Dairy Industry

Andrew George Excerpts

Thursday 13th September 2012 Westminster Hall

[Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)]

I, too, pay tribute to the outgoing Minister with responsibility for farming, my right hon. Friend the Member for South East Cambridgeshire (Mr Paice). I had the immense privilege and honour of being his Parliamentary Private Secretary for a year and a half. With his experience and expertise, he was one of the best farming Ministers this country has ever had. His departure is a great loss to the Government.

I set up the all-party group on dairy farmers in 2006, in the previous Parliament, because of the terrible crisis my Shropshire dairy farmers were going through. An important statistic to remember is that in 1997, 47 cows were slaughtered in Shropshire as a result of bovine tuberculosis; last year, that figure was more than 2,000. I repeat those figures: from 47 to more than 2,000. The misery that that disease has caused many of my constituents is appalling. When I set up the all-party group, 170 MPs joined it. Uniquely, the then Leader of the Opposition, now the Prime Minister, joined the group. I believe that that was the only all-party group he joined in the previous Parliament.

Our group produced a report in which the two recommendations were that we needed a limited cull of badgers and a supermarket regulator. At the time, we were told that it would be impossible to get either. We pleaded with the Labour Government to introduce a regulator and to take action on bovine tuberculosis. Our pleas fell on deaf ears. I am therefore slightly bemused to hear Labour MPs calling for us to support their actions on an adjudicator, because we pleaded on bended knee for years and no action was taken. One reason why the situation is so perilous at the moment is the inactivity of the previous Labour Government.

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

On the point about a supermarket or groceries code adjudicator, I have been chair of the Grocery Market Action Group for the past six years. I am sure that my hon. Friend will agree that it was only just before the 2010 general election that we had agreement from all three main parties that an adjudicator or ombudsman should be put in place.

[Daniel Kawczynski]

Indeed. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend, who is one of the leading proponents of the Groceries Code Adjudicator Bill. I look forward to working with him to get that proposed legislation through Parliament.

I want other hon. Members to be able to speak, so I will just briefly say that I have sat with dairy farmers at their kitchen tables, and seen those grown men burst into tears. The emotion involved in seeing their herds slaughtered is profound. I hope to hear from the Minister what steps the Government will take to address this appalling issue.

I will write to the Minister specifically with regard to a constituent of mine, Mr Jones of Pontsbury, who recently lost a lot of his herd. He has been given new figures on compensation that are much lower than he thought. He is worried that he will not have enough money to replace the cows he has had to send to slaughter. I would be grateful if the Minister looked at that case.

I reiterate the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) regarding exports. I feel passionately about exports to north Africa and the middle east. Libya, Egypt and Tunisia are full of Dutch and Danish cheeses, yoghurts and other dairy products, yet there are none from the United Kingdom. I hope that the Minister will work closely with his colleagues in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills to try to help the dairy sector find new markets in those countries.

Finally, I would like to put on the record that we now have a new Waitrose supermarket in Shrewsbury—the first one has just opened. My daughter and I go every Saturday to Waitrose, because it is the supermarket that pays most to dairy farmers.