Agriculture Bill

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

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

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

My Lords, having had the opportunity to read last Thursday’s part debate, I cast my short remarks in general terms. When I read what was said on that occasion, I was reminded of what my father said to me many years ago: real farming—that is, responsible farming—is farming with the grain of nature, because farming, agriculture and forestry are about cropping, not quarrying. This is why soil fertility matters, whether impoverishing the soil or treating it in such a hard way that the topsoil might blow away, as I understand has happened in parts of the Fens.

It is not as though some help, of an appropriate sort, cannot be applied. After all, there is a difference between a sensible and responsible application of fertilisers and certain pesticides to unlock the soil’s potential and simply using the earth as a kind of binding agent—a chemical mixture from which crops are derived. The same general approach applies to animals. I have considerable sympathy with proponents of organic farming, but if you have animals there are occasions when you simply have to use antibiotics, as we do on my farm.

All this shows that there is an interconnectedness in good farming practice, which brings us to questions of agroecology and agroforestry. Again, it is all a matter of integrating land uses and techniques, which is why agroecology is so important. Different uses on the farm need to complement each other in an ecologically and economically sustainable balance. I cannot see that there is any alternative but to have a degree of bureaucracy, because every farm is different.

In particular, I will touch on the espousal of agroforestry by the noble Baroness, Lady Young. It is important that we are clear, in this wider context, about the difference between trees, woods and forests. In particular, trees, copses and belts are important parts of farms, while forestry and large woods are something slightly different. Of course, the noble Baroness is an enthusiast for wood pasture. That is a very tricky one, because once you introduce stock, unless it is at a very low density, the trees get destroyed. In the north of England, where I come from, wood pasture has been very badly damaged by the introduction of livestock. It will cost a considerable amount of money to reinstate it, which is not to say that that is not the right thing to do.

All this is about human intervention in the workings of nature. If we do not run with nature’s grain, we shall destroy our countryside and degrade its products, which, as a number of noble Lords have said, are what we eat. That is why we must treat these things with such care. I suspect that the golden rule is that we must not be greedy. Of course, that includes the state, which must recognise that all of a farm’s outputs, as the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, commented last week, are important in whatever form they come.

[Lord Wigley (PC) [V]]

My Lords, I draw attention to my registered interests in agricultural matters and my membership of the Farmers’ Union of Wales. I give enthusiastic support to Amendment 259 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff, to which I have added my name. I pay tribute to the excellent work that she has undertaken on these matters, as indeed has the noble Lord, Lord Patel, who spoke with similar professional authority earlier in this debate last week.

My support for the amendment arises for three reasons. The first relates to the very real dangers of disabilities being triggered by exposure to chemicals among children, including babies in the womb. As an MP, I served for 11 years as vice-chair of the All-Party Group for Disability, working closely with the redoubtable Jack Ashley on these issues, not least regarding thalidomide. That experience taught me that we must always be guided by the precautionary principle. If there is any doubt whatever about possible ill effects of herbicides and pesticides, they should be banned unless and until it is proven beyond doubt that they are safe, not only for human beings, but for animals.

In this context, I respectfully disagree fundamentally with the noble Viscount, Lord Trenchard, the last speaker in this debate on Thursday evening. The break has allowed me to study his precise words. He said that leaving the European Union gives us the opportunity to develop our own food standards, avoiding the

“unnecessary and costly burdens on farmers”

because of EU regulations,

“which rely too much on the precautionary principle”.—[Official Report, 9/7/20; cols. 1324.]

I fundamentally disagree with this approach and invite the Minister to indicate whether the Government will distance themselves from the noble Viscount’s remarks.

My views are coloured not just by my involvement with disabled children. I have previously referred in the House to my late cousin, Owen Wigley, a Minnesota farmer who died from a condition that his family are convinced was triggered by exposure to the weedkiller Roundup, which is the subject of a raft of court cases in the United States. I have seen the devastating impact on the natural environment in my home area, where use of such chemicals in too strong a mix, which had not been adequately dose controlled, as the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, mentioned, had the effect of wiping out all plant life in a field for a whole season, leaving it unusable for agricultural purposes. My wife also had a relative, a farmer in Wales, whose close family was convinced that his health suffered enormously from the effect of such chemicals in sheep dips. When I was an MP, I had a constituent whose family were convinced was severely disabled from exposure to such sheep-dipping chemicals.

Thirdly, I add my voice in support of the need to safeguard the process of pollination. The vital contribution of bees and other pollinators to our wildlife is fundamental to the survival of our natural environment and, in turn, humanity itself. This amendment provides an opportunity to place a responsibility on all engaged in the production of food to have a proactive awareness of these dangers at the forefront of their minds, and for the living world to be protected from such dire consequences.

If we are, rightly, to place such responsibilities on our food producers in these islands, they must also, most assuredly, be criteria against which the standards of all imported food should be measured. Products that fail to meet the required standard should be denied access to UK markets. I was so glad to hear the noble Lord, Lord Burnett, highlight this. I urge the Government to accept Amendment 259.

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[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I refer to my interests, which I set out on day one of Committee last Tuesday. I refer back to the concerns of those supporting native ponies about the wording of Amendment 69. Naturally, none of them, nor I, have any objection to the support of food management, but the wording of Amendment 69 has the potential to confine financial support to food production and might therefore exclude native ponies from financial assistance.

[Lord Inglewood [V]]

My Lords, ever since the age of the hunter-gatherers, earth has been supplying humankind’s food needs. That is why I am pleased to support the amendment proposed by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, and the thrust of many of the other amendments which have been grouped with it.

Over the centuries, famine has been a regular feature of human history in different parts of the world. It is worth recalling that in western Europe, immediately post the Second World War, in the period that the Germans call Die Stunde Null—that is, within living memory of people alive today—people were starving to death. Of course, it was partly for this reason that the common agricultural policy was set up in the way in which it was. Given that, it is not perhaps as silly as it is sometimes thought to be by certain not very well-informed commentators in this country.

I think it is generally agreed that one of the duties of a state is to ensure with reasonable certainty that its citizens have enough to eat of an appropriate quality and at a reasonable price. It seems that if it is necessary and appropriate to do so, the state should spend money to ensure that this happens. Of course, medieval chroniclers tell us that, on occasion, people in besieged cities lived on cats, rats and dogs, but I do not imagine that many people would consider that a desirable state of affairs.

What is interesting about the first clause of the Bill is that climate change is mentioned, because it affects the earth we live on, and in turn the future of humanity. Equally, however, I believe that food security should be included in this section of the Bill because, in a completely different way, it just as much affects the future of humanity.

Some of your Lordships may remember that it was not all that long ago that there was a very poor wheat harvest, and suddenly the price of bread shot up in the supermarkets. If you were to believe the tabloid press, there was a huge crisis. Equally, there was an interesting article in the House magazine this week written by the managing director of Arla Foods—I declare a specific interest in that I sell my milk to Arla. He said that it is interesting that in this country we still import 35.5% of the yoghurt we consume, just under 40% of the butter and just under 68% of all cheese. Our security of supply is in a number of temperate foodstuffs—obviously, we cannot produce bananas and things like that here—very far from secure. It is rather like pandemics, is it not? “Oh no, it couldn’t happen here”—but then suddenly Covid-19 comes out of left field and we are all caught in a very exposed position.

The Minister may well argue that food security is by inference present around the Bill because it is part of general policy that the state should be guarantor of food security. However, if you look at the way in which the Bill is constructed, and you look at Clause 1, you see that those provisions are there to set out the ground rules for our future agricultural order and the financial support for it. I believe, for the reasons I have just explained, that food security should be included within it so that the ground rules are clear to everybody.

[Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, I am delighted to followed the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, and to support the amendments in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady McIntosh of Pickering and Lady Jones of Whitchurch. This group of amendments is quite clearly about the need to fight and campaign for, but above all to establish and place in the Bill, food security. While food security might be implicit, it needs to be explicit.

Like the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, and the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, I was a member—albeit not for as long as they were—of the Select Committee under the chairmanship of the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, that published the report last week entitled, Hungry for Change: Fixing the Failures in Food. I agree with my colleagues that a holistic, systems approach has to be taken to food, from the moment it is produced and grown by the farmer, right through processing and retailers, through to the consumer and food waste. These things are all vital. I urge the Minister to read that report. In advance of the government response, I urge him to indicate in his response today whether he has read our Select Committee report and whether he has any initial thoughts. Will he ensure that these amendments dealing with food security—now heightened as a result of the Covid situation—are placed in the Bill?

We are also still awaiting the report from Henry Dimbleby, who coincidentally gave us evidence. It is important that the national food strategy comes forward as quickly as possible, because we want to encourage people to eat healthily.

Like the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, I would like to see the day when people do not have to access food banks because of their inability to purchase food due to lack of resources. It is therefore important that we build a robust, resilient food supply. This is an issue for all of government, not solely Defra.

The amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, talks about food sustainability and farming

“in an environmentally sustainable way”,

which is vital. It is also important that this Bill reflects food security directly related to health and well-being as important components in qualification for financial assistance.

A whole chapter of our report dealt with food security. One of our recommendations is

“built around the central aim of ensuring that everyone, regardless of income, has access to a healthy”,

affordable and sustainable diet. An onus should be placed on farmers to ensure food security as part of the food system.

Equally, like the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, I say an onus has to be placed on the processors and retailers to ensure they are providing food of a healthy, nutritious quality, not subject to reformulation through the addition of fats and salts. We have to create a healthy nation of people who have good health and well-being. If that means more fruit and vegetables are eaten, that is all to the good.

I support this group of amendments, in particular Amendments 35 and 36. I also commend the report from our Select Committee and look forward to the Minister’s response to it, indicating support and that cross-departmental action will be taken across government to ensure that its recommendations are fully implemented.

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[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I support Amendment 122 in the name of my noble friend Lord Grantchester and I thank the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, for bringing forward his amendments. We are standing at a watershed for farming and land management. We cannot underestimate the scale of change that this Bill denotes. We need to fund an effective advisory process to support farmers and land managers through what could otherwise be cataclysmic changes. Over the past 30 years we have seen the erosion and virtual disappearance of what was, in early days, a systematic advisory support service, which had developed to support farming improvements in the post-war era. Most farming advice is now provided by commercial agronomists with products to sell or by fragmented single-focus organisations. Advice needs to cover not only technical and productivity improvements but ecological literacy. The scale and ambition of the changes the Bill proposes and the multiple functions we need land to deliver show that the time has come again for a comprehensive and joined-up approach to advisory services, and for the funding to deliver that. I hope the Minister can support this.

[Lord Inglewood [V]]

My Lords, being a farmer, over the past two or three years I have had to think very carefully about my activities in future. In my case, I have one specific and really quite complicated land use problem—or perhaps I should say challenge—to deal with. The way in which I have approached it is to take a certain amount of specialist advice. In simple terms, that advice has been paid for by the BPS payment I received. As all your Lordships know, the BPS payment is to be cut and the effect is that the money that otherwise would pay for advice may well not be there.

My example is not particular to me; a lot of farmers are thinking seriously about what they have to do next. They will have to take external advice, probably now—it is no good waiting until the changes come into effect before you decide what to do. What you have to do is think about the future, work on the basis of what we know about the general rules and regulations that will be in place and plan a course. In all sorts of ways, this is something which many farmers cannot do. Of course, if you are going to take advice, you have to pay for it. When the BPS is cut back, individual farms’ resources to do that will be curtailed. I suggest to the Committee, and through it to the Minister, something which I have mentioned to his private office. Instead of simply cutting pieces off the BPS payment until ELMS comes into being, it should be possible for that money to be drawn down from individual farms and hypothecated to get the advice necessary to prepare the farmers for the future world that will come. Otherwise I fear a lot of farms will not do enough homework, which will be to the detriment of not only British agriculture but Britain as a whole.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

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

Some will say that that rewilding sounds like a modern version of impractical hippy idealism, but the reverse is true. It is growing in popularity from small beginnings and it is here to stay. Holding a brief debate about it today in the House of Lords is a useful thing to do. I beg to move.

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

My Lords, I am pleased to follow the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, on these three amendments and to support the arguments that he has advanced. It is encouraging that these are narrower amendments, which means that the debate will be less slightly less prolix. It is clear from the debates in your Lordships’ House on the Agriculture Bill that there is general agreement about the revolution going on in the countryside, which is not only technological, but intellectual, psychological and emotional. Against that background, what is known as rewilding, as defined by the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, is in fact a real part, although obviously only a part, of a new era for the nation’s rural landscape.

Of course, as the noble Lord said, the populist perception of rewilding means releasing sabre-toothed tigers on Hampstead Heath, or perhaps slightly less melodramatically, what is happening on the Knepp estate in Sussex. That kind of rewilding may well have a role in the future countryside, but it will certainly be only a part of that future. Rewilding covers a whole range of things from plants and insects to animals. Since the beginning of time, our environment has been evolving and changing, sometimes quickly and at other times almost imperceptibly. It is absolutely clear that our flora and fauna are always in a state of flux. Look at what has happened to the landscape and the plants and animals in it since the last ice age.

During that period, we humans, as part of creation, have been one of the vectors. In some instances, our involvement has been benign, and in others, particularly in the case of some alien introductions, it clearly has not. But it is as legitimate, subject to proper consideration, to interfere with the ecology of the relatively unaltered parts of our land as with that of the more intensively cultivated parts, when it is called farming or forestry. That is why I believe rewilding, however exactly you define it, should be an element, but only a part, of the future. Natural and rural agricultural policy should encompass it, and hence, it should become part of national policy.

[Lord Lucas [V]]

My Lords, I look forward to the Minister’s reply on Amendment 19. Our ability to repair the landscape is obviously crucial to getting our South Downs back in order. Kew is immensely helpful in this regard with its seed bank, which gives us some species we have long lost. We have to play an active part in getting our countryside back and not just wait for it to happen gradually over the next few centuries.

As for wider rewilding, yes, Knepp is wonderful—I have been there—but it requires fences. If you fence an area and you want nature taking care of itself, with very light-touch management, you need large herbivores and top predators. Otherwise, as in Knepp, we have to be the top predator. So, we have to accept our role in rewilding—we are the top predator. We have a role to play in a rewilded landscape. If you try to do it without boundaries, the herbivores leak; I do not think Knepp’s neighbours would be much pleased if all the Tamworth pigs started straying across their wheat crops. It is a concept that takes some very careful working out. We ought to learn the lessons of the rebellion in Wales, when the rewilding attempt failed. I encourage the Government to look in this direction, but with a good deal of scepticism.

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[Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick [V]]

My Lords, I support Amendment 26 in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Shrewsbury. I live in the countryside, albeit I am not involved in farming, and I have always believed that there is interdependence and a symbiotic relationship between health and welfare when it comes to livestock: both go together. I want to probe the Minister to find out why it should be an either/or subject. The majority of noble Lords who have spoken this evening have said quite clearly that it should be conjunctive—health and welfare.

I take on board what the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb and Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, said about animal welfare. Of course animal welfare is important because we must have good animal husbandry if we seek to have a sound, productive system that provides health and well-being. We therefore need health and welfare in terms of good livestock and that symbiotic relationship, but we also need to ensure there is good-quality food that people can access—food security, not food insecurity. I am happy to support Amendments 26, 125 and 136, as long as noble Lords recognise the importance of health and welfare together. I also welcome back the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, who, I must say, is looking very well indeed. I wish him well.

[Lord Inglewood [V]]

My Lords, I am sure contributors are right to distinguish between animal health and animal welfare. The important thing is to combine the two: you can conceive of an animal being entirely healthy but having extremely unsatisfactory welfare conditions. Therefore, regardless of how you draft provisions, it is important that each is recognised as an independent concept. Support for livestock farming should be dependent on the satisfactory standards being reached in respect of each. I should declare that I am a livestock farmer and president of the Livestock Auctioneers’ Association.

The core issue we are discussing with these amendments was articulated by the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, earlier when she said that animals should have a good life and a good death. That must be the starting point.

Like many of your Lordships, I am also delighted to see the return of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, who combines expertise and robust common sense about these things. Of course, he is right. I personally do not like factory farming, but one has to recognise that, to feed our population, various forms of intensive animal husbandry will take place. I hope we can improve the standards of welfare that the animals experience over time and there must be a level below which the standards should now not be allowed to fall.

Against this background, it seems entirely appropriate that welfare and health should be a component of any support that might be provided for animal farmers. First, it must be right that the conditions in which animals live have to be above a certain minimum. Secondly, it is worth remembering that you have to move animals about. The conditions in which they are moved must also be appropriate. Finally, of course, we must turn our attention to the food on the shelves of our supermarkets and shops. No doubt we shall go back to this at a later stage in the proceedings and the Bill, but I have serious problems with the standards experienced by animals that are dead on the shelves, which would in no way be permitted if they had been reared in this country. That was the point that the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, alluded to.

It is a difficult problem for the reason one of the noble Baronesses gave: we are not creating new criminal law here. Issues of animal welfare depend on the animal, not on the system of agriculture in which it is reared. While I do not believe that animals have rights, I do believe that we have obligations towards them, which we jolly well must honour.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

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

[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.

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[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (The Earl of Kinnoull) (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, after the noble Lord, Lord Judd, speaks, I will call the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, again.

[Lord Inglewood [V]]

My Lords, with the first group of amendments, we did the easy bit: we discussed the generalities. Now, as we move towards specifics, it becomes harder. I will not speak to a specific amendment, for the simple reason that I agree with them and I disagree with them. It is all a muddle. My starting point is very much the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, and my noble friend Lord Marlesford. After all, at the end of the war, it was clear that agriculture was coterminous with the rural economy. That is no longer the case. The remarks of my noble friend Lord Marlesford about the Rural Business Unit, merit very serious consideration and have an important part to play in the evolution of policy in this area.

As far as the immediate matters we are discussing are concerned, the crucial thing is to think about the provision of public goods. This is not a form of outdoor relief, but an arrangement for the acquisition, in the public interest, of things it is desirable for the public to have. Their acquisition divides into two separate things. First, it is an ongoing product which is essentially a function of maintaining land, but to do that, in certain circumstances it is necessary to invest capital. If you start looking at the economics of it in that way, it becomes more understandable.

The other thing that I have learned from farming is that just about all you can be certain of is that things go wrong. In this country, as we know, an awful lot of agriculture is conducted under the landlord and tenant system, but this disguises a whole range of arrangements between landlords and tenants. In those arrangements, the various parties contribute very differently and the risk is carried differently. In any event, if you are thinking about these subjects, how do you deal with the landlord and tenant system separately from that of owner-occupiers? How, in financial terms, is an owner-occupier with large borrowings different from a tenant who is borrowing “money” from a landlord? That makes it very difficult.

In addition, there is not only one form of land tenure. In the north, where I come from, there is a great deal of common land, as we have heard this afternoon. The problems with common land have caused considerable injustice in the way in which they have locked, or failed to lock properly, into environmental payments. The noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, spoke about conacre in Ireland, which I have heard about but never come across personally.

Furthermore, in looking at public money for public goods, we have to be clear that what is suitable in place A is not suitable in place B. Different bits of Britain are completely different from one another. I live in Cumbria, on the edge of the Lake District, but I spent a number of years in East Anglia on the edge of the Fens. They are as different as the automotive industry and the aerospace industry. We have to be very specific and careful and start by thinking about what advantage the public can gain from any particular place.

In terms of money, it seems axiomatic that there should be proper audit. This must be accounted for properly because, in any commercial transaction and wherever public money is involved, you have to be able to see what is going on and trace it properly. However, confidentiality is also important, a point which I think has been made. I am a dairy farmer; we have had our supplier on to us about security in the face of animal welfare activists.

At the end of the day, it is for the Government to work out what they want to buy under the principle of public money for public goods. As I and others have said, they are pretty vague in their own mind about what they want to do. In dealing with the consequences for the people on the ground, as much as possible—this has been touched on by a number of speakers—if it is appropriate to find an agreement between the various interests involved in the use of land, that must be a very good starting point to take it further forward.

[Lord Judd [V]]

My Lords, I return to the basic amendment for this group from the noble Lord, Lord Addington, and the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market. It makes sense. It spells out more fully the range of activity which I am sure the Government intend to cover and specifies some of these areas more clearly. At this point in our economic history, which is not very cheerful, horticulture may become very much more important than it is even today. It may become an important part of our way of life and an important way of generating income for a cross-section of people. This will not be altogether a bad thing. It will lead to a better quality of life for them, frankly, than what they may have been involved in before. For all these reasons, we should be grateful for this amendment. I certainly support it.

Flood Response

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

Monday 10th February 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My understanding is that the property flood resilience recovery fund was part of the package following November’s flooding. The grant allows eligible local authorities, with 25 or more properties flooded in this timeframe of flooding—as in South Yorkshire and the north Midlands—to run a local property flood resilience scheme. Each eligible property under it would be able to receive £5,000 to fund changes that would help it become more resilient to any future flooding. To my knowledge, a number of insurance companies will also assist with that resilience. Having been flooded, one thing to do is to move obvious things such as the electric points. Where are they and can they be further up, particularly in areas that traditionally flood? That is why the pub in York, for instance, has its bar on the first floor.

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

Does the Minister not agree that a good place to start would be to have a simple, blanket moratorium on constructing houses and other sorts of buildings in areas proven to flood? No ifs or buts; it should just be no.

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, I think that would mean most of London could never have been constructed. I do not mean to be facetious by saying that, but the truth is that many parts of our towns would be so deemed now. That is why we have the Thames Barrier and the hard flood defences that we do, and the Environment Agency is absolutely key to this. While I do not have the statistics in front of me, I think that very few planning applications that would be in a flood plain are permitted, precisely because of the point that my noble friend has alluded to.

Direct Payments to Farmers (Legislative Continuity) Bill

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

3rd reading & 2nd reading & Committee negatived & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords & 3rd reading (Hansard): House of Lords & Committee negatived (Hansard): House of Lords & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 3rd reading (Hansard) & Committee negatived (Hansard)
Wednesday 29th January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, like a number of other contributors to this debate, I must begin by declaring my interests in the register. I farm in Cumbria, both in the uplands and on the lower ground, and I am now and have been for some time in receipt of basic payment scheme payments. I have received those because it was considered that what I was doing was in the public interest and should be supported.

That has been the case for a long time. For decades, not to say centuries, agriculture has been a market regulated in the public interest, but the problem now is that what I am being paid for is not thought a particularly good way of supporting me to do what I am doing, and nor is it necessarily supposed that what I am doing is in the public interest. It is thought more desirable that there should be different outputs that are produced and procured in a different way.

That seems an entirely reasonable proposition. What we are seeing today is a change which began in the 1990s and reversed a tendency that came into being at the end of the Second World War. The view that rural Britain was essentially the location of a single activity—namely, farming—is being replaced by a view that it is a place where there are multiple outputs and not a single one, food production. Let us remember, however, that food production is still important.

The hard part of this transition is the detail of where we go from here. A number of speakers today have detailed some of their concerns. I do not wish to go over that ground again, other than to say that we need also to look at the taxation system for both full-time and part-time farming, which is an equally important part of the rural economy, and at farming businesses from the perspective of sustainability. It is not desirable in the longer run for those businesses not to be able to fund reinvestment in those activities from the profits they generate.

It is also worth remembering—a point I raised in the debate on the Queen’s Speech—that rural England is similar in many ways to the north of England and the Midlands, on which the Government are placing considerable emphasis. As I said, I come from Cumbria, and I am chairman of the Cumbria local enterprise partnership. The economic condition of much of rural England is equivalent to that of the north and the Midlands, which have seen their standards of living and quality of life degraded by failure to keep up with the increased prosperity that we have seen in the south, and in particular in the south-east.

When thinking about the future of farming, it is also terribly important not to forget that we can generalise, but farms are different, random parcels of land. Many of the land uses and other things deemed desirable may well cross boundaries and it may be difficult to get people to agree on how this should be taken forward. Finally, it is very important that whatever emerges runs with the grain of land and water. We have to enlist people’s hearts and minds in the rural communities towards achieving an outcome that is considered in the national interest.

We already see cross-compliance attached to agricultural payments, and the direction of travel implies an extension and wider application of this principle. That does not seem to me remotely undesirable. Clearly, a combination of leaving the CAP and a reconfiguration of the definition of public goods means a new basis for payments. Hence the Agriculture Bill in the last Parliament; hence this Bill, now to be followed by the forthcoming Agriculture Bill just introduced in the other place.

The reality of the current state of affairs is that the Government have little alternative but to introduce the Bill in front of us, and I commend and support it. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Bew, for his work on various aspects of the payments system, particularly his emphasis on the desirability of solidarity across the United Kingdom as a whole. I would add that those in the north of England, whose agriculture is very similar to that of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, feel when you talk to them that they are getting a raw deal and that they are being discriminated against. It is important that this is both recognised and acted on.

Having said that, and as a number of other speakers have said, the Agriculture Bill introduced in the other place does not really get us a great deal further. By itself, it is very little help to those who are trying to look at the framework and financial implications of a new era and want to work out where to go from here. It is important to appreciate that, looking forward, this is both a science and an art. I feel slightly conscious in saying this that I might be portrayed like one of our 18th-century predecessors, although I would not go as far as the nobleman who is reported to have commented that he was very anxious to die before Capability Brown because he wanted to see heaven before he improved it.

It is clear that, if the new regime depends on an embedded system of public money for public goods, the requirements and terms and conditions attached to it are crucial. Currently, as Professor Julia Aglionby—recently appointed professor in practice at the Centre for National Parks and Protected Areas at the University of Cumbria—has pointed out, many in the uplands are currently staring into an economic black hole because there is no indication of what will happen next. This is a chasm as deep as that which separated Dives and Lazarus, lying between where people are today and a future sketched out by senior political leaders in statements of generalised policy tinged in green, painting a picture of sunny uplands a decade hence. Unless detail is forthcoming, and forthcoming shortly, I believe we shall have to come back to this debate 12 months from now and have a similar Bill to this one.

Queen’s Speech

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, my remarks this afternoon are based on those I was going to give the House in the debate last week on the report by the noble Lord, Lord Foster, on the rural economy. Thanks to the slippage in the timetable, I was unable to give them. I do not wish to comment on Brexit because, in an era of socioeconomic change in rural Britain and elsewhere, it is more or less irrelevant to discussion of the issues, although it may become relevant to the framework by which the policies that are developed may be implemented.

I declare an interest: I farm in Cumbria, in quite a big way by Cumbrian standards, but not compared to many other parts of England. I have a range of interests in the register. Specifically, I chair the Cumbria local enterprise partnership. Both Cumbria’s independently commissioned research and the CBI reckon that Cumbria is one of the places in England that will be most affected by Brexit.

As your Lordships know, the post-war countryside in this country is synonymous with farming and agriculture. That goes back to the policies that were delivered through the mechanisms of the Town and Country Planning Acts from the early post-war period. This was not the way it was historically, and I believe we are going to revert to something that is more similar to what went before, albeit in a different way. We can see this happening in the evolution of the common agricultural policy from the Mansholt plan to the MacSharry proposals and then the Fischler reforms. In the context of the Mansholt plan, which gave the CAP a bad name because of the wine lakes and grain mountains, we sometimes forget that people were starving to death in mainland Europe in the late 1940s.

The question to ask is: what is the countryside for? What is its point now? How does it fit in with the wishes, aspirations and framework of the wider body politic? If we think about it, it is needed for food, the protection of the environment and landscape, access, wilding and housing—both for a general increase in the amount needed in this country and in the context of finding housing in the countryside for the essential workers who make it what it is. There are questions of carbon capture, forestry, conservation, the protection of the cultural landscape—that is why the Lake District was recently made a world heritage site—energy, flood alleviation, soil protection and water. It is sometimes forgotten that most of the water used in Manchester comes from the Lake District. We do not get a penny piece for that. The countryside is also needed for business, but it will be a 21st-century business rather than a 19th-century business . All this will have to be reconfigured in this country in the context of wider international trade. We need new markets in this country, but how will they interrelate to state aid rules, et cetera? I am sure that in dealing with the European Union, were Brexit to go ahead, not having qualified majority voting might be rather a nasty shock.

Equally, we have to be clear about the different types of rural countryside. It seems to me that they can be divided into two groups. The first is what I might describe as—I hope that I do not upset people—“outer suburbia” and the second is “deep rural”, or l’Angleterre profonde, which is the kind of area that I come from.

The mantra “public money for public goods” sounds very attractive but it is worth remembering that, even in the days of area payments, which still survive to some extent, there was a need in recent years for cross-compliance. We are already moving down that road. How are we going to decide how much money is required —presumably, the more public goods you produce, the more money you get—and who will allocate it? A very substantial bureaucracy will be needed to deal with all of this. The idea that we can reduce bureaucracy in the countryside while trying to do the kind of things that have been talked about seems fanciful.

Speaking from the perspective of a LEP chairman, how will the shared prosperity fund be delivered? Will local enterprise partnerships have a role in agricultural support, as has been suggested? On the other hand, I believe that Defra is very much against that. This is important. These questions need to be answered because the process of sorting out how it will be done needs to be put in hand.

In the summer—I apologise for talking about my holiday reading—I read The Cornkister Days which is about farm towns in Aberdeenshire in the period after the First World War. What is interesting about that is that in those days money did not leave the rural economy. If you had a blacksmith-made plough and a couple of Clydesdales, the money went back into the area when they were replaced. Now, if you have a new combine, the money leaves the countryside. One thing that we need to do is to get money back into rural Britain. If we do that, we will start to address the kinds of things that cause problems, such as rural housing. We have managed—in a way, despite ourselves and despite our contempt for paysans—to turn a group of people in rural Britain more or less into what we derogatorily call “peasants”.

It is interesting that east Cumbria, which includes most of the Lake District, has a far less good record on productivity than west Cumbria. The conclusion I have reached about that is that productivity does not mention things such as the area’s contribution to the tourist industry and looking after the world heritage site. We need to redefine it to represent the realities of the 21st century. All this is going to need money and proper infrastructure. In bringing that about, I think we need to bear in mind the old Turkish story of Hodja’s donkey. Hodja had a donkey, he fed it well and it performed for him, but then he thought, “If I give it a bit less food, I’ll have a bit more money”. The less food he gave it, the more money he kept, until suddenly it died. There is a real risk that, in thinking about rural Britain, urban Britain will be not merely not very generous but positively stingy, and then the whole thing will collapse in on itself. In that context, the Government should look at again at concepts such as the CLA’s old idea of rural business units. We need to think of a rural business person: someone who is partly working on the land or doing some work of that sort but may also be working partly in a market town. We should treat them as a single taxable entity.

I believe that the resurrection of the agriculture Bill is a good step forward—it is good to see it—but we need to be clear that that is the easy bit, and the devil will lie in the detail.

Ivory Bill

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 24th October 2018 Lords Chamber

The House should be made aware that other countries use 20% as a cut-off. For example, in France, items incorporating less than 20% ivory do not need to apply for a sales certificate. Those with more than 20% need government confirmation that they were created before 1947. New York state also employs a cut-off of 20%. The amendment proposed by my noble friend Lord Cormack would change the Clause 7 threshold from 10% to 20% and thus bring consistency to the new law, rendering it fairer and simpler to understand and apply, without in any way fuelling ivory markets in the Far East.

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I shall speak to my Amendments 24, 32 and 36. Before so doing, I reiterate my declarations of interest in the register from Committee stage. In particular, I am president of the British Art Market Federation. I also own a number of ivory objects, as defined in the Bill. At least as relevant as that, I begin by saying that I like and am interested in old things. I had the privilege to chair for 10 years the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art. I am proud that I was appointed by the party opposite and reappointed by the party on this side of the House.

The purpose of my three amendments, which are linked, is simply to remove the requirement for registration of those items containing a de minimis amount of ivory, as described in Clause 7, prior to any possible sale. My arguments seem, in general terms, rather aligned with those of the noble Baroness, Lady Quin, and those concerned about musical instruments. The fundamental point is that my amendments entail no change to the substantive law being proposed, nor to the fundamental structure of the scheme around which the Bill is made.

We all know, as others have said, that we all support the underlying purpose of the Bill, which is to stop elephants being slaughtered for their tusks. The means that have been deployed to bring that about is to stamp on and out the trade in ivory that endangers elephants, graphically and appropriately known as bloody tusks.

The point behind my amendment is simple. The category of items I am looking at has no impact on the trade in ivory to the Far East that is endangering elephants. This point is recognised on all sides. The Government have spelled that out in the Bill’s Explanatory Notes. The conservation movement has specifically said the same, for example in the World Wildlife Fund’s briefing on the Bill. TRAFFIC, probably the most respected collector and interpreter of data about the ivory trade, as reported in the Art Newspaper, agrees. The art world—I draw your Lordships’ attention to a couple of articles by that respected authority Anna Somers Cocks in the Art Newspaper over the summer—is absolutely clear that these items in no way have anything to do with the demand in the east for ivory. Rather, we are talking about—as has been mentioned—inlays, shards and veneers: thin slivers of ivory, not the kind of thing that the noble Lord, Lord Hague, saw at a London airport. The Far Eastern market likes chunks and lumps of ivory that can be carved. The kind of things that I am concerned about cannot be, because they are physically no longer capable of being dealt with in that way.

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[Viscount Hailsham (Con)]

If that happens, there is a real risk that the artefact in question will be destroyed.

[Lord Inglewood]

It is as the noble Viscount rightly says. But some will then say, as mentioned in Committee, that it is not necessary: “Selling it doesn’t matter—give it away to a charity shop”. What is a charity shop to do with it? It will want to sell it to somebody else, so it will be caught by the requirements for prior legislation. The only way that I can see this chain of argument evolving is that we may end up with refugees from other parts of the world surrounded by battered Georgian furniture, which seems a pretty surreal destination.

As the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham, said, the likely result of all this is that a significant quantity of all the items—which, let us not forget, have real cultural and historical significance for this country—will end up on the tip. In addition, let us not forget that going to the tip along with the ivory will be a lot of tropical hardwoods such as mahogany, rosewood and so on. For a country that cares about these things and tells the world how much they matter, as we do, to legislate and consign them to the tip in Britain seems ludicrous, and a sad end to the ivory and mahogany involved. If I might misquote John Betjeman:

“Goodbye to old things. We who loved you are sorry

They’ve carted you off by refuseman’s lorry”.

By no stretch of the imagination could these things harm anyone or anything. In a free country one should, as a matter of principle, be able to sell freely items of that character. You should not need a state commissar’s authorisation to do so. From what I have heard, the Government’s case for this registration is illogical, not based on the evidence, completely disproportionate, philistine and a gratuitously destructive proposal. As a consequence, I am strongly opposed to it.

[The Duke of Wellington (Con)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 22 but, before doing so, I should like to support the noble Baroness, Lady Quin. I knew little about Northumbrian pipes until she spoke in Committee but her amendment seems entirely reasonable and I really hope that the Government will support it.

As I did in Committee, I declare an interest in that my family’s collection of works of art includes many items containing ivory but, as I also said in Committee, this is really a non-interest as I have no interest whatever in selling any of those items. However, the main point of the Bill, which I think we all support, is to try to protect elephants. I therefore completely support it and am very persuaded by what the noble Lord, Lord Hague, said in respect of Amendment 1. I agree with him that to exclude exports from the Bill would undermine some of its objectives and am very pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, withdrew that amendment.

However, I say to the Government that some of the restrictions on the exemptions are too restrictive. Amendment 22, which I am speaking to, has great substance and we should support it. After all, the Government have accepted the principle that portrait miniatures should be exempt. As we all know, they are painted on a tiny sliver of ivory. In no way does the value of a portrait miniature consist of its ivory content; it is in the quality of the painting or the identity of the sitter. Therefore, one really cannot pretend that it is a significant factor that so many portrait miniatures are painted on ivory.

The Government, therefore, have rightly accepted this principle. However, it is so surprising that they then restrict this to miniatures with an area of 320 square centimetres. I think I remember the noble Lord, Lord Gardiner, in replying in Committee, saying that this restriction would capture 90% to 95% of miniatures. I have to say to the Government that if you accept the principle of exempting miniatures but wish to capture only 90% to 95%, why not exempt all portrait miniatures? That seems logical and I cannot imagine that it creates a loophole that would give any concern to all of us who support this Bill.

That is really the main thrust of what I wanted to say. I really hope the Government will think again on the matter. I am minded to support a number of other amendments about percentage of content and other matters, which seem to make the Bill a little more flexible. It will be easier to establish that an object is exempt if we do not define the percentage of ivory content too narrowly. Therefore, I hope some of these other amendments will be put to the vote.

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Moved by

[Lord Inglewood]

24: Clause 7, page 5, line 15, leave out paragraph (d)
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment removes registration as a precondition of allowed sales of de minimis objects containing ivory.

[Lord Inglewood]

I am very grateful to the Minister for the way in which he responded to my earlier concerns in our previous debate. I found myself almost seduced by his silver tongue. I found myself wondering whether perhaps he was right, but all along there was a niggling doubt in the back of my mind. As I said in my remarks, the scheme which is being adopted globally to deal with ivory poaching is basically the same right around the globe. The interesting thing about that is that there is nowhere else on earth where there is a registration scheme associated with de minimis exemptions. It is also interesting that in the consultation that was held prior to the Bill, there was no mention of registration. It was a matter that came into the frame—if I may put it that way—right at the last minute. That makes me wonder.

My amendment does not change the substantive law, nor does it change the scheme that this Bill is intended to put into effect. If this amendment were to be passed, two things would follow. The first one is that the very real concern of my noble friend Lord Hague—that somehow we would be outside the scope and general thrust of the international efforts to deal with ivory poaching—could not be the case. We would merely be doing what other people are doing. Equally, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, made the important point that we do not want to be out of synch with other people. Indeed, you could make quite a strong case for saying that, on the basis of the facts, by including my amendment, we would actually be more aligned with other countries around the world rather than less so. I find it odd that we are being told that the right way to tackle this is rather different from the way that the rest of the world does so. It should be a matter for your Lordships to decide whether we want to be a bit different from everybody else or whether we follow the international pattern. Against that background, I would like to test the opinion of the House on this important matter.

Ivory Bill

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 12th September 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sheehan (LD)]

My Lords, I apologise for not having taken part in the Second Reading debate on the Bill. I was unable to do so, but, having seen the amendment put down by the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, I was moved to add my name. I will take a few minutes to say why I thought that that was necessary.

The aim of the Bill is well and good within itself and I support it wholeheartedly. The success of the Bill in reducing poaching will, we all hope, lead to a rise in elephant numbers and it therefore makes sense that we should also be alive to any unintended consequences that could arise. That is why I have added my name to the amendment in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich. I am most concerned about the consequences for developing communities in countries where the elephants are found.

The Minister will know—we have already heard about this from around the Chamber this afternoon—that human-elephant conflict is a real and growing issue in regions where elephants and humans live in close proximity. Indeed, the issue has its own acronym—it is frequently referred to as HEC. Smaller farms risk crops being devastated by elephants and the wrath of farmers can translate into hostility towards elephants and the granting of licences to poachers, which rather defeats the purpose of the Bill, as the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, mentioned. In addition, heedless large agribusiness, of the type that Africa is in dire need of, can cut swathes through traditional elephant corridors to food and water, causing major conflict.

The abhorrent practice of destroying majestic, intelligent creatures must be put to a stop, but it must be done so that it is permanently sustainable. If we are serious about the endeavour, we must be proactive in identifying areas where challenges will arise and take action to meet them. Some excellent work being done in this field has highlighted the important insights that local communities can provide, so it is crucial that those communities are involved in designing the initiatives for crop protection that will lead to elephant conservation. It is important that this is done by DfID, because it is best placed and has the best know-how and it will be able to take the lead in efforts to mitigate the impact of rising elephant numbers on the countries where elephants live and, in particular on the local communities, particularly farming communities, that may be adversely affected.

In conclusion, peaceful coexistence of humans and elephants is eminently possible through effective and sensible land management. However, we must be alive to the dangerous unintended consequences and must not neglect to give this issue sufficient attention.

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as president of the British Art Market Federation, as I did on the first day in Committee.

May I ask the Minister about the comments about resources that the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, made at the beginning of his speech? On the first day in Committee I moved an amendment that the noble Lord will remember, about the requirement to register Clause 7—de minimis—exemptions. These exemptions, in the words of the Explanatory Memorandum, are there because they in no way, either directly or indirectly, contribute to the poaching of wild elephants. At the same time, the Minister told the House that government policy had been prepared with the benefit of the widest consultation, with all the relevant interest groups, including the wildlife interest groups. That being the case, having heard the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, surely it must follow, given the very small number of resources that are available to deal with the problems of ivory, that this stipulation that de minimis exemptions need to be registered is a serious misallocation of resources. The Government admit that they are not contributing to the destruction of wild elephants. Therefore, if it is an offence not to register, they are deflecting resources that could otherwise be put to better purpose. If the noble Lord says that it will not lead to any change or misallocation of resources, I will ask him what the purpose is of having that stipulation in the legislation at all, because it is conceded that it is not achieving anything.

[Lord St John of Bletso (CB)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Sandwich. I declare an interest as a longstanding trustee of the Tusk Trust, which has not just been looking to address the chronic problem of poachers and dealers but to assist in educating local communities about the importance of ecotourism. In this regard, it is important to consider an impact assessment report, which would help DfID to support local communities in their education efforts. I also agree with the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, that enforcement is crucial. Without enforcement the Bill would be toothless.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

If it would be helpful, as part of BEIS, OPSS does not have a legal identity of its own, as it falls under the Secretary of State for BEIS. Perhaps that is the reason why it is not named in the Bill in its own right. I will reflect on what my noble friend said, but that is the position on the matter.

[Lord Inglewood]

Having heard the Minister’s remarks, it struck me that when the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, concluded, he said “This just will not do”, and he is right—it will not do. But having then heard what the Minister told us, I was unclear as to whether he will, in the period between now and Report, directly address the issues raised by the noble and learned Lord. His response struck me as being that of somebody interested in administration in reply to the noble and learned Lord, who was putting some specific constitutional questions to him.

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

I am grateful to my noble friend for permitting me to re-emphasise that the Government will consider not only what has happened during this debate but also the recommendations of the Constitution Committee. I cannot be fairer than that at this stage, as my noble friend should know.

Ivory Bill

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

Monday 10th September 2018 Lords Chamber

I realise that the Minister at the Dispatch Box has little flexibility on any of these matters, but no principle is involved in the amendment. The principle of a portrait miniature has been accepted, so it seems strange that what is in effect a technical definition of size should be on the face of the Bill. For that reason, I hope that the Minister will feel able at least to say that he, with his officials, will reconsider the definition of size. If it would be helpful, I would be happy to supply details of the object I was looking at this morning.

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, in speaking to the amendment I will speak to Amendments 20, 29 and 32, which are in my name. My suggestion is that the requirement to register Section 7 exemptions—that is, objects with the de minimis amount of ivory in them, which are not made of ivory per se but are ornamented with it—should be removed. I should declare that I am also the owner of a few ivory objects but, as a mere Baron, the extent and quantity of my ivory objects is probably less than that of most Dukes.

I hope that your Lordships will forgive me, but I want to go back to the Bill and look at the Explanatory Notes in particular, because sometimes we lose sight of what we are trying to do and why. Paragraph 5 states:

“The aim of the Ivory Bill is to help conserve elephant populations, specifically by reducing poaching, through significantly limiting the legal market for ivory in the UK. This is intended to reduce demand for ivory both within the UK, and overseas through the application of the sales ban to re-exports of ivory from the UK. This aim is in line with the 2017 Conservative Manifesto commitment to ‘protect[ing] rare species’”.


I am sure that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, can subscribe to that, as well as the noble Baronesses on the Liberal Front Bench and equally, I would hope, the Minister. I am confident that he can. The end of the next paragraph states:

“Finally, the ivory ban will demonstrate the UK does not consider commercial activities in any ivory that could fuel poaching to be acceptable and it sends a message that similar actions should be taken globally”.


I do not think that anybody would take exception to that either. It seems that there is a direct correlation between the sale of ivory and poaching.

Finally, the end of paragraph 16, which talks about exemptions, states:

“Strictly-defined exemptions will therefore apply where a ban on the commercial use of items is unwarranted. This is considered to be the case when it is understood that both the continuation of sales of certain categories of items would not contribute either directly or indirectly to ivory poaching, and the intrinsic value of that item is not due to its ivory content”.


Here we have an acceptance from the Government that, in certain circumstances, some items that contain ivory do not contribute in any way to the poaching of elephants. I am as enthusiastic as anyone about preserving elephants. Equally, I am interested in old things. It seems clear that this policy begins with the proposition that we should protect elephants, then says as an instrument of policy that the way in which we wish to do that is by introducing a ban on ivory that encourages the poaching of elephants. At the same time, it also spells out expressly that certain categories of items containing ivory do not do that. I am saying that the de minimis exception does not affect the market for ivory which threatens elephants.

That being the case, what is the purpose of the registration? On the Government’s own admission, this category of items does not contribute directly or indirectly to ivory poaching. Against that background, we have an embryonic system whose scope is very unclear. We have heard talk about 2 million to 3 million items, possibly more, that might fall within this category. Of course, not all of them will be sold—certainly not all at once—but we are not talking about a few rich and rare items, such as Byzantine ivories. We are talking about a very substantial quantity of, for want of a better way of putting it, household goods across the country. Given that the value of many of these items is small, as pointed out by the noble Lord, Lord De Mauley, the cost of registration will inevitably be big, relatively speaking.

I know from the Minister that the system and how it would work has not yet been finalised, but it will be expensive, time-consuming, bureaucratic and potentially iconoclastic. We have heard how items will be damaged or have the ivory removed if they are valuable. I cry no crocodile tears for the very rich man, whoever he was, who tried to sell the Chippendale cabinet in New York and found himself frustrated because it did not make as much as he wanted. If you buy works of art as an investment, they may go up or down in value, like all investments. The vandalism of that particular piece of furniture is a tragedy because, once you remove the original aspects, you degrade the inherent quality and characteristics. It is no good saying that a piece of furniture adapted in this way is the same as it was before. That is like saying that an original work of art is just the same as a photograph of it. It is not. This proposition intrudes into people’s ordinary lives. The other problem, as has been touched on, is that a lot of items in this category—such as chests of drawers with escutcheons or boxes with ivory inlay—are effectively, if not actually, the same. So, the argument for registration so that you can trace items will be more or less impossible in practice, even if it were worth doing.

Finally, you could say that at least we will know whether ivory is capable of being sold lawfully, but that is a pretty thin argument. If you can measure it once, you can measure it twice. Given the context and the fact that these items, by the Government’s own admission, do not contribute to the poaching of elephants, I also wonder whether it may be in breach of Article 1 of Protocol 1 to the European Convention on Human Rights:

“Every natural or legal person is entitled to the peaceful enjoyment of his possessions”.


I would have thought that being told that you had to do this to sell some of your household possessions is pretty close to a breach, if not already so. Echoing comments made on both of the main Front Benches, I am worried that a bit of collateral damage here is thought to be all right somehow. As I have said, I am as enthusiastic as anybody about preserving the elephants. I think, however, that it also matters that these items should not be indiscriminately and pointlessly put at risk and possibly destroyed or damaged. It is like a warlord saying, “We have got to take out that particular strongpoint in order to win the battle. If we happen to zap a lot of innocent civilians at the same time, it does not really matter. The end justifies the means”. I do not think that is right, and I think we need to be a bit more subtle in our thinking and sophisticated in our approach to this. This kind of “New lamps for old” attitude does not seem to fit the case of the world we are in. I would like to think that we should remove the registration requirement, not least because it seems to be a classic case of “de minimis non curat lex”.

[Lord Crathorne (Con)]

My Lords, I will briefly comment on Amendment 17, from the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, and Amendment 18. We have heard from the noble Duke, the Duke of Wellington, about items in his collection which exceed 320 square centimetres. That seems enormously restrictive. It would surely be better to remove that restriction so that anyone judging a miniature would have the ability to decide whether it was something worth saving and looking after. It is very restrictive to set the threshold at 320 square centimetres.

On Amendment 18, I think it is going to be so difficult to accurately assess the 10% threshold. I am at a slight loss to know why, if musical instruments may have up to 20% ivory content, it cannot be 20% across the board. As we have heard, in such countries as France, it is already 20%. I urge the Minister to perhaps give that a little more thought.

Ivory Bill

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 10th September 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I think that the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, is intended to cover items described in Clause 7—those that contain de minimis quantities of ivory. In his remarks, he kept talking about “ivory items”. These are actually slightly different. They are not ivory items but other sorts of items containing an element of ivory which is integral to the whole. There are many more of those than there are pure ivory items.

[Earl Attlee (Con)]

My Lords, I have sympathy with the amendment. I have nothing further to add but the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, has come up with a convincing set of arguments. I hope that the Minister will come up with some rather more powerful arguments than were contained in his letter.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Inglewood]

My Lords, I want to make a few brief comments. When I last intervened, I should have explained that I am the president of the British Art Market Federation.

I commend the introduction in Amendment 8 of the word “religious” because there is too much religious bigotry about. It is important to respect other peoples’ views as well as thinking that your own are important. I should explain that I quite like what my children call “old stuff”. For a number of years, I had the very good fortune of chairing the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art. One thing that struck me during that time was how tastes change. Can my noble friend the Minister ensure that the way in which these things are examined recognises that tastes can change? Sometimes, items that are considered of enormous global significance were more or less unrecognised even just a few years ago. That is very important to the way in which these arrangements—which will inevitably be capricious and arbitrary to some degree—are exercised.

[The Duke of Wellington (Con)]

My Lords, I apologise to the House for not being able to be present at Second Reading. Clearly, the Bill is a most important piece of legislation, as expressed at Second Reading and this afternoon. I am sure that everybody in this House supports the main objectives. I read the report of the Second Reading in Hansard, and I particularly commend the speech of my noble friend Lord Hague, who clearly, when he was Foreign Secretary, contributed significant movement to this attempt to control the undesirable trade in recently slaughtered elephant ivory.