the moment. They plan their year around the crops, around the seasons and also around the payments that come into their bank accounts. It is essential that we have immediate action.

I intervened on my hon. Friend the Member for Wells a moment ago and asked him about what HMRC should do. I know that the NFU has been having conversations with HMRC, but I very much hope that the Minister will take away from this debate that the one area that he and his ministerial colleagues have to look at straight away is HMRC. Is it being as sympathetic and as understanding as possible to farmers who have to pay their tax bills soon? In fact, if they do not pay by Monday, they will be charged interest. So I urge the Minister to have discussions with HMRC and to put in a request to Treasury Ministers that there should be a scheme for late payment for farmers who have not been paid their basic payments.

[Marcus Fysh (Yeovil) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the issue is not only about having a tax holiday, because many farms are not very profitable? When there is a cash-flow issue, as he has described, perhaps we should look at an emergency loan scheme against which they can draw.

[Sir Henry Bellingham]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who represents many farmers who are in the same position as mine. He makes a good point, because some of the smaller farmers will not even have a tax bill. Certainly some poultry and pig farmers in my constituency will be paying no tax, because they are not making a profit.

That leads me on to the possibility of partial payments. When the Minister winds up, I hope he will have a good look at the possibility of those farmers who have had their basic payment delayed receiving some sort of partial payment immediately. I understand from farmers in my constituency that some of the delays have been brought about by a series of problems, such as with cross-compliance or common land. In fact, it amazes me how much common land there is in my constituency—virtually every parish has common land and, although it is often owned in conjunction with local landowners, it is often farmed on long leases or by local estates. All sorts of problems lead to delays and I know of examples of farmers who have ticked every single box correctly and had no problems in the past, but because of one small issue over something quite trivial, everything has been delayed. Therefore, when there is no element of doubt about the farm, the business in question, and its record of paying taxes and abiding by rules and regulations, surely in such circumstances there must be scope for making a part-payment.

I also hope that the Minister will look at the farmers affected by the recent appalling floods. Scotland is under a different regime, but I have a friend, Mr David Baxendale, who farms in the borders at a place called Stanhope, on the upper reaches of the Tweed, and his area suffered its worst ever floods. He has seen damage to a large number of dykes and fencing, and his farm is under real pressure. I have no idea of exactly how big the damage bill is, but the answer is huge. Farmers in Scotland are suffering delays to their payment, too, and I hope that the Minister will look at them, as well as at farmers in Lancashire and Cumbria who might not have received their payment, but because they have been badly flooded face additional crises and problems to sort out. Will he look specifically at them?

My hon. Friends the Members for North Dorset (Simon Hoare), for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Michael Tomlinson), for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mrs Trevelyan)—she has just departed the Chamber—and others made mention of the need for some sort of certainty. Given any delays or issues between a farmer and the Rural Payments Agency, I understand from the NFU and the CLA that communications have been poor. Will the Minister explain why those communications, letters and discussions have not gone more smoothly? Why has the RPA not been more understanding and more proactive? Perhaps it is about the staffing, as my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole said, or perhaps there are RPA people who do not understand enough about farming per se. Surely none of that is an excuse for any form of incompetence or lack of keenness on the part of the agency to provide a better service. Those farmers who have not had their payment, or may not get it in the next few weeks, above all else need some form of certainty —the information and communication.