UK Food Shortages

Debate between Lord Benyon and Baroness Watkins of Tavistock

Thursday 23rd February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

It certainly will, and I pay tribute to the work of my noble friend. I entirely agree with what she says in that report in terms of food security. I also agree with what Minette Batters said at the NFU conference:

“Food security is not the same as self-sufficiency – we will always rely on imports to some degree, and it is sensible to ensure diversity of supply. But food security also means ensuring our food is safe to eat, that it can be distributed efficiently, and that it remains affordable.”


Those are the three key pillars of responsibility of any meaningful Government, and to achieve that we absolutely must have a diversity of producers as well—some will be owner-occupiers, some will be tenants, some will be in different forms of tenure and in share and partner farming arrangements, particularly in the horticultural sector—to ensure that we are producing food that is eaten as near to where it is produced as possible.

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Watkins of Tavistock) (CB)]

For the avoidance of doubt, I remind the House that when there is an Urgent Question repeat it is normal for the Opposition Bench to speak first. I also remind us of the convention, before we move to the Statement, that the first 20 minutes are for the Front Benches and then it is open.

Traffic-related Air Pollution

Debate between Lord Benyon and Baroness Watkins of Tavistock

Wednesday 21st December 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

We are driving down emissions across all sectors in the economy, including through the nitrogen dioxide plan, which has seen emissions from road transport decrease over 52% in the last decade, and the environmental permitting of agriculture and industry, which has seen sulphur dioxide emissions from energy production decrease 87% over the last decade, and by regulating the most harmful fuels in domestic burning to reduce emissions by 2030. That is what we are achieving. The noble Baroness is absolutely right that we need to help people to make decisions about their lives, so part of our support for local authorities is to help the whole health disparity problem by making sure that people have more information about how they can minimise the impact of poor air quality in their lives. Some people cannot do that—for example, you cannot expect people to move away from traffic hotspots—so the driver is to try to reduce poor air quality and to improve the lives of those people. Trying to ensure that we are limiting those issues is an absolutely core part of the national policy.

[Baroness Watkins of Tavistock (CB)]

My Lords, can the Minister comment on the relationship with the department of health? I am firmly convinced that there would be significant cost efficiency for the health service if air quality was improved more rapidly in inner cities.