Catchment Based Approach’s Chalk Stream Restoration Strategy 2021

Lord Chidgey Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd November 2021 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Chidgey]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the Catchment Based Approach’s Chalk Stream Restoration Strategy 2021 and related reports from the Angling Trust and the Rivers Trust and others; and what steps they intend to take in response.

[Lord Chidgey (LD)]

My Lords, I acknowledge that the Minister has extensive connections to the chalk downlands of southern England, together with his neighbour, the noble Duke, the Duke of Wellington. We are fortunate to have two such experienced and knowledgeable guardians of our treasured chalk streams in this House. I can only say that as a third-generation migrant to Hampshire from Somerset, I have been at ease with the welcoming South Downs since childhood, through my own eyes, those of my children and now those of my grandchildren.

My concerns over our chalk streams, and the importance of their protection and restoration, have been greeted with intense interest and support from all sides and at all levels. I place on record my thanks to the many organisations and individuals whose work is helping in the assessment of the state of our chalk streams, the restoration work in progress and the commitments still needed. They include: Stuart Singleton-White and Martin Salter at the Angling Trust; Christine Colvin at Rivers Trust UK; Jacob Wallace of Water UK; Stuart Roberts of the NFU; the Troubled Waters report; the Wildlife and Countryside Link; the Itchen Valley Association; Hampshire county councillor Jackie Porter; and Winchester City councillor Margo Power, among others.

Chalk streams are unique to England and, to a limited extent, to France and Denmark. They represent unique biosystems, supporting broad biodiversity with a delicately balanced food chain. Many are in a sorry state through decades of pollution, overabstraction and reckless discharging. They, like the fish now gasping in shallow puddles, are literally dying as the streams dry up. No more moorhens busy paddling through the water; no more water voles scurrying along the banks; no more kingfishers skimming over river surface in flashes of colour, to the delight of passing children and the chagrin of water bailiffs.

As we debated the Commons response to the Lords amendments to the Environment Bill, noble Lords interjected in disgust at the news that a drone had recorded an open pipe pumping raw sewage into Langstone Harbour in Hampshire. The Environment Agency’s own statistics reveal that water companies dumped raw sewage into our waterways and seas more than 400,000 times last year alone. I ask the Minister to acknowledge in his reply the realistic cost estimates from the Rivers Trust of a phased exercise in reducing discharge of raw sewage into CSOs, and to discard the fanciful figures conjured up for Government MPs by their spin doctors. They resorted to the age-old claim of the privatised water industry that because of the age of our Victorian era water and sewerage systems, it would be extremely challenging and could cost £150 billion to eliminate sewage discharges from storm overflows.

As the Rivers Trust points out, not all of our sewerage network is a relic from the Victorian era. There are different approaches to the issues. For example, the costs of retaining storm overflows discharging to inland waterways, but limiting their operations, vary widely depending on how frequently they operate. Modelling nationally applied policies and scenarios showed that reducing spillages to 40 a year on average would cost around £5 billion, with an annual benefit of £2 billion, and an impact on household bills of only £9 per year. A refinement, mixing the requirement for spill control depending on river type, and reducing the number of spills to, say, 10 in sensitive catchments, could cost some £18 billion. The impact on annual household bills would be around £30 per year.

In other words, a focused implementation of CSO reduction on chalk streams is cost effective, despite previous claims that it is not. This shows that, while you can spin the politics, it pays not to try to spin the science.

Shifting the focus to the finances of the privatised water companies, new analysis revealed that, in the past 11 years, as raw sewage dumping increased, those companies have paid shareholders £16.9 billion in dividends, or £1.4 billion a year on average. How much has been invested in upgrading the sewerage systems and sewage treatment? There are no figures available.

Let me briefly reference a chalk stream issue causing concern to the good people of Chesham and Amersham. The Little Missenden Parish Council has been in touch, concerned about the planned HS2 tunnel under their River Misbourne, which will go through structureless chalk, rather than the competent chalk envisaged in the HS2 Act, greatly increasing the chance of settlement and damage to the chalk stream beds. I confess I am not familiar with the River Misbourne, but chalk is a porous rock, providing an excellent aquifer and containing up to 40% water in its interstices, which can make it structurally unstable. Bore holes will no doubt be required to confirm its structural integrity.

I turn now specifically to the chalk stream restoration strategy, drawn up by a cross-sector group under the leadership of the Angling Trust. The report sets out a series of recommendations interlinking water quality, water quantity and habitat restoration. This is seen as a clear, comprehensive vision and plan for the future of our chalk streams. However, it will be worthless unless immediate and urgent action is taken by the Government, the Environment Agency, Ofwat and the water companies. There is no more room for excuses and delays.

The key recommendation of the strategy is for an overarching level of protection and priority status for chalk streams and their catchments. This would give them a distinct identity and help to drive investment in water resources infrastructure, water treatment and catchment-scale restoration in chalk stream areas. Other recommendations from the Angling Trust include: a consensus agreement that sustainable abstraction is that which ensures flows are reduced by no more than 10% of their natural flow; time-bound goals set to meet the targets on all chalk streams where feasible and beneficial; where public water supply is heavily reliant on ground water abstraction, provision of higher protection through designation as water-stressed areas; driving down nutrient loading of chalk streams to appropriate levels; prioritisation of investment in all sewage treatment works, to which can be added installation of phosphorous strippers, replacement of defunct septic tank drainage and connections to treatment works; and targets for reducing pollution and restoring process.

In its current work, 21st Century Rivers: Ten Actions for Change, Water UK sets out a series of recommendations to enable the water sector and others to deliver a holistic, sustainable improvement in the health of England’s rivers. Not limited to chalk streams, the report nevertheless sets out its own 10 recommendations, strengthening the arguments for dramatically improving the health of our rivers.

It calls for a new, long-term strategy for rivers to include input from the Government, regulators, water companies, catchment partnerships, agriculture, highways and other sectors to help guide and prioritise investment and policy change. It sets out the importance of all sectors working together to achieve the fundamental changes required. The creation of a national plan to eliminate harm from storm overflows, prioritising nature-based solutions and action to massively increase public awareness of the water catchments are among other proposals made.

One of the key species that defines chalk streams is the Atlantic salmon. The River Clyde, running through the heart of Glasgow and currently COP 26—much in the news—was once a dead river, but now teems again with shoals of Atlantic salmon. If they can return to the Clyde, they can return to the River Itchen and the Test. If it can be done on the Clyde, it can be done for chalk streams. All it needs is the will.

Finally, my Lords, I return to the CaBA chalk stream restoration group strategy report. In conclusion, it emphasises that,

“Over and over … it has been made clear that when it comes to the investment decisions which determine the health of our chalk streams—in reducing abstraction, or pollution or paying for habitat work—a powerful statutory driver makes all the difference … to bring our chalk streams back to ecological health, not just in a few privileged places, but right across the map.”


It will perhaps allow future generations to share the delights of the chalk streams that we enjoy.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Chidgey Excerpts

Report stage & Report: 3rd sitting (Hansard) & Report: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 22nd September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judd (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, said that we need this provision in the Bill. She is absolutely right. The reason why the amendment proposed by my noble friend Lord Grantchester and others is so important is that we have put considerable effort and commitment into build up the standards of food, animal welfare and husbandry and, as we were debating earlier, pesticides. It would be quite wrong, inadvertently or deliberately—and we cannot discount deliberately, given the way things are—to allow the commitment with which we have made all these improvements to be rapidly undermined. We need these amendments very seriously.

As a former Defence Minister—albeit long ago—I often remarked that we like to use the phrase, “The primary responsibility of government and Parliament is the safety of the British people”. Here, we are talking about a very real dimension of the safety of the British people, not to mention animal welfare; it is as strong and important as that. I therefore hope that there will be widespread support in the House for these vital amendments.

We get lots of interesting and well researched briefs from all sorts of people who are concerned about the Bill. The strength of feeling about our responsibility at this juncture to put our commitment firmly in place and reinforce it has never been more convincing. I am very glad, therefore, to be able to support the amendments.

[Lord Chidgey (LD) [V]]

My Lords, it is always a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Judd. I speak in support of these amendments, in particular, the requirement to meet environmental and other standards which are at least equivalent to, or exceed, those which apply to UK-produced agricultural goods.

Noble Lords may recall that I spoke in Committee in support of protecting and enhancing our countryside and of concerns about the pollution being suffered in the catchments of chalk streams such as the Rivers Alre, Itchen and Test, all in Hampshire. In particular, I referenced the activities of the agricultural processing and distribution group Bakkavor in its industrial plant close by the River Alre in Alresford. The abstraction and discharge of water from the Alre has been linked to the rise in pollutants exceeding the levels permitted by the Environment Agency.

I can now advise your Lordships that Bakkavor has since announced its decision to close Alresford Salads in October. The resultant job losses at a difficult time are, of course, a worry, but clearly, Bakkavor and similar businesses can operate their food processing plants from proper industrial sites anywhere, near or far. They do not have to pick sites that threaten the ecology and environment of unique chalk streams with their pollutants, or damage the infrastructure of historic towns with their 40-tonne lorries trundling through medieval streets. As the chairman of the Alresford Society has pointed out in a letter to the Hampshire Chronicle of 3 September:

“The focus now needs to be on what might happen to the Alresford site in the future. The market for ready to eat food, including washed and bagged salad, is large and growing”.


Could the current large water extraction licence held by Bakkavor be transferred to another operator? Could the discharge consent licence be renegotiated in the face of damning scientific evidence? If diversion into a mains sewage system was considered feasible and affordable, the town would still continue to suffer the daily stream of 40-tonne lorries through streets that were built to cater for stagecoaches.

I believe there is an opportunity within this Bill to avoid this. Alresford is just one example. It is on the boundary of the South Downs National Park. The local plan states:

“It will only permit development …. which has an operational need for a countryside location … or proposals for the re-use of existing rural buildings, which should not cause harm to the character and landscape of the area, or neighbouring uses, or create inappropriate noise, or light, or traffic generation.”


Nevertheless, the Minister will be aware that in 2018, the Government announced changes to the town and country planning order 2015, allowing adaptation of agricultural buildings, which could undermine restrictions set out in local plans. Could the Minister assure me that, in such sensitive rural areas, local planning restrictions will remain paramount?

This Bill can provide the means to protect towns like Alresford and surrounding villages, within the chalk stream catchment, from environmental vandalism for generations to come, if only by employing and reinforcing the regulations that are now in place. Unchecked industrial development should never take precedence over the preservation of our rural environment, particularly the unique chalk stream catchments of rural Hampshire. To that effect, I am very pleased to place on record that, following its inaugural meeting, I have become a vice-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Chalk Streams. Its intent, inter alia, is to monitor and hold to account, those agencies whose actions could damage chalk stream ecology and environment.

[Baroness Altmann (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, on moving Amendments 89ZA and 93 and on his excellent introduction. These amendments would ensure that agricultural products could be imported into the country only if they met our high domestic standards for food safety, hygiene and traceability and the protection of the environment and plant health. They are not only important in terms of maintaining and improving environmental public health and food standards and addressing the wider ecological crisis, but they will also protect our farmers and environmental standards, which are vital for all our futures on this planet.

I have listened carefully to the many excellent contributions to this debate and have been convinced more than ever by the arguments in favour of Amendments 89ZA, 93 and 103. I also congratulate my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering and have sympathy with her Amendment 90. We must ensure that we have fair competition and a level playing field for our farmers. If we allow lower-quality imported foods to undercut our higher-standard national farming methods, we jeopardise not only UK health standards but national food security. We must not undermine our own interests or those of our farmers. The well-being of the UK agriculture sector and small farms is vital for our national self-sufficiency in food. Especially as an island nation, we need a thriving domestic agricultural sector, and the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, made these points powerfully. We are talking about food, not widgets or cheap clothing imports or grains of corn. This is not the same as the Corn Laws debate. Importing cheap corn is a far cry from importing lower-standard meat or processed foods or risking the protection of the planet.

Following last year’s Trade Bill discussions, I regret that the Government no longer intend to align our standards—or seemingly no longer intend to do so—with existing levels across the EU. This would obviously have been safer both for the problem of the Northern Ireland border and for public health. My noble friend assured us in Committee that existing laws will protect our standards and that these amendments were not necessary. I do not doubt the intent and integrity of my noble friend, who is one of our most dedicated and knowledgeable Ministers, but I share the concerns expressed by so many noble Lords and am finding it pretty impossible to support the Government’s position. Therefore, I would be grateful if the Minister could respond to some of the questions from others—the noble Lords, Lord Krebs and Lord Rooker, in particular —including on whether our definition of food standards includes food production and whether Defra still rules out importing lower-standard foods, because it sounds from this debate as if that might not be the case.

Moreover, will my noble friend please explain how aligning with WTO food standards, rather than the higher standards that we have today, would impact the Northern Ireland protocol and the border flows for farmers on the island of Ireland, as mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Empey? Without reassurances on these questions, I wonder if the Minister, if he is unable to accept these amendments, could undertake to come back at Third Reading with the department’s own wording for a commitment to this effect on the face of the Bill.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Chidgey Excerpts

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

[Lord Mann (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, I speak in support of Amendments 12 and 13, and I endorse what was said by the noble Earl, Lord Devon, and other noble Lords, on the importance of robotics in agriculture. I well remember being involved in this in the 1980s. We were the world leaders in new robotic developments, but of course, constrained by the state subsidy rules of the European Union, we lost out to Japan and the United States, where, in particular, the use of contract compliance with state orders for the military gave them the competitive advantage to protect their fledgling industry.

My appeal to the Government as we leave the European Union is this. In this country, state aid is generally seen as protecting old, dying industries, but, at its essence, it is to protect fledgling industries that need link-ups with universities and the ability to experiment to get products that work to market. In robotics and artificial intelligence, not least in the area of agriculture, our potential is huge. If we were to win that battle, we would be more self-reliant and more competitively advantaged internationally. We should grab those opportunities before it is too late, not least because China is doing the same thing; it is leading the market and getting that market advantage.

At the same time, we should not copy the Chinese model for GM food. One thing that most surprises me about the debate on agriculture in this country is how we have allowed a form of quasi-communism to run it. Look at the role of the supermarkets: every strawberry and carrot must be identical in size and taste. This is specified by supermarket contracts, which farmers struggle to meet and make a profit under. The answer is not to move towards GM food—the ultimate communist dream of every product looking the same and tasting the same—but to go in the opposite direction. Something far more radical than farmers’ markets is needed, although they are a good starting point, conceptually. The whole basis of the tax incentive system for local food needs radically overhauling in his country. The incentives should be for real production, as the farmer sees it taken to the local market, to take out the food miles and to challenge directly this communism of the supermarkets in making everything the same. Again, in leaving the European Union, we have the opportunity to give that incentive to those local markets, and we should be doing so in a very big way.

Finally, I have a comment on trees and forestry. Pit timber used to grow alongside the collieries of this country in a very big way. We failed to learn the lessons of that in our forestry planting. Forestry planting has been seen as the preserve of the rural economy, yet on former coalfield sites we have huge swathes of reclaimed land, once brownfield and often still laid to waste. It would be ideal for reforestation as an industry, exactly as was done for those pit timbers 100 and 150 years ago—the remnants of which still exist. That would also give an amenity to local communities over the next 50 years. We should rethink precisely where our forests are being planted.

[Lord Chidgey (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I speak in support of Amendment 43 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, and other noble Lords, which provides for

“financial powers to develop local food strategies and infrastructure and to support small farms and/or community agricultural businesses with the purpose of improving public access to fresh and nutritious food, improving farm viability, reducing transport associated with agricultural products and securing our domestic food supply.”

I welcome this amendment, as in many ways it goes to the heart of my community’s concerns for preserving, protecting and enhancing our countryside, our farms and our food supply. Earlier in Committee, I described our concerns over the pollution suffered in the catchment areas of the chalk streams in Hampshire, which feed into the rivers Arle, Itchen, Test and others, and which, by extraction, provide a third of the domestic water supply in the area. In his response, the Minister reminded us that farmers were now constrained from allowing nitrates to wash into our watercourses. This is very welcome, though I am reminded that scientists believe that it can take 60 years for water to percolate through chalk aquifer and reach the watercourses. I recall that, in about 1992, through the good offices of the late Lord Ross, I was able to put a Question down in your Lordships’ House on the effects of pesticides on the chalk aquifers and our future water supply. If I remember my engineering geology, it is not unusual for chalk to reach 40% saturation in its natural state.

There are others in the food supply chain besides farmers. In my Alresford locality, close by the river Arle, we have an agriculture processing factory, operated by the Bakkavör Group, which has plants around the UK, in Europe, the USA and China. It imports salad products by road to the plant in Alresford, from as far afield as Spain, in 40-tonne lorries, squeezing through the narrow streets of our ancient towns to get to the processing plant. That is totally at odds with the aims of this amendment and, I would hope, of this Bill. I understand that at the plant they use water from the chalk streams and lakes under licence to wash the salad free of chemicals and fertilisers, and possibly nitrates, which end up in the watercourses and lakes. Can the Minister confirm that these agroindustrial operations are subject to the same regulations as farmers? Who is responsible for their enforcement and where are enforcement levels monitored?

The noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington, nicely and clearly described the situation in Bridport. In Alresford, like in many ancient market towns, while under pressure from urbanisation to meet housing demands, the opportunities to support small farms and community agricultural businesses to secure our domestic food supply are at risk of being overlooked. I support my noble friend Lord Greaves in his comments on this amendment, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle. I enjoy the benefits of a community market, selling homemade products, and a series of farm shops ranging from simple rustic sheds to sophisticated top-end establishments with extraordinary ranges of goods and produce, all two or three miles from my doorstep.

[Lord Naseby (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I declare an interest. My wife and I own 40 acres of woodland which is registered in a 10-year plan with the Forestry Commission, whose work I pay tribute to.

Before I get on to Amendments 13 and 61, I must say that I share the views of the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, and my noble friends Lord Marlesford and Lord Cormack. It is not productive to a good debate on long and difficult Bills such as this one to sit in front of a screen for six or seven hours, and frankly, nor is it healthy. Purely by luck, I stumbled across the code of conduct for Cambridge University, which says that you should not be in front of a screen for more than one and a half to two hours. I suggest to the House authorities that we have a duty of care to all Members. I hope that they will reflect on that.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Chidgey Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansarad) & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansarad): House of Lords
Tuesday 7th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Adonis (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I want to pick up where the noble Lord, Lord Empey, has just left off on the hugely important issue of co-operation between different parts of the United Kingdom.

Amendment 66, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, looks to be superfluous, as I assume that the Minister will tell us that there is absolutely nothing to prevent a framework for agricultural co-operation between England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland by the free will of their respective Governments. The issue, then, is not whether a legal power is needed—I assume that no legal power is needed—but what machinery the Government envisage will be needed to promote co-operation between England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland on agriculture and the environment; I am not aware that any such machinery is in place at the moment. I think that the Committee would be grateful if the Minister could address that point. It is about not just ongoing talks but what institutional machinery there will be to promote co-operation.

The noble Lord, Lord Empey, has just raised a very important point. In respect of co-operating with Northern Ireland, that means co-operating with the EU. As so often in our debates, I am afraid that everything comes back to Brexit.

This relates also a very important amendment in this very large group which has barely been discussed, because there are so many other issues. Amendment 234, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, proposes that:

“The Secretary of State must establish a service to provide a means for farmers to associate, and to support, advise and assist them to deliver improvements in food security, nutrition and environmental standards.”


In respect of agriculture and the environment, this strikes me as a very similar role to that which NICE—the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence—plays in respect of the NHS, as an independent body promoting best practice on the basis of thorough research and engagement. Most people who have experience of the NICE arrangements in the NHS think that they work well, have by and large promoted good practice, and to some extent have helped to depoliticise what would otherwise be very thorny issues.

Amendment 234, and the body that the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, envisages, looks to me to be a very good move, and I hope that the Minister will be able to indicate a willingness to consider it. It may be that we could work this up into a proposal between now and Report. I cannot think of any good argument against it, including from the Government’s perspective, because it is in the interests of the Government that a body of impartial evidence and the promotion of best practice are encouraged.

This comes back to the issue raised by the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, in Amendment 66. I am a supporter of devolution, and it is to my great regret that, in the past 20 years, Scotland and Wales have tended, as a matter of reflex, to define themselves against what England does. I think that sometimes they are right to do so and sometimes they are wrong to do so. To my huge regret, often what happens in Scotland and Wales is not a decision about whether or not policies are better than those in England, but just wanting to be different from England.

There is a real danger for the management of environment and agricultural support that Scotland, Wales and to a lesser extent Northern Ireland—Northern Ireland is effectively still part of the EU—will seek to define themselves against England for the sake of doing so. That would be hugely regrettable. Therefore, machinery to promote co-operation is important. An impartial best-practice body of the kind envisaged in Amendment 234 could act as a means to promote co-operation between the constituent parts of the UK. It would not be the Government in London seeking to promote in any partisan way their own policies and the interests of England; rather, if this works well, it would be serious experts and a serious process of promoting consensus that could, if that is done, even though it starts off being in respect of only England, have an impact on promoting co-operation between Scotland and Wales. It could also interact with the European Union, which would be good in its own right, but also enormously beneficial for relations with Northern Ireland.

[Lord Chidgey (LD) [V]]

I will speak to Amendment 83 to Clause 1, in particular the work that my noble friend Lord Greaves mentioned. I will highlight the issue of catchment areas and draw attention to the fact that, while they create great difficulty in some areas of the country, they also do so in some of the most favoured areas, if I may put it that way.

The catchment areas in question are a series of spring-fed chalk streams and their seasonal winterbournes, which define the landscape around Winchester in north Hampshire. Many people know that they are famed for their world-class fly fishing for the most favoured in the rivers Test and Itchen, and for the watercress industry around Alresford. The unique landscape is a product of human as well as natural history, providing drinking water for Southampton and, at one time, pure water for banknote watermarking at the De La Rue works near Basingstoke.

In the last 50 years—certainly while I have lived in the area—more than half of all wildlife species have declined across the UK, never more so than in Hampshire’s winterbourne and watercress landscape, including its conservation areas, sites of special scientific interest and areas of outstanding natural beauty. Historically, efforts to protect rivers and their ecology focused on the channel and possibly the immediate floodplain. There now needs to be an increasing awareness that a river system is inherently linked to and affected by its wider catchment.

The water framework directive recognises this and requires a holistic view of the needs of the freshwater environment. It identified the pressures affecting Hampshire’s seven headwater chalk streams and set targets for the improvement of the chemical and ecological status of each. It also required stakeholders to be involved in local decision-making and delivery. Clearly, the quality of the water in these headwater chalk streams is critical, contributing as the streams do to the Test and Itchen river systems and the groundwater resource they share.

It therefore has to be a cause of considerable concern that recent surveys have shown that all the streams are at risk from excessive levels of nutrients, sediment and pesticides, the worst case being the River Alre, which is literally on my doorstep. The lake behind a weir, built in the 16th century to control the river waters before entering Alresford’s watercress beds, is heavily polluted with nitrates and phosphates, largely due to agricultural run-off. The Environment Agency is understood to have recently tested the water in the River Alre above the lake and found it below standard. An industrial-scale salad-washing plant is nearby and is licensed to use the river water to wash all pesticides and other chemicals from salads imported from Europe and elsewhere for distribution across the UK.

Apparently, the Environment Agency is required to negotiate with polluters over infringements rather than close them, with predictable results. The Agriculture Bill should present an opportunity to strengthen this rather toothless organisation to tackle this extremely harmful abuse. To give just one example, Salmon & Trout Conservation considers the presence of these pesticides responsible for the marked decline in Gammarus freshwater shrimp, the foodstuff of the trout of the river.

I draw your Lordships’ attention to the UK Progress on Reducing Nitrate Pollution report from the other place. Have the Government taken action to take up and recognise the recommendations made by the committee that produced the report? They will be essential to tackle this hugely damaging problem of nitrates in our watercourses, water tables and water catchments.

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, as one of the silenced ones at Second Reading, I must begin by declaring my interests in the register. In particular, I point to the fact that I farm, have land and am involved in land management in Cumbria. I endorse the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, and a number of other noble Lords about the condition of the uplands.

Although this afternoon should have been the second day of the Second Reading—after all, the Bill is not due to conclude until September—I do not propose to make a Second Reading speech. Rather, perhaps unusually, I intend to follow the recommendation of the Government Front Bench not to be repetitious. I have heard the various contributions made across the Floor of the House and it is clear that they run with the grain of my thinking through this discussion of the first group of amendments, many of which would improve, refine and calibrate the general principles on the Bill. It is necessary to be clear what the generalities might in turn entail.

Many of your Lordships have said that we are at a very important point of change—perhaps as important as joining the CAP or even the great radical changes of the 1940s. In fact, I suspect it is a more important change, because we have not only political and administrative changes; they are combined with very far-reaching scientific and social change and a great deal of enhanced environmental consciousness. That is why I join a number of your Lordships in saying that it is a great pity that this legislation is not being run in substantive tandem with the new environmental legislation due to come on to the statute book. The underlying reality is that many of the Bill’s provisions cannot be free-standing in their own terms. The remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, were particularly important in this context when he talked about the complications and importance of systems and administration.

Direct Payments Ceilings Regulations 2020

Lord Chidgey Excerpts

Wednesday 1st July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Chidgey (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I support the regulations in spite of their originating through Brexit, which of course I regret.

In the distant past my family invested in an agricultural engineering business in Somerset. It is long gone but there remains in north Somerset the Chidgey farm, though I have no direct connection to it. However, I live in and have represented a farming community locally, with a rich history in farming evolution and development. The eastern border of the South Downs National Park runs past our drive on the road into New Alresford in Hampshire. I am a member of the Alresford and District Agricultural Society, established over 100 years ago. Its annual show, held half a mile away at Tichborne Park, is renowned throughout the region as a major event in the farming community.

New Alresford is one of several Georgian market towns that developed across Hampshire, prospering as a centre for sheep farming with markets supplied by drovers from across the South Downs. The Southampton-to-London coach road ran through the town, recalled by a turnpike cottage as you enter today, and no fewer than three coaching inns are located in the centre. Mixed farming seemed the order of the day, with cereal crops flourishing on the downlands. When the railway came, trout from Hampshire’s chalk streams, complemented by local watercress, could make it to London on the watercress line in a matter of hours.

Clearly, farming in Hampshire can be very much top-end and not at all in the difficult upland terrain requiring the support acknowledged in the review undertaken by the noble Lord, Lord Bew. His recommendations are a feature of the regulations for direct payments to farmers set out in this statutory instrument. Nevertheless, high-quality farming conditions attract high land values, high labour costs and high support costs. Without the benefit of an inherited farm, start-up costs can be prohibitive. There are many large farms in the farming community in Hampshire and, as mentioned by my noble friend Lady Northover, tenant farmers often struggle to meet the costs that they have to incur for that rental. With changes in public taste, there is greater interest in local products and produce and more opportunities for niche farming. The Bew review formula for funding allocations is based on such productivity, and on need.

The Government claim to recognise farming efficiency and the need to improve the environment, and that their policy will help farmers to continue to provide a supply of healthy home-grown produce to high environmental and animal welfare standards, yet Parliament is expressing unease at the prospect of agricultural standards being loosened under the new trade agreements. Only today it was reported that Waitrose has said that any regression from existing standards would be unacceptable.

We find that, through lax planning controls, the essence of our idyllic town of Alresford is under threat. A few years ago the watercress beds were bought by a major player in the fresh salad market. The farm became a major preparation and distribution centre for salad products brought in by road from mainland Europe. The clear waters of our River Alre are extracted to wash the nutrients and chemical deposits off the salads back into the river. As a result, the ecology of the river is slowly dying and the insects, birds and small mammals are disappearing, while the agencies responsible for maintaining and protecting the environment simply prevaricate.

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Alderdice) (LD)]

The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, will not be speaking, so I call the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering.