Rural Landlords and Land Letting: Reform

Lord Cameron of Dillington Excerpts

Thursday 21st January 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I declare an interest as a farmer, landlord and past tenant farmer.

In haste—if we want our agricultural productivity to compete with other nations’, we need fresh blood and, for agricultural tenancies to proliferate, to bring that fresh blood in we need to have a system that encourages both sides to get involved. Tenants need the incentive to invest in their soil and infrastructure. In my view, no tenancy should be for less than seven years and, if possible, it should be renewed for a further seven years unless there are good reasons not to, which could include, for instance, the landlord having a family who want to farm, or even wanting to sell the holding. However, a second term should be the norm.

Extending succession provisions of older tenancies to wider members of the family would not help. Interfering in existing contracts sends all the wrong messages to landlords and it would not open up our farms to all our best students, who do not happen to have a sitting tenant as a relative. Succession tenants are not necessarily the most able and, for our agriculture to catch up with others’, we must ensure that all of our very best can have their chance.

Equally, to encourage more lettings, HMRC needs to recognise the concept of the rural business unit, whereby you can have different enterprises operating on a holding but treated as one business for the purposes of tax. One of those permitted enterprises should be long-term agricultural tenancies. If that were to happen, long-term tenancies would flourish. Incidentally, agricultural tenancies themselves should be able to include a variety of enterprises, especially and including ELMS.

I stress again that, for agricultural tenancies to proliferate, the motivations of both landlords and tenants must be accommodated.

Fisheries Bill [HL]

Lord Cameron of Dillington Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments & Ping Pong (Hansard) & Ping Pong (Hansard): House of Lords & Ping Pong (Minutes of Proceedings): House of Lords
Thursday 12th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Henig) (Lab)]

I have had no further requests from the Chamber to speak, so I now call the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB) [V]]

My Lords, this group of amendments seems to put all the controversial fishing amendments—as opposed to the controversial Crown dependency amendment—into one group. I ask noble Lords to forgive the length of my intervention at this stage of the Bill but it will be my only intervention today.

On Amendment 1B, I support the principles being put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Krebs. One of the most unedifying parts of the common fisheries policy is the annual December bun-fight over future quotas and fishing rights. This is a party where too many Ministers try to represent the fishers of their country against the fishers of a neighbouring country; they try to represent the fishers of today rather than the fishers of tomorrow, who unfortunately do not get a vote. I remember the noble Lord, Lord Deben, telling me once about an occasion when he was representing the UK at that year’s fisheries meeting. The Danish Fisheries Minister tried to take a long-term view of fishing opportunities; when he got home, he was promptly sacked for letting down his fishing industry. That is an example of why the common fisheries policy has sometimes been described as a tragedy of the commons —in other words, today’s fishers say to themselves, “There’s no point in me not catching all the fish I can now because if I don’t catch them while they are there, the other blighters will”.

However, all that is now finished. These are our waters that we are discussing. The other blighters cannot catch them without a licence issued by us. When we get remote electronic monitoring on to all the boats in our waters, British and EU, we will know exactly who is catching what and where and thus be able to prevent overfishing for short-term socioeconomic gain. So there is no longer any excuse for not taking a long-term sustainable approach to our fisheries.

I quite like the use of “long term”. In saying that, I am not trying to oppose the amendment by the noble Lord, Lord Randall. I understand completely what he is getting at and I totally support his motives; he does not want short-term economic gain to trump environmental gain in either the short or the long term. However, I would quite like to have “long term” somewhere in this crucial Bill-defining first clause because it seems to me that that would make it clear that we are laying down these objectives for tomorrow’s fishers rather than today’s—for our current fishers’ grand- children rather than for those fishers themselves.

Coming back to Amendment 1B in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, a commitment by the Minister on the Floor of the House may suffice at this stage. However, although I may have missed this in his opening remarks, I ask that he considers in his final remarks committing to reporting on this matter more than just once after the Bill has been enacted. It would be good to know that this once-in-a-lifetime chance to embed the right principles in our fisheries legislation will be an ongoing commitment for the long term— which, as I say, is what really matters.

Turning briefly to Commons Amendment 3, I can see why, with the Brexit negotiations still ongoing, the Government did not want their hands tied by the details of our Clause 18 on the landing requirement. I can also see why they would want more flexibility—and time, perhaps—to consult on economic links. However, it is a pity, in spite of what the Minister said, that the Government did not feel that they could have replaced our Clause 18 with their own clause setting out the principles of an economic link. We have now lost all reference in the Bill to a landing requirement or an economic link; as I say, that is a pity, particularly bearing in mind the vision that the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, just gave us on how our negotiations with the EU might go over the next 10 years or so.

The same thoughts apply to Commons Amendment 4, which removed our Clause 27 on holding a reserve of quota for new entrants and smaller boats. The Minister in the other place said that

“the Government agree with the intention behind the clause, but disagree with the manner in which that intention is proposed to be delivered … It is our intention to consult on using some of the additional quota that I am convinced is coming to us to provide increased fishing opportunities for under-10 metre vessels … but I am afraid, because of the drafting difficulties, I cannot support the clause.”—[Official Report, Commons, Fisheries Bill Committee, 10/9/20; col. 123.]

If the Government support the clause but not its details, why not put in something better of their own in its place? Even if consultation has to follow, this seems to be an opportunity lost. After all, such schemes have worked successfully in Denmark, on a more local scale in the Shetlands and probably in other countries as well.

The impression given by the Government’s amendment just to delete our Clause 27 is one of Executive bulldozing—that is, “We don’t disapprove of what is proposed but, rather than sitting down and working out what is needed, let’s just scrap it altogether and leave it to us, the Executive, to work something out in future without the parliamentary scrutiny that words on the face of a Bill might require”. As I said about Amendment 3, this seems like a lost opportunity to put something in the Bill, which is a pity because this Bill sets the framework for our UK fisheries for probably a whole generation.

Turning to Amendment 14B, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, for bringing forward once again the question of having remote electronic monitoring, known as REM, on fishing vessels in our waters and trying to get some form of government commitment into the Bill. Having looked at fisheries several times over the years on the EU sub-committee that the noble Lord very skilfully chairs, and having heard hours—if not days—of evidence on this subject, I am convinced that REM is going to be the key element to the successful and sustainable fishing regime that we all wish to see in British waters after we regain control of our own fisheries.

As I made clear on Report, we need REM to manage all the fishing in our waters. One of the most important reasons is that we do not have the necessary fleet available to police either our new fisheries policy or the terms and conditions that will accompany the fishing licences for all boats in UK waters. Bearing in mind that some 70% of all fish currently caught in UK waters are caught by non-UK boats, the management role of REM will be really important to the equitable management of our fisheries and thus the long-term sustainability of our UK fishing industry. It is important that our own fishers realise that if we are to change the share-out of the fish in our waters, albeit gradually, we will have to accept that REM is inevitable as we cannot monitor non-UK boats without monitoring our own. The sooner we have REM, the better it will be for everyone.

In a similar vein, I acknowledge that the Scottish fishing fleet catches 64% of all UK fish landed compared to the English fleet’s mere 28%, so one might think that this compromise amendment—Amendment 14B—applies only to England and would put an unfair burden on the English fleet. It might, but then again we should note that the introduction of REM to the Scottish fleet was in fact a manifesto commitment of the SNP, so I do not believe that any disparity would last for very long.

In any case, without going into all the detail of the advantages of REM that I spoke about on Report—such as providing data for zonal attachment and avoiding choke species—I firmly believe that the large amounts of real-time data that would become available to fishers and fishing authorities as a result of the introduction of universal REM would become a hugely valuable asset to all parties, including to the fishers themselves. I am convinced that, if they try it for a few years, the fishermen will not want to go back. I realise that Amendment 14B does not go as far as universal REM but I hope that eventually we will get it on to all boats.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Cameron of Dillington Excerpts

Report stage & Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 17th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con)]

My Lords, when we come to the amendments in my name I will explain that they intend to, and will, provide for the smooth running of existing schemes under the EU programmes, not only so that they can continue to work well but so that people due to receive funds from them can do so. The amendments we have discussed were about additional and beyond, but my amendments on retained EU law are technical amendments to ensure that the existing programme under the existing schemes can work effectively.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I thank all those who have taken part in this short debate, albeit that it has taken place over two days—three, if you add in yesterday. I also thank the Minister for his carefully worded reply. I know that he personally understands the problems I have described and the importance of the wider rural economy, not only to farmers and farming households but to those who live on the edge in our countryside and whose poverty remains largely ignored by government.

Meanwhile, I reassure my good friend, the noble Baroness, Lady Young, that it was never my intention to take money away from ELMS, or even the agricultural budget—or perhaps, as she might have put it more figuratively, I had no wish to hang another bauble on to the ELMS Christmas tree. I was trying to make the “rural affairs” bit of Defra a bit more of a reality, as recommended by two Select Committee reports of this House in recent years. However, as hinted at by my very old friend, the noble Baroness, Lady Chisholm, it is probably best to keep rural communities alongside all other communities and therefore firmly within the ministry for communities, now known as MHCLG.

The Minister has indeed given me some comfort in what he said about the shared prosperity fund, although I realise that nothing is certain before the comprehensive spending review. It might have been good to hear some indication as to when we will get any tangible details about the shared prosperity fund, but I suppose, with our economy currently on a precipice of uncertainty owing to the fallout from Covid and the ongoing doubts about the Brexit deal, it would have been asking too much to expect more detail when neither the Treasury nor MHCLG have any firm grip on where they are going.

Anyway, I will stop there. In the light of the Minister’s undertakings on the Floor of the House about a future rural component of a shared prosperity fund, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 43 withdrawn.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Cameron of Dillington Excerpts

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

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB) [V]]

My Lords, first, for the purposes of all of Report, I declare my interests as a farmer and landowner, as chair of the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, and chair of the advisory board of the Government’s Global Food Security programme on research. In Amendment 29, we have the key to getting the whole new farming and environmental land management programme to work on the ground. It is exciting that we have a new approach to helping farmers produce our food and manage our countryside. But with some basic ELM schemes still being piloted, neither we nor even the Government know exactly where we are going.

The pilot stage of ELMS is, in a way, providing the Government with their own training. I hope they will learn from it, but one thing is certain: farmers and land managers will need all the help and training they can get if we are to make this new approach work on the ground. Because there is little time between now and the putting in place of thousands of ELMS contracts, we must get a training scheme in place as soon as possible—training a farmer not only in how he can best judge what he and his land can provide of value for the nation, but in how best to deliver that value. With proper training it will be better for farmers, better for our flora and fauna, better for visitors and above all, as others have said, better for the taxpayers, who might then get the best returns that their money can buy.

Farming is one of the most isolated jobs in the world. Farmers are not necessarily slow to change, but without some form of proper training scheme it will be hard for them to engage successfully with this brave new world. Without their successful engagement, not only will the brave new world not happen but farmers themselves will fail financially, in their droves.

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Finlay of Llandaff) (CB)]

I call the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris of Aberavon. No? Then we will move on to the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle.

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[The Earl of Caithness (Con)]

My Lords, while I thoroughly support the aims of this Bill and the direction in which the Government are taking us, I have to say that I get more and more concerned as we delve into the detail of the Bill and the experts who are farmers—such as the noble Lords, Lord Curry and Lord Carrington, my noble friend Lady Rock and others—expose the concerns that farmers face. It is for that reason that I support many of these amendments.

I tried to put my name to Amendment 36 in the name of my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering, but there was already a full house of supporters. However, I supported this amendment in Committee and would do so again now. The argument is very compelling that the pilot schemes have only just started and it is going to take a long time for them to report and for the department to go through them, gestate them and work out what the future is. There would be very little time for the farmers to implement the results. Therefore, putting the whole thing back by a year would be a sensible, pragmatic and welcome solution to one of the many problems that the farmers face.

The noble Lord, Lord Carrington, made some very good points when he moved Amendment 37, which also deserves support. On the points made by the noble Duke, the Duke of Wellington, on Amendment 38, I reiterate that you do not have to be an organic farmer to protect the environment. You can farm in a perfectly normal way and bolster it. My main concern is Amendment 42, to which I have put my name and which has just been so well introduced by my noble friend Lady Rock.

The noble Lord, Lord Curry of Kirkharle, put it very succinctly when he spoke of sucking out the good of the department—I think those were his words. My concern is that as we move to ELMS, inevitably the department will move the good people into the new scheme and the less good people will remain with the old scheme. I hate to categorise the department in that way because all the members of Defra are good, but inevitably the really bright ones will be with the more attractive new scheme, and as the old scheme runs out, there will be an inevitable tendency for it not to receive the same attention that it gets now.

My noble friend Lady Rock was absolutely right to say that the one thing farmers need is certainty. As that support is reduced, so it is imperative that the payments are made promptly and on time. What recourse does a farmer have if he or she is made bankrupt because the Government, using taxpayers’ money, do not pay as they should? The area of financial support is hugely concerning and we must get it right. As the Bill stands, I am not convinced that we have got it right, which is why I support Amendments 36 and 42.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I call this group of amendments “Mind the Gap”, as I did in Committee—although I note that others have called it “The Valley of Death”.

The Minister has shown some flexibility over Clause 4, on the multiannual plans. He has listened well to the views of this House and adapted the Government’s position on Clause 17, on reports to Parliament on food security, but it seems strange that here, where there is every excuse in the world for delay, there has been no shift in the Government’s position—as yet. I am always hopeful.

It is a good two years since this Bill was first published, and since then there have been numerous delays in the implementation of what I have already called the “brave new world” of ELMS. The long, drawn-out shenanigans over Brexit froze everything in its tracks for a good 18 months, with this Bill being withdrawn from its parliamentary passage more than once during that time. Then of course there was this year’s lockdown, which paralysed the system and slowed everything up even more.

Above all, since my first meeting with the ELMS team at Defra early last year, there has been a gradual realisation that the introduction of ELMS is not going to be quite so simple as was first thought. We now know that it will take several years to get ELM schemes up and running across all the country, yet in the Government’s transitional timings there appears to be no allowance for the fact that the brave new world will not be a firm reality until 2024 at the earliest.

All the farmers that I have spoken to are very worried about their future. How are they going to survive, when no one really knows how things are going to work in future? Even the Government do not yet know, and yet, in spite of all the delays—mostly not the fault of Defra, as I said—we still seem to be stuck with the 2021 start of the transition period. This cannot be right. With the rug of the old world being pulled out from under them, and the new rug unlikely to arrive for some time, more farmers than necessary are going to fall down that gap.

So Defra has every reason to take this one back and think again. I do not care how it does it, but we need something to close the horrible gap that is looming. Amendment 37 in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Carrington and Lord Curry, gives everyone the best chance of survival, while giving the Government the greatest room for manoeuvre. A 25% cut in the single farm payment will be enough of a shock to force farmers to throw themselves into the new training for the brave new world that we are assured will be available, but it will not be so much of a shock that they drown before they get there.

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Moved by

[Lord Cameron of Dillington]

43: Clause 16, page 12, line 44, at end insert—
“( ) providing new socioeconomic support programmes to help farming households”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment ensures that Defra has the ability to assist farming households through a variety of non-production related schemes, so these households can continue to farm and manage their land.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB) [V]]

My Lords, Amendment 43 is a very harmless amendment, which merely gives Defra powers to introduce schemes to boost the rural economy. It does not force anyone, including Defra, to do anything, but merely enables them to ensure that as many as possible of the farming families, who are the backbone of rural England, will be able to survive on their land in years to come—particularly in the next five years, through the dramatic changes being introduced by the Bill. The fact that such powers also allow Defra to support the wider rural economy, and thus justify the rural affairs bit of its title, is incidental to the Bill, but it is hugely important to the majority of the people who live in our countryside. We should never forget that all the UK farmers and foresters together represent only about 4.5% of the rural population.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Cameron of Dillington Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 7th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 7th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 28th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I put my name to Amendment 271 with a degree of sadness, just as, I am sure, the current Defra Secretary of State did when he was temporarily out of office last year. He put down his own, similar amendment to the Bill as it was last year and wrote an article in the Guardian supporting his views.

As others have said, the problem lies with the Government’s manifesto commitment, saying:

“In all of our trade negotiations, we will not compromise on our high environmental protection, animal welfare and food standards”,


and then trying to reconcile that with achieving a trade deal with America and, inevitably, other countries. To make the situation more complicated, at the same time we are trying to prove to the EU negotiators that, if anything, the standard of products available in the UK, and thus possibly available for re-export to the EU, will go up and not down—that there will be no regression on what has become known as the level playing field. A further factor of course is that the British public are adamant that we should support our farmers against cheap imports. There is absolutely no wish, out there, for a race to the bottom. Having had numerous assurances from numerous Ministers that there is nothing to worry about, it seems odd to me that we cannot have something on the face of the Bill.

As far as I am concerned, this is not a food safety issue. The Food Standards Agency and Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs have all the powers they need to audit and control the quality and safety of the food being sold in this country, so there is no need to worry, for instance, about chlorinated chicken as such. It is the production methods, not the product, that matters. If the President of the United States and his regulators think that disinfectant is the cure for all ills—including, apparently, Covid 19—then that is up to them.

However, if certain states—and it is only certain states—allow their farmers to breed their chickens with a higher density than is legally allowed in the UK and they do not have to clear out the litter between batches, and we are then forced to accept their product as imports, that is something that we should get hot under the collar about. Under their sub-standard regulations, production costs are much cheaper. Capital costs per head, for instance, are some 13% cheaper. Therefore, if our farmers are to compete on an equal footing, they have to risk going to prison for breaking our laws or we have to change our laws in a race to the bottom—or, best of all, we should just insist on some form of certification indicating that the US farms supplying us with chickens are breeding to our standards. It is not a very difficult thing to do. Every farmer in this country supplying a supermarket has to have every aspect of their farming processes supervised and certified by that supermarket.

Similarly, hormones in beef are not really a problem in the human diet—although they might undermine consumer confidence, as the noble Lord, Lord Curry, has just said—but many would argue that their use is an unnatural way of rearing meat. Again, the main point is: do we lower our standards, which have been in place in this country for some 35 years, or do we just say no? Ractopamine in pigs is another matter altogether, of course. It is an additive used to manipulate growth and is known to cause lameness, trembling and shortness of breath. It should not be used to produce pork eaten in this country. If we were to import such pork—not that I think we will—it would be tantamount to exporting animal cruelty.

This is not a party-political issue. The Government are aware that farmers have the people on their side. More than a million people signed the NFU petition, and voters will not forgive the Government if they sell our farmers down the river. I think their gut feeling is that, if it were the other way round and the US was insisting that we raised our standards before we could export to it, there would be absolutely no doubt that we would jump to it without a murmur. That is what happened in the 1980s when New Zealand wanted to sell its lamb to China. New Zealand had to produce an entirely different product. That is the way these things work. Who on earth wants to market their goods on the basis that they are cheap and dodgy?

Turning to the letter from the DIT on the Trade and Agriculture Commission, I have to say that I am not overly impressed. Both the commission’s terms of reference and its output would be at the beck and call of the DIT, its short life would hardly allow its members to get their feet under the table, and its recommendations would be only advisory. In other words, it would have no teeth and a very short-term say. I fear that it is more of a PR sop than a genuine effort to provide a solution to this problem.

Personally, I am not fussed which solution we as a House support: this detailed amendment—Amendment 271, to which I have put my name—the rerun of the Neil Parish amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hain, or Amendment 279 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Curry. However, on the latter, like the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, I would have to insist that his commission was given, on the face of the Bill and not just at the whim of a Secretary of State, an extended life to continue its work on trade deals into the longer-term future. Anyone who thinks that all trade deals will be wrapped up in a year or two is fooling themselves. I suspect that the key period will be from three to 10 years from now, so it is vital that this commission can still do its work during that time.

Let us think what a difference we could make. As the current Secretary of State at Defra said in his Guardian article last year:

“In the US, legislation on animal welfare is woefully deficient”.


Maybe we can help with that. We should note, for instance, that in the EU free trade agreement with Chile, the EU insisted on animal welfare provisions in the agreement, and Chile’s animal husbandry and slaughter standards have indeed gone up since. We should remember that we in the UK are the third biggest market for food imports in the world, and countries will remain very keen to sell their products to us, even if we stick to our guns—maybe especially if we stick to our guns. Being able to sell into a quality market is no bad advertisement for your goods, so perhaps we can make a difference to the way livestock is reared in all parts of the world. Let us be ambitious about this.

[Lord Greaves (LD)]

My Lords, if the Government are not too keen to listen to the voices from Opposition Benches or even from expert Back-Benchers on their own side, they really ought to listen to someone like the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington, who speaks in this House as the voice of the countryside and of farming communities.

This group of amendments is very important. Even though we are now on the seventh day in Committee on the Bill, it is one of the most important groups of amendments that we will discuss. That is why I was very happy to put my name to the amendments from the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, and the noble Lord, Lord Hain, which between them cover food standards on the one hand and animal welfare, plant health and the environment on the other.

I repeat those four things because they sum up just why politically this is such an important issue for the Government. This is an extremely unusual issue, in that it unites a whole series of people in the country who would not normally march down the street together. I know that this Government are rumoured to take daily opinion polls and have a focus group every 10 minutes to work out what people think about things, so they must know that what I am saying is true and that somehow they have to draw the line and put it into legislation, otherwise people will never be satisfied.

This is also an issue that unites the media, and not just the farming media or the liberal-left minority media who normally get involved in this matter. It also includes the right-wing tabloids—the Daily Mail, the Daily Express and the rest of them—and the Daily Telegraph. We have seen what happens when they get behind a campaign such as this: the Government cannot win unless they are able to satisfy them that everything is okay.

I ought not to be giving political advice to the Government; I ought to be telling them to do hopeless things that allow me to go out on to the streets to campaign and say what rotten folk they are. However, this is too important for that. I know that Ministers in this House are not the final decision-makers on what they can and cannot do; they are working for their bosses in other places. Nevertheless, we have here a Minister who has influence and authority in the department, and we are relying on him to come back with something that will satisfy us and the country. I say that in all honesty, although perhaps he does not want to hear it.

On issue after issue, we now have a country where a large number of people are very frightened about their health, because of Covid and everything that has happened. A lot of people are scared to go out of their house, and if they are willing to do so they will want to wear a mask for the next 10 years. A lot of other people are on the side there, but a lot of the people who matter are very frightened. We also have a Prime Minister who has just launched a campaign to make sure that we are all a bit less fat. I can appreciate that and I will join his campaign, but these issues are all linked: good health, good food, relying on good farming and good production processes, and all within a good environment that allows people to go out and enjoy themselves and get exercise.

It seems a long time since we started this Committee. When we were discussing access, perhaps on the first day, and people were worried about the speed at which we were going, I said, “Well, you ain’t seen nothing yet”. For good or for bad, I have been in your Lordships’ House now for over 20 years, and I have to say that seven days in Committee for a Bill of this complexity, importance and size is not unusual; it is normal. I do not think it is because we have had to operate within this hybrid system. I join everyone who compliments the staff, the leadership and everybody else who found a way for us to have something that approximates to a Committee. Even though I agree entirely with what the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, said earlier in the House about the need to get back to a new normality—if that is not a contradiction—because we have to make more progress, nevertheless we have had something approximating a Committee and everybody needs to be congratulated on that. However, I do not believe that this Committee a year ago it would have taken less than seven days; in fact, it might even have taken a bit longer.

To go back to the amendment, I am not an expert on a lot of the things in this group, although I know about the environment, but they are so important to people. Everybody cares about food. Increasingly they care about good food, increasingly they care about the environment and increasingly they are realising that the future of farming is in jeopardy unless we get it right.

I beg the Government to listen to what is being said here today by voices across the House, by voices from the rural parts of Yorkshire and Northern Ireland, by the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, from the countryside—people who know what they are talking about. Unless something comes back, I think the Government will suffer serious defeats on Report. Another old tradition of the House is that ping-pong goes on for longer than two days, and this may be a sufficiently important issue that we might even get back to proper ping-pong.

The noble Lord, Lord Empey, said that the tradition in this House is that we do not vote in Committee. That is absolute rubbish. It is a modern invention by Governments trying to have an easy time. There are traditions and traditions in this House. I do not know whether Lord Palmerston would recognise our House today as the one that he presided over, but I do know that for the first 10 or more years that I was a Member here we always voted in Committee. I am not suggesting that we should in hybrid, because that is a bit different, but voting in Committee is a very good way of getting shot of some issues early, one way or the other, and allowing the major issues to go to Report. So when people tell you that what happened last year or the year before are the traditions of this House, it is bunkum. The traditions of this House go back longer than any of us—even those of us who have been here rather longer than we ever thought we would be.

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Moved by

[Lord Cameron of Dillington]

275: After Clause 42, insert the following new Clause—
“Agricultural research
(1) The Secretary of State may by regulations modify the definitions contained in Part VI of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 in relation to products of breeding techniques for agricultural purposes where nucleic acid changes could have occurred naturally or through traditional breeding methods.(2) Regulations under subsection (1) may only be made after the Secretary of State has held a public consultation on any proposed modifications to the definitions.(3) Regulations under subsection (1) may only be made in relation to England.(4) Regulations under subsection (1) are subject to the affirmative resolution procedure.”Member’s explanatory statement
To enable the Secretary of State to make changes to the Environmental Protection Act 1990, as it applies in England, in relation to breeding techniques after the UK leaves the EU. This would allow for regulation of new precision breeding techniques compatible with international definitions.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington [V]]

My Lords, in introducing this amendment I declare an interest as chair of the advisory board of the Government’s Global Food Security programme. On this board we look at all UK research relating to food. We cover not plough to plate but one stage further at either end—soils to stomach—thus tracing a chain from the billions of bacteria in soil that convert sunlight and water into crops, all the way through to the billions of bacteria in our stomachs that convert those crops into human energy.

The first thing to say about crop research in the UK is that the days when it was all about yield per hectare are long gone. If there is a primary target in present research objectives it is nutrition per hectare but, most importantly, without any degradation of ecosystems and natural resources. This has been the case in the research community for the last five to 10 years. Actually, there are many objectives in crop and animal research these days, and there could be many more as the world changes. Crops that have resilience are often better than crops that have high yields.

The questions being asked include: how do you breed plants that can resist the many different diseases and pests present in every country without having to put chemicals into the environment? We have already debated the problem of agricultural sprays in this country, but it is even more important in the developing world, where literacy is a problem among farmers and chemicals therefore tend to get used far too liberally, often to the detriment of the farmer’s health. The other thing about gene resistance to pests is that it is better for biodiversity. Why? Because, unlike sprays, it does not kill the pest; it just protects the crop from the pest.

Next, how do you breed a plant that can resist droughts brought about by climate change? Irrigation schemes are expensive and use valuable water. Seeds are much cheaper, so you can breed either a plant that requires less water or, more often, one that comes to fruition—that is, to harvest—two or three weeks earlier, during which time its older counterpart might have shrivelled and died.

How do you breed a plant that resists flooding—either one that can stay alive underwater for several days or one that, when threatened, spurts upwards to keep its head above the floodwaters? How do you breed plants that are salt-tolerant or that produce crops less susceptible to the dreadful post-harvest losses you get in Africa, or plants that have a longer shelf life for our supermarkets and thus reduce the need for plastic?

How do you breed a wheat that minimises its gluten content to help coeliacs? How do you reduce the major allergy features of peanuts? That would surely save a few lives. How do you produce plants, such as tomatoes, that can be grown in an urban context—small plants that are covered with fruit but can grow on walls or in window boxes—or a cassava plant that does not have to be dried and processed within 24 hours, or a cocoa plant resistant to mildew or phytophthora? Finally, turning to yield, can you breed a wheat or rice that produces a much larger grain?

The answer is that all of the above are part of gene-editing research programmes at different stages of development in different parts of the world. We are not talking only about wheat, maize and rice here but sweet potatoes, cassava, cowpea, sorghum, millet, coffee, cocoa, fruits and vegetables, et cetera. Let us face it: we are too dependent on wheat, rice and maize, from the point of view of both resilience and, above all, nutrition. More work needs to be done urgently on these so-called orphan crops.

My point is that the opportunities and urgent needs are there in their thousands. If we are to meet our sustainable development goals and keep up with our exploding world population, speed is of the essence. Speed is the essence of what this amendment is all about —but not reckless speed. I want to make this absolutely clear: we are not asking or wishing for any reduction in the stringent regulatory requirements or supervision of all forms of breeding techniques of plants or animals. Defra’s Animal and Plant Health Agency insists that all new varieties must undergo at least two years of official tests and trials. Furthermore, the Home Office animal experiment regulations also license and test every stage of gene editing, over many years, so we already have a well-functioning UK regulatory system, with an impeccable track record of food safety, animal husbandry and environmental protection. This will continue and can easily embrace these new breeding techniques. But, as with traditional breeding, once the crops have passed all the tests and we know they are safe to grow, farmers should be allowed to grow them for sale.

The speed that is necessary comes from the scientific precision of breeding plants and animals using gene editing. Let me explain. Genetic changes used by traditional plant breeders are mutations that arise randomly in crop plants. Normally, a breeder will select for a handful of beneficial changes, in a background of thousands of other mutations that are either neutral or sometimes even negative. At a plant-breeding station, the greenhouses are full of hundreds of hybrids, of which probably only one or two are desirable. The removal of undesirable off-target characteristics, by back-crossing and selection, is what breeders have been doing for thousands of years since the domestication of crops and livestock.

In gene editing, the genetic changes are the same as those used by traditional breeders, but targeted more precisely. There is only a small or non-existent background of trial and error, so the precision of the breeding technique is the clue to its safety for the environment and the world around it.

One of the problems with a recent EU court ruling on this, which is raising concerns even among the most conservative member states, is how you can tell a gene-edited plant from a naturally bred one. There is no way of telling unless you were present at its conception. Some members of the German Green Party have also questioned the ruling. Their point is that, if the technique is regularly used in human health—to genetically manipulate antibiotic clusters, for instance—why should it not also be used to benefit the wider world? I agree with them. With the strong backing of more than 100 EU scientific organisations, the Commission is now looking carefully at the rules on precision breeding, with a view to reporting next April. I strongly suspect that the EU rules will change.

So we seek both precision and speed. Instead of taking 10 to 12 years or longer to develop a new seed, we are talking about two to three years. This allows the development to be driven by a wider range of research organisations, mostly led by small businesses and public research organisations, not just large multinationals. It allows some of the world’s best agricultural research stations, which we have in this country—places such as Rothamsted, John Innes and James Hutton—to team up with smaller research stations in developing countries, which have special crops, often with special local problems. By working with these poorer countries, as well as with UK agriculture, we can help farmers everywhere produce the food that their local population requires.

Another important point is that this proposed amendment would not affect, in any way, the control or current status of genetically modified crops, in which entire genes or even groups of genes can be transferred between species. This would remain strictly outside this law, with even their controlled experimentation, in government research stations, having to be licensed in exceptional circumstances. This amendment, however, would bring our rules into line with most other countries, apart from the EU, where precise improvements are made within the same species—improvements that could have occurred naturally or through traditional breeding methods.

Another final issue I will touch on quickly is the possibility of unintended consequences of gene editing. I have already commented on the greater likelihood of risks from traditional breeding techniques, both in plants and animals, but the main point to emphasise—and this applies to all scientists, whatever techniques they are using—is that modern scientists are always wrestling with the effects of their work on the wider environment. How will this affect the soil, the air, the local flora and fauna, including humans, and even the landscape? The idea is that their work should benefit the world in all its aspects. If they do not think like that, in this country at any rate, their regulators certainly do.

As we emerge from this Covid disaster, it is vital that our scientists are able to employ the precision and speed needed to breed the best and most useful crops with safety. I urge the Government to accept this amendment, which empowers them to consult and act on the possibility of making changes to the Environmental Protection Act 1990. I beg to move.

[Lord Krebs [V]]

My Lords, it is a privilege to follow my noble friend Lord Cameron of Dillington, who has so beautifully set out the basis for this amendment. I am sorry that, on this occasion, I part company with a number of Peers whose views I hugely respect and with Greener UK, whose support, on this and other Bills, I have much appreciated. I speak as a career academic scientist whose specialism is ecology and the environment.

I will make three points. First, I will reiterate the scientific difference between gene editing and genetic modification. Gene editing is like traditional breeding, but more targeted. It involves tweaking the genes that are already there in the organism. It is roughly analogous to adjusting one of the ingredients in a recipe to improve the flavour of the dish. On the other hand, traditional genetic modification involves inserting new genes from a different organism. It is a bit like the introduction of a new ingredient into the recipe to change the nature of the dish. For example, one of the major GM crops is Bt maize, with a toxin gene from the bacterium bacillus thuringiensis that confers resistance to corn borer. Gene-edited crops, with their ingredients adjusted, could be safer, more nutritious, more productive and more resistant to climate change, as my noble friend Lord Cameron of Dillington so eloquently explained.

But—this is my second point—the difference between genetic modification and gene editing is not relevant to those who object to gene editing. The objection is not about science but something else. Opposition to modern genetic technology, whether gene editing or GMOs, is often presented as three worries: the food made from GM crops is not safe to eat; the crops are not safe for the environment, for instance because genes could jump into wild plants or because it is part of the intensification of agriculture, which destroys habitats and biodiversity; and genetic technologies favour big agritech companies at the expense of small farmers.

The worriers also invoke the precautionary principle, saying that we should never adopt new technologies until we are 100% sure they are risk free. Ironically, the same individuals often invoke the precautionary principle as a call for new technologies to be used, even when the science is incomplete, for example on reducing pollution levels in the environment. In reality, these arguments are all code for a different vision of the future of agriculture, one that returns to traditional low-intensity methods, such as organic farming. In fact, organic farming and gene editing should not be in opposition. Organic farmers have as much to gain as conventional farmers, if not more, from the genetic improvement of their crops to make them more disease resistant without pesticides, more nutritious, more productive and so on.

My third point is that the amendment calls for public consultation, which is key if we are to avoid the mistakes of the 1990s. Noble Lords will recall that the first GM food on sale in the UK was tomato paste made with Flavr Savr tomatoes. These tomatoes do not go squidgy on ripening, so they produce a sweeter product. The GM tomato paste tasted better, was slightly cheaper and was clearly labelled. It sold well, until the campaigning groups launched their highly successful “Frankenstein foods” campaign. Before long, the supermarket shelves were cleared of all products involving GM.

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[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Lexden) (Con)]

My Lords, I have received no requests to speak after the Minister.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington [V]]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate, particularly my fellow sponsors of the amendment. I also thank the Minister for his very full reply, which I shall read carefully and reflect on. It is clear that people on both sides of the fence feel strongly on the subject. I think we can all agree that the most important thing is to feed our grandchildren with the least possible damage to the environment and the future of the planet. Those in favour of the amendment believe that using precision techniques is the best and safest way to do this, while those against think that the tried and tested random mutation is better, albeit slower. I want to respond to one or two of the points raised.

One cannot put traditionally bred plants back in the bottle; nor can one stop any cross-fertilisation in the wild, but properly regulated precision breeding is just less likely to do so, in my view. However, I agree that the wider consultation is a really good idea, which is why this amendment specifically recommends it and why it seems that the Minister has picked up on it. As a Scotsman, I picked up the remarks about wheat in Scotland. I should tell the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, that in the 1990s, a field in Aberdeenshire held the world record for winter wheat yields for several years. It is the long summer days there.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, also made a comparison with human medicine, with reference to an article in Nature. However, it is very misleading in this discussion about which is the best between precision breeding and traditional breeding. The removal of undesirable off-target characteristics is what traditional breeders have been doing for millennia. This back-crossing, as it is known, has never been possible with human medicine for obvious reasons, so the arguments and comparisons do not apply. Of course, scientists are cautious about the use of gene editing in humans. Meanwhile, compared with precision breeding, traditional animal and crop breeding is much more likely to produce off-target characteristics to be removed. Precision breeding is, as I said, much safer and more accurate.

I repeat what I said in my opening speech to the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter: this amendment in no way affects the legislation on GMOs and is not the thin end of any wedge. Several noble Lords mentioned or hinted at this, but I am not sure how we are pre-empting parliamentary debate with this amendment. If that is so with this amendment, presumably all amendments over the past seven days are pre-empting debate. Surely it is the opposite: we are promoting debate. If the Bill is about only rewarding new ways of land management, presumably the debate that we have just had on trading standards is also trying to slide an amendment through by the back door. I will say no more, but we all know that the Bill will go back to the Commons, which can have its say over all or any of our changes.

On animal cruelty, also mentioned by the Minister, I strongly refute that gene editing could be considered more cruel than traditional breeding methods. Think of the results of traditional breeding from the wolf over the years, which include dogs with noses that are so squashed they can hardly breathe and Pekingeses whose eyes drop out. Meanwhile, the process of taking an egg from a chicken or fish and editing its genetic make-up is not in any way cruel. If, for instance with the salmon egg, you can increase its resilience to sea lice, as they are doing at Roslin, you would be doing both the salmon and its surrounding environment a heap of good as there would be no need for environmentally damaging treatment to remove the lice, which also harms the salmon.

With mammals, you also take an egg, treat it and re-insert it into the mother—a process no crueller than IVF in humans to help a mother have a much-wanted child. If, for instance, you thus increase resistance to PRRS in pigs, as again they are doing at Roslin, you are reducing the enormous suffering and deaths from that appalling respiratory disease. Of course, if you alter the genes of one animal, you should get hundreds or even thousands of their progeny with the same characteristics without touching them in any way. Breeding resistance to disease into future generations is so much more sensible than the ongoing use of antibiotics or medicines as the best way of helping animals live pain-free and disease-free lives.

I will stop there. But as this is the last time that I will speak in Committee, I want to thank the Minister for his extreme patience and professionalism, expertise in the subject and fluency at the Dispatch Box. I am full of admiration for the skill and extraordinary tolerance with which he has handled us troublesome Members, and I thank him for the conscientious way that he has dealt with the Bill. With that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 275 withdrawn.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Cameron of Dillington Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 6th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 6th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 23rd July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Holmes of Richmond (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow my friend, the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Pittenweem. He has a barrister’s brain and an Olympian’s frame. Mark Twain said, “Buy land, they aren’t making it any more”. Although he did not see the Dutch project of polderisation, he certainly had a point, which goes to the essence of the amendments in this group. What has connected every speaker so far is a simple point of coherence. It makes coherent sense to have a land-use strategy. Anything else would inevitably mean competing interests, with land often going to the highest bidder or the largest voice. I support, in particular, the comments of my noble friend Lord Caithness, and, in essence, I support the amendments in this group.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 227, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Young. England—not Britain, but England—is the fifth most densely populated country in the world, from a list that includes the city state of Singapore. The south-east of England, with London at its commuter heart, is obviously very crowded, but so too are the Midlands. For instance, the Peak District National Park has 21 million people within an hour’s drive of it. That is a staggering number of human beings.

The second fact to note is that, as Bill Bryson once said, the unique feature of the English countryside is that its citizens love it to death. We all feel it belongs to us. Furthermore, most of us want to live in it and to have a home there. A survey in the 1990s showed that more than 80% of those living in southern England wanted to live in the countryside, where less than 20% currently live, so there are immense pressures on our countryside, even before we start to plan our nation’s food production. There are demands for leisure, housing, transport, energy, forestry and business property, as well as our obligations in relation to biodiversity, landscape and climate change.

How do we deal with all these pressures? At the moment, the way our countryside produces all those services and goods is a matter of haphazard chance. There are, of course, myriad strategic and neighbourhood plans, guided by the national planning policy framework, but there is a difference between what people need to get planning permission for and how we actually want to use the land on the ground.

At the moment, most of the usage is dictated by the marketplace and responded to—admirably, in a way—by a new generation of young, entrepreneurial landowners and others who look for whatever possible use the land might be suitable for. But we have already decided in this Bill that the marketplace cannot and should not drive all land usage. With the powers in the Bill, the state is going to step in with large amounts of money—£3 billion per annum is promised—to buy land uses that the market does not cater for.

This brings us to the question of what we should use our land for, and where. The answer may be that we need a plan, or rather a framework or frameworks, possibly at different levels—we possibly need a national framework and a regional framework. Personally, I would avoid local frameworks as I fear they might encourage too much nimbyism, which could destroy the innovation we so badly need for our future land use. The one thing we do not need, of course, is a Soviet-style plan that knocks local enterprise on the head.

Although I think a land use strategy is a good and useful idea, I strongly support the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, in his wish to have a one-off Select Committee in this House to really examine how best we could set up and implement such a land use strategy. There are now many new variables to go into the mix, including the need to plant more trees to absorb CO₂, maybe the need for more domestic tourism venues now that overseas travel has taken such a hit, and maybe even the imminent arrival of lab-produced meat and milk, which could dramatically change our farming landscape and what we want from our land. I strongly believe that this is just the sort of issue that a Lords Select Committee could get its teeth into to produce an illuminating and compelling message for government.

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD) [V]]

My Lords, my noble friend Lord Campbell remarked that this is a wide-ranging debate and that the whole Committee stage has been. There is an inevitability about that, because our shared objective of a thriving agricultural sector delivering a range of public goods can be met only if certain foundations are in place. It is those foundations that I think are troubling many Members of your Lordships’ House. We discussed one in the previous Committee session, namely the lack of an overall food strategy.

Today we discuss another: the total absence of any kind of comprehensive land use strategy. The noble Earl, Lord Caithness, had it exactly right when he remarked about having no framework on which to balance and manage the competing demands we make of our land. In May the RSA published a report and said:

“Land use is not an aspect of policy that can be compartmentalised, parcelled away and deemed to matter only in certain places and to certain people. We all live with the choices over how land is used every day.”


The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, highlighted that this was just one of a whole number of reports and organisations doing a lot of thinking in this area.

We know that Scotland has a land use strategy, Wales has a spatial plan and Northern Ireland has a regional development strategy. It was fascinating to hear from the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, how that is used to help new entrants. On the other hand, England has no overall framework. What it has for planning is a morass of strategies, plans and initiatives, so I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Young, and her cosignatories for tabling the amendment to set out the vision for a land use strategy that could help the Government to deliver their agriculture and forestry aspirations, as we are debating today, but also the 25-year environment plan, the 12 policy statements for critical infrastructure, and this sense of place, which is something on which the Government have based their civil society strategy. The noble Lord, Lord Cameron, was quite right to highlight just what a crowded island this is, and the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, talked about the lack of coherence; he is quite right too.

Amendment 228, tabled by the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, addresses this problem of new entrants to agriculture and the difficulties they face. In some ways this links with amendments on county farms in earlier groups, because county farms were intended to do just this, but, as we have heard, are becoming rarer. That links with land use, of course, because if you are a cash-strapped council and can sell some land on the edge of town for a housing development, I am afraid you are likely to do that. It is a fact that land for agricultural purposes will struggle to compete against the land demands of housing, for example.

Finally, Amendment 228A, tabled by my noble friend Lord Greaves, would create this link with local development plans and the neighbourhood plan process. This is absolutely the right thing to do. It has seemed to me for some time—clearly the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, tends to feel the same—that in this country we are very good at development control but not very good at planning. We had some elements of it up until about 2004 in the form of county structure plans. They did not cover the whole country, but they were at least strategic. However, they often got stymied by differences with district councils, which had the development control function. County structure plans disappeared in 2004, replaced by regional development plans, which bit the dust in 2010. It seems sensible to include local planning in any provisions and thought in Amendment 227.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Cameron of Dillington Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 21st July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Trenchard (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my interests as stated in the register. The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, suggests in Amendment 130 that the period of the first plan should be five years rather than seven years. In Amendment 142, he seeks to reduce the seven-year transition period, during which the direct payments scheme will be phased out, to five years. Farmers are already anxious about how their business models will have to change, and would not welcome the shortening of the transition period. Particularly because they do not have enough information on the new scheme, the noble Lord’s amendment is unwarranted and would be damaging.

However, there is considerable merit in Amendment 143 in the name of my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering, in that the seven-year transition period should start 18 months from now, rather than six, which would give more time for the Government to work out the details of the scheme, and would be neutral in terms of costs to the Exchequer.

The noble Lord, Lord Carrington, in Amendment 144, is right to seek to ensure that payments under the new schemes compensate for the reduction in and ultimate removal of payments under the direct payments scheme. But I think his intention to limit the reduction in total support to 25% is rather modest. I believe direct payments for larger farms are set to be reduced by 25% in 2021, and the noble Lord’s amendment would still permit this to happen, even if such a farm receives zero under the countryside stewardship scheme and other current schemes. As I said previously, the larger farming businesses employ the majority of agricultural workers.

I would not support Amendment 146 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, except in so far as it equates to Amendment 143 to delay the changes by one year. The seven-year transition period is not too long, given the extent of the changes farmers will need to carry out.

The noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, seeks to use this Bill to advance her concerns regarding animal welfare, but I cannot agree with her Amendment 147, which assumes that animal welfare standards are higher or lower, whereas different standards may produce different outcomes, and it is a fine balance. I regret that I do not see the justification for supporting her Amendments 147, 148 or 154.

My noble friend Lady Rock has eloquently explained the reasons behind her Amendments 150 and 151. I can see that where moneys are unspent, the amount provided in a subsequent year might increase if the Government accept carryover procedures. As for her Amendments 152 and 153 on delinked payments, they seem to provide an improvement to the Bill.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I have christened this group of amendments, “Mind the gap”. We need some sort of rethink from the Government on a safer way forward.

I support Amendment 143. When I first read the Bill in its earliest form, nearly two years ago now, I thought, “That’s good—the seven-year transition from one system to the next. All will be well; farmers can plan ahead with no problems, and while the single farm payment goes down, they can enter into ELM schemes, with profits, under the new regime.” Defra had three years to get ELM schemes in place, then several years to roll them out to farmers on the ground, which, as others have said, is going to be an almost impossible task. I thought, back then, that it could happen at a manageable place, and all would be well. Farmers would be involved in tremendous changes, but they could survive the transition because the way forward would be clear to them.

But now, two years on, the way forward is still as clear as mud. ELMS have only just entered the pilot stage, farmers have no framework by which to plan and they are saying, “What will ELMS look like for me in my area? I have no idea. What training do I need? I have no idea. Do I need to plan for new equipment or facilities? I have no idea.” No one in the farming community has any clear idea of the future. The details of ELMS will not really emerge from the mist until nearly 2025.

In spite of the delays, we still seem to be stuck with a 2021 start to the transition period. This cannot be right. With the rug of the old world being slowly pulled out from under them, and the new rug unlikely to arrive for some time, I worry farmers will fall down the gap. As others have said, the delay is not really Defra’s fault; we had all the shenanigans around Brexit, and so with this Agriculture Bill doing the hokey-cokey—in, out, in, out—then Covid-19 causing genuine paralysis this year, it is not surprising the timetable has slipped. So, the Government have every reason to take this back and think again before we get to Report. I do not care how they do it, but we need something to close the horrible gap that is looming.

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[The Earl of Devon [V]]

My Lords, I congratulate the Committee—we have made a lot of progress in the last few minutes. It is good to see that we are now up to Clause 16, focusing on support for rural development.

It is an honour to move Amendment 155. This is a simple amendment, supported by the CLA, which seeks to ensure that there is no gap in the support for rural socioeconomic schemes such as the Growth Programme and LEADER scheme, which are currently administered by the RDPE. They do so much to support the development of rural business through grants, training and the provision of advice. I have already noted my farming interests but, specific to this amendment, I should note that our rural heritage tourism business has applied for, and been granted, an RDPE grant—although, as far as I am aware, it will not be impacted by this amendment.

The work of the RDPE in assisting and administering rural development using European funds is key to maintaining the productivity and employment currently enjoyed by many otherwise struggling rural businesses. These are the businesses that, by current estimates, will suffer most from the economic catastrophe that is Covid-19 and the subsequent brutality of Brexit.

The role of the RDPE is due to be taken over by the UK shared prosperity fund, but we currently have no idea when that will take place. This amendment seeks simply to ensure that there is no gap between the winding up of the RDPE and access to the European funds and the establishment of the UK shared prosperity fund.

In a series of questions in this House on 21 May 2020, the noble Lord, Lord Greenhalgh, on behalf of the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, made it clear that, while the Government could give assurances about the UK shared prosperity fund, they could give no assurances whatever as to its timing—and so, we remain in the dark. Perhaps the Minister can shed some more light on when the UK shared prosperity fund will take effect.

Without this amendment, these key socioeconomic schemes may find themselves falling into that transition chasm, lost in the valley of the shadow of death. I beg to move.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington [V]]

My Lords, I want to speak to my Amendment 156. It tries to ensure that as many as possible farming families, who, to me, are the backbone of rural England, will be able to survive on their land through the various agricultural crises that will inevitably come their way over future decades. The first crisis is the dramatic changes introduced by this Bill.

Anyone who talks to farmers, tenants or owner-occupiers who are farming land that could probably not be described as prime agricultural land will know that, without the single farm payment, they currently have little chance of survival. They cannot survive solely on their agricultural production to produce the family income. All too often, the single farm payment provides more than 100% of their agricultural returns. As we all know, this will soon not be there anymore. Some farmers and their families branch out into other enterprises on their farm, involving tourism, leisure or local services such as contracting or some form of engineering. But mostly, these farming families—wives, sons, daughters and often even the farmer himself—depend on cash wages from local businesses, which allow the farming household to survive on the land. The whole survival of the farm and the family, or families, on it depends on the vitality of the wider rural economy around them.

It is important to remember that, throughout England as a whole, agriculture represents less than 5% of the rural economy. This dependency on outside jobs is particularly obvious on those farms, both lowland and upland, involved in livestock—mostly up and down the western side of England and, of course, in Wales and Northern Ireland. The further you get from urban centres, the more this applies.

What I am saying should not surprise anyone as this feature of rural living was one of the founding principles of the CAP with its two pillars: Pillar 1 supporting agriculture per se and Pillar 2 supporting rural development. The EU decision-makers knew that, to keep farmers on the land and prevent them leaving to join the urban unemployed, a variety of rural jobs would need to be available to both men and women near their farms. Returning to this country, and going back even further in history, it should be noted that, when Lloyd George started the Rural Development Commission before the First World War, he had exactly the same targets in mind. The RDC eventually became the Countryside Agency until it all got swept into Defra and then, of course, disappeared.

I am trying to give back to Defra a very small arrow in its quiver to continue the good work started so many years ago. It is not a new game but a tried-and-tested tool to help farming families stay on their land. I am also trying to give Defra a small reason to justify keeping “rural affairs” in its title.

I know that the Government will say that all this is going to be taken care of by the shared prosperity fund —as my noble friend Lord Devon has just said—but how and when will we know? Rural proofing is a concept that has lost its way recently, so what makes us think that the shared prosperity fund is going to break that mould? Can the Minister guarantee today that there will be a well-financed ring-fenced rural fund that will be an essential part of the shared prosperity fund?

If he can, that is all well and good but, even so, would it not be a good idea for Defra to have this rural development arrow in its quiver? Would it not be a good idea to hold on to the tried and tested way of helping farmers stay on the land, particularly as Defra already knows that a good percentage of farmers are going to struggle to survive under the new regime this Bill is putting in place?

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering]

My Lords, I oppose Clause 16 standing part of the Bill. This follows on neatly from the comments of the noble Earl, Lord Devon, and the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, with whom I have the pleasure to serve on the EU Environment Sub-Committee.

The original purposes of the rural development fund have made a great change to the countryside, improving the quality of life and economic well-being especially of those living in rural areas that are particularly isolated and sparsely populated, such as where I grew up—Teesdale in County Durham—and also the areas that I had the pleasure and privilege to represent in the other place: deeply rural parts of North Yorkshire.

The policy statement that was published in February this year says of the Rural Development Programme for England for 2014 to 2020:

“This £3.5 billion programme will continue to include support for rural businesses to expand and create new jobs and for farmers and growers to buy innovative new equipment.”


This is under the “Preserving our rural resilience” heading, and it goes to the heart of what is perhaps another gap.

I ask my noble friend the Minister, in summing up, to show that this gap will be closed in the current aims of the Rural Development Programme—which have so well served rural communities—and to show how this voyage into the unknown of the UK shared prosperity fund will actually work in the interests of rural areas. Therefore, my question to the Minister is: how will Clause 16 build on this and how will necessarily limited funds continue to be used for these socioeconomic purposes that have served rural communities so well?

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[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, the vision is for a prosperous rural economy, which obviously includes food production and agriculture. However, a whole range of communities form the rural economy. We want to ensure that all rural dwellers have the same opportunities. I have to say that very few industries have been promised that they will retain the same annual contribution from the taxpayer for the whole of this Parliament; sometimes noble Lords forget that in some of their commentary. That is most exceptional, and it shows that the Government support farmers and rural communities. That is of course why there is a very significant investment in the broadband structure. Therefore, there is a considerable vision for a prosperous, skilled and innovative agricultural sector within a broader rural economy.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington [V]]

My Lords, I thank the Minister very much for his extensive response to this debate. When will he be able to tell us whether there will be a well-financed, ring-fenced rural fund as part of the shared prosperity fund? When will we know about that?

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

I am afraid that I cannot give a precise date other than what I said in my remarks, that the quantum and design of the fund will take place following the spending review; I cannot give any further detail. However, I can say that the efforts and the work of Defra with MHCLG are to ensure that there is a very strong rural component so that rural businesses are an intrinsic part of this fund.

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[Lord Taylor of Holbeach (Con) [V]]

My Lords, as I have not spoken since a week last Thursday, perhaps I should my declare interest as a member of a family farming business in which I worked for over 45 years before coming to the House. The business celebrated its centenary last year but perhaps noble Lords do not know that my interest in this group of amendments stems from the fact that the business was founded by my grandfather, a Londoner returning from World War I, on a Crown colony—a 10-acre smallholding in Holbeach Marsh. We now own and farm 200 times this acreage and, I hope, provide evidence of the important steps on the ladder and the key provision of smallholdings.

This Bill does not pretend to be a wholesale review of the law relating to land ownership and tenancy but, as my noble friend the Minister has said, it makes some pragmatic and uncontroversial changes with which I believe the House will agree. In the meantime, the principle purpose of the Bill and the reason why we need it in good time, is the payment of financial assistance following Brexit through the environmental land management scheme. The thrust of the Bill is the building of a progressive and productive agriculture and horticulture system fit for the post-Covid 19 age. It also seeks to provide the nation with a countryside that is naturally and environmentally sensitive—objectives that are not incompatible or contradictory.

However, there will be changes, and we need to encourage the occupation of land by farmers and growers who can implement them. Making a success of ELM depends very much on the details of the scheme and the uptake by the industry—making sure that the scheme’s incentives work is wrapped up in the ownership and occupation of the land. Can my noble friend say what discussions there have been with interested parties on this matter and what the timetable is for any conclusion?

Perhaps I can be forgiven for also asking about cropping licences, which are very important in areas such as mine. Crop specialisation is part of a local scene and provides much of the impulse of industry locally. Not only do the licences make sense, they provide steps on the ladder for the farmers of tomorrow and enable established companies to work with neighbours for effective rotation. It is not a tenancy but a short-term licence. At the moment, by agreement, the financial assistance is paid to the long-term occupier of the land. This is as it should be. Can my noble friend assure me that the intention under the Bill is that this will continue?

[Lord Cameron of Dillington [V]]

My Lords, when I first saw the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, I was very supportive of the concept of providing a bottom rung for aspiring farmers. After all, who would not want to help young men and women into one of the most noble of professions? Then, I started thinking about it and gradually became more sceptical about its premise and, worried about my scepticism—which is not a normal frame of mind for me—I spoke to various members of the farming community from around the country, including the noble Lord, Lord Curry. I am afraid to say that even after these conversations—or mostly because of them—and in spite of the enthusiasm of the noble Lord, Lord Curry, my scepticism was not entirely removed.

In my experience, and that of others, the smallholder estates have lost their way from their original successful purposes. Their heyday, as the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, just mentioned, was after the First World War when they grew enormously and provided rural sanctuary and livelihoods for soldiers returning from the front. In Somerset, where I used to live, a whole estate near us was given to the nation for this purpose. Since then the farms have continued to provide sanctuary and livelihoods for many aspiring farmers.

More recently, over the past 30 years or so, I have been conscious that the occupants of these farms have been getting older and older. They can almost be described as being trapped on their smallholdings. The old form of tenancy that lasts for ever has resulted in these once-young families turning into grandparents on holdings that are now too small to provide a decent living. Some have survived because the children have been enterprising and converted buildings into workshops, farm shops and even playschools; but most survive by family members going out and getting wages in the wider rural economy, so that the family and the old man who is the tenant can survive on the land. Rarely these days is the tenant a young, aspiring farmer on the first rung of the farming ladder. One of the problems, as other noble Lords have mentioned, is that the next rung on the ladder is almost impossible to find or afford, so the old tenants have simply remained on that bottom rung.

You have to ask yourself, if you were a county council with farming assets of some £40 million, £50 million or more, would you use them just to keep 20 or 30 farmers on the land, often for the rest of their lives, or would you sell that land and invest the money to help a far greater number of your wider constituents? That would be a very unimaginative approach.

I turn to Amendment 159, from the noble Earl, Lord Dundee. Why not use these estates as a model example of what can be done with land and landed assets to make them really work for the people of your county? As his amendment hints, why not create small businesses on them? Create affordable housing or sheltered accommodation. Create allotments. Create environmental havens and biodiversity in a way that the locals can see and appreciate. Create innovative products using food, timber or textiles. Hold competitions for suggestions for new ways to use the land. Yes, also have some farm tenancies—strictly time-limited to, say, 10 to 12 years—that provide that essential bottom rung of the farming ladder for young families.

Having, as noble Lords will see, overcome my scepticism—thank goodness—I am now certain that these county council estates should be kept and survive, but they need a new purpose in life, new blood and new ideas, with more imagination as to how they can truly serve their electorate. I am very supportive of Amendment 159 in the name of the noble Earl.

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I take great pleasure in following the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, and his words of wisdom. I apologise for the discourtesy of pulling out of the last group because of a meeting of the EU Committee, but I agree with my noble friend the Minister about the invaluable contribution of rural communities and the vital importance of the various strands of work to accelerate digital connectivity on farms and in rural areas.

I wish briefly to express my concern with Amendments 223 and 237 to 246 on landlord-tenant issues. Some are more worrying than others. We need to be clear about how the landlords’ and tenants’ interests will be handled under ELMS and other schemes, but we need to be very careful. Those of us old enough to remember the introduction of hereditary tenancies by the Labour Government in the 1970s—without consultation, I may add—remember the devastating effect on the supply of tenanted land. The apparent attempt in Amendments 243 and 244 to widen this principle to less-close relatives is misguided. It is like trying to keep rents low by fixing them, then being surprised when the supply of housing dries up. I find it amazing that these amendments try to extend the hereditary principle in new areas. I thought the trend was to reduce it in modern Britain. In any case, the associated interference in the laws of property would be unjustified.

Moreover, I am highly dubious about trying to cover the detail in this already gargantuan Bill. Tenancy reform beyond the proposals already in the Bill should be the subject of separate legislation and preferably of parliamentary scrutiny in draft.

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[Viscount Trenchard]

My Lords, I was most grateful to my noble friend Lord Northbrook for his kind words of thanks for my support for his amendment in an earlier group. However, I fear I must disappoint him this time with his Amendment 165.

I worry that the inclusion in the Bill of onerous food security obligations on the Secretary of State might be counterproductive, because it is not clear whether the Government favour food sourced from domestic production or are even-handed between imported and domestic food. To report in detail more often than once every five years would be unnecessary. I therefore oppose most of the amendments in this group, especially Amendment 166 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, Amendment 167 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hain, and Amendments 168 and 173.

A requirement for food security targets, as envisaged by Amendment 171 in the name of my noble friend Lady McIntosh, might arouse suspicion among our trading partners just as we seek to strike comprehensive free trade agreements with several of them. I suggest that improved diet and increased diversity of foods, including those imported from overseas, has contributed greatly to food security and household food security in the years since the Second World War and has much reduced the percentage of the household budget that the less well-off spend on food.

Rather than national food plans and national food strategies, the Government should ensure that, in future, our food markets will be free of the distortions that exist today as a result of our membership of the common agricultural policy. Amendment 173 provides for public procurement to promote the purchase of domestically produced food, which many might think a laudable objective. However, as noble Lords are no doubt aware, campaigns to buy British are usually at arm’s length from government because they fall foul of WTO rules. This amendment could leave the Government exposed to challenge, as I am sure the Minister is well aware.

If we are to have regular reporting on food security every five years, as envisaged by the Bill, I have some sympathy with Amendment 169, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, which should assist in the reduction of food waste from the current unacceptable levels, and with part of Amendment 172 in the name of my noble friend Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, except for that part suggesting that the Government could control the amount of food imported compared with domestic production.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington [V]]

My Lords, I would like to speak briefly to Amendment 162 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh. I totally support the words of the noble Lord, Lord Curry, and I too congratulate the Government for introducing Clause 17 into the Bill.

The excellent thing about Clause 17 is its comprehensive approach. Looking at subsection (2), the relevant factors in these reports—as noted by others—would have to cover a wide range of areas. To name but a few, they would have to report on: our population, its distribution and its nutritional needs; changing tastes and markets; the success or otherwise of a food waste strategy; the percentage of our food that comes from our own diminishing farmland; and port facilities, logistics infrastructure and the cost of transport.

Externally, they would also have to report on: the world political map with regard to food production and consumption; world political stability, for all sorts of reasons, including transport; and now, of course, the world health outlook. There will be other matters to be examined, but that gives you a taste of the breadth of the subject.

As the noble Lord, Lord Curry, said, this will inevitably involve a small team of people at Defra permanently trawling for the relevant up-to-date information across this wide landscape, and this small team cannot just be convened every now and again. We have seen this year how quickly a situation can arise. The department needs to have its finger on the pulse, so if this team is permanently doing the work, and hopefully informing Ministers on a regular basis, why not have done with it and produce a report on an annual, or at the very least biennial, basis? Whether this report needs to be laid formally before Parliament is another matter. Personally, I would support an annual basis, as in Amendment 162.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Cameron of Dillington Excerpts

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

[The Earl of Dundee (Con) [V]]

My Lords, as has already been urged, there is a compelling case for paying attention to the plight of small abattoirs and for the Government to offer financial support to enable their survival. They are relied upon by farmers who market the meat from their own animals locally.

A small abattoir is one which slaughters fewer than 1,000 livestock units each year. However, as the noble Lord, Lord Trees, said, in spite of strong and growing local demand, they are being driven out of business by a combination of factors beyond their control. For example, in the last 12 months a further seven have had to close. The Government seek to protect local farming communities and their ancillary services, and to increase rural employment. In the conditional and qualified way that the noble Lord has outlined, it is therefore all the more consistent with the Bill that they should now assist small abattoirs.

I hope that my noble friend the Minister can give us reassurance about this today. Meanwhile, in supporting this amendment, I pay tribute to the Food Standards Agency for doing as much as it can in difficult circumstances, as I do to the noble Lord, Lord Trees, for the useful recent report he has written on small abattoirs, as chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Animal Welfare.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB) [V]]

My Lords, in line with this amendment, I support the principle of slaughtering animals as close as possible to their place of growth and finishing. To me, there are three main reasons why this is a good idea, some of which have already been touched on.

First, it minimises the stress on the animals, which must be a golden rule or ambition underlying everything that our livestock industry stands for. I might add that this lack of stress has also been proven to improve the quality of the meat.

Secondly, local abattoirs allow specialist producers to generate premium prices from the sale of meat, based on branding due to genuine local provenance and high animal welfare. For some of our breeders, especially those in remote and special landscapes, this USP is crucial to the success of their enterprise.

Thirdly, local slaughter allows for the handling, cutting, processing and marketing of the meat to be done close to the point of production, thus enabling the economic and social benefits of the whole production process to be captured by the local rural economy.

All three of these reasons are important for remote rural communities, and particularly island-based communities, as mentioned by noble Lords. As the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, said, the shenanigans and even cruelty involved in the process of getting animals bred on the Isles of Scilly to slaughter is a prime example of how to almost destroy a perfectly good-quality local organic food business. Clearly, small abattoirs result in an expensive system, but with the market emphasis focusing more and more on high-quality and specialist production, particularly local production, it is to be hoped that the Government will support such schemes wherever they can.

[Baroness Hodgson of Abinger (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I refer to my interests as declared previously. I too will speak to the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Trees, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Mallalieu, Lady Jones and Lady Bakewell. I had hoped to put my name down to it too, but was too late getting in.

Noble Lords have already eloquently laid out the case for this amendment and I do not propose to repeat all the arguments. However, I too emphasise the benefits that this amendment would bring. Clearly, reducing travel times has to be a priority. Slaughter should take place at the closest point possible to where animals are raised. Also, the more individual handling that takes place in a small abattoir is, I hope, less frightening than a big processing abattoir. Not only would that enable the provision of private kill, as described previously, thus helping farmers who wish to sell their meat themselves; farmers would also be able to ensure that animals are killed in the way they prefer and that they are pre-stunned.

Much as I respect the needs of our multicultural society in the UK—I emphasise that—I am also concerned about welfare standards. The RSPCA and Compassion in World Farming have highlighted that more animals are killed without stunning than are needed for UK halal and kosher consumption, and that they are more flexible for sale. A Food Standards Agency report last year highlighted that 90,000 of the 2.9 million non-stunned animals slaughtered for kosher-certified meat were rejected as unfit for religious consumption and went into the general market unlabelled. Enabling private kill for local small abattoirs will give farmers a choice if they do not wish their animals to be slaughtered in that way. I also ask the Minister for better labelling of all meat products regarding the method of slaughter, so that those who wish to eat meat that has been pre-stunned are able to do so.

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On tier 2 and tier 3, a farm is going be asked to take part in a wider scheme with local farms under tier 2, or one of the tier 3 schemes—whatever it turns out to be. I am still not getting very sensible answers from the Minister; he is not telling me what I want to know. I want to know what tier 3 schemes are going to be beyond peat, moors and forestry; the last time, I think he also mentioned catchment area schemes. Let us have some more information about tier 3. If a farm takes part in a tier 3 scheme, who carries it out? Who makes the money out of it? What is in it for the farmer? Will farmers just be paid a rent, for example, for allowing their farm to be part of it? How will that work? It is not very clear. It is complicated, and I can see that it is going to be an absolute disaster unless it is organised very well indeed.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington [V]]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 131 because of the worry that political short-termism could interfere with what is a very long-term and often unstable industry. In farming, when you buy a bull, you are not likely to sell the progeny of that animal for at least three years. If you buy a dairy calf, it is two years before it produces its first litre of milk. If you invest in projects such as a new grain building or new milking equipment, you are likely to be taking out a 15-year mortgage, so that enterprise has to last for 15 years before you start to get any real return.

All this means that it would be incredibly helpful if you had a long-term perspective from whatever Government are in power or will be in power; you need a degree of certainty that the rug will not be pulled from under your feet after only five years. Of course, no business expects to operate in a world of total certainty, but farmers have enough uncertainty as it is without Governments removing key building blocks at short notice. Not only do we farmers get floods, droughts, pests and diseases, but our farm product prices sometimes literally halve overnight, dropping some 20% to 30% below the cost of production. It is difficult to make a decent living from a small farm.

All I am saying is that I think we owe it to our farmers to take government backing for agriculture, in whatever form that currently happens to be, out of the five-year political cycle and allow farmers the comfort of a seven-year, multi-annual financial plan. I realise that no Parliament or Government can bind their successor, but it would be politically much more difficult for them to change the rules if a seven-year term for a financial plan were in this Bill.

[Lord Wigley (PC) [V]]

My Lords, I very much agree with the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, when he spoke a moment ago about the dangers of short-termism. That issue is vital when we are talking about long- term investment. I draw attention to my registered interests.

I have put my name to Amendment 134, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh. It requires financial provisions to be linked to strategic priorities, addressing the same issue as that referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, and the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie. The central message of this and other amendments in this group is to ensure that the good purposes in the Bill and as committed to by Ministers at the Dispatch Box are tied to the financial mechanisms—that one links to the other, and there is certainty.

The lead amendment in this group, Amendment 105, moved by the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, focuses on the need to ensure adequate finance—specifically, no less than has been provided in the recent past. Given our present economic plight, it is clear that assurances along these lines are very much needed.

Amendment 112 deals with carry-over, as does Amendment 128, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Rock. This question is one that we really need to give some attention to. We had difficulties in the National Assembly, as it then was, in Cardiff a few years ago when the Welsh Government very sensibly arranged not to spend money at year-end for the sake of it, but to carry it over into a consolidated fund for strategic purposes. That money was immediately taken back by the Treasury. If ever there was an example of short-term thinking and punishing people for sensible approaches to financial planning, that was it.

Maintaining the level of cash support for agriculture is clearly regarded by the farming fraternity as a key issue. A plethora of general commitments may well have been given to assuage their fears, but we need a specific commitment in the Bill, if possible. That is why I believe these amendments are important for the House.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Cameron of Dillington Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 14th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Burnett (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I declare my interests as set out in the register. I shall speak to Amendment 38, in the names of my noble friend Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie of Downpatrick, and the noble Lord, Lord Randall. This amendment adds implementation of comprehensive integrated pest and weed management measures, based on an agroecological approach, as an additional criterion for financial assistance.

Before I speak to Amendment 38, I shall say how grateful I am to the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff, to whom the previous speaker referred. She made a compelling and valuable contribution last Thursday evening in support of her Amendment 259. She was powerfully supported by the noble Lord, Lord Patel, a co-signatory to the amendment. I have considerable sympathy for the principle of a periodic review of the safety of herbicides and pesticides.

Reverting to Amendment 38, I start by declaring that of course I understand that competition is valuable when it is fair and based on common rules and standards. I think that all noble Lords will agree that British agriculture has high standards of animal welfare, and that farmers and growers strive to protect the environment and our landscape. They rightly strive to produce healthy and safe food, not only for human consumption but also for animal consumption. I remind noble Lords that much of the grain produced in the UK goes toward animal feed, and that some of those animals are slaughtered for human consumption.

The experiences of foot and mouth and, prior to that, BSE vividly illustrate the consequences for individuals and this country when standards are allowed to slip. Our growers produce much-needed high-quality vegetables and fruit for human consumption and, to grow the crops, there has to be a system of pest, weed and disease control. This process should be

“based on an agroecological approach”,

in the words of Amendment 38. Unfortunately, when the transition period ends on 31 December this year, many of our likely new trading partners will not be inhibited from using methods and chemicals that are toxic and potentially damaging to human physical and mental health. These products are also potentially damaging to animal health. Some of them have carcinogenic side-effects. Even exercising rights of way by walking or running near crops sprayed with toxic sprays would be a danger to health from inhalation.

There are reports that British consumers face being exposed to toxic chemicals linked to serious health problems if they buy food imported from, for example, America, under the terms of a new trade agreement being negotiated with the USA. Experts say that supermarkets and restaurants will be flooded with cheap produce that has been sprayed with toxic pesticides which are currently banned in Britain and the European Union. I have seen a list published in a respected national newspaper of 70 pesticides that are widely used in the USA but banned in Britain and the EU.

A Toxic Trade study also shows how US farmers use vast quantities of pesticides compared to producers in Britain. If we allow these products to be imported into this country, the price will include a significantly increased risk to human health, which will be borne by the British consumer. It is my hope that Members from all parts of your Lordships’ House will come together to enact legislation in the Bill to ensure that the British consumer is protected from this threat. With the financial assistance provided for in this amendment and with other statutory provisions, we should go some way to keep our standards high and our food safe.

Finally, the Government have manoeuvred us out of the European Union on terms yet to be agreed. This leaves all businesses scandalously and perilously short of time to plan and prepare. The Government themselves have rightly been manoeuvred away from a reliance on the People’s Republic of China. We are not in a strong bargaining position. It is up to Parliament to ensure that the Government comply with the commitments they have repeatedly made to farmers, growers and the public to keep our food safe.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I am so pleased that the question of good soils found its way into this edition of the Bill. We have Rebecca Pow MP to thank for that improvement to the earlier editions. As the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, said last Thursday, in a mere teaspoonful of good soil there should be over 1 billion bacteria and probably, among those, over 1 million different species of bacteria, of which we can identify clearly only about 10%. Nevertheless, it is the bacteria that, with the help of water and sunshine, produce our crops and food. We ignore their health at our peril, so I support all the amendments on maintaining healthy soils and the continuous monitoring of the soils of our nation.

I support the principle of Amendment 117, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, and others, on the protection of meadows and other semi-natural grasslands. Meadows and semi-natural grasslands are very important habitats, first because of the amazing variety of flowers that exist there, especially rare orchids and other wildflowers, some of which have wonderful names—such as chalk milkwort, lady’s bedstraw, cuckoo flower, common toadflax, et cetera. These meadows and ancient grasslands also hold a wide diversity of fauna—rare moths, butterflies, beetles, crickets and grasshoppers—which in turn attract a large variety of birds trying to eat them. All this biodiversity specialness is not to underplay the important historical significance of these meadows and semi-natural grasslands.

I have already declared my interest as chair of the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology. Some noble Lords may have noticed, last week, that our satellite survey indicated that 8,000 square kilometres of meadows and other grasslands have been lost from Britain’s farms and public land over the last 25 years. That is about the size of Cornwall. When you consider that the previous statistic available was that we had lost over 90% of our ancient meadows and grasslands since World War II, it is really important to keep the ones we still have.

My only comment on the amendment is that, while I am sure the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, knows a semi-natural grassland when she sees one, I am not sure that all farmers and landowners necessarily do, particularly if they have just bought the land in question and it is midwinter, when it might not be so obvious what a jewel they have. It would be best if local councils and/or Natural England designated all such meadows and semi-natural grasslands where they have not already done so—a lot of them are, of course, already registered—to make it clear to all and sundry what incredibly valuable heirlooms these places really are.

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[Lord Marlesford [V]]

I have one thing to add. There is the inescapable fact that after 2021 farmers will not get money under the basic payment scheme in the same way as they have done. That money is on average around 70% of their taxable profit. Without it, many would not be able to continue. They therefore must be helped into what they will do instead and how they will diversify their farming operation to get themselves a living. That is why I back these amendments.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington [V]]

My Lords, on this group of amendments on training for farmers we have come to the nub, that pivotal point where this Bill will either succeed or fail in its ambitions. These amendments are the key to getting the whole new agricultural, environmental land management programme to work on the ground.

It is exciting that with this Bill we have a whole new approach to producing our food and managing the countryside while rewarding farmers. We do not know yet exactly where we are going—ELMs is still at the pilot stage—but one thing is certain. Farmers and land managers will need all the help and training they can get if we are to make it work on the ground.

There is very little time between the demise of the single farm payment and the putting in place of thousands of ELM contracts—good luck with that—so we must get a training scheme in place as soon as possible, training not only how best to judge what the farmer and his land can provide for the nation, but also how best to deliver. Proper training will make things better for farmers, better for our flora, fauna, meadows and woodlands, better for visitors and, above all, better for the taxpayers, who might then get the best return on their money.

By their very nature, farmers take a long-term view: live as if you will die tomorrow, but farm as if you will live for ever. That does not necessarily mean that they are slow to change, but they need help and assistance to change. Farming is one of the most isolated jobs in the world, so without some form of a proper training scheme it will be hard for farmers to engage properly with this brave new world that we are hoping to roll out—and without their engagement, frankly, the brave new world will not happen.

[Lord Carrington [V]]

My Lords, I support Amendments 58 and 119, as tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, and the noble Earl, Lord Caithness. I also agree with every word that the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, just said, and the words of other noble Lords.

The threat of sanctions put off many farmers from taking up opportunities under the current environmental schemes. These sanctions threaten not only the environmental scheme payments themselves, but also, through cross-compliance, the basic payments. Access to and the eligibility of financing advice is therefore supremely important if there is to be a wide take-up of ELM schemes. The wealthier farmers with larger farms often have good access to advice, but most of this is expensive and unattractive as an option. Farmers are not a homogenous group. All that a farmer with a small to medium-sized farm knows about is the traditional farming that he has done for ever through good and bad years. He knows the risks. That is his life and livelihood. A farmer may not have great expectations and he may not take foreign holidays, but he fears getting involved in a new venture outside of his comfort zone which could lead to direct or indirect sanctions and put him out of business.

A study by the School of Agriculture, Policy and Development at the University of Reading and the Institute for Sustainable Food at the University of Sheffield looked at the impact of the digital divide and sometimes limited access to broadband in rural areas, which, together with lack of time, the age of the farmer and social isolation, has made it difficult for farmers to contribute to or participate in the design of ELMs.

These factors will not have changed at the implementation stage, so access to and funding for farm advisers with good training and good communication skills is essential. The success or otherwise of the Bill will be judged partly by the take up and success of environmental land management schemes. The balance between crop production on marginal land and environmental schemes is the key. Too little profit from the environmental land management scheme will encourage continued production on marginal land, leading to possible losses and risks to the farmer’s business and livelihood. If there is too much profit in the scheme there will be a loss of farm production and, consequently, greater imports of food and less self-sufficiency. This demonstrates the importance of the provision of advice and, if necessary, financing it.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Cameron of Dillington Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 9th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB) [V]]

My Lords, as this is the first time I have spoken in Committee, and for the purposes of all the Committee stage, I declare my interests as a retired farmer and landowner, as chair of the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology and chair of the steering group of the Government’s Global Food Security programme.

This is a strange grouping, and I wish to speak to three completely different aspects of the group. Starting with Amendment 12, I join most of my colleagues in emphasising the importance of helping farmers to welcome schools, families and other citizens to their farms. It is vital that people from all backgrounds, especially inner cities and the BAME communities, are helped to make that all-important personal connection to our wonderful countryside in a way that is more meaningful than sitting and watching it on telly. It is vital that both the joys and hardships of rural life are understood by as many people as possible.

We are a very crowded nation. I believe England is the fifth most densely populated country in the world. Yet we still have some of the most fantastic countryside. I would like to hope that that countryside, and the farmers who created it and now manage it throughout all seasons—hot and cold, wet and dry—will continue to be an inspiration to our children and grandchildren, and that it will always be part of that unique heritage which we pass on with pride to those who come after us.

I turn to Amendment 32 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, on the advancement of technology. As you might expect, I am very keen on agriculture and environmental technology and the advancement of robotics. I have an amendment later on genetics, so I will keep my powder dry on that, but robotics has huge potential as well, using small or mini tractors in each and every field. I hope that these tractors will eventually be not be much bigger than, say, a large suitcase with arms on wheels or tracks, even, which would be great for avoiding soil compaction. Let us hope that they will also be cheap enough for African smallholders to own.

They will come out of their small electric charging sheds, probably in the middle of the night, check that it is not raining and that the soil is dry enough to work, then using minimum tillage techniques, plant the crop. In Africa, of course, they will emerge only if the automatic connection to the local weather station says that it is going to rain in the next few days, because the timing of planting crops in Africa, in relation to the coming of the rains, is crucial.

After this small robotic machine has planted the seeds, it will wander around the growing crops looking for signs of pests and diseases and then either warn the farmer, hoe the weed or squirt each leaf with whatever treatment it needs to make it healthy. Note that it will squirt only the individual leaf, not the whole plant, let alone the whole field as is done at present, so the use of pesticides and herbicides will be reduced to an absolute minimum, partly because only the individual leaf is being treated and partly because the treatment will be carried out the moment the problem has appeared, thus, one hopes, preventing it spreading throughout the rest of the crop. Such robotics will revolutionise the growing of crops in our country and, more importantly, in the developing world. What is more, we in this country are at the forefront of these developments and with the right funding we would be the leader in the field, so I support Amendment 32.

And now for something completely different, I turn to Amendment 43 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, and others. I welcome the tenor of this amendment, although I also recognise the Government’s desire to limit the ambitions of ELM schemes to what is already in Clause 1. There is no doubt that ELMS cannot be all things to all men, although we in this House might like to hope so. However, it is always good to have a debate and to get the Minister’s response on the Floor of the House, and I hope that in this case other bodies, such as local authorities, local town councils, national park authorities and even public-spirited companies, will pick up on this issue and take it forward in the spirit of the new rural environment we hope to create with the Bill.

When I chaired the Countryside Agency, a long time ago—at the turn of this century—we looked carefully at local food chains and what we could do to help. We realised that “Buy British”, for instance, was a forlorn gambit that had never and would never work with the buying public, but all our research indicated that customers really liked the idea of supporting local growers and local businesses—ie, Farmer Bob and his daughter down the road. Incidentally, under Covid, new supermarket research has shown that the “buy local” trend is now really taking off. So at the Countryside Agency, we sponsored and helped to promote farmers’ markets. In many towns local shopkeepers loudly objected to this “undercutting competition” as they called it, but they soon discovered that on market days the town was rammed with punters, which of course made their turnovers boom as well. Every town should have a farmers’ market or a local market, but they need kick-starting, usually with some form of public money to begin with, even if it is only rent holidays for stall-holders.

At the Countryside Agency we also had our “Eat the View” campaign, which tried to persuade customers who loved their local countryside that the best way to support it was to eat its products. The phrase “eat the view” came from curmudgeonly farmers of the 1980s who complained about the emphasis on the environment over food, and used to say, “It’s all very well but you can’t eat the view”, and we said, and I still say today, “You most certainly can.”

Another relevant scheme we had was our market town initiative. We had some good rural supporting projects at the Countryside Agency. If a market town was going to act as a hub for tourism and its surrounding villages, it needed to promote itself with a local theme, usually involving local products from either a local business or a farm. A very good example of this was Bridport in Dorset, which was brought low by the demise of its rope-making industry, but has now reinvented and revived itself as a thriving must-be-at destination, largely based on local food. It has a brilliant local market on Wednesday and Saturday every week of the year, and it hums—or at least it did before Covid-19.

What I am saying is that given a small amount of pump-priming and organisational help, such projects can make a big difference to local farmers and businesses and would be totally in line with the Chancellor’s desired economic boost. The difference would be particularly apparent where the farms were small and the land did not lend itself to large agricultural enterprises. We should remember that it is just that sort of land that is probably the most highly prized by the British public, because it tends to be the most beautiful, and it is just those farmers and land managers whom the public would expect their taxes to support.

So, we must have local ELM schemes, locally envisaged and run by locals for locals. Perhaps I can end with a good example from the Blackdown Hills AONB in Somerset. Two or more decades ago, with lottery and local authority funding, the Blackdown Hills Business Association, including many farmers and small businesses, was started. It has training sessions for its members in everything from IT to marketing and takes a large tent at the local show to market its wares. With now more than 100 members paying membership fees, it funds itself, but it needed funding for its first 10 years. It is the encouragement and flexibility of that sort of funding that we are asking for here, so that, for example, farms and businesses who are not lucky enough to be in a really good AONB can also hope to get that kind of support.