Food Price Inflation

Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville Excerpts

Thursday 23rd March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

I can assure the noble Baroness that the Secretary of State is deeply involved in this issue. The Food Minister, Mark Spencer, took this Urgent Question, which is right, as he is the Minister responsible for food supply, food security and other related issues. The noble Baroness is absolutely right that this matter affects a number of different departments right across government, and the Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer have also been deeply involved in this. I do not know precisely what meetings the Secretary of State has had on this issue, but I will be happy to write to the noble Baroness with details of discussions she has had. I can certainly say from my own experience that the Secretary of State is very involved in this issue.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for repeating the Statement. Some £37 billion has gone to support households with the cost of living but there is no detail as to eligibility. Can the Minister say how this money is being distributed? I welcome the Government’s intention to permanently extend free school meals eligibility to children from all families with no recourse to public funds. Can the Minister say whether this means that free school meals will be available to all those who are eligible during the school holidays? As the Statement says, the price of milk, cheese and eggs has risen by 30.8%. Can the Minister say whether any of the £37 billion support is reaching the farmers who produce our milk, cheese and eggs?

Imported Beef

Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

My noble friend is absolutely right that there are some different standards in the EU, and we have worked as members of the EU and will continue to work with the EU and other countries through the World Organisation for Animal Health and the World Trade Organization to create greater and higher standards of animal welfare that more reflect what we have here so that there is a much more even playing field in trade across the world.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, the Government appear very keen to do trade deals with Canada and Mexico, against the advice of the Climate Change Committee, which felt that such deals would compromise UK carbon targets, allowing imported meat with a higher carbon footprint than our own. Why are the Government not prepared to take measures to achieve the UK’s carbon targets? Perhaps they feel they are unimportant.

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

I can assure the noble Baroness that we do not. The Climate Change Committee has gone through each department. I am responsible in Defra for making sure that we satisfy the Climate Change Committee’s demands, which are extremely challenging and testing. We have a commitment to get to net zero by 2050. British farming, under the leadership of the NFU, has committed to getting to net zero by 2040, and I can tell her that, as a farmer, that is an extremely challenging thing to do, but we as a Government and the leadership of farming are working together to help farmers try to achieve that. It is a vital priority that we decarbonise, and we understand that there is prosperity in doing so.

Agriculture (Financial Assistance) (Amendment) Regulations 2023

Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville Excerpts

Tuesday 14th March 2023 Grand Committee

Two final questions remain for the Minister. Will the Government now reconsider their income-forgone model for payment, also mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh? It has long been derided, over many years, for linking payments to production. Will they now reconsider that food is a public good, which was rejected under the Agriculture Act 2020?

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his introduction to this statutory instrument and for his time, and that of the officials, in providing a briefing. I welcome his warning of impending doom should the fatal Motion be agreed in two weeks’ time.

The gist of this SI is that some information on the financial assistance that farmers receive for their activities will not now be published and therefore open to scrutiny. The Agriculture Act indicated that this information would be available for public scrutiny, and these exemptions from publication relate to the annual health and welfare review and the tree health pilot.

The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee considered this SI on 28 February and asked a number of questions of Defra as to why there should not be publication of the assistance farmers are receiving. The answers related to the likely disadvantages farmers would face if detailed information was published. In the SLSC report, it is clear that Defra Ministers would be able to exempt certain schemes from the full publication requirement without having to lay secondary legislation before Parliament.

Defra stated that it

“carefully considered where publication could have a detrimental impact on scheme uptake, risk achievement of target outcomes and value for money, as well as potentially damage individuals and businesses.”

Can the Minister give examples of where such instances might occur, leading to a detrimental impact on the farmer and on scheme uptake? It would be useful for the Committee to know this.

Turning to the Explanatory Memorandum itself, the last bullet point in paragraph 7.4 refers to

“the investigation of breaches and suspected offences in connection with applications for, or the receipt, of financial assistance”.

Can the Minister say how many suspected offences and breaches are recorded in any one year? Is this a big problem or only an occasional occurrence? Paragraph 7.6 states that the instrument

“omits the previous definition of the ‘farming investment fund’ that referred only to section 1(2) of the Act… For example, the policy intention is to launch the ‘animal health and welfare scheme’ as part of the farming investment fund”.

Can the Minister please give an example of just what this means?

Paragraph 7.7 of the Explanatory Memorandum indicates that publishing a full list of financial assistance received could lead to individuals and businesses not reporting cases of pests and diseases, for fear of not being able to sell their stock or produce or being accused of having poor animal health practices. I understand this rationale but, on the other hand, it is important that everybody knows where there are outbreaks of pests and diseases. It is not helpful to neighbouring farms if, for instance, there is an outbreak of African swine fever in pigs in an area, especially if they are kept outside and neighbouring farms are unaware of that.

It is not just animal diseases which it is important to be aware of. For example, plants and trees are also under threat; in particular, they are under severe threat from oak processionary moth and Xylella fastidiosa. Can the Minister provide assurance that pests and diseases will be notified to Defra and its officials, even though they are not on the published list of financial support given to the farmer or the individual concerned?

I fully support the importance of encouraging farmers to join as many schemes available under ELMS as possible to maintain their living. It is also important for the public to understand what the money they receive is spent on. I also accept that publishing some information could give the wrong impression of what is happening on farms. It is important to protect farmers and their families from the activities of animal rights activists, wherever possible.

There is a fine line between total transparency on how public money is allocated and protection of the privacy and reputation of those engaged in agriculture in the wider sense. I am confident that the Minister is fully supportive of this. I have expressed my concerns but, generally, I support this SI.

[Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his introduction to this SI. While this is my first outing shadowing him, I am sure it will not be my last—unless this goes horribly wrong—and I look forward to our interactions in the months ahead. I also thank his officials for indulging my newbie questions in the briefing.

In recent weeks, our newspapers have been filled with tales of food shortages, excessive levels of food inflation and the associated food poverty. There has even been a national debate about our domestic turnips. No longer is the impact on our farmers and rural communities reserved to news stories on “Farming Today”. We live in a period of global uncertainty and economic challenge; this is no less the case for our domestic agricultural economy than for any other sector. Labour shortages, new bureaucracy and the ongoing impact of the war in Ukraine on grain and energy supplies are having a direct and daily impact on our domestic food supplies, as well as on the natural environment.

It is therefore vital that, in our post-Brexit world, we get the regulatory and payment structures fit for purpose to ensure security of food supply, and that we do everything that we can to support our farming businesses and communities. They are invaluable to our long-term sustainability and security, and we all rely on them. That is why the Labour Party will not be opposing this SI. However, I have some questions for the Minister relating to the implementation of the regulations.

The financial assistance amendment places more burden on Defra civil servants in terms of monitoring and the likely ongoing adaptation of some of the financial assistance schemes already launched. Can the Minister confirm that Defra has the resources to apply these changes in a timely manner over the next 12 months, given the additional strains which would be placed on his department by the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill, should it pass into statute? I promise that I do not seek to rerun the arguments which were heard in Committee on the REUL Bill last week; rather, I seek reassurance from the Minister that this has been considered and that appropriate resources are in place.

Following on from the debate in the other place on this statutory instrument, I hope the Minister can assist the Committee in answering some specifics which his colleague, the Farming Minister, failed to address. My colleague Daniel Zeichner sought clarification on Regulation 5(c); can the Minister confirm which schemes do not require a request for payment but will instead require an annual declaration to the Secretary of State? How many cases do we believe will fall into that category each year?

I also seek clarity on points raised by the right honourable Kit Malthouse in the other place in Committee. Referring to paragraph 7.6 of the Explanatory Memorandum, he asked:

“Does that mean that, without parliamentary consent, the Minister can start or close a new scheme or quietly”—[Official Report, Commons, Delegated Legislation Committee, 28/2/23; col. 8.]


abandon a funding mechanism that is no longer viable? As my noble friend Lord Grantchester highlighted, given the significant discretion that now rests with the Secretary of State, can the Minister confirm that, when schemes are launched, amended or closed, the department will be required to consult their beneficiaries before the terms are revised? If so, to what timetable will the department work?

I know that the Minister has vast experience of this area, which I do not claim to have, and is committed to making these regulations work for our farmers. I look forward to working with him in the months ahead to deliver the best possible deal for our rural communities.

Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill

Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 8th March 2023 Lords Chamber

I decided to become a scientist as a child because we had just approved Calder Hall—the first atomic power station producing civil nuclear power in the world. It was produced a few years after the war when the first atomic weapon was produced. They went through the whole process of inventing the technology, getting approval, and getting up and running in those few years. Nowadays, you would not even get through the approval process for the environmental regulations in that time. That cannot be right. There must be scope to streamline these processes in a way that does not undermine environmental protection, or mean that we will lose biodiversity or that our beautiful landscape will be desecrated. I hope that we focus on that aspect of changes to environmental law as the principal fruit of the REUL Bill.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, my noble friend Lady Parminter clearly set out the arguments for Amendment 126, which I fully support. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, ably introduced her Amendment 130, to which I have added my name. I will speak briefly to that amendment.

The Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Benyon, made it clear that he is personally committed to ensuring that environmental standards are maintained, that biosecurity is improved, and that the Government leave the environment in a better state than they found it. However, this commitment and aim are not shared by all in the current Government.

The Bill is worded in such a way as to provide a very large degree of what can be called “wriggle room”. We have debated in Clause 15 the meaning of “appropriate” and how this will be interpreted by both officials and Ministers when it comes to individual pieces of legislation.

Clause 15 allows Ministers to amend important retained EU environmental law on nature, water and chemicals, ensuring that there is no reduction in environmental protection. This has to be achieved without extra bureaucracy, taxes or burdens being incurred. My noble friend Lady Parminter has spoken on this issue.

In evidence to the Lords Environment and Climate Change Committee, the Secretary of State referred to the Environment Agency’s wish

“to change quite a lot of the water framework directive”.

The quality of our water has featured in our debates more often than many of us would care to mention. To be informed that a lot of changes are likely to come to the water framework directive without any indication of what they may be is extremely worrying for many in this Chamber. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, also raised this.

Amendment 130 would insert a new clause whose aim is to maintain environmental standards across a range of regulations and directives, which the country has taken for granted and which have protected the health of the population, our environment, wildlife and the marine environment over the years. Proposed new subsection (4) lists those laws that we believe are essential to keep. Others are also important, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, also raised, but those five are vital and should be included in the Bill. There is consensus on this across the Committee.

We have debated these issues on previous days in Committee without the Minister giving any comfort. On this occasion, we are all looking for the Minister to realise that the vital issue of protecting the environment and the population is not going to trickle away. Unless he wants to see a flood of opposition from all quarters, both inside and outside Parliament, he will accept the amendment before we come to Report. I look forward to his agreement.

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I have been listening to this debate with interest. Obviously, it relates to environmental standards, but is also about the way in which the legislation that deals with environmental standards is cast. I am sure we are all agreed that some of the things that the noble Lord, Lord Lilley, described could be substantially mitigated, to the benefit of everybody.

Having said that, what we see with the two amendments we are considering is the introduction of legal certainty into the legislation. That, it seems to me, is actually quite important because, as has been described on previous days in Committee, the underlying rationale behind the kind of approach being adopted by the Government is what I might describe as the operation of a compensatory principle. This, it seems to me, is a very attractive notion. But how is it going to work? In particular, as has been debated previously, what is the currency you use to determine whether or not something is compensation? It has to be equivalent, it seems to me. That is the basic meaning of the word in the English language.

Then there has been discussion about “Well, it’ll be done on the whim of a civil servant or a Minister”. But I do not think this is going to be the end of the story—this is what my concern is—because any change that comes about will produce winners and losers. Wherever there are winners and losers, not least in this area of policy, the law gets dragged in. I can see that the whole scheme on which this particular approach has been adopted is going to lead to an absolute abundance of applications for judicial review, because any change that is made on the basis of this compensatory principle is going to have a winner and a loser, and is going to be the hinge on which the legislation depends. I would be very interested to know the views of the Front Bench on this, because I can see that what sounds superficially like a siren song of easy administration may well end up providing an absolute bonanza for lawyers. I suppose that, as one myself, I should declare an interest.

Water Companies: Water Pollution

Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville Excerpts

Wednesday 1st March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

I am not an aquatic scientist but I can tell my noble friend that the problem in the Wye is principally due to phosphates coming from the poultry industry, which has boomed in that area and for which no adequate planning provision was made to prevent the leakage of effluent. The Environment Agency and other parts of Defra are making sure that we are correcting that. I hope that we will prevent what is happening, which is an absolute tragedy. For large parts of the year, large sections of one of the great rivers of this country are nearly ecologically dead. We want to reverse that.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, there has been considerable media interest in the pollution of bathing waters, inland rivers and waterways as a result of the release of sewage overflows. Nearly every week, the Minister is called here to answer questions on this issue. Given that warmer weather is approaching, can he say how the Government will protect the health of the children and adults who will be exposed to this fetid and polluted water?

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

We rightly beat ourselves up about this but it is worth stating that our bathing waters are in their best state ever. Last year, 93% of them were classified as “good” or “excellent”. The number of serious sewage incidents has fallen from 500 a year in the 1990s to 62 in 2021, although that number is still 62 too many. What is called wild swimming—what my mother used to call swimming—is becoming a great national sport and activity. We want to connect more people with nature; that is a wonderful way of doing it. Making sure that our rivers are clean is vital.

Environmental Improvement Plan 2023

Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville Excerpts

Monday 6th February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

My Lords, last month the Office for Environmental Protection warned of a serious failure to deliver on every one of the goals set out in the Government’s own 25-year environment plan. The body said:

“The situation is poor across the board, with adverse trends across marine, freshwater and terrestrial environments.”


It added that progress towards 14 of the 23 targets was “off track”, while a lack of available evidence meant that progress could not even be measured for the remaining nine.

Against this backdrop, we welcome Defra publishing its environmental improvement plan, and actually managing to publish it on time. There are some promising-looking targets in the document. However, the Government have generally been pretty good at setting themselves targets; for example, at COP 26. The problem is that Ministers have not been so good at taking the action needed to actually achieve them.

Dame Glenys Stacey, chair of the OEP, has welcomed the environmental improvement plan but also warned that:

“It’s all about delivery now.”


So I ask the Minister: what are the Government going to do differently this time around to actually deliver on their commitments? Members of this House have expressed concern regarding the long-term environmental targets contained in recent SIs we have debated, and we are concerned that some of the interim targets may not be ambitious enough.

I ask the Minister: does Defra accept the observation of Philip Dunne MP, chair of the Environmental Audit Committee in another place, that

“the targets are only worthwhile if they are met and have the backing of all departments across Government”?

This has also been stressed by the Office for Environmental Protection in its recent report, where it stressed the need for better

“alignment and co-ordination at all levels—

of government—

“local and national, and actions that extend beyond Defra”.

I have a number of other questions for the Minister and am happy for him to write, if he is unable to address some of them this afternoon. What did the Secretary of State, Thérèse Coffey, mean when she said in a recent letter to Mr Dunne that, after publication of the EIP, she intends

“to undertake a series of deep dives on priority issues so we can get on and deliver”?

Can the Minister outline the areas that she will be focusing on and what form these “deep dives” will take? Will they just be reviews of the current situation or are they likely to lead to policy change and/or actual legislation? How does Defra intend to work with local government and other departments across government to ensure a commitment to deliver?

The Secretary of State’s letter also says that Defra is on track to legislate for an alternative transition registration model for UK REACH in 2024. Can the Minister provide any information on what that will look like? Is it likely to be primary or secondary legislation, for example? If primary, is there not a case for bringing forward a broader piece of environmental legislation?

Concerns have also been raised about the lack of new money to assist with delivery of the EIP. The Secretary of State herself confirmed that there will be no major new funding, beyond a dedicated pot to protect some species including hedgehogs and red squirrels. Although, of course, we welcome this increased protection, some farming leaders have said that new sources of funds are needed to encourage farmers to take up environmental land management schemes.

The Public Accounts Committee made a series of recommendations to Defra in its report on ELMS, which said:

“The Department is over-optimistic about what it will be able to achieve by when”.


The report went so far as to question the Government’s readiness to deliver their policies—sadly, not a new occurrence for Defra. So what action is the department taking in response to these concerns? Has Defra made any bids for extra funds from the Treasury in advance of March’s Spring Budget?

As well as considering what is in the plan, we must also acknowledge what is missing. For example, although it contains stipulations for fitting dual-flush toilets, it does little to force water companies to deal with other issues, such as stopping pouring sewage into our rivers. The noble Earl, Lord Caithness, recently asked what happened to the dedicated soil health strategy, which was a promise made by the noble Lord, Lord Goldsmith, during the progress of the Environment Act. Despite that pledge, it appears that soil-related issues have simply been wrapped up into the EIP. Can the Minister explain why the target of bringing 40% of agricultural soil into sustainable management by 2028, and 60% by 2030, is now tied into “new farming schemes” and nothing else?

Finally, with the Second Reading of the retained EU law Bill later today, what guarantees can the Minister give that Defra’s existing environmental regulations will be maintained and not ditched or watered down? I hope he can understand our scepticism about this, when he says that the Government will keep green regulations by default and yet there is no final figure for how many actually exist.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, the nine actions listed in the Government’s statement of achievements and implementations in the first 100 days of this Government appear to be impressive on paper, but a little digging into the reality reveals a very different picture. Much is made of the ban on single-use plastics from October 2023. Two years have passed since the statutory instrument to bring this into effect was agreed in this Chamber. At the time, those of us involved in the debate pressed for a much earlier implementation date but were unsuccessful. Even now, with so much notice, industry is complaining about the cost. It was widely publicised at the time, so there was plenty of time to plan and even to implement before the cut-off date this year. However, I welcome the Government’s co-operation in persuading other countries to agree a new legally binding global treaty to end plastic pollution by 2040. Does this apply to all plastic in consumer items only, or will it include plastics used in manufacturing industries as well?

I read with interest the environmental principles policy statement when it was first released, but I fear I found the principles underwhelming in the extreme. If government departments choose to ignore them, there appears to be absolutely no redress to bring them into line to consider and protect our dwindling biodiversity. How will Defra ensure that all government departments fully embrace the environmental principles?

Of course, it is important that children and adults have access to green spaces and coastal areas for leisure activities. I look forward to the implementation plan for ensuring that everyone in the country can be within 15 minutes’ walking distance of blue or green spaces for relaxation and enjoyment. How will this be achieved? What is the exact timeframe for the delivery? In what form are the Government engaging with landowners, local authorities and other agencies to ensure that this happens in the most built-up areas?

I turn to the thorny issue of fly-tipping. I see from the Statement that the intention is to ask local authorities to deal with the problem. During the passage of the Agriculture Act, the debate demonstrated across the Chamber that fly-tipping on agricultural land costs the farming community dearly. Affected farms have to pay to clear up the waste tipped, regardless of what it is—garden waste, retail and industrial waste, building waste—costing farmers thousands of pounds. However, the then Minister rejected the suggestion that CCTV on farms would be extremely helpful, despite much of the support for CCTV coming from his own Benches. Can the Minister say when the Government will publish what they intend to do to tackle that scourge and what they consider to be best practice?

I turn briefly to the Illegal Wildlife Trade Challenge Fund. The Statement indicates that £39 million has been invested in the project. Can the Minister say exactly when the £39 million was released and how much of it has been allocated so far? Does the fund have a time limit for applications? As the fund is focused on the illegal trade in wildlife, can the Minister also say whether any of that money is allocated to tackling and imposing heavy sanctions on the importation of ivory? It is illegal to import ivory products into this country, but that has not made a significant difference to the African elephant. Can the Minister please give an update on the effect of the Ivory Act?

I agree with the Statement from the Minister in the other place that Defra will have to work across the whole of government, Natural England, the Environment Agency, the Animal and Plant Health Agency, communities and businesses to achieve the measures set out in the Statement. Given the huge loss in biodiversity and the levels of plastic and chemical pollution in our landscapes, coastal areas and waterways, does the Minister believe that this is achievable in a realistic timeframe?

[The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Benyon) (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my farming interests as set out in the register. I am very grateful to the two noble Baronesses for their questions on the environmental improvement plan. As they know, it was published last Tuesday 31 January and sets out the action we are taking to implement the 25-year environment plan, leading on from the work your Lordships did in this House to make that ground-breaking legislation law. Each chapter of the EIP describes the progress we have made in realising the 10 goals of the 25-year environment plan. It also sets out our plans to continue to deliver those goals and to achieve legally binding targets that support them.

Our most critical goal is to achieve thriving plants and wildlife by halting the decline of nature by the end of this decade. The noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, rightly asked whether there is any real prospect of achieving that, and we think that it is achievable. It is difficult, but we can achieve it if we work really hard. We said that we will create and restore habitats the size of Dorset, we will invest more than £750 million in tree planting and peatland restoration, and we will protect 30% of our land and sea for nature by 2030. The EIP sets out how we will achieve clean air by cutting emissions from domestic burning appliances and by reducing ammonia emissions through farming incentives and investments in slurry storage. Our goal of clean and plentiful water is vital for a healthy natural environment, and we will deliver that by upgrading 160 wastewater treatment plants by 2027 and promoting sustainable agriculture, restoring 400 miles of rivers and reducing water company leakages by 50% by 2050.

Addressing one of the points raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, we will continue to manage exposure to chemicals and pesticides. We will develop a chemical strategy and prioritise the sustainable use of chemicals through UK REACH legislation. We will achieve the goal of minimising waste by implementing the extended producer responsibility, introducing a deposit return scheme for plastic and metal drinks containers, and banning single-use plastics; similar schemes have been extremely successful in other countries. The EIP sets out how we will achieve the goal of using natural resources more sustainably and efficiently by growing the long-term UK timber supply, bringing 40% of our soils into sustainable management by 2028, and tackling illegal deforestation in our supply chains.

In delivering our goal to mitigate and adapt to climate change, we recognise the two-way relationship between climate and nature, and we will prioritise the use of nature-based solutions. This embeds changes that were made at COP 26, and underpinned at COP 27 and CBD 15 in Montreal just before Christmas, which have hard-wired nature into the whole climate piece. It is absolutely vital that we reflect that in the United Kingdom as much as we are globally.

This approach is at the forefront of our goal to reduce the risk of harm from environmental hazards by investing in flood defences, rewarding our farmers for actions to reduce the risk of floods, droughts and wildfires. To restore our biodiversity, we will continue to deliver the goal of enhanced biosecurity. We will implement the five-year action plan of the 2023 Plant Biosecurity Strategy for Great Britain and seize the opportunity of Brexit to tailor our border import controls with a new risk-based target operating model.

Our final goal, woven through all the others, is to enhance the beauty and heritage of, and engagement with, the natural environment. The key point that everyone should live within 15 minutes of green or blue space is really important to Ministers. To address the point made by the noble Baroness, an enormous amount of data is held by Natural England and others. We are using it to identify the communities that are most economically challenged with the highest levels of deprivation, which are often the hardest ones to connect to nature. There are good examples right across the country of how that is being achieved, and we want to see that rolled out nationally.

To address the other points that have been made, I think the targets are achievable. I entirely agree with my colleague in the other place, Philip Dunne, that they must be met and that nature underpins everything right across government, be it the NHS, our defence forces, how we educate our children, heal our sick or support our vulnerable. Nature is at the heart of it, whether in the provision of drugs, through the health and well-being that can be created, how we can divert people away from our health service—nature is the deliverer of that. If we are not supporting nature, nothing else fits in.

The Secretary of State is determined on delivery. We spend a lot of time holding ourselves to account, but also those delivery agencies that we need to work properly to make sure that this plan is delivered. The noble Baroness is absolutely right that this is not a matter only for Defra; it is a matter for all aspects of government, including local government. We are putting huge burdens on a variety of different agencies, professions and individuals to make sure that this is successful, and we are determined to work with them to make sure that that is achievable.

On environmental land management schemes, we have ring-fenced the £2.4 billion a year that goes into supporting farmers in England, and that is a commitment up to the end of this Parliament. Of course, parties will be discussing among themselves how we take that forward, but every major economy in the world supports agriculture in different ways. What we have done in recent decades has caused huge problems for our environment and for the well-being of precisely those businesses we want to see flourish. Now there is an opportunity to pivot and to make sure that we are supporting farmers who are doing the right things for the environment—investing in soils and in the natural capital for which they are responsible, and which will underpin the long-term benefit of their businesses.

The noble Baroness asked about soils. This is absolutely fundamental to turning round our environment so that we can reverse the decline of species by 2030 and increase the potential of the farmed environment. So yes, tied into the targets is improving and protecting soil health. It is a key part of this document. By 2028, we will bring at least 40% of England’s agricultural soil into sustainable management through our new farming schemes, increasing this to 60% by 2030. We will do this in a variety of ways, which I probably do not have time to go through today. However, I am happy to take the noble Baroness through it, along with my noble friend the Earl of Caithness, who is rightly concerned about this.

I will make just one further point to the noble Baroness: there is no way we could achieve what we have tied into law, and into our targets through the Environment Act, if we were to somehow, as has been suggested, be about to trash our environmental protections. We cannot do it. It is absolutely vital that we use the sensible ones that are relevant to our natural environment, that we can discard ones that have nothing to do with these islands at all, and that we can work with people to do that. I implore the noble Baroness to join me, if she wants to, in the process part, but it is the outcomes that matter, and the outcomes are set out very clearly in this document. We have to achieve them, and we will not do that by somehow getting rid, as has been suggested, of all these protections.

On the key point to the noble Baroness made on fly tipping, I would add litter. I live the distance away from a McDonald’s drive-thru that it takes to eat a McDonald’s drive-thru, and what people then do with the rest of their McDonald’s drive-thru causes me to fulminate in a way that alarms those around me. I think the state of some of our highways and roads is absolutely disgraceful. We can talk about government and their responsibility for this, but we still have to talk about a culture, where people have so little regard for the natural environment and where they seem to have lost a sense of place, that allows this to happen.

We have given powers; powers are available to local authorities to deal with this. We want to make sure that they are using them, that we are encouraging people not to throw litter and that we are able to support those authorities that need to clear it up. Yes, CCTV is absolutely available. The Environment Agency has the means to record what is happening at key hotspots and it has taken forward prosecutions; but we, as Ministers in Defra, really want to get behind those efforts of society and those who share our views that the state of some of our countryside through litter is unacceptable.

On the illegal wildlife trade, the Ivory Act is an exemplary piece of legislation. It became law in all its measures relatively recently, and of course we are not a range state. We have to accept that we can only do our bit to stop the importation of ivory, but we are putting huge resources into assisting range-state countries to make sure they have the means to prevent poaching—with some success, I have to say. I agree with the noble Baronesses that it does require a whole-government approach to implement these targets, and that determination exists very clearly within Defra.

Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Bill

Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville Excerpts

3rd reading
Wednesday 1st February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

It is my privilege to move the Third Reading of the Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Bill in this House today. As we have discussed in debate, it is essential that we forge ahead with the Bill now to help address the many challenges we are facing across our food system and environment.

During the Bill’s passage through the other place, we saw record-breaking heat and drought and now, as it nears the end of its journey, we are managing the impacts of winter flooding. Precision-breeding technology is one of the tools we can use to develop plants that are more productive, more resilient to extreme weather, and less reliant on fertilisers and pesticides. This technology will help support our farmers to grow and harvest better, improve the health and welfare of animals, and provide healthier and more nutritious foods for consumers.

We have some of the best scientists and research institutes in the world, and we want to encourage this exciting research and translate it into tangible benefits. I recently had the pleasure of visiting Professor Jane Langdale at the University of Oxford, where I learned about her cutting-edge work developing high-yielding rice varieties for smallholder farmers. I heard how you can precision breed drought-resistant varieties. That is exactly the kind of work we want to see. I know that this is happening across the country, including at the John Innes Centre at Rothamsted, the Roslin Institute and many more places. I left Oxford with the warm glow—no doubt some noble Lords might feel that it was naive but I felt it was genuine—one gets from the belief that we have actually done something good here, which will benefit people in not just this country but abroad.

By introducing a more proportionate and science-based regulatory framework, we want to encourage innovation and enable new breeds of plants and animals to be released for field trials and brought to market more easily. We want to encourage this innovation responsibly. Following the Bill’s passage, we will continue to work with experts and other stakeholders to develop measures to safeguard animal welfare before we bring the measures in the Bill into force in relation to animals.

I thank all those who have supported the Bill and those who put it through its paces to ensure it will deliver on its vision of proportionate and safe regulation of precision-breeding technologies. The specialist expertise that the noble Lords, Lord Krebs, Lord Trees, Lord Winston and Lord Cameron of Dillington, have brought to the debates has been invaluable. As we are all aware, this is a scientific policy area with which some of us do not always feel at ease. It was a truly extraordinary experience to hear the level of understanding and knowledge in some of the exchanges. I really thank many noble Lords for their wisdom and for ensuring the appropriate direction of debates.

I also thank noble Lords on the Front Benches for their invaluable contributions. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, has led well-considered scrutiny, and I thank her for her debate on this legislation. The noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, has provided extensive input to these debates, for which I am grateful. I thank other noble Lords from all sides of the House for their interest and engagement, which has undoubtedly improved the Bill. I know that we had some arguments and that not everyone will have been happy with precisely where we ended up, but it was an enormously beneficial experience to have the debates that we did.

Finally, I want to thank the Bill team, who were led by Fiona White, Emily Bowen, Elizabeth Bates and Elena Kimber, and the Bill policy team, parliamentary counsel and the Food Standards Agency, which worked so hard on the Bill. I thank noble Lords for their support and input into these important debates. I beg to move.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, I realise that the Chamber is filling up and getting ready for the next debate, which is very important, but I would like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Benyon, for his good humour, patience and flexibility during the passage of the Bill. I also thank the Bill team for their help in answering our queries, along with the noble Baronesses, Lady Hayman of Ullock and Lady Jones of Whitchurch, and all those on the Labour Benches, including the noble Lord, Lord Winston, who made a very valuable contribution to the Bill.

As the Minister has said, the expertise of the noble Lords, Lord Krebs, Lord Trees and Lord Cameron of Dillington, was absolutely invaluable. I really enjoyed the exchanges across the Chamber on this very technical Bill. I cannot sit down without mentioning the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, who also brought a great deal of expertise to it. My noble friend Lady Parminter supported me brilliantly; we could not have got where we are without her, so I thank her for that.

There were excellent cross-party debates and we reached a reasonable conclusion. We did not get everything that we wanted but we got a satisfactory result and I thank the Minister for that.

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

In adding to the noble Baroness’s thanks to noble Lords, I forgot to mention my noble friend Lord Harlech, without whom chaos would have ensued.

Agricultural Transition Plan

Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville Excerpts

Wednesday 1st February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

My Lords, I shall first speak to the Statement on the agricultural transition plan. We know from the Statement that Defra is moving away from the direct payment schemes that farmers have been receiving for many years from the EU, such as the basic payment scheme, and is instead moving to a system where farmers are paid to make improvements to the environment, animal health and welfare, and to reduce carbon emissions and pollution. We welcome this. Farmers will get grants to improve productivity, including new robotic equipment.

Our one concern around this is that funds will need to be matched, which will make them unaffordable for many. The Government claim that farmers will, within seven years, produce healthy and profitable food in a sustainable way and without subsidies. Therefore it is important that the Government keep a close eye on progress to ensure that it is achievable, because we know that farmers have been struggling with the increased cost pressures on fertiliser, fuels and labour supply, for example. For upland farmers, such as in Cumbria where I live, the withdrawal of the basic payment support is going to make life much harder. What reassurance can the Minister give to upland farmers that they will have access to sufficient funds for their farms to continue to be viable?

We also know that tenant farmers have raised concerns: for example, how will the new environmental payments work in practice? How will the value of income streams be possible for tenants? How would tenant farmers go about claiming them, and how can the length of tenure be accommodated within this? We also know that they are concerned that the loss of BPS could have an impact on rents. The Rock review raised the issue of access to the various schemes, so I would be grateful if the Minister could provide further clarity and reassurance in these areas.

The other concern we have is that, despite the many schemes on offer, some of them are quite complex. We would be grateful if there was more attention paid by the Government to ensure strong take-up of the new schemes. Our concerns arise from the figures on the sustainable farming incentive from the last year: just 224 applications were paid out, a far lower number than the number that received BPS, which was over 80,000. It is clearly important that these schemes are successful, both for our farming and rural communities but also for the environment. If the Minister is able to provide any information on the projected take-up over the next 12 months and what Defra is doing to encourage that maximum level of interest, we would be very grateful.

Moving on to the Statement on crustacean mortality in the north-east of England, I am sure that many of us are aware of the extremely distressing scenes of thousands of dead and dying lobsters and crabs that have washed ashore on beaches there. We also know that fishing crews have reported a drop of up to 95% in their catches and continue to report high levels of dead shellfish, a situation which has been described as catastrophic for their livelihoods.

We do not understand why this mass die-off has happened, and I appreciate that it is understandably very difficult to identify exactly what the cause is for such incidents. But as the Statement says, the independent crustacean mortality expert panel reports that a novel pathogen was the most likely cause. In making this Statement to the House of Commons on 26 January, Mark Spencer, the Minister, said:

“I am considering carefully whether further analysis by the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science can ascertain conclusively the cause of this unusual mortality.”


Since then, Sir Robert Goodwill, the chairman of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, has written to the Minister asking for a study to be carried out as “a matter of urgency.” The letter also states:

“The Committee believes that further work should be undertaken to identify this novel pathogen, given the importance of determining its origin, its vectors of transmission, its transmissibility, its virulence and other factors related to it.”


I have two questions for the Minister. First, how is Defra working with the local fishing industry to support it during this crisis? Secondly, will the Government take note of the Select Committee’s letter and act on its request to get this mystery solved, so it is prevented from happening again?

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, the farming Statement in the other place on 26 January has been generally welcomed. Farmers are keen to move forward with ELMS, but sufficient detail to allow them to plan ahead has been sadly lacking in the past. This current announcement provides more information, which should give some reassurance. The rollout of the sustainable farming incentive is overdue. There appear to be six strands to this, and it provides for paid actions by farmers to manage hedgerows for wildlife, plant nectar-rich wildflowers and to manage crop pests without the use of insecticides.

I particularly welcome this last one as there were amendments and debates during the passage of both the Agriculture Act and the Environment Act on the very harmful effect of pesticides. Can the Minister tell the House the extent of the regulations around the proposed use of insecticides?

The six additional standards to the sustainable farming initiative allow farmers to receive payments for actions on hedgerows, grasslands, arable and horticultural land, pest management and nutrient management. This adds to the existing standards on soil health and moorlands. Can the Minister give more detail on these standards?

There do now seem to be a plethora of ways in which farmers can access money. Farmers are busy people and their workload is heavy, especially in bad weather. The larger farm businesses will employ staff, including farm managers, to look at the detail of the schemes and assess what is best for them. The smaller farmer is unlikely to have the time to look into the detail of the myriad schemes available in order to make the best choices for his or her land. The Minister is aware that there have been complaints about the complexities of applying for existing schemes, and has said on previous occasions that the process is being simplified. Can he give us reassurance that these new schemes will be easier to apply for and less complicated than those already running? It is vital to increase the uptake of sustainable farming initiatives and Countryside Stewardship schemes, and crucial that the schemes are easily understood and that the forms are not overly complex, so that the smaller independent farmer is able to participate.

I am concerned about tenant farmers generally. Countryside Stewardship Plus encourages farmers to work together with their neighbours and landowners. How will the tenant farmer fit into this pattern?

I welcome the new ambition for local nature recovery to include managing flood plains and maintaining peatlands. How will that assist farmers on the Somerset Levels, where flooding is a way of life and water management an everyday part of life? This year, as in others, large tracts of land have been under water for a considerable time. I look forward to the Minister’s comments on this.

My final comment is about the overall thrust of the transition plan, which is towards improving the land, increasing biodiversity, carbon capture, and enhancing and managing woodlands. This is a vital part of managing the land. However, there is insufficient mention of the production of food. The growing of crops, the husbandry of animals and the production of food is essential, both for the sustainability of the British farming industry and as part of the process of feeding the nation. Agriculture cannot be about only biodiversity and carbon capture. Food production must have equal billing for farming to survive. Can the Minister provide reassurance that there is a balance in the transition plan?

My noble friend Lord Teverson, who led on the then Fisheries Bill from these Benches, will speak on the north-east crustacean Statement.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I will be very brief. Exactly as the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, said, the images of this incident are quite something. Given its importance, I would be very interested to understand from the Minister why Professor Gideon Henderson, the main scientific adviser to Defra, was not involved at the beginning to make sure that the first inquiry was well managed and actually dealt with the real issues. That, perhaps, would have made the second inquiry unnecessary. In fact, we have had two inquiries now but we still do not know what the answer is. I would be interested to learn from the Minister what happens next.

I am particularly interested to understand whether we have samples in cold storage of the original crustacean victims so that we could actually go back and look at pathogens. As we all know, invasive species, whether they are pathogens or larger organisms, are potentially extremely dangerous and expensive to our economy. This was a major incident and I would like to know what will happen next, and exactly how this should move from here. We have had very few answers from those two inquiries.

Plant Health and Trade in Animals and Related Products (Amendment) Regulations 2022

Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville Excerpts

Tuesday 31st January 2023 Grand Committee

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)]

My Lords, I am most grateful to my noble friend for introducing these regulations, which I broadly support. I have just a couple of points of interest.

I know my noble friend has visited—sometime last year, I think—Fera, based at Sand Hutton near York, which used to be in my constituency. I take this opportunity to praise it for the work it does. Presumably it will have a role to play in identifying any pest and the danger it might hold.

I would like to focus on the position of the Lebanese potatoes to which my noble friend referred. I think the regulations call for demarcation and for controls to be taken at the point of entry. On paragraph 7.9 of the Explanatory Memorandum, I sympathise with the department for the errors it has made and welcome this opportunity to correct them. It begs the question: if we are transposing these regulations into UK law, will they be subject to the retained EU law Bill? Will we ask Defra to lift them? I would be interested to know why we are being asked to look at them this afternoon if they are to be reversed later this year.

I know that it is a slightly separate issue, but it is very difficult to follow the retained EU legislation from looking at the dashboard. Defra does not appear in alphabetical order but has just shy of 1,800 regulations. I know that we in both Houses were involved in transposing these regulations into UK law, but Defra bore the brunt of the 2,700 or 4,000 regulations. I thank the officials for the work they did over a very intensive programme.

Paragraph 7.9 refers to ensuring

“that potatoes from certain regions of Lebanon meet stringent entry requirements.”

Did the checks take place at the port of entry? What is the normal entry route for these Lebanese potatoes? Do they come directly from Lebanon or through the EU? That is my first point of information. If they come through the EU, which is a strong possibility, I draw attention to the concern that the Food Standards Agency raised in its most recent annual report, Our Food 2021: An Annual Review of Food Standards Across the UK, which states at paragraph 8 on page 13:

“The UK Government recently announced that full import controls for goods coming from the EU to Great Britain would be further delayed and replaced by a modernised approach to border controls by the end of 2023.”


I am trying to understand whether that really is the case. If it is, it will put a huge onus of responsibility on local authorities. For information, I would like to know where the entry and route into this country is.

I also raise a question my right honourable friend Kit Malthouse asked in the other place. Ash dieback has taken hold of the country. I think my noble friend will confirm that we have ended the practice of exporting ash seeds and reimporting young saplings into this country from regions such as Denmark and Poland, in which ash dieback is rife. Kit Malthouse asked about ash dieback on Wednesday 25 January when this instrument was debated in the other place. It again begs the question: where are ash trees, whether saplings of bigger trees, being imported to? Where do the checks take place? That is crucial to ensuring that any diseased trees among these imports are taken at a very early stage.

I commend these regulations because there is an animal or plant scare or scandal roughly every 10 years. I think of BSE, foot and mouth, horsegate and, this year and last year, avian flu. The regulations provide the department with the tools it needs, but I have raised concerns that I hope my noble friend will address.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for setting out the rationale for this statutory instrument so clearly. It apparently addresses failures of retained EU law to operate effectively following Brexit. It also corrects some errors in previous SIs, including ensuring that potatoes from Lebanon meet stringent entry conditions. Perhaps the Minister can say whether potatoes from Lebanon were entering the country without being properly monitored before this SI was laid.

Corrections are also needed to the Trade in Animals and Related Products (Amendment and Legislative Functions) Regulations 2022, or the TARP (ALF) as they are called. These ensure the transfer of functions from the EU to appropriate GB authorities, with a change to establish specific rules on imports of equine animals from third countries. Corrections in Regulation 7 in part 2 of the instrument before us deal with the import of potatoes, while Regulation 8 in part 3 deals with the errors in TARP (ALF).

Environmental Targets (Fine Particulate Matter) (England) Regulations 2022

Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville Excerpts

Monday 30th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord De Mauley (Con)]

My Lords, we all have a growing understanding of the devastating effects of PM2.5 and particulate matter in general on human health, and we welcome efforts to bear down on them. I think I heard the noble Baroness sidestep the question of what an appropriate target was, preferring simply to demand more ambition. Although other noble Lords have made some suggestions, she did not answer my noble friend the Minister’s question of what actions she specifically proposes should be banned or seriously cut back. It is important that the public know what they are.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his introduction to this SI. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, has spoken in detail about the lack of ambition and urgency in the Government’s regulations on fine particulates, and previous speakers have made powerful arguments for more ambitious targets.

I fear I feel like a single-track CD that is on continual replay, continuously playing the same track or, in my case, repeating the same arguments. The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, of which I am currently a member, has drawn the attention of the House to the issue of reducing concentrations of PM2.5, the pollutant causing the most harm to human health. The extensive consultation carried out by Defra drew responses on this regulation from Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, the Woodland Trust and Asthma + Lung UK, all of whom jail felt the annual mean concentration target—the AMCT—of 10 micrograms per cubic metre at the sites of the highest level of concentration by December 2040 was not adequate. The Royal College of Physicians has written to me saying:

“Air pollution and poor air quality are a significant and growing public health challenge. In 2016, the RCP alongside the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health published Every Breath We Take. This report examined the impact of exposure to air pollution across the life course.”


The report found that around 40,000 premature deaths every year in the UK were attributable to exposure to outdoor air pollution.

The Healthy Air Coalition stated that the EU Commission proposes that this same target, of 10 micrograms per cubic metre, be reached by 2030 —10 years earlier than Defra’s target of 2040. The Healthy Air Coalition also asked why the requirement for a minimum number of monitoring stations will not come into effect until January 2028. Without these stations it is extremely difficult to have confidence in our ability to monitor the particulates and meet the targets, even at their very unambitious levels. Defra’s response to the questions on this were that it expected the monitor network to be completed in the next three years, but it had allowed for unavoidable slippage in building, networking and testing. Therefore, the legal requirement was going to be 2028.

The consultation responses from all quarters were clear that the targets were unambitious and should be higher. Despite this, as with all the other five areas of environmental targets, no change was made to the final targets. As this is the last of the six target areas to be debated, I ask the Minister how much the consultation exercise has cost in total? How many hours of Defra staff time were spent analysing and collating the responses? Given the very large number of responses—over 181,000—were extra resources deployed and temporary staff employed in order to help deal with the level of responses?

Defra spends a lot of time consulting on various pieces of legislation. I therefore imagine that the consultation department is used to the processes involved and is efficient in collating the resulting responses. On this occasion, to totally ignore and override the submissions received, and stick to the original targets, gives a very strong impression that Defra’s mind was already made up long before the consultation started. Defra was only paying lip service to the process. Meanwhile, those who suffer from asthma, bronchitis and other respiratory tract conditions, long-term and short-term, are left with no hope of improved air quality in the immediate future. That really is unacceptable. Given the level of concern on the total lack of meaningful response to the consultation exercise, if the Minister is not able to answer my questions on costs and staff resources this evening I would be grateful if he could write to me with the necessary information and put a copy of his response in the Library.

[The Earl of Caithness (Con)]

My Lords, can I challenge the noble Baroness on what she said? While it was very interesting, she focused entirely on outdoor pollution from PM. There is a much greater problem of indoor pollution from PM, about which we know much less. There is much less monitoring of it but it comes from damp houses and from the chemicals we use; it comes from a whole range of issues. She referred specifically to the outdoors and then to people suffering from asthma. They are going to be suffering indoors as well, given the pollution inside our houses. This is why the whole of air pollution is so difficult. Theoretically, we know much more about outside pollution, which is much more heavily monitored. Even the noble Lord, Lord Tope, said how difficult it has been to reduce particulates in the City of London, despite how much the traffic has reduced. Yes, this is a hugely complex and very difficult and sensitive issue, but we need to look at it in the round. I have no doubt that by 2030 we will have a huge reduction, but it is going to be totally impossible to get to the required level for every single area in England.