Agriculture Bill

Baroness Hayman Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 7th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 7th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 28th July 2020 Lords Chamber

The amendment we are debating would enable the Government to start a public consultation on harnessing the potential of the brilliant UK plant science research community to make our agriculture greener, more productive and more sustainable. It is often claimed that the public are against novel gene technology but the most detailed study of this issue, by Professor Nick Pidgeon of Cardiff University, shows that this is simply not true. Nevertheless, it would be wise for us to proceed cautiously by an open and transparent public consultation before we adopt gene editing as part of our armoury for producing food in future.

[Baroness Hayman (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I should apologise to the Committee for making my first contribution on the Agriculture Bill at what I think is the seventh hour of the seventh day. I hope the Committee will give me a few minutes to speak to the amendment to which I have added my name, and which has been so ably described by my noble friends Lord Cameron and Lord Krebs. Their comprehensive and lucid explanations mean that I need not delay the Committee long.

I served two decades ago as a Minister at MAFF with responsibility for GM issues. As my noble friend Lord Krebs said, it was not a happy time. There was a highly polarised and often bitter debate to which I have no desire to return, certainly not in the form it took then. I very much hope that any future discussions on GMOs will be much more nuanced, seek to find common ground and be focused on the outcomes we are trying to achieve, rather than on very divisive attitudes. The term “culture wars” was not in such common usage then, but it was an early example of that.

That debate brought me into contact with many plant scientists who inspired me with their vision of the potentially beneficial effects of crops that could be transformative, particularly in the developing world; that could withstand drought and thrive in high salinity and soils that needed fewer pesticides and herbicides; that could improve the nutrition and yield of very basic crops on which people’s lives depended; and that could improve the environment and build resilience to climate change.

Gene editing techniques offer these potential benefits, providing specific, targeted changes that conventional breeding could achieve but which might take 10 or 12 years, in one-quarter of that time. These are not just dreams for the future: as my noble friend Lord Cameron made clear, these are actual pieces of research that plant scientists are working on. They are relevant to this country as well as to the developing world. Work is going on to produce elite varieties of sugar beet that are resistant to beet yellows virus, which threatens to reduce the yield of sugar beet in this country by 50% and is of such concern to my farmer neighbours in Norfolk. Meanwhile, the possible development of salt-tolerant strains of rice, maize that can withstand drought, and many more applications, could mean the difference between famine and survival for many families in some of the most deprived areas of the world.

In that context, I argue that it is our responsibility to provide the appropriate regulatory framework for these advances, after what has been widely seen as the flawed ECJ judgment of 2018. We do not have to create something de novo, because we have regulatory frameworks in place for assessing varieties that are bred conventionally to have new qualities, but which, with gene editing, would simply be produced quicker and with more precision. We have the rules available, and this amendment would allow us to consult and see whether this is publicly acceptable when the difference between gene editing and introducing new DNA into a product—transgenic work—is actually explained. I believe it is possible to do that in a responsible way. I feel that very strongly because after I left MAFF, I became, for a time, a regulator. I chaired the Human Tissue Authority and served as a member of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority. We faced similar issues to those that underlie the debate today: exciting scientific possibilities and new technologies, the risks and acceptability of which needed to be assessed. An appropriate level of regulation that commanded public support was essential.

These are never simple issues but if we approach them openly, they can maximise the benefit of scientific advance within the framework of public safety and confidence. We have set that framework in this country in other areas, such as human fertility and embryology, and those frameworks have been admired and followed in many other parts of the world. I believe we need now to do the same in the field of gene editing. I hope that the Government, who have on many occasions accepted the logic behind this amendment, will respond positively when the Minister speaks at the end of this debate.

[Lord Rooker (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, it is an absolute pleasure to follow the noble Lords, Lord Cameron and Lord Krebs, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman. I was privileged to be able to put my name to the amendment. It is the only time my name appears on any amendment, because I was not sworn in to your Lordships’ House until late June and I missed part of the early debate. I do not want to repeat points, but my experience is worth sharing with the House.

First, I want to make a topical point, which is that I was not impressed on Sunday by the BBC “Countryfile” programme, which dealt with this subject, nor by “Farming Today” yesterday. I will not go over the details, but they were not impressive examples of how to explain the technique to the public. It is a simple change to allow faster methods of plant breeding by access to novel gene-editing procedures. Such changes that take place would be the same as, but faster than, traditional plant breeding methods. Plant breeding is not politically sexy; it does not get a high profile in journals and on TV, and most members of the public would not have a clue about what goes on with the plant breeding technology we use.

As has been said, gene editing has nothing to do with genetic modification, because no foreign DNA is used. The European Union currently makes no distinction between gene editing and GMO technology, and that is the purpose of the amendment, although that might change. The EU regulations have emptied some UK laboratories, because people and companies left to work outside the EU. Companies abandoned first-class labs, one of which I visited in the Home Counties after I left the Government in October 2008, and it was tragic to see the empty space and the lost scientific opportunities.

Of course, new methods need handling with care for plants and consumers. I have got scars from 1997 to 1999, when I dealt with genetic modification. Going back to the previous debates, I was taken by what the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, said about Monsanto. During that time, I met the man from Monsanto, and I explained to him that lectures to me and other Ministers about how we should grow our food from the company that gave us Agent Orange did not go down very well. Monsanto, of course, does not exist now; it is subsumed into the companies.

When I arrived at the Food Standards Agency, when I was at Defra the second time, from 2006 to 2008, it did not really figure. When I got to the Food Standards Agency in 2009 as chair, we had been charged by the Government with running an information campaign. In fact, we had started the process, we had appointed Professor John Curtice to chair some of the public meetings and deliberations. But it was ended. There was a reluctance from some groups to embrace any idea of new technology. The anti-science groups are still vocal and are clearly deliberately linking Amendment 275 to GMO technology. I have had hundreds of emails and notices, like everyone else, and I have actually read the standard line. It is more difficult to describe products in a single plant species as Frankenstein food, so they do not do it. But the idea is to link the two together using the letter G, which is alleged to be the one that frightens people. It is precision breeding, nothing more nor less.

We need better productivity in agriculture and better resistance to disease and climate change. We cannot stand still while our competitors—the United States, Brazil, Australia, Japan—are able to use gene-editing technologies. It does not make sense. The EU, over the years, in my personal experience as a Minister and as a regulator, has moved away from the science as a result of lobbying by pressure groups, which are almost at a religious zealotry in terms of opposition to the technology. Unlike with GMOs, there is no reliable test to distinguish between gene editing and conventional plant breeding. Why should there be? It is the same plant. Nothing extra is added from another species, so I am not surprised there is no test.