Sustainable Livestock Bill

Debate between Lord Johnson of Marylebone and David Nuttall

Friday 12th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Nuttall]

No, absolutely not. It is a very tiny matter really.

I want to deal specifically with clause 1. Subsection (1) states:

“It is the duty of the Secretary of State to ensure the sustainability of the livestock industry.”

What I am not clear about is why it should be the duty—I emphasise the word “duty”— of the Secretary of State to ensure the sustainability of the livestock industry. Surely the best people to ensure that farming is maintained are farmers. Surely it makes sense to rely on farmers’ desire for self-preservation to ensure that they tend their livestock and look after their land in a sustainable way. All the evidence points to the fact that we can rely on them, both to protect the welfare of their animals and to care for their own land properly. How can that responsibility be transferred to the Secretary of State? Do we really expect the Secretary of State to spend every weekend driving up and down the country doing spot checks to see whether farmers are doing their bit to maintain the sustainability of their farms?

If any industry—if we are calling farming an industry, which I consider to be an unusual term, but for the purposes of the Bill it is an industry—in the United Kingdom can make a claim for having proved over the centuries that it is capable of sustainability, it is surely the livestock industry. Man has been tending animals since the beginning of time. Agriculture is the oldest of all industries continued in this country. What more can the poor farmer possibly be expected to do to make his “livestock industry” any more sustainable than it has been already?

Fortunately, the Bill’s draftsman has also spotted this potential problem, and in clause 3, headed “Interpretation”, we are helpfully given a most enlightening explanation of what is meant by the phrase

“ensure the sustainability of the livestock industry”.

We find that it goes much further than anything that we may ordinarily think. For the purposes of the Bill, we are told that the words mean

“addressing the economic, social and environmental impacts of all stages of livestock farming and consumption, in order to…reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and address climate change in the United Kingdom and overseas…prevent biodiversity loss in the United Kingdom and overseas…promote animal welfare…protect and enhance the landscape…protect the resilience of farming communities, and…promote food security.”

Not much to do there, then.

We see immediately that the idea of livestock sustainability has in one fell swoop been extended to include animal welfare, the well-being of farming communities as a whole, which I take to mean the whole of rural Britain, and the promotion of food security—matters that I feel sure any casual inquirer into livestock sustainability would not expect to see because they go well beyond any concept of sustainability, even if it is considered in its widest sense. This starts to demonstrate the enormous difficulties that face anyone who attempts to define the term “sustainable” in so far as it relates to farming. The Bill seeks to define sustainability not just in environmental terms, but in social and economic terms too. It is such a broad definition that it makes the Bill completely unworkable in any meaningful way.

I am concerned that the definition in clause 3(d) includes a requirement not just to protect the landscape, but to enhance it too. It is not clear to me why that requirement should be included in the Bill.

[Joseph Johnson (Orpington) (Con)]

I am sure that my hon. Friend will appreciate the extent to which our farmed landscape, the visual beauty of which we enjoy every day, is owed to the farming practice of grazing. If we continue to go down the road that our farming industry has been going down of penning ever greater numbers of cows into industrial sheds to be fed imported soya, we will lose the entire warp and weft of our rural countryside, and we will lose much of the visual beauty that so many people, including farmers themselves, appreciate. Coming from a constituency that includes part of the Kent downs, I urge my hon. Friend to visit them and realise quite how much we owe to the traditional farming practices that created the country as it is.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. My hon. Friend has more farmers in his constituency than most people in London—[Laughter.] I entirely appreciate that the traditional view of the farm with its green fields is one that most people—

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[Mr Nuttall]

Absolutely not. That is, indeed, one of the glories, and as someone who has on many occasions enjoyed walking in that environment and eating such animals, I certainly would not suggest as much, but it is worth considering that even in the most natural of environments, that method of farming still has an environmental impact.

The Bill seeks to define sustainability not just in environmental terms, but in social and economic terms. The definition is so broad that it makes the Bill completely unworkable. I am concerned that duty (d) in clause 3 includes a requirement not just to protect the landscape, but to “enhance” it. I am not clear why that is necessary.

Alongside that definition, there is no mention whatever of the economic aspects of sustainability. We need farmers to make a profit and to be consistently profitable. It is surely essential to the sustainability of the livestock industry that farmers be economically viable, and at the very least the reference in clause 3, duty (e), to

“the resilience of farming communities”

should be redrafted to include that critical point.

[Joseph Johnson]

Profit is important, but it cannot be the sole determinant of Government farming policy. I should prefer my hon. Friend to give some consideration to biodiversity. At our current rate, half of all existing species on the planet will be eliminated within 50 years, and if we continue down that track we will be moving to a world in which there are farmers, cows, people and not much else. I am sure that my constituents in Orpington, which gave the world Charles Darwin, the father of evolutionary biology, do not want that to happen.

[Mr Nuttall]

I agree, and I am not suggesting that economics should be the only criterion by which farming is judged. There is clearly an environmental responsibility on farmers, and they would be the first to accept that. Indeed, the coalition programme for government, which was mentioned earlier, refers to the need to promote biodiversity.

Clause 3, which is entitled “Interpretation”, also contains a definition of “livestock”. One might have thought that, in view of the fact that much more obscure terms have not been defined, “livestock” was a fairly straightforward term that need hardly be mentioned. However, according to, and for the purposes of, this Bill,

“‘livestock’ includes any creature kept for the production of food, wool or skins, or for the purposes of its use in the farming of land or the carrying on in relation to land of any agricultural activity.”

As we would expect, it covers all the usual farm animals—cattle, sheep, pigs, goats, chickens and so on. However, the definition is much wider than that; the words

“use in the farming of land”

would include the trusty sheepdog. Would it also cover the farm cat busy catching the mice?

Clause 1(2) sets out everything that the Secretary of State must do to be able to demonstrate compliance with the duty in subsection (1). It requires the Secretary of State, when deciding how to carry out that duty, to

“give consideration to…supporting sustainable practices and consumption through public procurement of livestock produce…providing appropriate public information and food labelling…supporting research into sustainable livestock practices…reducing the amount of, and finding sustainable methods for use or disposal of, food waste…changing the subsidies available to and support for farmers to promote sustainable livestock practices, and…the effectiveness of existing programmes aimed at improving the sustainability of the livestock industry, and action that could be taken to increase their effectiveness.”

I should point out that, although the Bill contains a definition of what is meant by the scope of the phrase

“sustainability of the livestock industry”,

in so far as it relates to the duty under clause 1(1), no such explanation or definition is given in relation to the references to “sustainable” in paragraphs (2)(a), (c) and (e). It seems to me that a crucial part of the Bill is therefore open to challenge.

Clause 1(3) states that

“The Secretary of State must ensure that policies in relation to negotiations and other activities at international level, including at the European Union, are consistent with sections 1(1) and 1(2).”

It is not enough that Secretaries of State should have to devise a series of policies to try to meet the wide demands of the Bill in this country; they will also have to ensure that, with their ministerial colleagues, they try to persuade the other 26 nations that make up the European Union—and, during international negotiations, persuade other countries in the rest of the world—to adopt all the detailed duties set out in clause 1(1) and (2); effectively, they will have to try to impose the duty imposed on them on the rest of Europe and the world. I am sure that any Secretary of State would look forward to that little task with unbridled enthusiasm.

It is fair and reasonable to assume that the only way in which any Secretary of State could have any hope of showing compliance with all these duties would be to impose ream upon ream of new rules and regulations—not only on farmers, but on food manufacturers and packagers.