Oral Answers to Questions

Anne-Marie Trevelyan Excerpts

Thursday 25th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Goodwill]

Methane is a very potent greenhouse gas, but it is interesting to note that, unlike carbon dioxide, which takes 100 years to dissipate, methane dissipates in about 12 years. That means that if we can reduce the current rate of methane production—never mind net zero—we will actually reduce the amount of methane in the atmosphere, which will be an important way of contributing to our net zero targets.

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

2. What steps she is taking to designate forestry investment zones in England.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (David Rutley)]

We are piloting the first forestry investment zone in Cumbria to learn how best to support long-term forestry investment. I was delighted to visit Northumberland last week to discuss with my hon. Friend and others how to increase tree planting rates. We have everyone from the county council to the national park agreeing to work together to increase woodland creation in that great county.

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

I welcome the Minister’s visit to Northumberland last week and thank him for his kind words. Does he agree that what we need is a whole of Northumberland FIZ, which will be structured to allow long-term private investment to support local landowners to plant and, importantly, maintain extensive commercial and amenity planting projects, so that our 11 million new carbon sinks—our trees—will be a reality, not just a plan?

[David Rutley]

I welcome my hon. Friend’s further comments on the development of a FIZ in Northumberland and completely agree that we need to do more to make our long-term tree planting aspirations a reality. As we discussed last week, we need to explore further the opportunities around the potential FIZ in Northumberland, basing them around the lessons learned from the Cumbria pilot. I welcome the positive work that has already taken place. We clearly need to do a lot more to achieve our ambitious targets across the country and in Northumberland.

Red Squirrels: Potential Extinction

Anne-Marie Trevelyan Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd July 2019 Westminster Hall

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Copeland (Trudy Harrison) on securing this important debate. I declare an interest: my family own and manage woodland in Northumberland and we are passionate red squirrel protectors, so I am proud to come with a natural bias. The reason why the native British squirrel, which happens to have red fur, is under threat of extinction, is because men of wealth—I have yet to find any evidence of female culpability—with an interest in zoological matters in the late Victorian era, when travel and discovery of previously unknown wildlife became fashionable, decided that bringing grey non-native squirrels from the United States would improve their standing, feed their curiosity and perhaps even help to advance scientific understanding.

Every mother dreads that moment over tea when her child declares that they need to bring into school some strange object or picture that clearly requires parental assistance and time, just as they are trying to put their kids to bed. And so it was that when I was told by my then six-year-old that a project on the red squirrel was the following day’s activity and we needed to take in project information and pictures, my heart sank. I wondered how on earth I could assist that very enthusiastic young boy by providing something that had not simply come off the internet. We were in the stage of development when the internet was not the solution to all questions and we could still use books to elucidate new material.

We disappeared into an old musty corner of the house where my father-in-law’s grandfather’s books were kept—they had never been opened in my time in the house—and discovered a series on interesting zoological subjects. I pulled one off the shelf and flicked through, looking for “red squirrel”, but could not find it, which was very confusing. I looked through again and saw “squirrel”, only to realise that in 1923, when the book was published, the conversation was still about the squirrel. The red squirrel was a given; that was the colour of our squirrel. We flicked through and saw a wonderful line about a gentleman who had brought some grey squirrels to London and placed them at the Zoological Society—London Zoo—and everyone was fascinated to see the big grey squirrel, which was described as a curiosity. Also, they had bred so successfully that they had let them out into Regent’s Park. It was fascinating to watch a six-year-old go, “How did that happen? Weren’t they a scientific curiosity?” Perhaps no child understands this, but the point is that something entirely exciting and positive can have incredibly long-term repercussions.

My son took in the musty old book, which did not match the internet submissions that other parents had dug out late at night to support the project of the day, but it led to a school trip to Wallington Hall, a National Trust property in my constituency. It is a wonderful place with 13,000 acres of farm and woodland that now has a vibrant community of red squirrels, thanks to the conservation efforts after near extinction in 2011. When the schoolchildren went to visit in 2008, the red squirrel population had almost disappeared. They went with their exciting project in mind and were told by those working at Wallington that there was a real problem. It was fascinating to watch that next generation become aware of the need for conservation. Wallington is a wonderful house and garden to visit. It is a huge part of the Northumberland tourism industry and provides an opportunity to bring people out from Newcastle to enjoy a beautiful rural existence.

The National Trust has led in investing in finding ways to preserve and restore the red squirrel population. At Wallington, we have our very own red squirrel ranger, Glen Graham, a wonderful man, who has led the way in supporting and protecting our native squirrel population, and working out the best ways to do that in what is, helpfully, a relatively contained woodland environment. He provides food, because the greys eat more than the reds, and he keeps predators away with a lot of humane trapping. He also tries to keep the humans away.

We have wonderful traffic signs on the roads that say, “Squirrels crossing here—please slow down”. Realising how much we all need to do has been a really interesting part of the community’s involvement in the red squirrel project. Every time people drive into town they drive past those signs and slow down, sometimes so that they can peer over the hedge to see the red squirrel who might just be crossing. The National Trust has been profoundly involved, and was a founder member of the UK Squirrel Accord. Across Northumberland and the rest of the UK, landowners and farmers are committing time and resource to trapping grey squirrels. The only way is to rebalance the numbers. The greys will just take over the woodland space if they can.

There are three real threats, one of which is clearly disease. We have discussed the squirrel pox, for which the grey is a carrier and by which the red is almost always fatally affected. That is a technical problem, which we need to continue to work on. We must find a vaccine against it so that the red has a chance to compete, at least on that level, in a fair and balanced way. Competition for food is also clearly a huge challenge, simply because the grey eats more in a day and has more of an impact on trees. The reds just cannot keep up.

A fundamental part of that is the question of the amount of woodland habitat that we need. The grey poses a greater threat to our woodlands, as they strip bark from the broadleaf trees for food and for building dreys. That can leave a tree vulnerable to disease, creating weaker, disfigured trees, and that can reduce seed production through crown loss and then depressed timber values. There is an all-round negative impact on the woodland, which requires long-term investment.

We need to plant more broadleaf woodland to create more areas of potential home for our native red squirrel. I raise again with the Minister the logistical challenges put before any landowner wanting to plant new woodland. Our manifesto commitment to 11 million new trees through this Parliament is proving far from likely to be achieved. The Forestry Commission and Natural England seem intent on thwarting progress, with endless internal battles that leave the private investor at a loss regarding how to make any progress.

The Minister will recall the interventions, for which we are still grateful, that she had to make to help the Doddington forest project to get under way. She will be pleased to know that it is now planted, despite years of effort to slow its progress. Local children helped to plant it. The Northumbrian red squirrel population is now waiting for those trees to grow into a new home for them and their families in the decades ahead. In the meantime, because trees grow very slowly, I call on the Government to increase their support for and investment in grey squirrel reduction projects, in order to leave space for our Squirrel Nutkins.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Coffey]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend on that important point, and I recognise the importance of what is now called “citizen science” in ensuring that data is available to local authorities and Governments, to inform policy and decision making so that policies are properly implemented.

There has been a lot of discussion about trees. In the wider discussion about biodiversity, it is important to remember that habitat degradation is one of the major reasons for the global biodiversity challenge. On the kinds of trees that we have, my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight spoke specifically about the need to plant more broadleaves, but we actually need a balanced biodiversity and a balanced tree strategy to take that forward. Both conifers and broadleaves will work for red squirrel habitats but, as has been pointed out, they thrive mostly in areas where there are conifers. Largely, greys do less well there, because there are not the same kinds of nutrients as in broadleaf woodland, so there is less competition for the reds.

It is important to recognise the multi-purpose of trees. As we have discussed many times in this Chamber, the right tree in the right place offers multiple benefits, for flood situations, for habitats, for protection from heat in urban areas and for all sorts of other things, as well as being a general force for good. The hon. Member for Workington mentioned the 10% woodland coverage in Cumbria, and I agree that Cumbria is absolutely under-forested. A year last December, I too planted a tree up in Cumbria—I cannot recall the constituency, but it was on the Lowther estate—in what is one of the largest such developments, alongside Doddington moor on the other side of the country. I encourage my hon. Friends from Cumbria to speak to the national park authority about what it will do to encourage the planting of more woodlands and forests, because that can make a difference.

Countryside stewardship schemes will support landowners who want to develop habitats specifically for species such as the red squirrel. As we develop the design of the environmental land management scheme for when we leave the European Union, it will in effect turn the existing common agricultural policy on its head so that we pay for public benefits. Those schemes will attract more and more attention from landowners, rather than them just considering commercial forestry.

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

In Cumbria, the first forestry investment zone, or FIZ, is a small test of that, but what else are the Government doing to encourage such activity? As I said, the challenge for landowners is the active support of the Forestry Commission to make something happen.

[Dr Coffey]

The Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (David Rutley), is now responsible for domestic forestry and the Forestry Commission, so I no longer have day-to-day contact in that regard. I hope that the tree strategy will be a way to make progress.

I suggest that some of the biggest forest and woodland planning applications had particular issues. We have to balance compliance with the habitats directive and the different assessments that have to be made, and I know how expensive those can be. Applications for financial support from the Government need to ensure that they are not only absolutely compliant with UK forestry standards, but taking wider environmental regulations into account. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Anne-Marie Trevelyan), however, that lessons could have been learned from some of those major applications, and I hope that they will be for future developments.

My hon. Friend the Member for Copeland asked why the Forestry Commission does not allow more shooting. Shooting, or culling, of grey squirrels is an important driver in their elimination. The Forestry Commission has asked me to point out that it has responsibility for public access and public safety on its estate. However—I will be open about this—I do not think that the commission does a very good job of tackling non-native invasive species. We have the wild boar problem down in the Forest of Dean, and other such problems across the country. I would like to see a more proactive approach, such as the deer initiative, in which people who are not Forestry Commission employees work in partnership to tackle the deer problem. I would like to see more of that happen with some other non-native species.

In speaking about other elements of the issue, many hon. Members paid tribute to the important role played by volunteers in the protection of our domestic red squirrel populations. As they said, a variety of charities up in Cumbria raise public awareness of the threats to red squirrels, engage directly with local landowners, and created a citizen science system in which members of the public record red and grey squirrel sightings. Pockets of improvement could happen elsewhere. My hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight talked about the nature networks and the woodland and habitat links in his constituency. I see that as something we could take forward in the environmental improvement plans that we expect across the country.

As for grey squirrels being a carrier of pox, I have already tried to address some things, such as dealing with grey squirrel procreation success—I think that is the best way of putting it. We also have to be open about this: for red squirrels to survive for the next 500 years —although none of us will be alive then to keep that guarantee to my hon. Friend the Member for North Wiltshire—we must significantly or entirely reduce the threat from the grey squirrel and its diseases. We must also ensure that any future introductions of species align with international guidelines. Such threats have to be tackled head on.

I have already referred to the fact that landowners, if they wish to do more and possibly designate reserves, may apply for countryside stewardship scheme funding. That is open to them. Many different challenges will of course continue but, in response to other questions about funding, it is available. Natural England still funds a variety of activities such as species recovery programmes, which are very much alive. There is also what we will do with the shared prosperity fund. The choices about future funding in Wales are a decision for the Welsh Government, but certainly the environmental land management scheme will be a real opportunity for farmers and landowners to consider carefully where, in the right place, we can continue to invest significantly in a species.

In conclusion, the passion to protect our red squirrels touches many right hon. and hon. Members. It is important to keep our focus on ensuring that iconic native species, whether fauna or flora, remain important in the future. That is a key part of our 25-year environment plan. I am confident that some of the measures in the forthcoming environment Bill will help, but equally important is direct action through the nature improvement and recovery networks that we will establish.

Puffin Habitats

Anne-Marie Trevelyan Excerpts

Wednesday 26th June 2019 Westminster Hall

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered puffin habitats.

It is a pleasure and an honour to be able to discuss the wonderful puffin here in Parliament. I have been trying to secure this debate for many months, as I have the great honour of being the MP who represents the largest proportion of the puffins who come to our shores every year along my exceptional, environmentally spectacular Northumbrian coast. Along those 64 miles of coast, within the boundaries of my constituency, can be found world-renowned habitats, which some of our planet’s rarest, funniest, cutest and most determined birdlife choose to make home for their families every year. From Lindisfarne to the 28 Farne islands and down to Coquet island, my constituency welcomes kittiwakes, shags, guillemots, black-headed gulls, arctic, little and roseate terns—in fact, 95% of the UK population of roseates are found on Coquet island—and the majestic and unique puffin.

The puffin is only a little bird, about the same height as a long ruler, with a wingspan of two rulers. That is the measurement used by schoolchildren at one of my schools in Amble, the fishing port that hosts the Amble Puffin Festival every spring bank holiday. The puffin seems to wear a black coat and has a bright white chest, with spectacularly orange feet to match its large bill. Puffins look somewhat ungainly on the ground; they are a little bit awkward and shy. However, when they take off for flight, we see just why the Atlantic puffin—Fratercula arctica, or the friar of the Arctic, so named because of its monkish black hood—is to be respected. The puffin flies like a fighter jet, setting its beak at the front of a streamlined body with powerful wings, enabling it to head out from its cliff-top base to plunge up to 60 metres into the sea to source sand eels or sprats to feed their young.

In Northumberland, we use the puffin’s arrival to the Farne islands and Coquet island as the harbinger of spring. The smallest of the world’s four puffin species, our Arctic puffins, arrive en masse to breed on our most remote, unpeopled and predator-free islands. They come to land only for breeding, and they arrive at our Northumbrian coastline from across the vast northern seas where they live a solitary, invisible life on the wing following the previous breeding season.

Spring is carnival time for puffins. They get to the safe cliff tops on Inner Farne and some of the other 27 islands and turn from solitary birds to wildly social courting birds intent on finding a mate and creating the next generation of puffins. If they can meet up with their mate from the previous year, they often do. Once they have found a mate, their outsized beak and big, webbed feet set to work digging a burrow in the soft earth. The female lays just one egg, and the couple take turns incubating it under their wings in the burrow, out of sight of other birds.

Predators might be rats or cats, so the management of islands where puffins choose to breed, and where human activity has brought threats onshore, is vital to puffins’ safety. The Farne islands are now managed by the National Trust and a team of rangers based on the islands all summer to monitor and protect this vital habitat. The islands sit within the Northumberland marine special protection area and are now included in the latest set of UK conservation zones. The trust has monitored numbers on a five-yearly basis for decades, and the 2018 census showed some 44,000 pairs of puffins, up from 40,000 in 2013, so Northumberland colonies are in great health at the moment. The National Trust has been doing this monitoring for more than 50 years, which has helped us to keep abreast of colony size and to work out, where there have been drops, what might be causing them. It is great news that the trust now plans to monitor numbers formally on an annual basis to help inform the climate change debate as fully as possible.

Puffin parents share feeding duties, as they do incubation roles, although the female seems to make most of the trips—might that sound familiar, gentlemen? She will fly out from the island and dive for sand eels, coming back—as so many photos of our wonderful bird show—with a beakful of fish. She has to dodge the gulls, skuas and terns that would like to help themselves to her supplies. That fighter jet skill can be seen by visitors to the Farne islands, coming by boat from Seahouses, as puffins whizz past other species and come in to land—those big orange feet acting as brakes right next to the puffins’ burrow—to deliver lunch to their baby puffling.

Beyond safe, predator-free habitats for burrows, the continued breeding health of the Arctic puffin is dependent on the state of the sea around the locations from which their food sources come. A plentiful supply of sand eels, sprats, baby herring or capelin is vital if the puffins are to breed. This critical factor was first demonstrated to me on the Farne islands, which my family and friends visit every spring to be amazed and awed by the influx of wildlife for the breeding season. Suddenly, one year, there just seemed to be fewer puffins. The breeding success rate was low. Locally, a sense of panic set in that it was all over for the puffin.

Thankfully, that was not the case. Rather, for reasons best known to the sea, there was a dearth of sand eels that year, and so the puffins simply did not breed, knowing that there was not enough food for their young. Nature’s wildlife has a way of regulating itself for its own survival. Reassuringly, the numbers grew again in the years that followed, back up to the colony size we see now, as food supplies have remained abundant since that weird year.

The other direct threat to our puffins each year is stormy seas. I have been updated just today by one of our National Trust rangers, Gwen Potter—who looks after the Farne islands puffins and other nesting birds, such as my dear friend the eider duck—that a recent high tide and stormy sea came over the normal high water mark and drowned some 300 of our puffins and their baby pufflings just a few days ago. Some might say that that is just nature, and sometimes she is brutal, but how we manage our environment on a global scale, as well as a local one, remains a challenge.

While our UK puffin population is in rude health and we invest in looking after their unique habitats, around the world the Arctic puffin is not doing so well. In 2015, it was announced that the puffin is now classified as “vulnerable to extinction”; Fratercula arctica is now on the red list. The Northumbrian monks of old, who communed with nature on Lindisfarne and the Farne islands—perhaps most famously St Cuthbert, who died on Inner Farne in 687 AD—would be horrified that we have failed to live in better harmony with nature in recent centuries.

Different breeding grounds, even around the UK, are in different states of health. Tagging and monitoring tells us that, from some breeding sites, puffins have to travel up to 400 km to find food for their young. Whether from overfishing, weather impacts altering water temperature and stormy sea levels, or food sources being much further away, we have trouble ahead. If the fish that puffins find are smaller because the temperature of the North sea shifts the sources of plankton that supply sand eels, more effort expended for less outcome can only have a detrimental impact.

I appreciate that the Minister cannot single-handedly restore our oceans and seas to balance and good health, and nor can he control the weather—I do not think—but we can, as a country and as a Government, ensure that we support those who manage puffin colonies with vermin control and good data monitoring, so that we can have an early and thorough understanding of causes of change or decline. I challenge the Minister to discuss the falling numbers of puffins in Norway and Iceland and whether it is acceptable anymore to eat puffins, since they are taken from breeding grounds.

While millions of birds sounds like a large number, it takes only a few years of poor breeding—there have now been nine years in Norway—for there to be a sudden and irreversible drop in numbers. The challenge of shipwrecks and oil spill impacts for food sources for many years is also a concern, and I ask the Minister to speak with his Department for Transport colleagues, who work globally to improve the safety of shipping activity.

As well as the opportunity to share the wonderfulness of another species centred in my beautiful constituency—hon. Members will recall our discussion on the eider duck, and I give many thanks to Ministers for including her in the list of protected birds in our new marine conservation zone—I hope this debate provides a good opportunity to highlight not only concerns that can be alleviated, at least in part, by local and national co-operation and forward planning, but some of the global risk factors, on which we must advocate, as a nation who lives by her word, as we move to a way of life that considers in the round the impacts we have on our wildlife.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

I thank the Minister for his comprehensive and detailed response to today’s debate. I look forward to the challenge of long-term rebalancing, through which we will have the opportunity to manage our waters and think in a much more holistic way than perhaps the common fisheries policy has given us the opportunity to do. I very much hope that we will be able to work together as we go forward, so that we can genuinely be a world-leading country in understanding that balance of decision making and ensuring we support those who work in our seas alongside those who look after our natural wildlife.

In the long term, we often discover that plants and animals that we did not appreciate before have a greater value holistically to our natural habitat, of which we are a part, than we perhaps understood. I thank the Minister very much for his detailed responses, and look forward to working with him on this issue in the months and years ahead.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered puffin habitats.

Oral Answers to Questions

Anne-Marie Trevelyan Excerpts

Thursday 21st February 2019 Commons Chamber

The right hon. Member for Meriden, representing the Church Commissioners was asked—

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

1. What recent assessment the Church of England has made of the effectiveness of its recruitment of clergy to rural parishes.

[The Leader of the House of Commons (Andrea Leadsom)]

With permission, Mr Speaker, as an ex officio member of the Church Commissioners I have been asked to reply on behalf of the Second Church Estates Commissioner.

The Church of England has over 10,000 rural churches and 45% of those who attend church go to rural churches. The Church supports these rural churches through its dedicated national rural officer, who provides advice, consultancy and training for dioceses. The Church has recently launched a new recruitment portal which currently displays all jobs in 30 of the 42 dioceses, enabling clergy to sort jobs by postcode and categories.

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

As rural parishes go, the parish of St Mary on the island of Lindisfarne, Holy Island, in my constituency must be one of the smallest, most rural but most magnificent. It has a permanent population of only 200 people but, living in the cradle of British Christianity, it has hundreds of thousands of visitors every year. So will the Leader of the House join me in welcoming to her post, and with an outreach vocation, the Reverend Canon Dr Sarah Hills, our new vicar of St Mary, Lindisfarne?

[Andrea Leadsom]

I understand that the religious community on Holy Island was founded by an Irish monk called St Aidan in 635 AD. I certainly welcome the Reverend Dr Sarah Hills to her post and wish her well with her ministry. She brings with her considerable experience from Coventry cathedral, where she led the international reconciliation team.

Oral Answers to Questions

Anne-Marie Trevelyan Excerpts

Thursday 17th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

“Banging on” in this place tends to be a prerequisite of achieving anything. It is the colloquial version of my “persistence pays” principle.

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

Would a Minister be willing to meet me to discuss banning the use of bolt guns as a method of putting down greyhounds that are no longer used in the racing industry?

[Dr Thérèse Coffey]

We need to tackle in a humane way however animals are put down, whether they are wildlife, domestic animals or racing animals. I am sure that a Minister will be delighted to meet my hon. Friend.

European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Anne-Marie Trevelyan Excerpts

Thursday 10th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Several things have changed since 2014. First, of course, there was a coalition Government then. Secondly, we have had a referendum in which the people of Scotland voted to stay in the United Kingdom, and another referendum in which the people of the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union. But one thing has not changed: the interests of Scotland’s farmers and fishermen are better protected by maintenance of the Union than by the separation that the Scottish National party and the Scottish Government want to see. We remain influential, not just in respect of our relationship with the EU27 but globally. We have a stronger voice in trade negotiations, a stronger voice in environmental protection, and a stronger capacity to protect and enhance the interests of Scottish citizens as one United Kingdom. That is why the people of Scotland voted to stay in that United Kingdom, and that is why our Union will endure.

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

For how much money is the Secretary of State applying to the Treasury fund for fisheries protection in case the backstop has to come into force, or, indeed, we have to leave on a no-deal basis? My local fishermen who fish out of Berwick and Amble are concerned that there is already not enough fisheries protection in those waters, and there would need to be a great deal more to ensure that we did not end up with something like the cod wars all over again.

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend has made an important point. The Ministry of Defence, in which she served with such distinction, has a suite of new offshore patrol vessels—state-of-the-art fisheries protection vessels—and we are negotiating with both the Treasury and the MOD to ensure that the work of those vessels will be complemented by the aviation and technological capacity that will guarantee that our fishermen are properly protected.

Draft Humane Trapping Standards Regulations 2019

Anne-Marie Trevelyan Excerpts

Wednesday 19th December 2018 General Committees

[Dr David Drew (Stroud) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. I am delighted that the Minister is in her place. Happy Christmas to everybody—it may not be so happy when I finish, but let us start as we mean to go on.

This is an interesting piece of secondary legislation. It is the sort of thing that could pass through on the nod without people taking much notice, because in a sense it is just doing what was agreed some time ago with the EU. Why has it taken quite so long to get here? It was laid down in 2016, and the original agreement dates back to 1997. I am a little intrigued about why, within three months of our potentially leaving the EU, we have this piece of secondary legislation now. I have always thought that the idea of humane trapping is an oxymoron, but I will pass over that quickly.

I want to raise a number of issues. Clause 108(1) in the Government’s excellent draft legislation to replace the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 is about the prohibition of leg-hold traps:

“It is an offence to use a leghold trap for or in connection with the purpose of killing, injuring or capturing a wild bird or other wild animal.”

The Government are clear that they want to outlaw these things. It is disappointing that the primary legislation has not been introduced, which would mean at least that we had clarity. The Minister will have to answer this: should we reject this legislation, would it make any difference? We have an indication that the Government want to outlaw leg-hold traps when they introduce the primary legislation.

Are we putting ourselves in jeopardy as regards the international agreement? Clearly, this is one agreement that we will, supposedly, have to renegotiate: it is between the EU, Russia and Canada, not the UK. The Minister will have to persuade me that we have some clarity on how we will go about doing that—otherwise, why are we all here today? We could have left it until after March and done our own thing in due course.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich might have some other things to say about the consultation, because he pointed it out to me. The consultation was a bit one-sided: respondents included every estate that can be imagined and only a very small number of animal welfare organisations. In the main, they shrugged and said, “Well, if it’s coming, it’s coming,” but they were not overjoyed at some of the proposals.

I draw the Minister’s attention to the accompanying impact assessment, which I thought was the most interesting document of the lot. On page 11, on currently approved spring traps that are rarely used and not compliant, it says:

“We should be restricting the continued use of non-compliant traps to the minimum necessary to enable the continued trapping of stoats”—

as the Minister rightly said, the regulations are mainly about stoats—

“prior to implementation. The remaining traps approved for stoat have been out of production for some time and are not used in meaningful numbers to trap any permitted target species.”

Out-of-date traps are therefore still being used—presumably, to trap stoats—yet we currently have no real intention of outlawing them, even if we pass the SI. If we are not outlawing, to some extent, these traps, what are we doing today?

Page 16 of the impact assessment says:

“There is significant evidence that the public value animal welfare”—

there’s a surprise. It goes on:

“Research by the University of Reading…conducted a small survey on animal welfare.”

That research found that 96% of respondents thought that animal welfare was a very good thing—I do not know about the other 4%; there always people who are contrary to the public will—and were prepared to pay extra for animal welfare to be put in place. I am not sure how that relates to the trapping of wild animals, but in my view we need animal welfare to be in line with not just the letter of the law, but the practicalities of how animals are treated.

Obviously, any trap in which an animal is kept for only five minutes can do limited damage. Nothing that I have read, however, says that the traps are time limited: an animal can be trapped for days, during which time it dies, yet that trap is apparently treated in exactly the same way.

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

I am confused by that statement, because it is illegal for a gamekeeper not to check traps every 24 hours, so an animal could not legally be left in any trap for any length of time. Does the hon. Gentleman agree?

[Dr Drew]

That is what happens in theory, but of course other people put traps down for slightly nefarious reasons. Yes, I know that gamekeepers have a strict way of doing things, and I accept that the regulations relate largely to gamekeepers. Within current law, however, others can trap and catch wild animals. On the one hand, we are trying to reintroduce stoats into certain parts of the country—sadly, their numbers are very small, despite being one of our native species—and on the other, we are trapping stoats in other parts of the country. That is just an observation.

Before I sit down, I will make a couple of other points. There is a real lack of clarity about why the regulations are being introduced now and what their impact will be. I mentioned the time limits for keeping an eye on caught animals, but there is no mention of animals caught by accident. Clearly, with any trap, any animal—dare I say, even a human being—can put its foot on a trap. Some ask whether that is an appropriate way to manage our wildlife.

The League Against Cruel Sports has been critical of the continuation of trapping generally, and, in particular, of the way that the Agreement on International Humane Trapping Standards operates. It wants greater clarification on how we intend to move forward—we are talking about a new traps regime. I am not totally sure who pays the £1.7 million cost of providing the new traps. Is it the industry, or are the Government prepared to put some money where their mouth is?

Perhaps alternative ideas could have been explored and brought forward. There are a number of questions. Where are the Government going with their animal welfare legislation? No doubt this issue would have been wrapped up with the animal welfare Bill if we had got it to the stage of being debated, in which case we would not have had to have this debate at all. Since we are having it, if the Opposition were to vote against it, would that put us in any international jeopardy or can we do our own thing, when appropriate, after March—if that is when we have some freedom—and adopt even higher standards of animal welfare? That could include looking at alternatives to trapping. Trapping is a very difficult exercise and we will always check to see that it is done in the most humane way possible. That is the whole point about this legislation.

Agriculture Bill

Anne-Marie Trevelyan Excerpts

Wednesday 10th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

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

As a rural Northumbrian for more than 20 years, I have been closely involved with the trials and tribulations of the local farmers and land managers, whose livelihood is determined by the health of our rural economy. It is a physically hard life, and the Northumbrian weather—perhaps even more dramatic than that in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset (Richard Drax)—is a constant companion, with financial rewards sometimes feeling scarce.

The understanding of taxpayer support for farming is a fundamental underpinning of our food supply system, and it is a support that taxpayers buy into, as long as it reaches its intended target and meets its stated aims. The EU’s common agricultural policy did not do that. The voice of UK farmers has too often been drowned out by the demands of French or Spanish farmers. We have been stuck in a system not aimed at investing in the best land use in Northumberland or anywhere else across our islands.

With our departure from the EU and this Bill, we can stop the EU CAP funding bias against our own farming communities and put our own more effective and targeted land-management choices first. This reflects the optimistic outlook that Brexit brings—despite the depression on the Opposition Benches that has positively brought me down to earth—about the fact that we can and should determine our own land-management policy.

At a local level, my caseworker Jen spends a great deal of her time dealing with concerned farmers who have yet to receive last year’s payment, or are wondering whether this year’s will ever materialise. Mapping disagreements, disputes over hedge lines, common land use and cross-border issues with the Scots—not helped by the SNP’s current position—are just some of the challenges that the EU-based system, and perhaps historically our own delivery teams in Whitehall, have thrown up, causing months of financial and emotional challenges for Northumbrian farmers.

In addition to the funding disparity with other EU nations, years of working with our upland farmers in Northumberland has brought to my attention too many stories of wasted time and energy that could be better directed. One of the biggest gripes, as the Minister well knows, is the multiple visits by officials to ensure that EU rules are being followed, each visit adding stress and taking time, when one visit could cover all the issues—like an Ofsted visit, perhaps. Farmers would face one short window of pain, but would then be trusted, left alone to get on with their job. The vast majority of our farmers want to look after the land they are stewarding.

The undue pressures placed on our rural communities have always worried me. Farmers have been asking for help to ease the burden for years, but until now there was nothing we could do. That is why the Bill is so exciting: we will at last be able to create management and financial incentives to suit our needs and this Government’s long-term commitment to looking after our whole environment. We will be designing a system that does not funnel funds to our farmers’ foreign competitors, but frees up our land stewards to innovate; a system that supports a holistic perspective of land management, which puts long-term soil health, food production and water basin management with tree planting; and a system that incentivises long-term investment for public and economic good—the two are not mutually exclusive. Most important, public good is not an empty phrase: it means that we can join up long-term urban and rural health and security needs with the way we use our land—for everyone.

The Bill is based on inherent fairness, whereby farmers are rewarded for what they do and produce, rather than for the size of their landholding. Crucially, it offers rewards for those already working hard to improve the environment and to ensure that their methods of production are sustainable. That will begin to drive change for good across the countryside.

As the MP for one of the most sparsely populated constituencies—albeit the most beautiful, and I will take on anyone who wants to fight me on that—I am pleased that is not just farmers who grow food who will benefit from the new system. I have spoken many times about trees, and this debate offers an opportunity to do so again. As the Minister is aware, I believe we need to be planting at least one tree for every citizen, not one for every five, but the target of 11 million needs at least to be met to allow the long-term thinking we need for land management and water basin stabilisation, to support the timber industry’s needs and to reduce long-term reliance on imports for biomass, for housing frames and for furniture. We must aim to be able to become self-sustaining in timber.

[Deidre Brock]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Mrs Trevelyan]

I will not. Timber absorbs carbon dioxide as it grows and then holds that carbon a second time as wood products. I ask the Minister to consider, as part of the Borderlands initiative, planting a borderlands forest as part of our meeting our tree-planting targets—not so much a wall dividing us from our Scottish colleagues, but a biodiverse habitat that the English and the Scots can nurture together.

Sustainable Fisheries

Anne-Marie Trevelyan Excerpts

Wednesday 4th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I am very grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for the generous and constructive tone that he takes, which is of a piece with all his contributions in this House. Absolutely, in Shetland, in particular, there are communities that we want to work with precisely along the lines that he mentions.

[Mrs Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend should know that the fishermen just south of the Scottish border, along the north-east coast, are really pleased to see the progress that has been made with this White Paper, but the issue continues to be how we will tackle the choke species issue, because that is something that continues to concern them.

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend raises an important issue. One thing that we hope to be able to do is to use additional quota, which we can allocate to UK vessels to help deal with that particular challenge. It is also the case that the White Paper includes proposals, which we hope will make it easier for individual fishermen who catch over quota to be able to land all the fish that they have caught in a way that ensures that we can have environmentally effective management. We look forward to responses from the industry to our proposals.

Ivory Bill

Anne-Marie Trevelyan Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons
Wednesday 4th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[David Rutley]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.

What a pleasure it is to move the Third Reading motion for this important Bill. It is a simple but vital piece of legislation with a clear purpose: to help save one of the world’s most magnificent animals, the elephant, from the brink of extinction at the hands of ruthless ivory poachers. The ban on the sale of elephant ivory items of all ages, with only limited exemptions, will be the strongest in Europe and among the strongest in the world. The introduction of the Bill has reaffirmed the UK’s global leadership on this critical issue, and reflects our commitment to making the abhorrent trade in ivory a thing of the past. By seeking to ensure that ivory is never seen by the poachers as a commodity for financial gain or by potential customers as a status symbol, we will protect elephants for future generations.

The Bill has been improved today by amendments made on Report that took account of the evidence put forward by expert witnesses in Committee. This is my first time taking a Bill through the House as a Minister, and I am grateful for the positive way in which Members have engaged with it as it has progressed; I hope that that spirit will continue. We can all be rightly proud of the Bill. Let me take this opportunity to thank all the non-governmental organisations, the museums, the antiques sector and the enforcement bodies for their contributions and written evidence taken and received in Committee evidence sessions.

[Mrs Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

The Minister mentioned museums. On Second Reading, I raised the question of Northumbrian pipes made since 1975 using CITES-approved ivory. I understand that in Committee, despite these pipes’ unique and beautiful nature, it proved impossible to give a specific exemption for pipes made since 1975, but will the Minister meet me to discuss how we might find a way to use the local community or to set up some sort of fund, so that these pipes, which are owned by families, will not be lost to the musical traditions of Northumberland and will find a repository that can be passed on to future generations?

[David Rutley]

That issue was also raised by the hon. Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist). My hon. Friend is a formidable local champion and I will of course meet her to discuss how the Government can look into ways to continue to keep that rich part of her community’s heritage very much alive.