Agriculture Bill

Viscount Trenchard Excerpts

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

[Lord Rooker (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I agree very much with what was said early on in the debate, but I must say to both noble Earls, Lord Caithness and Lord Shrewsbury, that making the argument requires a positive approach to access. It came across certainly in the first few minutes of the speech of the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, that he would be very happy if there were no access anyway. He then went on to deploy the arguments and consequences of access.

Access is here to stay, whether it is the coastal path or access to the countryside. However, I could not agree more that in a small country it must be managed. Think about this: you go to a countryside car park for a walk. You will probably pay something, but there will also be a sign saying that every month the costs of removing the litter germinated by the car park and its users will be shared by every car parked there, and that by paying to park there you accept that. That might be a salutary warning to those causing the trouble, and to those who see trouble and do nothing about it.

I have been a walker in the Lake District for more than 30 years and I freely admit that I have never seen any seriously bad examples of fly-tipping. On the other hand, I have seen really bad examples elsewhere. I do not accept that it should be the responsibility solely of the landowner. There must be more enforcement, more cameras and more forensic examination of the waste. Given the kind of stuff that is so carelessly piled up in serious fly-tipping, the evidence that people leave can be traced back to where it came from. There is an argument about who actually did it, who was responsible in the end and where the waste came from, but the police should take some responsibility—they do not take rural crime seriously enough, and this is a rural crime. I very much agree with what was said about the broken windows theory, which is fundamental.

I am in favour of a crackdown. We have automatic number plate recognition cameras all over the city and in different areas. We need a bit more of it in the countryside, with some warnings about responsibility. That being the case, I realise that it is very difficult, though not impossible, to provide a proper enforcement system, but to be honest, there is no enforcement system at the moment. We ought to start to generate one.

[Viscount Trenchard (Con)]

My Lords, as I said on Tuesday, additional public access, however beneficial to people whose livelihood does not depend on agriculture, is a distraction from farmers’ primary responsibility to manage their land efficiently to produce food for the nation and to assist our balance of trade by producing high-quality food products for export around the world.

I congratulate my noble friends Lord Caithness and Lord Shrewsbury on their eloquent and persuasive introduction to their amendment. They are absolutely correct that the new scheme must properly compensate farmers for the damage and additional costs they will incur as a result of the obligation they will face to provide more public access. Littering has been getting worse in recent years. So has fly-tipping, which has got much worse through lockdown, as my noble friend Lord Caithness observed. I wholeheartedly support the amendment and look forward to the Minister’s reply.

As my noble friend Lord Shrewsbury said, the answer from my noble friend Lord Goldsmith, which I heard as well, was unsatisfactory and rather ambiguous. It seems that the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, also considers fly-tipping to be at least partly the responsibility of the landowner, which I was rather surprised to hear him state. Could the Minister clarify the Government’s policy on responsibility for fly-tipping and what my noble friend Lord Goldsmith actually intended to say?

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, this is one of those occasions where you have rather more sympathy with what was said than what was written, because the amendment can be taken, and probably would be by many, as an attack on greater access to the countryside. On Tuesday I moved a series of amendments tabled in conjunction with the Ramblers and British Canoeing. I can give noble Lords an absolute assurance that both those bodies would agree with those sentiments.

As someone who lives in the Lambourn valley, close to Swindon and the M4, I know about fly-tipping. Usually a pile of rubbish occurs where there is access to a road and somewhere quiet. It will not be enhanced by a footpath, because people do not carry old fridges up footpaths to dump them—or if they do, I would steer well clear of them. Let us not confuse the issues. The incident the noble Earl, Lord Shrewsbury—who has been here even longer than I have and is a friend—talked about was just trespass. It was not to do with access. The two are not that closely related.

The general points about taking these problems more seriously, with criminal enforcement, are a serious matter. A lot of littering comes either from unplanned, uncontrolled gatherings where you do not have bins, et cetera, or close to urban centres. It is not just the young; grey hair does not stop you dropping litter. I have seen it myself. For any noble Lords who have travelled on the Tube, it is a bit like face masks; the young are only as bad as their seniors. It is engrained.

I totally approve of the attitude of the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, on the last amendment and of the Minister’s response. I am afraid it is rather unanswerable —I cannot ask you about what you have said until you have said it. I appreciate how it was taken down and I hope that flexibility will come in during our discussions on this, because it would make it work better.

This amendment raises issues, but it would be totally against the spirit of the rest of the Bill. Greater access would not cause most of the problems here. On being irresponsible in a Royal Park close to an urban area, I am sorry, but people have access to go there anyway. Extra access will not make it worse. On specialist paths for ramblers and other groups, these groups are more likely to report people—a path that ramblers use regularly will discourage fly-tipping. The general public all have a phone with a camera. Telling people that they have a responsibility to use them may be something the Government can do; they can certainly make it easier to report and get the reports back.

I do not think that we will get more of these problems every time we expand access to the countryside. They are there already in uncontrolled access. Having better control and understanding of the problems—integration, the odd use of cameras, not having better reporting infrastructures—is a better way to go about it.

On the final comment about a farmer resenting having to take time off because someone fell and broke their leg: if somebody falls in the street, would you stop and help them? I know I have done it a couple of times. Was it inconvenient? Yes. But come on—there are limits.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Hain (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I particularly enjoyed the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, who I have known for over 50 years, when he talked about his local bird life and the implications it has in this debate.

I support Amendment 42 to Clause 1 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, and others, which relates to whole-farm agroecological systems and organic farming. The pandemic has been a tragic lesson in how broken our connection to our life support systems, by permission of nature, has become. In March, the UN’s environment chief, Inger Andersen, told us that

“Nature is sending us a message”


with the coronavirus and ongoing climate crisis.

In 2019, the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services published the most comprehensive study into the health of the planet ever undertaken. It concluded that human society was in jeopardy from the accelerating decline of nature, on which the survival of the human race depends. This ongoing work is telling us that

“Rampant deforestation, uncontrolled expansion of agriculture, intensive farming … as well as the exploitation of wild species have created a perfect storm for the spillover of diseases.”


The scientists leading this work have warned that

“The health of people is intimately connected to the health of wildlife, the health of livestock and the health of the environment. It’s actually one health.”


Agroecological agriculture—of which organic is one system—supports small farms that are diverse, integrated and use low levels of chemical input to ensure the long-term balance between food production and the sustainability of natural resources. Although agroecology is recognised in the Bill, it is in a very minor way. In Clause 1(5), the Bill states that

“better understanding of the environment”

—one of the purposes for which the Secretary of State may give assistance—

“includes better understanding of agroecology”.

This appears to signify a basic misconception of what agroecology is and what a large-scale transformation to agroecological farming could deliver for farmers, wildlife, climate and public health. It should not be relegated to a legislative footnote; it should be a key part of this Bill and the Government’s broader agricultural policy, as others have said.

While I welcome this reference in the Bill, a more substantive reference, such as that proposed in Amendment 42, is also needed to create a specific commitment under Clause 1(1) for financial and wider support for existing agroecological farms—such as organic—and to ensure that all farmers can promote agroecological practices on the whole farm. This would then allow for support and incentives for farmers to facilitate the integration of food production with the delivery of environmental and social public purposes, in line with the avowed objectives of the Bill. It would ensure that farmers could transition to ecological farming models, producing food while restoring environments and nature.

These benefits are enhanced when they are part of the whole-farm system, rather than in reserved areas or only on the margins. Organic farms have been shown to support 50% more wildlife than is found on conventionally farmed land and healthier soils, with 44% higher capacity to store long-term soil carbon. Agroecological farms can also improve public access to nutritious, affordable fruit and vegetables, and to community projects, supporting improved public health outcomes for us all, as well as enterprise. I therefore hope that the Minister will indicate his acceptance of Amendment 42 in particular.

[Viscount Trenchard]

My Lords, I sympathise with Amendment 29 in the name of my noble friend Lord Lucas, although I wonder whether it is necessary. Is it not covered effectively by Clause 1(1)(j)?

On Amendment 38, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, I observe that the best and by far the cheapest way to implement integrated pest and weed management measures will follow from our freedom from EU regulation, which has unnecessarily banned some pesticides and fungicides which could be used to reduce pest and weed problems without any negative environmental consequences. Of course, many chemicals have rightly been banned, but some have been banned without definitive scientific evidence.

I am sure that all noble Lords would support nature-friendly farming, as advocated by my noble friend Lord Caithness in Amendments 39 and 96. However, I believe it is already clear that nature-friendly practices are wholly consistent with the purposes listed in Clause 1.

Amendments 40 and 84, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, seek to add agroforestry schemes to the list of approved purposes. I agree with the noble Lord but believe that they are unnecessary, because agroforestry is surely included within the scope of Clause 1(1)(I). Similarly, my noble friend Lord Dundee reminds us that the Government have committed to plant 30 million trees without taking any agricultural land out of production. Will the planting of these trees lose us 7% of agricultural land, as I thought he also said, and how many of these trees will be planted on brownfield sites? Was this policy adopted before or after it was recognised that ash dieback might decimate the country’s population of ash trees?

The noble Duke, the Duke of Wellington, supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, in his Amendment 48 seeks to widen the purposes for which financial assistance may be paid to include conversion to organic and ecologically sustainable farming. I believe that the noble Duke is right: farmers who follow ecologically sustainable practices should be rewarded. I had believed that consumer demand meant that farmers were replacing less ecologically sound practices with organic practices and was surprised to hear how small the organic acreage is. Ultimately, organic produce should command significantly higher prices, which will increase the profitability of farmers who produce it. I support the noble Duke’s amendment.

We have already noted the introduction of a new concept: agroecology. Through Amendment 97, the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, wishes to include whole-farm ecological systems as an additional and distinct model. I think that what it represents is already included in the Bill, and it would be better not to complicate the Bill unnecessarily.

I am not at all opposed to—indeed, I would support—increased monitoring of soil health, as proposed in Amendments 217 and 224, but I would not be able to support Amendment 259 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff. Growing crops such as oilseed rape in this country has become unsustainable because EU regulations, which rely too much on the precautionary principle, have placed unnecessary and costly burdens on farmers and unnecessarily exposed their crops to various diseases. One of the benefits of leaving the European Union is that we will be free to develop our own food standards. These must of course maintain the highest standards, but should no longer unnecessarily apply rules which are unsupported by scientific evidence and which artificially raise the prices of food, especially at a time when many consumers are badly affected by the serious economic damage inflicted by the coronavirus pandemic.

House resumed.