Agriculture Bill

Debate between Lord Chidgey and Lord Mann

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.