Brexit: Plant and Animal Biosecurity
Lord Teverson Excerpts(5 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Teverson
To move that this House takes note of the Report from the European Union Committee Brexit: plant and animal biosecurity (21st Report, HL Paper 191).
Lord Teverson (LD)
My Lords, it is very appropriate that this debate should follow one on defence and security because it has exactly the same theme, except that the bugs are not cyber bugs but actual ones, since those still exist. It is also appropriate because I understand that this week is Invasive Species Week; the first such week took place in 2015. I know that the Minister, who is very involved in this sector, has also been involved in a number of other initiatives. The other reason this debate comes at exactly the right time is the publication of the report by the intergovernmental committee on biodiversity and ecosystems, which laid out how the numbers of species within the ecology across the globe were threatened. One thing it highlighted, which was perhaps not publicised quite so strongly in the press, was that alien and invasive species are a severe threat to biodiversity across the globe—including Europe, obviously, and our own country. That is why this subject is so important.
Also, to reflect some of the comments in the previous debate, if Brexit happens, although we will be leaving the European Union, we will not be leaving the European biosphere. We share its marine and aerial environments, and we are only 22 miles away from its terrestrial environment. The question to which my committee particularly wanted to find an answer was whether, post Brexit, our ecology will be as protected on invasive species and biosecurity as it was during our membership of the European Union. Can we even improve on the situation that we have at the moment?
The threat is very real. I am sure that all of us will remember the foot and mouth outbreak back in the early 2000s. That cost the country some £8 billion, but in some ways that was nothing compared to the effect it had on farming communities and rural communities throughout the kingdom. We know that we now have ash dieback disease; a recent report from Oxford University suggests that the total cost of that disease will be some £15 billion over 100 years, half of that—£7.5 billion—coming over the next 10 years. These threats are real and they are about real organisms. There is the Asian hornet and the American skunk cabbage, which I am sure the Minister will talk to us more about later, although I had never heard of it before. It is also about oak disease and a number of other threats to our ecology at this moment.
We are not only a part of the European biosphere but absolutely integrated into the systems of the European Union in this area of national security and defence. Let me remind Members of four of those systems: the animal disease notification system; the alien species notification system; the rapid alert system for food and feed; and, lastly, the plant health interception system. While I very much welcome the Government’s response—they wanted to remain a part of those systems—one of my first questions to the Minister is: has that bid progressed in any way? Are we at all confident that we will be able to participate in those systems, and if there is no deal in place do we have alternative systems? Most importantly, I am aware that, through those systems and that shared intelligence among the communities of scientists and researchers in those areas, we have advance warning of these organisms approaching us across the continent. We are able to prepare and plan for those potential invasions. How will we be able to continue having those connections and those sorts of systems once we are outside the European Union?
On day-to-day issues, the IT system called TRACES is absolutely fundamental in tracking the progress of trade between European Union member states of animal and plant products. We have had assurances from the Government that we now have an alternative to that system. Has it been truly tested yet? Will it be able to integrate with the TRACES system, allowing us at least to approach on the phytosanitary side the frictionless trade that will be so important between us and Europe on food and animal products in future? Those are clearly key issues.
Other issues that came out of the report are, first, around trade. I have mentioned EU-UK trade, which is very important for the farming industry in this country, but will we be able to have the systems that we will need to cope in the future? It particularly concerns me that the Government are clear in making the point that from day one, when we leave the Union or end the transition period, we will have exactly the same list of potential threats to biosecurity. We will have the same lists as parts of those systems but, clearly, they are likely to diverge quite significantly over the first one to three years. How will we deal with frictionless trade at the point when we have that divergence on scientific advice? Will we instead ensure alignment well into the future?
The greatest concern is about new trade deals. We often talk about America and the great leverage it would have on a trade deal with us. On the details of that trade deal, we are far from confident that environmental and biosecurity issues will be at the top of that list. Will they be a sine qua non, without which we will not do that deal? Can the Minister assure us that that is still the case? We know that even with China, there are huge issues with food quality. A lot of the problems with invasive issues in foodstuffs have been to do with Chinese products, as is a lot of the protection. Again, there is huge leverage there so, as a nation, will we be so concerned about having those trade deals post Brexit that we will not pay sufficient attention to those areas?
I come on to resources. We know that Defra has in the past been under huge constraints and reductions in funding. We know that large resources have been taken in there for Brexit planning. Will they remain there to ensure our biosecurity well into the future, rather than just on Brexit day one?
I come back to a theme that my committee has often talked about and taken evidence on: the veterinary profession. On the front line of industrial veterinary work, something like 95% of staff are EU citizens. The committee went to the London Gateway port two weeks ago, where we met the veterinary team on the front line. Of that team of eight, the lead and six others were Spanish, and one was Italian. There is a real issue about keeping those people here. Most of them will earn less than £30,000 and, under the present government proposals, they will not be able to enter the system.
Our research laboratories are the pride of the country; we are the European Union experts on foot and mouth disease, bluetongue disease and many others. We have access to the rest of that network of research laboratories, with all their scientific evidence and expertise. In addition, there is a collegiate feeling among the scientists and researchers in that community. How will we replace the research laboratories that concentrate elsewhere in the EU on other diseases and threats that do not exist here?
On the island of Ireland, the issue is different from the normal one about customs and borders, as bugs know no borders. Can we keep the island of Ireland as a single biological territory in terms of rules, regulations and biodefence? Will that be possible?
I have laid down a long list of challenges. However, we recognise that Brexit will give the United Kingdom the ability to make its own rules and regulations about biosecurity. Witnesses have looked at the very strong rules that New Zealand and Australia have to protect their bio-environment. Does the Minister see what areas of greater protection we might have, taking into consideration that those southern ocean territories are much more isolated from other territories than we are from Europe?
This is sometimes seen as rather a niche subject, yet it is a key part of the defence and security of our nation. There is already a threat and it is costing us £1.7 billion annually to make this defence effective. We are looking to the Government to assure us that once we leave Europe—if we leave Europe—we will have the same defence that we have now.
Lord Teverson
My Lords, I congratulate the Minister on pronouncing “epidemiological” correctly. I was trying to avoid it and find an alternative all the way through my speech. The committee and I absolutely recognise his dedication to this area. We welcome his taking the responsibility so seriously and the way he has responded to the debate. We look forward to him writing to us as well.
It is the end of the day, so I thank all those who have contributed, including committee members. It is also great to see some recent former members, particularly the noble Lord, Lord Trees. I thank him for all his excellent input on the veterinary side and broader areas during his membership of the committee. I also thank the Deputy Speaker, the noble Viscount, Lord Ullswater, who has presided over the debate and was an important member of the committee until recently. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Browne, and the noble Earl, Lord—
Noble Lords
Lord Teverson
I know the noble Earl so well by his forename that I sometimes forget his title. He regularly contributes to these events. As others have, I thank Alexandra McMillan and Jennifer Mills, the clerking team for this committee. They have been absolutely excellent.
I sum up by saying that I welcome everybody’s concentration in bringing this matter to the fore, but it will get more difficult to contain, not just, as the noble Lord, Lord Trees, said, because of increasing global trade, but because of climate change and the proliferation of personal travel. Yet it is so important that it is contained. I am positive about the way the debate is being taken seriously and has been responded to by the Government. I thank the Minister for that. I beg to move.
Trade in Animals and Related Products (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019
Lord Teverson Excerpts(5 years, 6 months ago)
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Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his introduction to the SIs this afternoon and for arranging a useful briefing for us beforehand. I particularly thank our Northern Ireland departmental colleagues, who joined us online and were particularly candid about some of the challenges facing cross-border trade, with which they are grappling at the current time. Their briefing and insight was extremely helpful. It is clear that close co-operation with the south is essential although, as I understand from an earlier letter from the Minister, it is not possible to have specific bilateral talks on trade between the UK and EU member states, such as the Irish Republic, in advance of us leaving.
Whatever happens as a result of the Brexit negotiations, it is fairly obvious that trade across the Irish border will become more bureaucratic and less free-flowing in future. There will, for example, be a need for phytosanitary certificates for plants crossing the border. There will be a new need for importers to be registered and new offences arising from the new requirements to take goods to an approved place of inspection. At a minimum level, this will require a huge communication initiative to ensure that farmers, food manufacturers and retailers are made aware of the cross-border import issues. Can the Minister assure us that all of those affected by these changes have been made aware of these new rules?
On the trade in animals SI, the Minister will know that when this was considered by the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, it expressed surprise that the regulations had been delayed after being cleared for consideration by the House. The reason given was that the Department for Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs chose to delay it pending negotiations on third-country status. As a result, we are now dealing with it under the “made affirmative” process. I shall not make heavy weather of this, but it seems the wrong way round to proceed. Surely, the UK Parliament should have considered the content before the issue was included in the package for conclusion with the EU on those third-country negotiations. Having said that, we accept that the SI is largely technical in nature. It is clearly important that we can continue to import the goods covered by it post Brexit with the minimum of disruption at the Irish border, and it would be helpful if the Minister could reiterate that there will indeed be no additional checks at the border—although I think he has made that point clear.
On the plant health SI, these regulations are very similar to those which we have already debated covering England. Again, the presence of the land border between the north and the Republic brings these issues into starker focus. As the Minister explained, goods entering from the EU that currently require a plant passport under EU rules will now require a phytosanitary certificate, which can be checked digitally rather than at the border.
However, there seems to be a real challenge in managing goods coming from a third country. In our earlier briefing with Northern Ireland officials, it was initially suggested that goods from third countries would arrive via Belfast port or Belfast airport and could be checked at those entry points—the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, raised this issue, although I have put a slightly different emphasis on it so clarification would be helpful. In our earlier discussions, it became clear that the other obvious route for third-country goods to arrive was via Dublin airport; there was an expectation that they would then be driven across the border. If that were the case, surely border checks would be necessary. Perhaps the Minister can clarify how goods will be handled when they arrive at Dublin airport en route to Northern Ireland. If I am right in what I am saying, is there a danger that, once this route becomes known, many more importers might opt for it because no checks on the border would allow importers to avoid additional checks? Either there will be checks on the border, which everybody says is completely undesirable, or goods coming via Dublin airport will face no checks, in which case there is a danger of goods being imported illegally. I would be grateful if the Minister could explain how he thinks those journeys will take place and what checks will take place.
Can the Minister also explain more about the new offences created in this SI, which seem to include unlimited fines for failing to take goods to an approved place of inspection? Is that indeed the case? Is there ever a limit to an unlimited fine? How will that be calculated? Too prohibitive a fine could mark the end of business for some importers. Will importers be given adequate notice of this new provision? Does the Minister feel that it is proportionate, given the significant changes in import arrangements with which businesses will be grappling? Will these new fines be phased in, or on what date are they due to be applied? It would be helpful for importers to know that. Has any estimate been made of how many businesses will be affected by this new measure?
As the Minister knows, the animal health, seed potatoes and food SI was debated in the Commons on 23 April. During that debate, my noble friend Sandy Martin MP—the Defra shadow spokesperson—pointed out what he thought were other technical and grammatical errors in the text of the SI. At the time, the Minister gave an assurance that he would look at these possible errors and correct them if necessary. Were his concerns checked and corrected before the SI came before us?
When we met with officials, it also came to light that our exit from the EU would have a major impact on seed potato growers in Northern Ireland, as 50% of their seed potatoes are exported to the Republic and the EU bans the import of seed potatoes from third countries. What steps are being taken to mitigate the impact of this loss of trade on Northern Ireland businesses?
These issues aside, we accept that the SI is broadly technical in nature. We are therefore happy to approve it in all other respects.
Finally, it continues to be a considerable political failure that these devolved issues do not have a Northern Ireland Assembly to scrutinise them—a point made by noble Lords on the Cross Benches. I very much hope that this will be rectified soon.
Lord Teverson (LD)
My Lords, I have been very impressed by the debate. I remind Members of the House that there will be a debate on Wednesday afternoon on Brexit and biosecurity, which goes through this whole issue and applies much more broadly. The speakers’ list is still open. I am sure that the Minister and I would very much appreciate further participation.
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
I entirely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Teverson. I am very much looking forward to the debate; I rather think I am looking at a number of the participants already. I am most grateful to the noble Lords, Lord Browne of Belmont and Lord McCrea, for participating and emphasising that we wish this matter were being dealt with elsewhere. That should be the right way forward—it is the way mature politics needs to proceed—so I very much endorse what the noble Lord, Lord Browne of Belmont, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, have said. In my view, the responsibility is really on everyone in the public service to ensure that these talks are productive and successful. Alas, as we all know, we are talking about people’s lives and communities. We want a better time for Northern Ireland—what a great place it is—so, although I should not be doing this, it is a privilege and we are seeking to do the right thing for Northern Ireland.
My noble friend Lady McIntosh hit on a vein: I think she and many of your Lordships know that I am rather keen on the horse. Obviously, the Government recognise the value of the equine sector to the UK economy. I also know—declaring an interest in that my wife’s family breed horses in County Tipperary—that it is of great importance to the rural economy of Northern Ireland and the Republic. We therefore need to do all we can to ensure the movement of horses between the United Kingdom and Ireland—and indeed France; across the piece—and to ensure that in some way we can continue what was the tripartite agreement. We need to work on some arrangement to ensure the free movement of horses, particularly bearing in mind biosecurity. We do not want any future arrangements to jeopardise something that is absolutely crucial, particularly in that thoroughbred end—racing—where pest diseases, viruses, et cetera, are absolutely kept to a minimum by high biosecurity.
How to find an arrangement to best succeed the tripartite agreement is something for negotiations. We all recognise—the UK Government and, I think, the Irish and French racing interests as well—that what we had was of value, and we need to see how we can work. This is why the British Thoroughbred Industries Brexit Steering Group is collaborating with Defra officials. We absolutely need to see what we can do for a very important part of the rural economies of the Republic and our country.
The noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, rightly raised a number of points about the resource implications and so forth. My understanding of the sort of numbers under a new regime is that the five inspectors would need to be increased to 11—a doubling. All consignments of regulated—that is, high-risk—plants and plant products currently imported from the EU under the existing EU passport system would require pre-notification, to be accompanied by a phytosanitary certificate and subject to remote documentary checks in the event of exit without an agreement. This plays into a point that I emphasised and that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, acknowledged: this is precisely because neither we in this country nor the Republic want to have checks at the border. We think there are ways in which these matters can be checked. As we said in the previous debate, we should not be nervous of thinking about the best ways of heightening biosecurity. Making this the responsibility of a country’s plant health authority has that strength and imprimatur. If we import something from Italy, say, it will be the Italian plant health authority that has to signify the phytosanitary certificate. We should not be fearful of some elements of this new arrangement because they are about what we increasingly need to look at.
Plastics: Reduction in Use
Lord Teverson Excerpts(5 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, it is absolutely essential for us all that, in seeking to do the right thing, we are in a position to do so. In response to the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, Morrisons are replacing plastic bags for loose fruit and vegetables with paper ones. That sort of thing is happening up and down the country with retailers that understand their responsibility to ensure that we have a better planet for the next generations.
Lord Teverson (LD)
My Lords, one of the ways that we will reduce the use of plastic is making sure that we dispose of it responsibility, not at the cost of the environment. One way of doing that is banning exports of our waste and clearing up our own mess. What target do the Government have for banning the export of low-grade recyclate?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, the noble Lord is absolutely right that we must recycle more here. We must use less, so there will be less recycling. We certainly need to do more at home, so we need to work with industry to have suitable plants to take much more of the UK’s plastic waste. Other countries that take waste are also important. We are a party to the Basel convention and it is essential that we work together to ensure that we are absolutely not sending plastic, or other waste, to countries that cannot cope with it and therefore pollute the environment.
Brexit: Food Prices and Availability (EUC Report)
Lord Teverson Excerpts(5 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Teverson
That this House takes note of the Report from the European Union Committee Brexit: food prices and availability (14th Report, HL Paper 129).
Lord Teverson (LD)
My Lords, it is a great pleasure to introduce this report, which, like the previous one that was debated this afternoon, is a year old. For that reason, I am sure that we will bring the debate up to date. On the other hand, in a key way nothing has happened: we are still in the European Union, and the concerns, fears, expectations and hopes of this report when it was written a year ago are still to be proven or unproven. I hope that today’s debate may still contribute something, for when or if Britain leaves the European Union, on this important area of food. I emphasise, though, once again, like all my fellow EU Sub-Committee chairs, that the committee itself is completely neutral on Brexit or no Brexit: what we are attempting to do through these reports is to explore the issues in depth and to call Ministers and the Government to account, as we will today.
The report we are debating today is particularly important because food is not an issue that we necessarily debate in this House very regularly. Although food and Brexit, and the issues that are in the report, are very important, we Members of the House of Lords are able to go downstairs and have a two-course meal for probably a fiver. It does us good, it is very nutritious and there is probably no one around the Chamber, I suspect, who is challenged in terms of diet, consumption, being able to eat or food poverty. Yet today a report came out saying that we now have some 1,800 food banks in this country and that some 14 million meals over the last year were provided to those in fuel poverty—sorry, food poverty; I was speaking in the wrong debate there. What I want to emphasise during this debate is that while we as—dare I say?—typical Waitrose customers may not be too concerned about this area, it is a real challenge to a large number of families in this country. Food prices and food security really matter.
Let me give a little background. Why is food particularly important and why is it different in terms of the Brexit debate? First, unlike services and unlike many manufactures, food is perishable. If we do not deliver it, if we do not get it through borders, if we do not manage to get it through phytosanitary controls, the product is wasted. It is an important part of the food supply chain that is very time-determinate. The other area is that food is particularly important in terms of public health and biosecurity. Therefore we cannot just throw open our trade gates and ports, because there are serious issues around public health—as we saw with the tragedy of foot and mouth disease some decades ago—and all the challenges we have with biosecurity.
We import some 50% of our food, and 30% of all our food comes from other European Union countries. You have to add on to that, in terms of this debate, another estimated 11% that comes through the 50 trade deals and agreements that the EU has with some 56— sometimes reported as 60—other states. So altogether, 40% to 41% of the food consumed in this country comes through EU or EU-related treaties. For some 30 years our self-sufficiency—an area which sometimes receives particular political attention—has declined. That is not necessarily a very easy answer.
We have to remember that, unlike manufactures—certainly unlike services—the agricultural sector is still least affected by reductions in trade tariffs and the costs of trade. Barriers to agricultural produce, whether processed or raw, are still relatively high in world trade. As we know, the EU tariffs that we reflect at the moment in our joint customs regime are on average something like 22% on the cost of food coming in from non-EU areas—although developing countries of course have preferential terms in that area. It is worth saying that one of the biggest determinants of the change of food prices is the exchange rate. It was certainly true for the Minister when we held the inquiry that that was far more important than the Brexit issue. We must remember that the two are intricately related; a bad or difficult Brexit probably means a major impact on exchange rates as well.
I will go through a couple of scenarios that the committee considered as to what might happen with food prices. One is very optimistic: once we are a free trading nation, we will have complete control over our tariffs and could decide to completely reduce them to zero and open our agricultural markets to the rest of the world. In that scenario, food prices should come down quite substantially. That would of course have a major effect on the UK agricultural industry, but it might be seen by a Government at the time as a price worth paying. But we must remember that, under World Trade Organization rules and most favoured nation rules, if we reduce tariffs to zero for one area and do not have trade agreements with other nations, they all have to be reflected in precisely the same way. That is particularly concerning in terms of a no-deal exit from the European Union. We could reduce prices in that sort of situation, because there would probably be a glut of UK products that could no longer be exported to the EU because of its external tariff. So there is optimism on prices.
Alternatively, in a no-deal Brexit we will almost certainly have, not the frictionless trade we all want for the future but one that is very much the opposite—high paperwork, full controls on phytosanitary, documentation and new IT systems. In terms of the export and import of goods, it is estimated by the port of Dover that the difference could be from two minutes, as at the moment, for goods passing through on ro-ro to as much as 45 minutes under full documentation. Efficiency will go down, and that cost will ultimately have to be borne by consumers. A completely open and free trading nation could have world markets and increased food security, but, again, our domestic self-sufficiency will almost certainly go down. Again, we have a whole area of technical regulations and red tape barriers. As we now know, even more than a year ago, we have a situation where other free trade deals are probably far more difficult to implement than we had thought at the time.
I will look briefly at a no-deal scenario. Exchange rates will probably go adversely, which will cause prices to go up. There will be border checks and a tariff regime—although, as the Government since our report have published what those tariffs might be, it is interesting to see that there would still be substantial tariffs in a number of areas such as pigmeat, sheepmeat and similar products, and not so much in manufactures.
In the time that I have left, I will concentrate on labour and food security strategy. One of the consistent themes in the reports of my sub-committee is the real challenge of labour post Brexit, with or without a deal. This was mentioned in previous debates. Certainly, some 30% of the individuals engaged in the food processing industry, which is the largest manufacturing industry in this country, are non-UK EU nationals. In Cornwall, where I live, that proportion is significantly greater. Some 80% of the workers in the horticultural industry are seasonal, and 96% of them are from other EU countries. So there really is a challenge in delivering UK food in terms of both the supply chain and actual production and harvesting. We also looked a number of times at vets, who are overwhelmingly non-British EU citizens. There, too, there is a huge challenge.
I will return to the other development since this report was produced a year ago—immigration policy, and the potential £30,000 level of barrier to entry. Clearly these sectors will be hugely challenged by that. A year ago, the Minister was even against a seasonal workers scheme. I believe that now there is a change there, and I would be interested to hear from the Minister whether it is still the intention to change that.
Members of the committee felt very strongly that overall there was a need for a food security strategy. I would like to think that through listening to our report the Government have now undertaken to publish one post Brexit, but I would be interested to hear from the Minister where that is now.
I have one or two questions from the committee. First, we have already seen within the WTO the conflict around tariff rate quotas and splitting those between ourselves and the European Union, and the objections, particularly from southern hemisphere producers. I would be interested to hear where we are on that. On IT systems, the so-called CHIEF system had huge capacity issues in terms of future customs procedures, so can the Minister say where we are in terms of replacing the system or at least enabling it to cope with the huge amount of increased paperwork? On tariffs, I found it difficult to understand the Government’s proposal in terms of the Northern Ireland/Republic of Ireland border, where they said that there should be no tariffs. I do not understand how that cannot cause both large distortions in trade and indeed criminality —so I would like to understand that. It was almost a surprise to the committee that the former Minister, Sir George Eustice, said that to help trade through ports there would be no phytosanitary checks. If that is still the case, how long would that last for, and when will that national food strategy come out?
One of the things that came out strongly from our report is that the Minister at the time seemed a lot less concerned about food and its security and pricing than the committee and certainly our witnesses were. It is quite obvious that the frictionless trade in food and food products that all of us, including the Government, want, is impossible in the context of the red lines that the Government still have. I do not understand how those can be reconciled, and nor does the committee. Food will be the first casualty of Brexit, particularly if it is a no-deal Brexit. In addition, we have food poverty and real wages have not gone up in the UK since before the recession in 2008. For the lowest decile of the population, food now accounts for 33% of household expenditure, whereas for the top decile—which I suspect a number of us are in, although perhaps not myself—it is only 10%. That is a real challenge. I look forward to the Government taking this issue seriously for the future and to the answers that will be given by the Minister, as well as to the noble Earl’s maiden speech. I beg to move.
Lord Teverson
My Lords, I also congratulate the noble Earl, Lord Devon, on his speech. I give him one bit of advice: when you sum up the last debate on a Thursday in this House, you should be very brief—and I will be.
I thank all noble Lords for their varied contributions. I am now tempted to get into a debate about climate change, but we will not do that. I am pleased—I have every faith in what the Minister says about this—that the Government have now perhaps changed their message from the rather casual view on food prices and biosecurity demonstrated to the committee and mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker. That has also happened on the Labour side, with all the various difficulties there. I hope those will change.
I am a proud resident of Cornwall. I represented it in the European Parliament, together with Plymouth. However, my maternal family is from Devon. When I have a cream tea in my home near Tregony in the centre of Cornwall, I usually put the cream on the bottom and the jam on the top, but could the House keep that within these four walls?
Agriculture: Carbon Emissions
Lord Teverson Excerpts(5 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, that is precisely why I think that precision farming—which, as I have said, is being used much more widely in both the arable and livestock sectors because it directs the product on to what is required—is going to be of enormous environmental benefit in terms of the fine tuning of the use of those products. It also enhances productivity, and both enhancing the environment and increasing food production is a good thing.
Lord Teverson (LD)
My Lords, it is estimated by Natural England that some 600 million tonnes of carbon are sunk in English peatlands, yet they are degrading. Will the Minister tell us what urgent action the Government are taking to restore our peatlands? Should not the commercial exploitation and sale of peat stop now?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
The noble Lord is absolutely right. Peatland offers the best carbon storage—double that of woodland. It is immensely important, and that is why we are implementing four projects to restore more than 148,000 acres of peatland over the next three years. Clearly, as we have seen in horticulture, the important thing is that—quite rightly—there is not quite the use of peat that there used to be, as it is such an important part of our ecosystem.
REACH etc. (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019
Lord Teverson Excerpts(5 years, 8 months ago)
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Lord Teverson (LD)
My Lords, I have tabled an amendment to this Motion, and speak very much as the chair of your Lordships’ EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee. We deal with Defra issues. We issued a report on Brexit and the chemicals industry which has not yet been debated on the Floor of the House, so that is why I want to bring up some of these issues here.
I will give a little background about the chemicals industry, because it is key to this debate. It is the second-largest manufacturing industry in the UK, after food processing. It has a total gross value added of something like £12 billion. It is extremely dependent on trade: some 60% of its output goes to the EU and some 80% of our chemicals imports come from there. It employs half a million people. Not just the chemicals industry but a huge proportion of industries in this country use chemicals in their supply chains. Therefore, it is not just the chemicals industry that is affected by this but all those other businesses that use chemicals in their processes, particularly those that are downstream in the manufacturing process. They do not import, export or manufacture chemicals themselves but they use them, so they are affected by the REACH regulations.
I will be more critical than I usually am, as chair of the committee. The committee found—and felt very strongly, if I am honest—that Defra was not on the front foot on this issue. Understandably, Defra focuses on agriculture, fisheries, flooding and stuff looked at by the Environment Agency; the EA obviously has a role in this. When we had Ministers and senior department officials in front of us, we felt very strongly that they did not understand the gravity, timescale and effect on industry of coming out of REACH. That is not the case now, but perhaps this SI is an example of trying to catch up and lay a statutory instrument that is sufficient for the industry’s needs, but not being able to do that quickly enough.
I will talk a little about the European Chemicals Agency. To give your Lordships an idea, it has 500 staff, a budget of around £100 million, and 21,000 registered substances, of which only about 5,000 are registered by UK companies and organisations. That is a serious operation. What I want to come back to is that all of its functions will now have to be replicated in the United Kingdom. That is essential after Brexit. There will still be 21,000 chemicals that the UK will want to use, which will have to be authorised, recorded and checked up on, to make sure that the regulations are applied.
The committee very much welcomed the Prime Minister’s view that we should remain part of the European Chemicals Agency. We agreed with that very strongly. But of course that is not possible if we are not in the single market or a member of the EU or EEA. That is just not on offer. We asked many times what the Government have managed to negotiate further with the EU on this. They are not able to, because the EU will not do that. It is not in the Government’s power to arrange that pre-Brexit, unfortunately. That is the situation: we cannot be part of the chemicals agency and the REACH regime if we are not part of the single market.
The committee was also struck by the absolute unanimity of the whole industry, NGOs and the scientific community—far more than on any other subject we have looked at, whether fisheries, biosecurity or food supplies—that we should try still to be part of the European Chemicals Agency; or, if not, we should have total alignment with its decisions, however we manage to do that.
Lord Teverson
I absolutely endorse that: we often think of this industry as dominated by large corporates and internationals; it is not. There is a huge SME sector which is just as important in this.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering
I am most grateful.
In paragraph 17 of the 15th report the department is recorded as replying to one of the concerns thus:
“Should it become clear that we are in a ‘no deal’ scenario, staffing levels will be scaled up as required over a period of several years, allowing time for recruitment and training”.
The question has to be asked: as we are on the eve of a potential no deal, what is the position now and how far advanced are we with the scaling up? Are the officials coming from the industry and from other departments? What certainty can we have that the officials who are being asked to prepare for exit day under no deal are in place and have the knowledge in this regard?
My heart sank when my noble friend said that the dedicated IT system had been tried and tested and was ready to go. Successive Governments have found themselves in an embarrassing situation where we have a new, swanky IT system in place, it has been tried and tested and is ready to go, but it has proved to fail. I think the two examples I am going to choose actually reflect badly on my own Government. One relates to the Rural Payments Agency, where we not only introduced a new system of farm payments but, at exactly the same time, introduced a new IT system which had been tried and tested—and failed. The other IT system that caused great distress throughout the country was rolled out by the Child Support Agency. Again, we had a new IT system that had been tried and tested and proceeded to fail, with devastating consequences for families across the country. I hope that my noble friend will be proved right that this IT system is indeed ready to go.
At paragraph 27 of its 15th report, the committee raises concern about the possibility of failure and disruption:
“We remain concerned … that there may be disruption to the UK chemical industry, supply chains and wider economy as a result of new requirements to register chemicals from the EU after exit”.
That is certainly something noble Lords would wish to be satisfied on this afternoon.
My final point is that the House is incredibly grateful to Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Sub-Committee B for its work in preparing us for this debate on a very important SI.
I am rather concerned that the noble Lord, Lord Fox, might be at my dinner. We were at breakfast together this morning, as indeed was my noble friend Lady Byford and a number of others. We are now together—almost—post-lunch. I pray that we might be at dinner together this evening, but perhaps we might both have a reprieve. He mentioned the need for reassurance about ongoing consultation, and that all the groups are united. It is quite a challenge to unite such disparate groups as the Green Alliance and the broader environmental groups, the health companies, the animal rights charities and indeed the chemical industry. I conclude by asking my noble friend to give the House an assurance that the consultations are indeed ongoing and will continue throughout any transitional period.
Lord Teverson
At the end insert “but this House regrets that the draft Regulations do not address concerns raised by the European Union Committee in their report Brexit: chemical regulation, published on 7 November 2018, about Her Majesty’s Government’s plans for chemical regulation after the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union.”
Relevant document: 23rd Report from the European Union Committee
Amendment to the Motion not moved.
Motion, as amended, agreed.
Rural Development (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019
Lord Teverson Excerpts(5 years, 8 months ago)
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Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)
My Lords, I will speak to the first two of these four statutory instruments that are being taken together. I thank the Minister and his officials for their very helpful briefing session on what is, as the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, has already indicated, a very complex subject.
The European agricultural fund for rural development provides rural development programmes which run under the multiannual financial framework. This SI allows funded programmes to run allegedly unhindered after exit date, until their natural end in 2020.
Annexe 2 of the Explanatory Memorandum lists the six legacy regulations affected by the SI, two more in which deficiencies will be remedied and four where the devolved Administrations have had programme amendments approved. This will ensure that structure fund programmes continue to run smoothly. As I understand it, these programmes will continue to report in the same way as previously but will report to the rural development programmes of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, as the relevant devolved Administrations, instead of direct to the EU.
The aim of these SIs is to ensure operability of schemes and the continuity of investment in rural areas, which is the key element for me—it is really important. I wish to ask about the specifics of reporting mechanisms. The EU was very stringent on the information that was required by those who had received structure funds. Being involved with an organisation that had some of their money, I am aware of just how stringent it was. Can the Minister assure us that the UK will get good value for public money? This is especially necessary now that the Exchequer will pick up the funding instead of the EU.
As someone who comes from a rural community, I have a keen interest in the effect of these SIs. Last Friday I took part in a rural conference whose chief aim was to press the Government to produce a rural strategy. The Government have produced an Industrial Strategy which addresses the needs of urban communities and their economy. Now it is time to produce a strategy to address some of the huge disadvantages that rural communities face. These include lack of infrastructure, lack of transport, significantly less pupil funding, lack of affordable housing and poor access to services. I am concerned that the lifeline of rural development funding will be cut off by 2021, to be replaced by a nebulous undertaking that this will in future be covered by the Agriculture Bill.
The Agriculture Bill as published makes some significant changes to the way funding for farming and the environment would take place—as has already been said, public money for public good—but the Bill has become stuck in the Commons after Committee. I am concerned that a large gap in funding for rural areas is opening up before us. As the noble Lord has indicated, Sub-Committee B of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee estimates that the value of EU funds that will need to be replaced is between £400 million and £450 million a year of the European agricultural fund for rural development programmes for the remainder of the period to 2020. The loss of this investment will be keenly felt by many in deep rural areas.
Paragraph 7.3 of the Explanatory Memorandum states:
“After EU Exit, no new rural development programmes will need to be approved and from 2021 new agricultural and environmental schemes will be delivered under the Agricultural Bill”.
The Agriculture Bill will therefore need to be in place by 2021. It should have been in place by the 29th of this month, so that rural communities could plan ahead and have confidence that they were not going to suffer from a severe lack of resources. I know that the Minister understands these issues, but I am not sure the rest of the Government do.
Paragraph 12.1 of the Explanatory Memorandum, under “Impact”, states:
“Beneficiaries will continue to receive rural development funding as before EU exit”.
I am not confident that this will happen and am very concerned about the fate of rural communities.
Lord Teverson (LD)
My Lords, I first thank and apologise to the Minister for having missed his briefing on Monday; I was election monitoring in west Africa. I left central Guinea-Bissau at the right time and the journey all the way back to Gatwick Airport was perfect until I tried to get the Gatwick Express to Victoria, when it all went wrong and I missed the meeting.
For six years I had the great privilege of being a board member of the Marine Management Organisation, a Defra non-departmental public body. I have had an awful lot to do with structural funding over the years as an MEP, in other roles locally in the south-west and a little bit as part of the MMO. The EMFF recently has been one of the best-delivered structural funds. I am particularly thankful for the good work of the MMO’s finance director, Michelle Willis, under the direction of the chief executive, John Tuckett, who managed to deliver a programme of structural funding pretty well on time and of the right quality, which is unusual in this area.
I know the Minister always likes me to be positive, so I seriously congratulate the Government on one thing in particular—there will be others: in paragraph 6.7 of the Explanatory Memorandum, for the first time ever the Government have used the term “fishers” rather than “fishermen”. I have brought this up before, and the government response on why they used that word was that they consulted with the industry and that is the term it said it wanted to be used. There is something wrong in the way that that logic works. But congratulations on that. My sub-committee’s most recent report on the landing obligation, which I cannot go on to today, also used that terminology, because that is the way that participants in this industry are described in most other English-speaking countries. I hope that that will continue in future.
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, I am most grateful for what has been a valuable debate and consideration beyond what are, as we all know, the technical requirements behind why we need to do this. I fully appreciate that many of us have been waiting and wanting to get on with some primary legislation, but that is not in my gift, alas. If it is my privilege to do so, I look forward to taking part in discussions, in the Chamber and beyond, on how we take forward fishing and marine interests and agriculture, and the produce we create in our waters and on our land, which is so important for domestic production and for export.
These instruments ensure that the rural development programmes and the maritime and fisheries operational programmes continue to operate effectively. As I said, the rural development fund is worth some £430 million per year and the maritime and fisheries fund is worth some £32 million per year. I am sure that, at this point, the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, is thinking that that looks like a big gap. It was very generous of him to raise the fact that the fund has been a good custodian of other people’s money.
I will try to give as much detail on this as possible. The Government have guaranteed that any projects funded from the 2014 to 2020 allocations from these funds will be funded for their full lifetime. Whatever is agreed up to 2020, and if thereafter those projects are to be funded, that will be honoured. My noble friend Lady McIntosh opened by asking where the money is coming from. The Treasury allocates to departments. My advice to applicants is that Her Majesty’s Treasury funding is a guaranteed cover of all rural development projects entered into before the end of 2020 for their full lifetime. I encourage those who are minded to think strongly of that Treasury guarantee.
My noble friend raised another point. I have declared my farming interests, and we all would like as much certainty as possible. That is precisely why there is a promise to, as far as is possible—I use those words deliberately, and will seek to clarify that—guarantee the same level of funds until 2022. Some noble Lords will wish completely the reverse, but I have no idea whether this Parliament will go on until 2022, and, as we all know, no Parliament can bind its successors. But this is a promise to the rural community, while this Government are in office and have that responsibility, to honour the level of funds until the end of this Parliament. None of us here is in a position to know precisely when that Parliament may conclude.
My noble friend Lady McIntosh raised the legal basis for reimbursement and the date. It is because the EU is bound by the regulations while they apply to the UK as a member state. Any commitments that the UK has entered into prior to exit are commitments made from the EAFRD. That is the basis, and it was why that was the date in Article 50 and why precisely the Treasury guarantee kicks in for anything after the date of us leaving.
Several noble Lords raised the issue of the link to the Agriculture Bill, including my noble friend Lady McIntosh and the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell. These SIs are made under the withdrawal Act; they allow us to correct deficiencies. The purpose of the Agriculture Bill, for which we are waiting, is obviously to provide the opportunity to redesign our approach to agricultural support, so that if we wish to we can amend retained EU law. Therefore, any amendments that we make are, yes, probably for the short term, and they will probably be to see how we might improve the current arrangements and give better experience to agreement holders.
Under Clause 1 of the Agriculture Bill, the Secretary of State may provide financial support for managing land or water in a way that protects or improves the environment. Of course, as we design our agriculture policy, we will look to see—and this is a point that I would like to put to my noble friend Lady Byford—how we can support bringing together groups who work together in the agricultural sector. Clearly, as we look at how we can enhance the environment and how we deal with landscape, it is with clusters and the concept of catchment areas. I think of Slowing the Flow at Pickering, in regard to my noble friend Lady McIntosh. All this is where working together in schemes is going to be very rewarding in terms of enhancing the environment and producing very good food as well in that context.
To my noble friend Lady Byford, I say that I am delighted that the House of Commons said that we should have a debate on this. My understanding is that future funding is important to rural and marine communities. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, that on 10 December 2018, the Government committed to providing £37.2 million of extra funding for the UK seafood sector for projects approved for 2019 and 2020 to boost the industry as we become an independent coastal state.
On the Agriculture Bill, rural growth, which includes the LEADER scheme, is currently included in the rural development programme and will continue under the government guarantee until the end of the programme period. Beyond that, the expectation is that rural growth initiatives will be supported through the UK’s shared prosperity fund, which is intended to deliver for all parts of the country. Wearing the rural-proofing element, which is a strong one, I say that Defra is working with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to develop the ways in which it will support the rural economy.
Perhaps I can immediately say to the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, on the rural strategy that I was fortunate enough to give evidence with the Secretary of State, and he has said publicly that he was looking forward to the report of our Select Committee and that it might be an occasion to respond. I think he was generously saying, as noble Lords who were in that committee will have heard, that this was something that was raised. I know that he and I will be very much looking forward to the rural economy report whenever it comes out.
The noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, asked for reassurances about reporting. I assure your Lordships that the level of rigour currently applied to ensure that the rural development programme achieves value for money and overall public benefit will continue. Inspections will still take place. Annual implementation reports will continue to be produced and approved programmes can continue to be evaluated administratively by relevant authorities. The National Audit Office will continue to be involved to maintain existing levels of scrutiny and good practice. We have put in place arrangements to ensure that the Commission’s functions are now taken up by each devolved authority or the programme monitoring committee, which is composed of representatives of environmental, rural and agricultural stakeholders, including non-government organisations.
The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, raised the question of EMFF and how new replacement work schemes will work. In the Fisheries Bill, we propose a power to replace, modernise and broaden the existing grant-making powers in the Fisheries Act 1981. This will provide greater flexibility and ensure that new grant schemes can deliver value for money. Fisheries are devolved and once we leave the EU and on the closure of the EMFF grant scheme, devolved Administrations have indicated that they would want to run their own grant schemes targeted on their national priorities.
The noble Lord asked about fishing support after 2020. The Government have committed to replace EMFF from 2021 across the UK for the next two years, as I said. It was announced that that extra EMFF will be available to UK-licensed vessels.
The European Investment Bank was raised by the noble Lords, Lord Grantchester and Lord Teverson. It currently has no involvement in UK rural development programmes or the maritime and fisheries programme. Treasury funding will still be accessible to those seeking it. The impact on agreement holds will therefore be negligible. I am bound to say that the loss of access to the EIB is a result of exit, not as a direct result of the instrument.
Lord Teverson
My Lords, may I say that my fishers friends in Mevagissey did not have the European Investment Bank highest on their priorities, but I am glad he clarified that.
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
I thank the noble Lord. I have dealt with the issue of further financial assistance.
The noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, raised areas where different Governments are engaged in regulating the same area. We are working closely with the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy in developing the instruments. The European rural development fund and the European social fund have domestic power to continue making payments following exit. This is not the case for the European agricultural fund for rural development or the European maritime and fisheries fund, which rely on the spending powers in the EU regulations. That shows the distinction. A different approach is therefore necessary to allow funds to continue operating under the Treasury guarantee.
The noble Lord also asked why the provisions do not apply to the European rural, development, social and cohesive funds. They are being addressed in a separate SI by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. That SI and others will be developed in your Lordships’ House on 14 March.
Aquatic Animal Health and Alien Species in Aquaculture (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019
Lord Teverson Excerpts(5 years, 9 months ago)
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Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend for bringing this statutory instrument forward. He will be pleased to know that I do not oppose it; I just have a couple of questions. I remind the Committee that I chaired the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee next door for one term of five years.
My noble friend set out very clearly the importance of aquatic health to the whole of the island of Ireland. My question goes to the heart of this. I presume this is a no-deal statutory instrument; is that correct, or is it something that will continue in the event of a deal? I read with great interest of the trade deal that has been made with the Faroe Islands. I have visited those islands. I am very proud of my Danish heritage and that the Faroe Islands used to be a part of Denmark. I was intrigued to see that the United Kingdom is selling £6 million-worth of goods to the Faroe Islands, but importing £200 million of goods from them, most of which is fish, particularly shellfish. I understand that a lot of this is crabs. Will this pose a problem for Northern Ireland? Specifically, is the MSC the body that will continue to check all imports from what will effectively be third countries, including other European Union countries—the remaining 27 members of the European Union—at the point of entry? I should know the answer to this, but making the analogy with the Food Standards Agency in England, I want to ask what the relevant body will be and whether my noble friend shares my concern about ensuring that we maintain the excellent aquatic health that Northern Ireland currently has.
In paragraph 7.5 on page 5 of the Explanatory Memorandum—I think this is repeated in the next statutory instrument as well—I was delighted to see that the Government have very wisely chosen to maintain the equivalent or higher standards set by the World Organisation for Animal Health; I will not say it in French, even though I am quite proud of my French accent. I hope that is something that the Government intend to do going forward; I am sure we will discuss this. I am sure my noble friend agrees that it is absolutely vital that we maintain regulations regarding aquatic health in the EU. This is relevant because these will be third-country imports from the date of our leaving, if we leave with no deal.
Lord Teverson (LD)
My Lords, it is always with some sadness that we deal with a Northern Ireland issue, a part of this country that voted remain quite decisively yet is completely unrepresented in the other place. In fact, it is represented by a very extreme party of Brexit. However, we are where we are.
I say to the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, that in my Select Committee this morning we looked at the Faroe Isles FTA and have brought it to the special attention of the House. It would be quite useful to debate it on the Floor of the House, even though it is only our 144th trading partner worldwide.
Farming: Carbon Emissions
Lord Teverson Excerpts(5 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, research is essential, whether it is agritech or research into tackling endemic disease, which obviously affects livestock. For instance, we want to deal with bovine viral diarrhoea and salmonella in poultry and pigs. All the research will help us to reduce emissions, whether it is through low-emission fertilisers or whatever. In all that, we need to collaborate strongly.
Lord Teverson (LD)
My Lords, just as, in the energy sector, energy efficiency is the best way to reduce emissions, surely in agriculture one of the best ways to reduce emissions is by reducing food waste. What action are the Government taking to reduce the one-third of food waste there is in the supply chain, particularly when in this country we have food banks looking for food, for all the reasons that we know?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
The noble Lord is absolutely right about another key strand of work, which is reducing the extraordinarily high amount of food waste produced by many households. That is happening with retailers through WRAP and the Courtauld commitment, but we need to change how we conduct ourselves and reduce food waste, because it is highly inefficient unnecessarily to produce food.
Invasive Non-native Species (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019
Lord Teverson Excerpts(5 years, 10 months ago)
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Lord Teverson (LD)
My Lords, one of the privileges I have in this House is to chair your Lordships’ EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee. We were very grateful to the Minister for giving evidence for the Brexit and biosecurity report we produced, and part of biosecurity is invasive species. One thing that particularly stood out for the committee was the cost of getting it wrong in this area, with the example given of the 2001 outbreak of foot and mouth disease: it cost us some £8 billion to solve that crisis over many weeks, to say nothing of the misery caused to the farming community. As we have not yet managed to debate that report—and I suspect we will not do so for some months—perhaps I could ask one or two questions that came out of it concerning invasive species.
My first question is on notification, which has been touched on by other Members. The Minister said that, once we leave the EU, this would be a responsibility for the Secretary of State. But what will happen during the implementation period, if there is one, and after that in terms of the divergence of the European list that we have at the moment? Will we just copy that current list when we start afresh as a third country? But that list will change rapidly over time, so how will we deal with that divergence, particularly when it comes to border control?
On border control, at the moment, one of the fundamental building blocks of protection is an IT system called TRACES, which concerns the transfer of animal products, animals and vegetable products, and whatever bugs and insects they happen to have with them. Are we still looking to try to integrate that system and use it ourselves? Post Brexit, particularly if there is no deal, how will we replicate IT systems for the import and export of these types of materials? That is absolutely fundamental to being able to control the management of this.
We were shocked—and shocked is the right word—by one thing that the Minister from the other end, George Eustice, told us when he appeared before us. We suggested that, if there was no deal, we would have huge border issues around transit times. The Minister said that, in that case, the phytosanitary checks would not be done. That is a pretty dangerous approach, to be honest, and one that is, I suspect, contrary to WHO rules—to WTO rules, sorry; although perhaps it may be contrary to WHO rules too. Can the Minister help me understand how we will approach phytosanitary controls, particularly in the case of no deal—an option that the Government have not taken off the table?
On the island of Ireland, there is clearly no barrier or sea border—ineffective as that might be against certain things, as my noble friend Lady Parminter said when she talked about species coming across the channel. But our committee felt strongly that Ireland as an island should be treated as a single econological area, as it is at present, to some degree. I would be interested to hear the Minister’s view on that. A lot of trade goes between the two parts of Ireland but obviously there are no natural barriers at all.
Lastly, I am interested in reference laboratories. I do not know whether they come into this area—they certainly come under biosecurity. I am interested to hear from the Minister whether we should be concerned about reference laboratories in terms of invasive species. This is an area where, as the Minister says, we have great expertise, but it covers only certain areas that other parts of the European Union also cover. Will we up our game through Defra funding to be able to ensure that our scientific and research base is sufficient for this area?
Viscount Ridley (Con)
My Lords, I walked through Hyde Park this morning and saw three invasive alien species: Egyptian geese, ring-necked parakeets and, of course, grey squirrels. That reminded me that there is quite a gap between the way we talk about the issue in this place as mainly a bureaucratic issue of getting the right regulations, committees and quangos in place, and what is actually needed on the ground, which is to control and, where possible, eradicate these species. The grey squirrel is doing terrible harm to the position of the red squirrel in this country. Will my noble friend confirm that, in this case, we are not changing policy at all and this is a simple tidying-up exercise, and what needs to follow is more effort going into actually doing something about these creatures?