Support for Farmers

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Wednesday 21st October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Jenny Riddell-Carpenter]

I thank my hon. Friend for the work he is doing to engage with his local farming community. I will be talking about that more, but work is already under way to make those improvements and scrap the first come, first served element of the scheme.

We anticipated stronger demand and increased the window 2 budget significantly over this summer. An additional £50 million was announced by the Prime Minister in August as part of the response to the dry weather that we saw, and a further £20 million was added before window 2 opened.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

rose—

[Jenny Riddell-Carpenter]

I will give way because it is the right hon. Gentleman.

[Mr Carmichael]

I am grateful to my former colleague on the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee—these links are important. Can she tell the House how many applications the Department expected? It was modelled by some that there would be somewhere in the region of 40,000. In fact, there was money available for 12,000. Did it come as a total surprise to the Department that it got as many applications as it did?

[Jenny Riddell-Carpenter]

The right hon. Gentleman is correct that modelling was undertaken. As a result of that modelling, a further £50 million was announced by the Prime Minister and a subsequent £20 million was announced by the Secretary of State.

I recognise that the substantial demand remained unsatisfied when window 2 closed, and I understand how difficult that was for farmers who were ready to apply but did not have the opportunity to secure an agreement. Let me say this clearly: there will be future SFI offers, and we plan to make an SFI27 offer available as soon as possible.

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[Robbie Moore]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. He is completely right to outline the impact of the statutory instrument that was voted on just this week, which all Conservative Members voted against.

I was just about to come on to the point that this does not stop with the family farm and family business tax. As if the dramatic drop in de-linked payments, the SFI debacle and the family farm and family business tax were not enough, from 1 January next year Labour will hit farmers with yet another tax—the fertiliser tax—through the carbon border adjustment mechanism. Industry warns that this new fertiliser tax could pile up a further £75 a tonne, if not more, on current fertiliser prices. This is simply unfeasible. It adds an additional cost to many of our farmers at a time when they are already being pushed to breaking point. The fertiliser tax should not have been introduced, and the Conservatives voted against it last week.

[Mr Carmichael]

The hon. Member will be aware that the carbon border adjustment mechanism was started under the last Government. The consultation was launched in 2023. With the benefit of hindsight, does he think it might have been a good idea at that stage to take fertiliser out of it?

[Robbie Moore]

I pleased that the right hon. Member, for whom I have great respect, has raised this point, but I will gently push back and say that we are two years into this Labour Government. He makes reference to a consultation that was started under the previous Conservative Administration, but we voted on the fertiliser tax this week, and it was predominantly Conservatives who voted against it. I have to say to the Liberal Democrats: where were you when we voted to stop the fertiliser tax? Not one Liberal Democrat MP voted to stop it.

Yet again, the Liberal Democrats are all over the place. The hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Pippa Heylings) said in a debate that I attended last week:

“We Liberal Democrats support the carbon border adjustment mechanism.”—[Official Report, Second Delegated Legislation Committee, 12 October 2026; c. 7.]

However, in today’s motion, the Liberal Democrats propose that the House

“notes that farmers are deeply concerned about surging input costs, the impact of the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism on fertiliser costs”,

but they cannot bring themselves to be concerned enough to vote to stop it.

Far from protecting our farmers in this House, the Liberal Democrats simply demonstrate that they are Labour enablers, helping those on the Government Benches bulldoze their plans through while outside this House, I suspect their leaflets will be portraying a very different message to their constituents to try to keep everybody happy, but we see through that.

To conclude, the record of this Labour Government is clear for us all to see. They broke the SFI scheme and cut its budget. They taxed family farms and now are taxing fertilisers and assets. We have a Farming Minister who faints at the sight of meat. We have a countryside Minister who thinks that anyone who has a black Labrador and enjoys a warm pint in one of our rural pubs is far right. What an absolute nonsense. Farmers feed this nation—they deserve a Government on their side. It is clear that farmers can no longer afford another day of this Labour Government.

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[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I remind the House of my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for South West Norfolk (Terry Jermy). I can endorse his asks to the Chancellor and I could probably add a few of my own. Like him, I welcome the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the hon. Member for Suffolk Coastal (Jenny Riddell-Carpenter), to her place. She has maybe had a slightly rocky start at some moments, but I know from her time on the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee that she has knowledge about and a concern for the industry. It is in everybody’s interests that the Government should be successful, so we wish her and her colleagues well.

I am not going to say a great deal about the sustainable farming incentive. The Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the hon. Member for Portsmouth South (Stephen Morgan), is coming to the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee next week and we will doubtless spend some time on it then. It would be worth him and others reflecting on the full extent of the damage and the nature of the damage that has been done by that particular episode, because we are already seeing an unpicking of land that has been managed in a way that was beneficial for nature, sometimes for decades.

Farmers have found themselves overnight with massive holes in their budgets. When they ask, “Well, what is going to happen next?”, it is simply not tenable for any of us to turn around and say, “Well, it is okay—just trust DEFRA. They will come up with something in the next financial year.” I am pretty sure what most farmers would say if we turned around to them and said that.

The real impact is another nail in the coffin of financial investor confidence in the industry, at a time when there is a perfect storm for British farming. We have seen a price spike in input costs from earlier in the year, as a consequence of what happened in the strait of Hormuz, particularly in relation to urea for the production of fertiliser and diesel. The Food and Drink Federation told the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee in May that that would take another 10 months to feed through into price inflation, so we still have the worst of that to come in the new year.

Since then, we have had a long, hot summer, in which many arable farmers have been through the third bad harvest in succession, with yields down. Let us not forget that many of them chose not to plant in the spring in the first place, because it made more economic sense just to sell the fertiliser and not plant the seed. The usual sources of replacements, at the time of a bad harvest in continental Europe, are going through exactly the same things that we are going through. Our livestock farms are already feeding winter forage, because they have not had the grass available for their cattle and sheep. Parenthetically, let me say that that is not the case in Orkney, where the problem we have with our winter forage is getting it off the fields after a long, wet summer.

In the red meat sector, our livestock numbers continue to decline in a way that risks threatening the critical mass of the industry. If that were to fall over, it would have a massive ripple effect through the rural economy—through the marts, hauliers, abattoirs, vets and merchants of all sorts. The chicken and pork sectors are under serious pressure. I had a conversation just last week with Cranswick, one of the biggest operators, which told me that between it and 2 Sisters, something in the region of £1.5 billion of planned investment is held up in the planning system. In many ways, that sums up the frustration of the situation in which we find ourselves.

Despite this perfect storm, there are people in every sector of this brilliant industry who continue to want to farm and invest. We have spoken about all the different agricultural policies that have an impact on the sector, but there are policies across nearly every Department of Government, especially in relation to the planning system, that could free up investment opportunities that would generate growth. The Prime Minister speaks about growth in every postcode, and a lot of postcodes are in farming communities. The rural economy presents a real opportunity to generate the economic growth that we all know we need.

For all the downsides that there are in the industry at the moment, I remain optimistic for one reason only, which has nothing to do with anybody in this Chamber or in government: despite everything that happens to our farmers, they continue to want to produce food to feed our nation, and they are better than almost anybody else in the world at doing that.

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[John Lamont]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The Labour Minister did not seem to understand the impact that the mechanism would have. I was even more shocked that the Liberal Democrats decided not to vote against the proposal, unlike Opposition Members.

As I was saying, the ammonia that our fertiliser depends on is now just about all imported. For farmers, the fertiliser tax is not about protection, but is simply a further tax on growing food. As the NFU has warned, food grown overseas with exactly the same fertiliser will come into this country with no tax being paid. British farmers will be put at a disadvantage in their own market by their own Government. This tax will hit every farm in the United Kingdom, including the farms on the Scottish Borders that the SFI never reached.

As we have heard, the Conservatives tried to stop the fertiliser tax, but where were the Liberal Democrats? They were sitting on the fence. When I challenged the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Pippa Heylings)—she is not in the Chamber, but she was a member of the Committee that was considering this regulation last week—she accepted that there were concerns about the uncertainty and the additional costs; but when it came to the vote, the Liberal Democrats sat on their hands. They refused to oppose the measure imposing this additional tax on our farmers.

[Mr Carmichael]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[John Lamont]

The right hon. Member had his time to have his say, but he refused to deal with this issue. The Liberal Democrats have had their say, but have refused to justify their failure to stand up for the farmers and try to stop this. [Interruption.]

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[James Naish (Rushcliffe) (Lab)]

I refer colleagues to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

When the Labour Rural Research Group polled rural voters in the summer of 2025, 75% of them told us that their communities had been neglected over the past 15 years. Over half, 51.3%, said that agriculture and the rural economy should get more Government spending—a higher share than for any priority except the NHS. People really do care about this agenda, and it is important that we on these Benches remember that.

There is no doubt that there was exceptional demand for SFI26; that demonstrates farmers’ desire to invest in their soil, hedgerows, crops and wildlife. That was partly anticipated, which is why the Government allocated an additional £20 million in window 2, on top of the £50 million announced by the Prime Minister in August. I am pleased that, through this scheme, we have nearly £1 billion of investment in nature-friendly farming, as part of the £11.8 billion in funding for sustainable farming in this Parliament.

The good news is that SFI26 was allocated; the Tories did not manage that. But farmers had been preparing for months, and some were left part of the way through applications that could not be completed. The Government have acknowledged that too many farmers who hoped for an agreement have been left disappointed. I welcome that acknowledgement, but acknowledging a problem is where fixing it must begin, and we need to see the co-design of a new system very quickly. We need the IT systems at the Rural Payments Agency reformed, and we need a much clearer and more transparent road map for future application timelines.

I agree with the part of the motion that covers some of the failings of the previous Government. The motion

“regrets the previous Government’s decision to design the SFI on a first come, first served basis”.

It also regrets the trade deals with Australia and New Zealand, and it is true that the Conservatives left a transition that was half built and half funded. On trade, the former Secretary of State, Michael Gove, has admitted that the Conservatives negotiated poorly with Australia and New Zealand.

There are therefore serious questions that need answering ahead of next year’s scheme. First, the National Farmers’ Union has said that any decrease in income jeopardises future business planning, so when will the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs commit to a date for SFI27? Secondly, there is potentially the gap mentioned earlier today: £520 million of agreements are due to expire. In the Minister’s view, is that accurate? If so, what are the Government doing about it? Thirdly, I seek clarity on the timing for those whose applications failed because of the system’s technical problems. Fourthly, on horticulture and smaller farms, SFI must work for market gardens and smaller growers; the 3 hectare minimum for SFI26 shut some of them out altogether. Can that be reconsidered?

[Mr Carmichael]

I agree with everything the hon. Gentleman is saying, but we neglect at our peril the sheer extra cost of administration for SFI, as compared with the basic payment scheme. Baroness Batters has remarkable figures on that in her report. Does he agree, to pick up the point made by the hon. Member for Penrith and Solway (Markus Campbell-Savours), that one of the advantages of a more universal system is that it would be hardwired in for food production, and would be much cheaper to administer?

[James Naish]

The right hon. Gentleman speaks from a position of expertise. He is right that the more complicated we make a system, the more expensive it is to administer. I know that Ministers are looking into how a system that is not “first come, first served” might work; there are risks with that, and we should acknowledge that in this place. It is not a silver bullet by any stretch of the imagination.

I notice that the Liberal Democrat spokesman, the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron), did not mention the word “profitability” in his contribution. However, that is an essential point in any debate on farming. Baroness Batters’ “Farming Profitability Review” notes that the farming budget in England has hovered around that £2.4 billion figure since 2007, but the input costs are forecast to be 30% higher this year than in 2020. We need to be clear about the essential mission for farming. The aim is a countryside where farms are less dependent on subsidy and scheme windows, and more independent, resilient and sustainable—for people, profit and our planet. That is the thread that ran through the Batters review, and it is also the thread that ran through the Labour Rural Research Group’s report on the rural economy.

Sustainable Farming Incentive

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Thursday 15th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

How many applications did the Department expect to receive when it opened the window? The farming software platform Soil Benchmark publicly estimated that there would be about 40,000 applications, and it thought that there would be a budget for about 15,000 successful ones. In the event, it was about 12,000. If Soil Benchmark could do that calculation, why did the Department not do so? Or did the Department do that calculation and then open the scheme in the knowledge that approximately two thirds to three quarters of applicants would be disappointed at the end of it?

[Stephen Morgan]

I thank the Chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee for his measured intervention, and look forward to being before his Committee later this month. We obviously anticipated that there would be high demand for the scheme this year, which is why we had two windows and increased funding for the overall pot to £310 million—I have already mentioned the window 2 process. DEFRA expected strong initial demand, and made it clear before the window opened that its duration would depend on the rate of applications. Ministers obviously allocated the £50 million, and then the additional £20 million. We are really keen to learn from all in the sector what we can do to improve the scheme going forward, and I look forward to the right hon. Gentleman’s contributions in due course.

English Whisky: Single Malt Definition

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Tuesday 15th September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Morgan]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right; Scotch whisky is one of the country’s top global exports, and that is not going to change any time soon. We remain committed to backing it and supporting its continued success.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I am really struggling to see what the Government are seeking to achieve by removing the requirement for the whole process to be carried out on a single site. It seems to me that they risk confusing the definition for the Scotch, Welsh and Irish industries, and they undermine the investments that have already been made in the conventional model by other English distilleries. Are the Government trying to create a new market for a different product, and if that is what they are doing, should that not be reflected in its name?

[Stephen Morgan]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his long-standing support for the Scotch whisky industry, including as Chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee. I know that he recognises the significant contribution that whisky plays to our national identity and as a global export opportunity. I can assure him that nothing has changed in terms of the protected status reputation or production requirements of Scotch whisky. I am looking forward to meeting him later today, when I will be happy to answer any further questions he may have.

Bluetongue Virus in Livestock

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Thursday 3rd September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Select Committee.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I remind the House of my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests and also that my wife is a practising veterinary surgeon.

What is happening was predictable because it was predicted. The Government were warned by the National Audit Office in June last year that they were unprepared for outbreaks of this sort. Will the Minister tell us what actions were taken by the Department following that? The priority for the moment must be getting a better vaccine supply and faster testing turnarounds, but then there are questions that need to be answered about the lack of a proper awareness campaign earlier in the midge season, because we will be coming back to this.

Why is better information not available for vets and farmers? I vaccinated my stock last year. I could not even find out this year whether that was going to be sufficient, or whether vaccination would need to be done again. The Minister is right about the protection we get from vaccination. The second most important thing is reliable information.

[Stephen Morgan]

I thank the Chair of the Select Committee for his contribution. He is absolutely right that this is a serious issue that needs serious consideration. I mentioned that DEFRA has tried and tested approaches to dealing with outbreaks. There are always lessons that we can learn. I will certainly look very closely at what the report tells us and I will listen very closely to what the Select Committee may say on these issues in due course.

On communication, there is always more that we can do. We have had popular webinars and have been putting information on the gov.uk website. There has been information from the APHA as well. I also want to praise the contribution the National Farmers’ Union has made to ensure that farmers are engaged on these issues and are getting the right support at the right time.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Thursday 9th July 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I welcome the new Minister for farming to his post and welcome his willingness to meet the National Pig Association, and presumably the National Farmers Union Scotland pig sector, too. However, I suggest that the situation needs a bit more urgency than meeting in due course. There is a clear and present crisis for the sector, which is complex and requires action from producers, processors, retailers and regulators. Will he convene a summit of all these different interested parties and come forward with a package for help? Without it, we are going to lose the smaller independent producers.

[Stephen Morgan]

I thank the Chair of the Select Committee for his question. I take these issues extremely seriously, and will bring forward the meeting so that I see the organisation as soon as possible.

Farming Road Map and Profitability Review

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Wednesday 24th June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

I call the Chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I remind the House of my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

I welcome the publication of the farming road map. It may not have been rushed, but it is welcome none the less; all we need now is a revised food strategy, and the Secretary of State’s homework will be up to date. Is the implementation of the Batters review still being pursued as a discrete piece of work, or is it being subsumed into the farming road map? In as far as that relates to the operation of the market, why is she not involving farmers’ unions from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland? The Secretary of State refers to DEFRA as a growth Department. Agriculture accounts for 0.6% of UK GDP at the moment, so if we follow the road map and she gives leadership to the industry, what would she want that figure to be in the future?

[Emma Reynolds]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for marking my homework, and I look forward to having it marked in even more detail when I appear before his Committee. There is a separate document in which we have published our response thematically to the 57 recommendations of Baroness Batters’ profitability review. We are already working closely with the sector to take forward those recommendations. In December, we accepted a number of her recommendations: first, the Farming and Food Partnership Board; secondly, the sector growth plans; and thirdly, the trade missions. I suspect that I will be able to answer the right hon. Gentleman’s questions in more detail when I come before the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Thursday 19th March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Select Committee.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

Obviously, there are real opportunities to be had from the completion of an SPS agreement, but those who import fresh produce, in particular citrus fruit, are concerned that imports from countries outside the European Union will become more difficult and more expensive as a consequence. May I encourage the Secretary of State to engage more vigorously and in greater detail with the Fresh Produce Consortium, which brought these concerns to my desk recently?

[Emma Reynolds]

The Minister for Food Security and Rural Affairs is more than happy to meet the consortium. As the right hon. Gentleman said, there is a big prize here, because we do more trade with our nearest trading market and, as he knows, there have been significant delays at the border, and administrative costs. That means that the export of fresh produce is very difficult; in some sectors, such as shellfish, it becomes almost impossible. We have to keep our eyes on the prize. I understand the point that he makes about produce from non-EU countries. We are engaging on that, and as I say, the Minister is happy to meet the group that he mentioned.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Thursday 5th February 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

Has the Minister had the opportunity to consider the report by the Andersons Centre for CropLife UK? It estimates that if a sanitary and phytosanitary agreement with the European Union was implemented without a suitable implementation period, it could result in steep drops in UK crop production and a total loss of income of up to £810 million. That is why the Select Committee is today asking for an implementation period of 24 months. Will she impress upon her colleagues in the Cabinet Office the need for that suitable implementation period?

[Dame Angela Eagle]

The first thing to say is that the SPS agreement is attempting to put right the Tories’ botched Brexit deal, which made it almost impossible for many people to export to our largest market. The idea is that this should be a new, mutually beneficial agreement to remove barriers, and I hope the right hon. Gentleman supports it. I know that the Select Committee report came out last night, and we will certainly respond to it in more detail. We are aware of the potential downsides if wrong deals are done, but we will not sign a deal that is not in the UK’s interests.

Fishing Industry

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Thursday 22nd January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Government support for the fishing industry.

I place on record my appreciation of the Backbench Business Committee for making time available for this debate and for bringing it back to its rightful place here in the main Chamber of the House.

The Prime Minister and his colleagues often tell us, rightly, that food security is national security. The focus of our discussions about food security is often what we farm on land, but we should never lose sight of the fact that we are an island nation and we are surrounded by seas which, if managed properly, can provide us with a source of good quality protein that can be harvested in a carbon-efficient way.

The people who work in our fishing industries often do so in difficult and dangerous circumstances. Still too many of them lose their lives in pursuit of our food and we should record our appreciation for what they do to keep us fed. I say “fishing industries” for a reason. Too often, we talk about fishing as if it were a single homogeneous industry, when the truth is very different. Even in my constituency, the issues facing inshore crab boats are very different from those facing the larger white- fish boats, which are in turn different from the issues facing the pelagic boats. Layer on top of that the interests of aquaculture, and we begin to get a sense of the complexity of seafood harvesting and production.

[Caroline Voaden (South Devon) (LD)]

As many Members may know, warmer sea temperatures brought unexpected numbers of octopus to the waters around South Devon last year, and my crab and lobster fishermen have seen their catch decimated. They have lost up to 80%, hauling empty pots for weeks on end. That means fleet members are now cancelling maintenance work and having to lay off crew. Our fishing communities desperately need support, whether to enable them to stay in the industry or to help them decommission and leave. Does my right hon. Friend agree that that support is desperately needed from the Government?

[Mr Carmichael]

It is critically important. I heard that for myself from my hon. Friend’s constituents when I visited Brixham not once but twice in the run-up to Christmas. It remains to be seen whether the invasion of octopus will be permanent because of changing water temperature, or whether it is just another of those blips that I think last happened in the 1950s. Whatever the truth of the matter, something has to be done for the industry that is there at the moment when the truth is finally established.

We speak about aquaculture as being all about finfish, but in my constituency and elsewhere the role of shellfish aquaculture is enormously important and deserves more attention, especially as we anticipate the conclusion of a sanitary and phytosanitary agreement with the European Union.

Fishing is still a predominantly community-based and family-run industry. It may not shift the dial massively in terms of UK-wide GDP, but in those areas where it matters it is nearly always essential. In Shetland, caught and farmed fish account for approximately one third of our local economic product. We have benefited over the years from the presence of oil and gas, and now from a growing visitor economy, but they do not define our community in the way that fishing does. I labour that point because it matters. People would be forgiven for thinking that this is an industry determined to plunder the seas and extract every last living organism from it. Nothing could be further from the truth. Fishing is predominantly a family business, and the people working in it want to hand on their business to the next generation. They have more of an interest in ensuring that there is a business to be handed on.

Fishing is an area of Government policy where good co-operation between our Governments makes a difference. That is what the industry needs and expects of us. Sadly, it does not always get it. The recent controversy around the fishing and coastal growth fund illustrates how it is fishers who lose out when that goes wrong. Let us remember that the roots of that fund lie in the decision of the Prime Minister to sign up for a 12-year extension of the catastrophically bad deal that Boris Johnson got us in the trade and co-operation agreement in 2020. Given that the EU was looking only for a five-year extension, it is quite an achievement to have managed to negotiate it up to 12 years. Let us also not forget that the loss of fishing effort traded away by the Prime Minister is worth about £6 billion over the 12-year period at today’s prices. If we were able to get half or even a quarter of that, the fund would never have been necessary.

To my mind, it makes perfect sense for the fund to be administered on a UK-wide basis, as was the case with the previous fund delivered by the last Government. That would, in fact, have been an opportunity for Scotland’s two Governments to work together collaboratively on the delivery, and might have been more reflective of the fact that Scotland’s fleet accounts for more than 60% of the UK fishing effort.

Instead, the Government in Whitehall acquiesced to demands from the SNP Government in Edinburgh to devolve the administration. With devolution, there inevitably followed the application of the Barnett formula, and, as a result, we receive only 8.3% of the fund. Madam Deputy Speaker, I could weep. On one of the rare occasions when they do manage to agree on something, they still manage to do it in a way that works to the detriment of the fishermen in my constituency.

[Torcuil Crichton (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (Lab)]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that it is a matter of considerable regret that the Scottish Government asked for the fishing and coastal growth fund to be devolved without first agreeing the mechanism outside the Barnett formula that would reflect the fact that Scotland has a larger share of the fishing industry?

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[Mr Carmichael]

That would have been perfect sense. It was certainly also regrettable that it was said that the Scottish Fishermen’s Federation had asked for this, when they obviously had not. A good, mature working relationship between the two Governments is required, and unfortunately we are just not there at the moment. That may change after May—who knows?

The irony of the fuss created by SNP Ministers about the allocation of the fishing and coastal growth fund was not lost on fishermen in Shetland. As The Shetland Times pointed out, Shetland received only 5% of the Scottish Government’s marine fund, despite the fact that we account for 20% of Scotland’s fishing product. We were assured by local SNP politicians that this was entirely different, as their scheme was “merit based”, which presumably means that we got our quota share only because we were not good enough to get the rest.

The relationship between the UK Government and the devolved Administrations is one thing; more important still is the relationship between all Governments and the industry as a whole. When any Government think they know better than the industry, we know that bad outcomes are just around the corner. Never has that been seen more clearly than when the SNP in Edinburgh, along with their coalition partners the Greens, sought to close down vast areas of fishing grounds by designating them as highly protected marine areas, which was stopped only by the most colossal campaign by industry and community organisations around the coast. It should never have been so difficult to make our own Government back down on measures that were so obviously an existential threat to coastal and island communities.

[Steve Darling (Torbay) (LD)]

My colleague is making some very good points about where Governments are misjudging these matters. Charter fishermen in Torbay are extremely worried that the three-bag limit on pollack could devastate their industry. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Government need to monitor this extremely closely to see whether it does have this massive impact on the industry?

[Mr Carmichael]

My hon. Friend makes a relevant point, which goes to the heart of how decisions are made. It is critical that Government are able to take on the infinite nuance and complexity in fisheries management, and that is done by being in the ports and on the quayside, talking to fishermen, processors, auction houses, transporters and all the rest of it.

The signs remain, however, that the same attitude persists in the Scottish Government. Members will have heard me speak before about the difficult situation facing our pelagic fleet as a result of the quota cuts, which are yet to be finalised, from the year-end negotiations. These cuts will put our pelagic fleet under serious pressure. At times like this, it is more important than ever that boats are able to land fish where they will get the best possible price, so the increase in the requirement for pelagic boats to land in Scotland limits unnecessarily their scope to maximise their restricted opportunities. Again, it has not gone unnoticed that nationalist voices in The Shetland Times condemn the change, while in the pages of Fishing News, Gillian Martin MSP stridently supports her ministerial colleagues.

It does not have to be like this. Our fishing fleets around the coast and in our island communities ask only to be listened to and heard by Government. They do a difficult and often dangerous job, and they should not have to contend with it being made even more difficult —and yes, occasionally more dangerous—by the people we elect to serve here and in other UK legislatures.

[Torcuil Crichton]

The right hon. Gentleman speaks about the fishing industry being heard. I hear reports of the SNP saying that Shetland would be listened to if it had a seat at the SNP table. I have a message for Shetland: we in the Western Isles have an SNP MSP, and we have not been listened to for 18 years.

[Mr Carmichael]

I am sure that message that will indeed be heard with some interest in the Northern Isles. We island communities need to learn from the experience of each other.

There are lessons to be learned from the management of fisheries in different parts of the country. Before Christmas, I visited Brixham with the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee as part of our ongoing inquiry into fishing and the marine environment, and much of what I heard there was similar to what I hear back in Shetland. In fact, speaking to fishermen around the country, the same issue rears its head time and again: spatial squeeze. The salami slicing of access to traditional fishing grounds as a result of other marine and maritime activities now poses a clear and present danger to the viability of our fishing industries as a whole.

[Richard Tice (Boston and Skegness) (Reform)]

The right hon. Gentleman talks about the obstructive nature of some authorities. Does he share my concern about some of the inshore fisheries and conservation authorities? The Eastern IFCA, for instance, has caused grave concern to my fishing constituents in Boston, who are furious about the increasing interference and regulations. It is almost as though they want to stop the whole fishing industry as opposed to enhancing it.

[Mr Carmichael]

I do not know the specifics around the Eastern IFCA, but if the hon. Gentleman writes to me about it, I will see if I can help him out in any way, shape or form. It comes back to my earlier point: authorities have to listen to and be informed by the fishing industry, whatever their locus. By the same token, the fishing industry has to accept that it is not always going to get everything it wants either.

On spatial squeeze, no single demand is unreasonable: the development of offshore renewable energy, aquaculture, marine protected areas, the laying of cables and pipelines, the use of the sea for leisure and doubtless other purposes —the list goes on. At every turn of the wheel, it is fishing effort that is reduced to accommodate something else. The root cause of the problem is that no one holds the ring to look at the whole picture of how our seas are being used. The policy of compensatory MPAs for damage caused to the seas by development done elsewhere feels particularly unjust and illogical.

[Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes) (Lab)]

Does my co-chair on the all-party parliamentary group on fisheries not think that the marine spatial prioritisation programme, which was introduced last summer, will do exactly the job he is hoping to see delivered?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Carmichael]

Well, I hope it will. It remains to be seen. As the hon. Lady knows from working with me as co-chair of the APPG on fisheries, along with our independent co-chair the hon. Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner), to come up with a fisheries strategy for the whole country—it is that lack of strategy that needs to be addressed—the Government have a bit of a backlog on strategies, and the one she mentions has not even joined the queue yet. That is why we are doing this job: I think any initiative without a strategy is always going to struggle. I thank the hon. Lady for allowing me to junk a couple of pages of my speech there.

The House should be in no doubt that if the spatial squeeze on our fishing industry is allowed to continue, we shall soon risk losing its critical mass as a productive industry—that is true in all four parts of the United Kingdom. Once that critical mass is lost, we may never recover it. For the families and communities affected, that would be catastrophic. Fishing families are hard-working and economically productive people. Take away their ability to earn a living at sea, and they will not just sit idle; they will doubtless move with heavy hearts to do something else, somewhere else. That will forever change the nature and character of our coastal and island communities, and not in a good way. I hope that the Government will hear the warning and act before it is too late.

Finally, I wish to raise a concern that is very specific to my constituency: Norwegian access to our local waters. There are, as I speak, big, powerful vessels appearing around Shetland that were not there in the past. We often speak about the North sea fishing area, but in reality, so much of the international fishing effort has become concentrated around Shetland. Shetland fishermen have called on the UK Government to reduce the reciprocal catch limits in the UK-Norway annual bilateral fisheries agreement, but that appeal has not been heard. This is effectively the one major fishing effort in our waters over which we can still have some annual control.

The official preliminary figures show that the Norwegians caught over 22,000 tonnes of demersal fish in UK waters, while the UK caught just short of 9,500 tonnes in Norwegian waters. That is not a fair or balanced deal. We have long held the view that Norwegian access is a good thing for the Shetland fleet, not because there are many Shetland vessels going into Norwegian waters, but because several larger Scottish vessels go, which takes them and their catches away from our waters. That illustrates well the subtleties and complexity of managing effort in shared waters.

A degree of Norwegian access is welcome, but the current agreement and catch limits clearly favour Norwegians at the cost of our fleet. The stats show that Norwegians’ saithe catches in UK waters doubled from 8,000 tonnes to 16,000 tonnes between 2024 and 2025. Saithe, let us not forget, is one of the stocks under pressure. Things are tough enough without a doubling of Norwegian effort on a key stock that is concentrated mainly around Shetland. By contrast, the highest UK demersal catch in Norwegian waters this year has been about 4,000 tonnes of haddock. That is a bit of a disparity, so can I can ask the Minister to give urgent attention to the lowering of the reciprocal cap from 30,000 tonnes a year to 20,000 tonnes a year?

There is a commitment in the agreement to reviewing the cap throughout the year. That is something that fishing industry representatives in Shetland have called for, but now it needs to be tackled as a matter of urgency. In this, I am merely the interlocutor. If the Minister wishes to discuss this with the real experts, she will find them in Shetland. I hope that once the days lengthen a little bit, we may see her there.

--- Later in debate ---

[Seamus Logan (Aberdeenshire North and Moray East) (SNP)]

I thank the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) for applying for this debate, those hon. Members who supported his application, and the Backbench Business Committee for allocating time on this important subject. However, I regret that the right hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Torcuil Crichton) used so much of their time to attack the SNP Scottish Government. The plain fact of the matter is that I am elected, as are they, to deal with matters in this place. My advice to them is: if you are so concerned about Scottish matters in Holyrood, please stand for election there.

I want to give some context before I deal with those matters that are relevant to Westminster.

[Mr Carmichael]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Seamus Logan]

No, not yet. I may allow interventions later, but I want to get to the second paragraph of my speech first.

Fishing is an incredibly important livelihood for many of my constituents. Fraserburgh and Peterhead ports are among the largest fishing ports in Europe in terms of the tonnage and value they consistently bring in. Across Scotland, the Scottish Government’s Scottish sea fisheries statistics show that the value of the Scottish fishing industry in 2024 was £756 million—the highest in the past 10 years. Scotland’s sea area is six times larger than our land area and accounts for 63% of the UK’s exclusive economic zone. It is therefore no surprise that Scotland accounts for the largest part of the UK’s fishing industry, generally representing around 60% of total UK landings by both tonnage and value.

The industry is obviously important to Scotland’s rural and coastal communities; it is a key part of Scotland’s food economy and provides employment all around our coast. The issue of this debate is crucial to my constituents—but, regrettably, the decisions taken by the Westminster Government regarding the Scottish fishing industry are regarded by those constituents as treacherous. First, we had the EU-UK agreement, announced last year, which saw fishing access arrangements extended for 12 years, rather than the preferred annual renegotiation that would have ensured better leverage for fishers. The Scottish Fishermen’s Federation described this decision as “disastrous” for Scottish farming and described the UK Government’s view as being that the fishing industry is “expendable”. The Prime Minister said that this UK-EU deal was a “win-win”, but that characterisation is risible.

Then, as if to pour salt in the wound, the £360 million fishing and coastal growth fund allocations saw Scotland receiving just £28 million over 12 years, or just over £2.3 million a year—7.8% of the fund. How on earth is that approach sustainable? It is an unmitigated disaster for Scottish fishers. Trading away access to Scottish waters and refusing to mitigate that policy through the coastal growth fund is simply creating the conditions for the Scottish fishing industry to fail. A sector worth £756 million to the Scottish economy faces changed conditions with no consultation, as Members have acknowledged, mitigated by a pitiful amount from this UK Government.

The Scottish Government were sidelined in the allocation of the coastal growth fund, with the pathetic excuse that they had requested a devolved approach. Now we learn from the Fishing News that the application of the Barnett formula was because of a decision by the Treasury to baseline the marine allocation for 2024-25, rather than ringfencing it. To clear this up for Members who commented on it, at no point did the Scottish Government say that the allocation should be Barnettised; they simply asked for the devolution of the decision making on that fund to Scotland.

[Mr Carmichael]

Well, what on earth did they expect? They asked for devolution. With devolution comes Barnettisation. Is the hon. Member going to stand there and tell us that the SNP Government did ask for the rebasing that we have seen previously? I have certainly never heard that suggested, and we have taken evidence on this in the Select Committee.

[Seamus Logan]

I want to address that now. Under the European maritime and fisheries fund, when we were part of the European Union, the UK received approximately £207 million over six years, of which Scotland received 46%—46%, not 7.8%. That is why Scotland wanted that matter devolved: so that we could properly support the Scottish fishing industry, in the same way that the European Union and the UK did in the past. Why change the approach?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Carmichael]

I do not know if the Education Minister from Ontario that you welcomed is still here, Madam Deputy Speaker, but if not, that is unfortunate. Many of my family emigrated to that province in the early 19th century, so it is nice to see some of them coming back now.

I place on record our appreciation for the engagement from various fishing organisations, in the run-up to today and throughout the year. They include the Scottish Fishermen’s Federation, the Shetland Fishermen’s Association, and the National Federation of Fishermen’s Organisations; Mike Cohen and Felix Davies from the latter have been in the Gallery throughout our debate. If that is not an illustration of their determination and commitment, then I do not know what is.

We have had, I reckon, 13 Back-Bencher contributions, as well as contributions from the three Front Benchers. We have covered the usual range of issues, including tax, quotas and spatial squeeze, but we managed to diversify into how to kill lobsters and the reintroduction of eels. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) took us back to the beginning of time. There was a happy contrast between his speech and many that we have sat through over the years that did not take us back to the dawn of time, but made us feel as though we had been taken back to that time.

The Minister gave an impressive list of the asks that she has been given. It will be daunting to address them all, but I encourage her to see that list as a positive, because it shows that there are people in this industry who want it to develop and grow. This is a great industry that can have a great future if we give people the basic tools to get on and make it great. I thank the Minister for allowing us to ventilate the issues today, and I am sure that we will return to the subject in future.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered Government support for the fishing industry.

Water White Paper

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Wednesday 21st January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Emma Reynolds]

I commend my hon. Friend’s leadership on this issue. I know that she was putting pressure on Southern Water on Christmas eve. She was concerned about the previous outages, but also about those that were likely to occur. She is absolutely right to say that we need more emphasis on ensuring that companies such as Southern Water are investing in the infrastructure that is needed to prevent these outages in the first place. We are moving from a system of “fix on failure” to one of prevention. That is what this White Paper is all about.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I welcome what is in the White Paper, and it should lead to more effective regulation, but I have just a couple of words of caution. First, the Drinking Water Inspectorate is the only part of the set-up that works well, so folding it into a new regulator should not involve it losing that ability. On agricultural pollution, can the Secretary of State work with the farmers to ensure that this does not just become another stick with which to beat them? She has referred to a whole-system failure, and she is right about that. She will have seen from her recent welcome engagement with South East Water, however, that what we have there is corporate failure, not just of management but of non-executive directors and shareholders. As the Select Committee said, this is an industry that has a real problem with its culture, and what we have in the White Paper, welcome as it is, is not going to shift that. When will we hear from the Government about what they are going to do to change the culture in the industry?

[Emma Reynolds]

I thank the EFRA Committee Chair for his thoughtful reflections. I agree with him on the Drinking Water Inspectorate—it does a magnificent job—and we will ensure that we transfer its strengths into the new single water regulator, as he suggests. I also agree with him that we will work, and we are working, in partnership with farmers to make sure we get this right. We are looking at what we can do with the ELM schemes to ensure that we give them the support they need to tackle the pollution of our waterways from agriculture. He talks about culture. He has a point, but I would say that the leadership of some of these companies is very varied, and we see good leadership in some of the companies. For example, I have visited Severn Trent, and it has a terrific apprenticeship programme. We need to ensure that we see better performance in the water industry across the board, sharing that best practice from those companies that are actually doing the right thing.