Agriculture Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansarad) & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansarad): House of Lords
Tuesday 7th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wigley (PC) [V]]

I am happy to follow the noble Earl, Lord Caithness. I certainly identify with his comments on the 1947 Act and its significance. God help us if agriculture went back to the state it was in in the 1930s. There needs to be a reliable, transparent and dependable framework which our farmers and everyone involved in the countryside can depend upon. I draw attention to my interests as declared in the register.

This Bill applies primarily to England, although Wales will also come within its scope until such time as Welsh Ministers decide to have our own legislation. As the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, mentioned a moment ago, Amendment 66 addresses the question of the relationship between Wales, England, Northern Ireland and Scotland and the new regimes that will emerge. In the context of the European Union, there has been a framework for some understanding, whereas at the moment, unless some mechanism is brought in, there is a danger of us not having such a framework. My Amendment 66, which is in this group, attempts at least to flag up this question and seek an answer. This issue is probably better addressed later in the Bill, when we have already dealt with provisions relating to Wales—Schedule 5 and Part 7. Amendment 290, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, is probably a better point at which to address it. None the less, my amendment gives the Minister an opportunity to explain the initial thinking on it.

I agree with what was said in introducing the first amendment about the need for certainty and clarity. We need transparency regarding what exactly is going to replace the existing regime. The CAP can rightly be criticised for being expensive and bureaucratic, but it had one benefit: it brought certainty. It is important that farmers and others have certainty. In order to invest in the land, they need long-term certainty. We need to investigate that issue in Committee.

I also accept entirely what the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, and others said about less favoured areas. We need clarity and certainty there, too, because they depended so much on the European regimes. I support the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, on the question of reservoirs and water storage—an issue that might become even more important, given the climate change dangers we are facing. Having said this, many of these issues will be discussed in greater detail in considering later amendments, so on that basis, I will curtail my remarks at this point.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP) [V]]

My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Wigley. I will speak to my own Amendments 8, 22, 25, 31 and 50, which all relate to the issue of air pollution. I also support the amendments signed by my noble friend Lady Bennett of Manor Castle and Amendment 37, on pasture-fed grazing livestock systems, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering.

In this clause, there is near-unlimited potential for amendments, so we should all be commended if we manage to stay focused on our most pressing issues. As I said, the main focus of my five amendments in this group is on reducing the air pollution that results from farming and from land management, and on recognising the benefits of doing so.

Agricultural activities are a critical source of air pollution in rural areas—not just the fumes from machinery but the chemicals, slurries and manures that are applied to the land. Reducing this air pollution would obviously be of great benefit to the people who live and work on and around the land, but it would also benefit nearby towns and villages while reducing the accompanying smells. In most cases, farming-related air pollution is not an inevitable by-product of farming activity; it is in fact a huge waste of resources. For example, the offgassing of ammonia and nitrogen gases is an escape of nutrients that would be much better off retained in the soil.

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[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson. I was also excluded from the Second Reading by virtue of being a surplus Peer when we were not able to get all of us into our virtual Chamber. I am sure that that was in the early days of remote working and could not possibly happen again on any future big Bills.

I have signed three amendments in this group—Amendments 65, 103 and 106—which are all in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering. Clause 2 could be greatly improved so that the legislation and the resulting funding schemes reflect the scale of ambition that the Government are laying out. Amendment 103 would better target financial support to specific environmental and social outcomes. The conditions would help focus schemes around specific purposes, rather than leaving so much room for ministerial discretion. I know the Minister will soothingly reassure us about why this is all better left to ministerial discretion, but your Lordships’ House may favour the greater wisdom contained in our greater numbers. That is what I am hoping, anyway.

The other probing amendments in this group are about ensuring funding is directed to the most effective places to achieve the aims of the Bill. Funding must be available for a wide range of land managers, so that whatever are the most environmentally and socially beneficial activities can be encouraged. That said, it is worth probing the Minister on how the Government will ensure that that will be the case so that money is not put into the wrong hands. We must remember that these are large sums of money, so we must target them well and be able to explain who is eligible for public funds and why.

Some noble Lords have taken the opportunity to lobby for a return to the new normal of us all returning to the Chamber. I would just like to point out that many of us like remote working. We do not want to risk disease and death. We have to remember that coronavirus is likely to be part of the normal for the next few months and possibly years, so let us take advantage of the fact that we can be a hybrid House, unlike the House at the other end of the building.

[The Earl of Devon]

The amendments I have tabled in this group largely go to the same issue which the noble Baronesses, Lady McIntosh and Lady Jones, have touched on, which is who is to receive payments under the ELMS and for what specific land they are to receive them. Noble Lords will see that I have suggested that it should be agricultural land. As I said previously, this is the Agriculture Bill. I would hate these payments to go to highways, Heathrow or Hyde Park. As the Bill is currently drafted, it strikes me that environmental land management in all those non-agricultural spaces would qualify. For that reason, Amendments 3, 15, 20, 23 and 30 focus the Bill and Clause 1 specifically on agricultural land.

In Amendment 85, I have lifted the definition of agricultural land from the current rules for the BPS. However, I added to that definition “common land” because, under the current rules, there is some uncertainty around whether common land, which is often found in uplands which we have discussed a great deal today, qualifies, as the right to claim BPS for common land is quite opaque. I would appreciate it if, in summing up, the Minister could address how common land will be treated under ELMS, because a major concern for common rights holders on Dartmoor and elsewhere is whether they will qualify and how.

Amendment 64 suggests that ELMS payments should be directed to farmers and those who are active in the management of agricultural land. This amendment and its wording find favour with the NFU and is therefore strongly supported by the agricultural and farming community. It allows us to determine exactly who should be the recipients. As the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, said, we do not want the money to be given to people who are not engaged in agricultural practices.

Agriculture Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 9th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees]

In that case, I will call the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP) [V]]

My Lords, I am pleased to support Amendment 12, moved by the noble Lord, Lord Curry of Kirkharle, and of course the amendments in the group tabled by my noble friend Lady Bennett of Manor Castle. I also should probably have signed Amendment 13, moved by my colleague the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, but I am afraid that sometimes these amendments just get away from me.

A direct experience of land, farming and wilderness is hugely important to understanding our place as human beings in the world and the impact that we are having on the environment and on our climate. As we begin to make the transition to a more sustainable, ecologically sound society with net-zero carbon emissions, public education is more important than ever. Education is a public good, and Amendment 12 reflects that fact, opening the door to enterprises that combine land management with education and training. I hope that the Minister will take these amendments away and ensure that environmental education and training is not left out of the Bill.

[The Earl of Shrewsbury (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I support Amendment 12 and I shall speak to Amendment 13, in the names of my noble friends Lord Caithness and Lord Colgrain. I ought to declare my interest as a member of the National Farmers’ Union.

Education is key to producing future generations of efficient farmers and land managers. While there are excellent world-class agricultural education facilities in this country—such as Harper Adams University in Shropshire and the Royal Agricultural College in Cirencester, to name but two—over the past few years a number of them have closed, such as Wye College, while a number of other establishments have downsized their activities considerably. In my opinion, it is vitally important that we have a world-class agricultural education system for this multifaceted agricultural industry.

I am pleased to have added my name to Amendment 13. I do not believe that “forestry” widens this Bill in the context of agriculture; I believe that forestry is a part and parcel of agriculture and the countryside, and therefore it should be included in the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Curry. I support the amendment.

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[The Earl of Dundee [V]]

Amendment 44, which is in my name, seeks financial assistance to encourage the rearing of livestock outside as opposed to factory farming. Outdoor rearing of animals reduces the use of antibiotics. Too many of those in farming have already undermined the efficacy of antibiotics in British medicine. Equally, animal-to-human transmission of diseases is far more likely to occur when animals are farmed indoors—for example, Covid-19, SARS, swine flu, avian flu et cetera. The grazing of animals outdoors also benefits crop rotation, since they keep soils healthy without the overuse of synthetic fertilisers. Animals reared on good quality pasture also produce less CO₂ and methane compared to those reared indoors and fed on animal feed.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, I am speaking to my four amendments in this group and I obviously heartily support Amendment 77, which was tabled by my noble friend Lady Bennett. My amendments are focused on improving animal welfare. They would also ensure that minimum standards are enforced and that no public money is given to the most harmful farming practices. Amendment 66 would prevent financial assistance being given to a number of cruel farming practices such as mutilations, including debeaking, tail docking and tooth pulling without anaesthetic. Castrating sheep with your teeth would also most definitely be included. The amendment would require publicly funded farmers to keep animals in species-appropriate numbers, not exceeding specified stocking densities or certified levels of illness and disease. Public money should not be used to support animal cruelty. That is the purpose of the amendment.

Amendments 125 and 136 would require the Secretary of State to consider animal welfare specifically when planning and reporting financial assistance. These amendments are important in putting animal welfare at the forefront of the Minister’s mind, and in ensuring that the health and happiness of our farm animals does not fall behind other priorities, such as profit.

Finally, while much of the Bill is focused on offering farmers and land managers a financial carrot, my Amendment 225 will bring a big stick for those who refuse to adopt even the most basic standards of environmental protection and animal welfare. I loathe the concept of new criminal offences, although I accept that sometimes they are necessary, and I think this is necessary. While the Government might not choose to adopt such a harsh approach as imposing criminal liability, I want at least to draw attention to the apparent lack of any plan to raise the standards of those who consistently fall behind and refuse to bring themselves up to modern standards of farming and land management. As always, I look forward eagerly to the Minister’s assurances on animal welfare and hope that he or she will specifically address what will be done about those farmers who lag behind.

[Baroness Boycott [V]]

I support the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, and all the amendments that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, just addressed. We currently have 65 billion farmed animals on this planet, and 80% of livestock is kept at the moment in various kinds of cage. That is a truly terrible thing for us all to know. They are kept in cruelty, in the main. I always say that if, as a country, we factory farmed Labradors, the whole country would grind to a halt in about two minutes. I used to keep pigs, I played football with them, and they are just as engaging as any dog.

I add my support to Amendment 77, which is about community engagement and involvement, and I want to bring to the Committee’s attention a scheme called Capital Growth, which I started when I worked for the then Mayor of London, who is now Prime Minister. We began it in 2008 with a plan to create 2,012 new community gardens in London. Now, 12 years later, we have 2,500. We have 200 acres of London that were derelict and are now growing gardens with 100,000 volunteers. I have listened today to many speeches, including the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, talking about city farms, which are much more difficult to achieve, and the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, talking very eloquently about rubbish. He mentioned the fact that if an environment is in decay, people do not keep it. What this scheme proved was that you can turn the most derelict area around, you can bring a community together and you can teach children, which has again been a big subject through the day. You can teach children that, indeed, spaghetti does not grow on trees, which one child said to me, or, as one noble Lord mentioned, that cheese is not a plant.

This was a cheap scheme. We spent very little money on it, it was very viable, and I hope that we can, as we run up to the climate talks in Glasgow, now postponed for a year, take this scheme countrywide. I am thrilled that the Minister for the Environment is interested and I hope, given that it is a very viable scheme and extremely cost-efficient, we can have it in every school. I have watched a school where there were 54 languages and the teacher was explaining mathematics to someone who had no English at all by holding out 12 beans and saying, “Plant these in three rows.” You can do magical things like that and I commend the scheme to the House. I am very pleased to be part of this debate and to support the various amendments, especially those around animal welfare.

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[Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick [V]]

My Lords, this group of amendments deals specifically with the management and custodianship of the environment. I have added my name to some of them.

I believe in the principle of public money for public goods to achieve good soil health and biodiversity. To get to that stage we need to employ nature-friendly farming methods, agroecology and agroforestry. In that respect, I support Amendments 39 and 96 in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, which clearly seek to put nature-friendly farming in the Bill and ensure that financial assistance is targeted at and supports nature-friendly farmers and land users who carry out nature-friendly farming practices on their land.

A considerable number of farmers throughout the UK now employ nature-friendly farming; there are many of that type in Northern Ireland. They have restored biodiversity and some of them use organic methods, but above all they have produced good, healthy food that contributes to our health and well-being. That is something we should support.

I agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, has just said, because there should be direct references in the Bill to “whole farm agroecological systems”. That is in Amendments 42 and 97. Amendments 40 and 84, also in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, and Amendment 41 in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, seek to add agroforestry to the Bill. This is an important practice for the diversification of farming, meeting our national tree-planting targets and bringing overall benefit to our natural environment.

These methods help address climate change and produce food, so I think we need to move to this type of farming, which complements livestock and other types of farming. The most important thing about nature-friendly farming, agroecology and agroforestry is that they are good not only for land and biodiversity but for landscape development and renewal of our soil. I was very much taken by the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, that there is probably a need to regenerate the soil because it has been leeched of various nutrients over many years due to intensive agricultural production methods.

I support Amendment 120, which

“allows the Secretary of State to make regulations to develop a target for the uptake of integrated pest management and to monitor progress towards this target.”

Those are the amendments I support. It is all about producing better environmental standards for our landscape and the local environment and thereby producing food that will lead to better food security, health and well-being for our nation.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, I do not think I signed any amendments in this group, so I will say simply that I support all my noble friend’s amendments, which are obviously superb.

Agriculture Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 14th July 2020 Lords Chamber

and reinforces the idea that Clause 1(4) must encourage the production of food by producers in England rather than simply having “regard to”. With these few remarks, I beg to move.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP) [V]]

My Lords, it is a pleasure finally to get to this group after so many hours of waiting. I commend the amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering. Again, I say what a pleasure it is to follow her; her contributions are always extremely valuable. Having signed a lot of her amendments, I am afraid that I shall keep saying that. I also commend my noble friend Lady Bennett of Manor Castle and her Amendment 47. In fact, I support too many of the amendments in this group to list them all. It is a fantastic group, which strikes at the heart of what the Government should be aiming for with their food policy: supporting high-quality, healthy, nutritious food, grown as close to the consumer as possible.

When I chaired London Food, an initiative of the then mayor Ken Livingstone, I put together a report on how to make food sustainable for a huge conglomeration of cities and large towns. The single most important factor was that food should be local. I love organic food, but local food is the way forward if you want to be truly sustainable, so that food does not move around too much and stays nutritious. We can eat it very quickly after cooking. These amendments recognise the fundamental link between the food we put into our bodies and our resulting health. Too much of our food system remains tied to the World War era mindset of processing as much high-calorie food as possible to meet the most basic nutritional needs of the population. The outcome has been obesity, diabetes and food-related ill health. Good food policy should have health and nutrition as its core principle.

Sadly, I have not signed Amendment 53 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, or Amendment 63, in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Dundee. I did not spot them in time, but they are wonderful amendments. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response on what the Government plan to do to support urban and community food-growing, which the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, has already mentioned in previous amendments.

Finally, I turn to my Amendment 46, which would tie public procurement into the Bill. The enormous buying power of the public sector is often overlooked, but it is essential for the transition to a sustainable and ecologically friendly world. Too much procurement goes to the lowest-cost bidder without consideration of social and environmental impacts. My amendment hopes to prompt the Minister to address public procurement and its role in supporting a better food system for the UK.

[Lord Greaves (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the previous speaker for her support of my Amendment 53. I do not want to say much about it, but I wonder whether the Government can comment on the way in which new technologies are producing food, such as protein in laboratories and the concept of vertical gardens and vertical market gardens in urban areas. How do they fit into their general food strategy?

I want to support pretty much everything that the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, said in introducing this group. It is extremely important. I have one minor quibble: she said we need less reliance on food banks. I always have to pinch myself when I come across a food bank, and I come across them fairly frequently nowadays. Why do we have to have food banks? Food banks are an indication that there is something very sadly wrongly with the society and the economy in which we live. Although at one level they are an excellent example of community endeavour and of people coming together to meet a need, we ought not to be looking for less reliance on food banks; we ought to be looking to abolish them because nobody needs any longer to go and get free food because they and their families cannot afford to eat.

I added my name to Amendment 63, tabled by the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, about “urban and peri-urban areas”. I have mentioned urban areas; I had not really come across the phrase “peri-urban areas” before, until I realised that I probably live in a peri-urban area. There are urban buildings on the very edge of the fields. We are talking about the areas surrounding towns, cities and urban agglomerations—earlier in this Committee, I spoke briefly about this on Amendment 79, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher.

What I want to do briefly now is to mention the importance of the range of small-scale enterprises that go under the name of allotments. A lot of allotments are hobby allotments, but they are still very important as part of a food strategy because people are growing their own food which, by definition, is what they want and it is usually organic and nutritious. Some allotments are community enterprises and some are semi-commercial enterprises—small market gardens and that kind of thing. It seems to me that there is huge scope for the expansion and extension of this kind of thing in peri-urban areas, as the noble Earl describes them.

I should perhaps declare an interest as a councillor in the Waterside ward of Colne because I want to mention something that happened there. Much of Waterside ward is an areas of closely packed terraced streets which are nevertheless on the edge of the countryside. They are on the edge of the peri-urban area because we have old mill towns that never expanded —particularly between the wars because the towns were shrinking not expanding. In that area, we have several community-based allotments, including a community land trust, an allotment used by a group catering for people with special needs and one I am particularly proud of as, as a councillor, I was fairly responsible for the council acquiring land in the 2000s and laying them out for new allotments using money from what eventually became the ill-fated housing market renewal scheme, but which nevertheless provided us with very useful funding that we could use for that purpose.

We need a lot more. In most areas the provision of allotments is a responsibility of town and parish councils. The problem they have in expanding is getting the money to acquire land and lay out the infrastructure of an allotment, such as dividing it up, providing the fencing and perhaps a water supply and so on. By the structure of the way they work, parish and town councils do not get direct funding from the Government in a general sort of way. They do not get local council support grants. However, there is a huge need for an expansion of mini market garden community allotment and traditional allotment provision, particularly in the areas around towns where not only can they provide very useful growing facilities for people but they can solve some of the problems of what is quite often a tatty zone around some urban areas.

I do not think it is his department, but I ask the Minister to go back and see whether in what the Government are doing under their proposals to regenerate towns, in particular left-behind areas such as the old industrial areas, specific funding for allotments could be given a great deal more priority.

Agriculture Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 16th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP) [V]]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, and an even greater pleasure to hear a Conservative Peer—a hereditary one at that—speaking so eloquently about climate change, because this is a problem that the UK is not facing up to in a coherent way, so the more that we can do with this Bill, the better. It is not really a surprise that the concept of zero carbon is not in the Bill, because most of it was written before we signed up to that. It was drafted three years ago, and I regret that more redrafting was not done before it came before your Lordships’ House. The Government have had over a year since they put a commitment to net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 into law. I will be very forgiving with the Minister and suggest that they have just not got around to updating this legislation yet.

The amendments in the group, including my Amendment 274, seek to bring the Bill up to date with our net-zero carbon commitment and ensure that agriculture and land management play their proper role in achieving net zero. Agriculture plays a huge role in our carbon footprint and it will grow proportionally as other sources of emissions are reduced. It is therefore essential that the Government should set out a clear trajectory for agricultural emissions and a credible strategy to achieve that. Of course, we have to think about other parts of the economy as well. If we insist on carrying on flying as we did in the past pre coronavirus, other bits of the economy will have to do more to bring our emissions down to zero carbon—so there is that thought as well.

There are some differences between Amendments 272 and 274. Amendment 274 would require net-zero agriculture emissions by 2050, whereas Amendment 272 does not contain this net-zero requirement. Instead, it would require the Secretary of State to have “due regard” to Section 1 of the Climate Change Act. This would mean that agriculture would make some contribution towards the wider goal of net-zero emissions across the economy, but I believe that net zero is possible, and indeed achievable and desirable, for agriculture, and I urge noble Lords to aim to include the amendment in the Bill on Report.

I turn now to the Minister. I have a few things to which I hope that he or she—I cannot see who it is—can give a response. Does the Minister think that net-zero carbon emissions in agriculture is actually achievable by 2050, and what about the important role that setting this out in law will play at stimulating innovation and investment in the right things? Will the Minister undertake to work with noble Lords from across the House to update the Bill by Report stage to reflect the big change in net-zero legislation that occurred last year after the Bill was first drafted? I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[The Earl of Devon (CB) [V]]

My Lords, we spent the first three days of this debate discussing the baubles that were to adorn the Christmas tree under Clause 1 on ELMS. We are now somewhat getting to the meat of the matter and considering, in my view, the Christmas tree itself. But I am concerned that if this Christmas tree Bill is allowed to pass into law in the manner in which it is currently drafted, it may well wither and die before any of those ELMS baubles can be appreciated. The reason for that—I raised this issue at Second Reading—is the transition gap, or perhaps more pertinently, the transition chasm across which many farms may not make it in the years between 2021 and 2028, when ELMS are due to come into effect.

The noble Baroness, Lady Young, spoke about the “cataclysmic changes” that will occur to farming as a result of this legislation, and I do not think that she is overstating the position. As a result of this legislation, we will see over the coming years a dramatic decrease in the basic payments that farmers receive. At some point, those payments will be replaced by a series of payments under ELMS, but, as we are well aware after three days of interesting but very varied and somewhat random debate, the details of the scheme are years away from completion, and farmers simply do not know what will replace the essential income that they currently receive. My real concern is that this will have a dramatic effect on the environmental impact and environmental outcomes of farming. This is based on personal experience as well as discussions with the NFU and others, and it stems from a number of different angles.

For a number of farmers, the loss of the BPS will be fatal to their businesses, and those businesses will go out of business. The result will be that land will either fall fallow and therefore deteriorate—the environmental impact of that is considerably negative—or it will be sold to a more commercial neighbouring farmer who will be able to increase productivity and thus increase environmental degradation. Other considerations are that those farmers who are able to survive the transition chasm will do so only by tightening their belts. From a personal perspective, I have been advised not to invest heavily in capital projects at this time; why invest in something now for which you might well be paid by ELMS later? The conversations that I have had with agricultural and environmental advisers along the same lines conclude exactly the same thing: they are advising all their clients to hold off making any major productivity and environmental investments at this time because we simply do not know what is going to happen and we may be paid for these things at some point in the future. The net result of that will be a catastrophic drop-off in environmental gains.

My amendment is a very simple one that I recommend to noble Lords as a somewhat shorter amendment than Amendments 272 and 274, although I believe that it is targeted at the same thing. It asks that the Secretary of State should confirm that the implementation of this legislation will not negatively impact our progress towards net zero by 2050. The amendment is worded in that way for a specific reason. It is not that it will stop us achieving net zero by 2050; it is that, during the time between 2021 and 2028, our progress towards those goals will not be negatively impacted; that is, we will not go backwards.

The next five, six or seven years are absolutely crucial if we are to have any hope of reaching the monumental target of net zero, but introducing a system that simply forces us to take backward steps is not, I believe, appropriate. My amendment was inspired by the decision of R v Secretary of State for Transport with respect to the Heathrow runway. It seems that Parliament should not be passing legislation that is contrary to those net-zero targets and we should not be passing legislation until we have satisfied ourselves that this will not have a negative environmental impact.

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If the Bill is to be effective in rebalancing the relationships, as is required in the supply chain, the whole industry will be keen to understand how this will be made to work. If the Government have a new operation in mind, this would require setting up in primary legislation and, therefore, should have been included in the Bill. Many thanks.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, this is quite a mixed bag of amendments, but I accept that if we separated them out, we might never see the end of the Bill before we all experience collapse. I of course support the amendments of my noble friend Lady Bennett of Manor Castle on ensuring scientific accuracy in the drafting of the Bill. I stand—or sit—in awe of her erudition when explaining this subject.

I speak to my Amendments 196, 201 and 206 on animal welfare, and I support Amendment 207 on the role of the Groceries Code Adjudicator. My amendments would require improvements in animal welfare to be made via the mechanisms established in Clauses 27, 28 and 30. Amendment 196 requires contractual rules that raise standards above the statutory minimums. Amendment 201 requires trade groups relating to animal products to appoint a person responsible for monitoring and improving animal welfare. Amendment 206 requires the Secretary of State to consult representatives of the animal welfare sector.

These are all opportunities to improve animal welfare in our farming system, and to use the Bill as a force for good. I hope the Minister will commit to integrating more animal welfare measures into the Bill on Report. This is one of the issues very close to my heart; I am therefore more than happy to talk this through with the Minister to see if we can, perhaps, do it my way.

[Lord Carrington (CB)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as a farmer and landowner, as set out in the register. I shall speak to Amendments 202, 203, 204 and 205 in my name. The basic purpose of these amendments is to set the conditions in which future delegated legislation under the auspices of this Bill is fair, transparent, responsive, proportionate and equitable.

Amendment 202, on publishing information related to producer organisation grants, seeks to delete the requirement to publish grant application decisions online. Such a requirement is disproportionate, and the publication could contain commercially sensitive information that buyers could seek to use against the producer organisation.

Amendments 203, 204 and 205 relate to competition law. I fear there are no baubles here; we begin to get technical. The Competition Act 1998 contains the following exemption in relation to agricultural products:

“The Chapter I prohibition does not apply to an agreement to the extent to which it relates to production of or trade in an agricultural product and—


(a) forms an integral part of a national market organisation;


(b) is necessary for the attainment of the objectives set out in Article 39 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union; or


(c) is an agreement of farmers or farmers’ associations (or associations of such associations) belonging to a single member State which concerns—


(i) the production or sale of agricultural products, or


(ii) the use of joint facilities for the storage, treatment or processing of agricultural products, and under which there is no obligation to charge identical prices.”


I did not write that.

As currently drafted, the Agriculture Bill removes this exemption and replaces it with exemptions relating specifically to producer organisations, associations of producer organisations and recognised interbranch organisations. In doing this, the current exemption for agreements, which is necessary for the attainment of the objectives set out in Article 39 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union—in other words, the common agricultural policy objectives—is removed. There does not appear to be any justification for the removal of this exemption, particularly during the period when the UK’s domestic agricultural policy is being developed. If an agreement between farmers is necessary to achieve the current CAP objectives, it should remain exempt from the prohibition of agreements contained in Chapter 1 of the Competition Act 1998. The removal of block exemptions from specific aspects of competition law, with no clear justification, is concerning. It is necessary to understand whether there is any objective and sensible justification for removing the existing agricultural exemption. I would be most grateful for the Minister’s comments.

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[Lord Wigley (PC) [V]]

My Lords, I very much agree with the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, when he spoke a moment ago about the dangers of short-termism. That issue is vital when we are talking about long- term investment. I draw attention to my registered interests.

I have put my name to Amendment 134, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh. It requires financial provisions to be linked to strategic priorities, addressing the same issue as that referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, and the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie. The central message of this and other amendments in this group is to ensure that the good purposes in the Bill and as committed to by Ministers at the Dispatch Box are tied to the financial mechanisms—that one links to the other, and there is certainty.

The lead amendment in this group, Amendment 105, moved by the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, focuses on the need to ensure adequate finance—specifically, no less than has been provided in the recent past. Given our present economic plight, it is clear that assurances along these lines are very much needed.

Amendment 112 deals with carry-over, as does Amendment 128, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Rock. This question is one that we really need to give some attention to. We had difficulties in the National Assembly, as it then was, in Cardiff a few years ago when the Welsh Government very sensibly arranged not to spend money at year-end for the sake of it, but to carry it over into a consolidated fund for strategic purposes. That money was immediately taken back by the Treasury. If ever there was an example of short-term thinking and punishing people for sensible approaches to financial planning, that was it.

Maintaining the level of cash support for agriculture is clearly regarded by the farming fraternity as a key issue. A plethora of general commitments may well have been given to assuage their fears, but we need a specific commitment in the Bill, if possible. That is why I believe these amendments are important for the House.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Wigley. He feels passionately about these issues and I enjoyed his speech very much.

I agree with others who have said that this Bill is an enabling Bill. In essence, it gives the Government a lot of power and trusts them to go off and implement what we have decided without many checks and balances. I cannot imagine that there are that many people left in the UK who actually trust the Government any more, so why should members of your Lordships’ House trust them?

The collective theme of the many great amendments in this group is that they would, in one way or another, force the Government to show their working and allow Parliament to mark their homework. I think this is something that we need to take very seriously.

Turning to the amendments to which I have attached my name, Amendments 127, 134 and 137 are important because they will tie the Bill to the Environment Bill and ensure that funding is sufficiently allocated to achieve the environmental aims. There is little written into either the Environment Bill or the Agriculture Bill —two enormous Bills—to create a cohesive framework; both seem rather to create their own stand-alone systems. It is as if two teams drafted them and they were not allowed to speak to one another but just got on and produced their own Bill. Both Bills are setting up very long-term systems that will spread their tendrils throughout huge parts of our economy, and it makes sense to bring these together now, or we will be back here in a few years’ time, trying to close the gaps.

[Lord Judd [V]]

My Lords, I am very glad to support this amendment. It seems to me absolutely crucial that at this juncture, of all times, we should be committing ourselves to making sure that proper funding is available for agriculture. It is one of these difficult situations: for quite a long time in Parliament I have been concerned about it. We have a Minister in our midst who takes these issues very seriously, but he will not necessarily be there for ever—alas—and that means that we do not know what lies ahead; nor do we know how far the Treasury and other key members of the Government share the commitment and aspirations that we know he has.

It seems to me, therefore, very wise of my noble friend to table this amendment, because it is saying that we must not allow circumstances, inadvertently or deliberately, to create situations in which the amount of funding available for agriculture decreases. This is the very time that this should not happen, and I believe that this amendment relates to other amendments, not least those by my noble friend Lord Whitty which are coming up in a moment—or at least this evening, we hope—in which he talks about smallholdings and the rest. The point here is that I think we are entering an economic phase in which land and the opportunities it offers for productive, constructive and creative activity will become necessarily more available and more important than ever. I am very glad that my noble friend has wisely tabled this amendment.

Agriculture Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 21st July 2020 Lords Chamber

Amendment 145 is a technical amendment to ensure that regulations made under Amendment 144 would be subject to the affirmative procedure.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP) [V]]

My Lords, there are two strands of amendments in this group: those that probe the Government on the agricultural transition period, such as Amendment 143 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh; and others, such as my Amendments 147, 148 and 154, that would prevent secondary legislation that would undermine animal welfare.

As other noble Lords have said, the agricultural transition period needs probing to understand what the Government’s current position is. The Bill has been floating around for a long time, but there is still no real detail in it, which is very frustrating for us who have to comment on it. On the one hand, I am very swayed by the argument from the noble Lord, Lord Teverson. The transition period should probably be as short as possible, simply because we can then move rapidly to a new system of public money for public good. I also do not particularly want to give the Government a lot of time to delay the big, tough decisions they will have to make, but they of course have to give farmers and land managers the time to adapt and improve. Overall, we need the certainty that comes from the Government setting out their plans very clearly. I hope the Minister can set out a timetable for that happening.

The second strand of this group is my amendments which, like so many of my amendments, seek to protect animal welfare. Clauses 9 and 14 grant very broad power to the Secretary of State in what might be termed cost cutting and corner cutting. The clauses should be scrutinised on their own and the Government should make it clear what they plan to use them for to justify their existence. My amendments would prevent the Government cutting these corners for animal welfare so that the Secretary of State cannot simply say, “That’s rather expensive for animals. Let’s see if we can improve on that and cut the cost.” There are probably a dozen other issues that should be added to the list of things that these clauses should not be allowed to tamper with, but for me, animal welfare stands out as a priority.

I hope other noble Lords will join me in their concern about Clauses 9 and 14. We might work together in bringing amendments on Report to curtail these cost-cutting and corner-cutting powers.

[The Duke of Wellington (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, as before, I declare my agricultural interests as detailed in the register. During the many days of this Committee a considerable number of thoughtful and constructive amendments have been tabled, but in most cases the Government have suggested that they are unnecessary since the matter is already covered in Clause 1 or can be provided for in the new environmental land management scheme. However, the ELMS will not begin until 2024. During the years between now and then, many farms that are currently barely profitable will suffer or disappear.

I will speak to my Amendment 149. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, for signing it as well. As I said at Second Reading, my real concern is for the very survival of smaller hill farms during the intervening years from now until the new ELM payments begin in 2024. The Government announced in February that farmers in the lowest band of basic direct payments—up to £30,000 per annum—would have their payment cut by 5% in 2021, with further cuts in the following years. However, the Government’s own figures for 2018-19—the latest available—show that the average cattle and sheep farmer in a less-favoured area received a direct basic payment of £24,000 and still made a profit of only £15,500. Figures for 2019-20, when available, will probably show a slightly better position. Nevertheless, these smaller hill farms are only marginally profitable even with the basic payment and would be commercially totally unviable without taxpayer support.

We all accept that we are moving away from the basic payment system to the new environmental land management scheme payments. The purpose of my amendment is to ask the Government to think again about whether it is sensible or fair to reduce those in the lowest band even by 5% before ELMS payments kick in in 2024.

On Tuesday two weeks ago we debated Amendment 78 in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Bruce and Lord Greaves. Their amendment urged the Government to maintain support for hill farms and other marginal land. I support this general principle. My amendment is more specific and asks the Government simply to protect just the lowest band of recipients from the cuts until the new payment systems come into play.

Last Thursday, the noble Baroness, Lady Bloomfield, stated that since small abattoirs operate on a commercial basis they would not fit into the principle of the public good. My contention is that, unfortunately, small hill farms are not in any way commercial on their own, so I believe the public will consider it more than just for taxpayers’ money to be given for the public good of maintaining our small hill farms, which play such an important part in so many rural communities in this country. When the Minister responds to this group of amendments, I hope he will give the Committee an assurance that the Government will look again at the timing and percentage of the reductions in the basic payments for small farmers in the uplands.

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[Lord Judd (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I have great joy in very warmly supporting this amendment moved by my noble friend Lord Whitty. The future economic prospects for Britain and the great changes to our way of living and our society that may become necessary only emphasise the urgency of what he is talking about.

I live in rural Cumberland, right up in a valley, where an unwelcome social development is becoming very obvious. Farming, and hill farming in this instance, is increasingly done by elderly people who find it more and more difficult to cope. Consequently, the land gets bought up and concentrated in the ownership of a few people, very often living far away.

Therefore, my noble friend’s amendment has wider implications and challenges beyond what he is specifically talking about. I think it would be nothing but good for British society if more young people who wanted to become involved in farming had that opportunity. Too often, you hear of people who would like to be in farming but cannot afford to get into the system as it has emerged, and who are looking for small, manageable farms.

It is also true that, as we are taking a balanced diet and all the rest so seriously, we may need to concentrate far more on a variety of farming which lends itself to producing varied diets and to the self-sustaining approach to agriculture. For these reasons, I am very glad to support my noble friend.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, this is a near-perfect group of amendments, and the Government would do well to pick all of them up. It is certainly good luck that your Lordships’ House has so many very talented people who can help the Government to improve the Bill.

Reforming agricultural tenancies and giving greater protection for tenants and their families would help give the security needed to take a long-term view as a guardian of the land, make beneficial investments and work the land to its fullest potential. The county farm amendments are also brilliant and should be encouraged in order to bring more enthusiastic entrants into the agricultural sector. I echo the dismay of the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, that county farms are being sold off; I am sure he knows that his adopted county of Dorset has recently sold six county farms.

Alongside smallholdings, I ask the Minister how he sees the provision of allotments in improving our food security, resilience and health. There is a huge underprovision of allotments in this country, with multi-year waiting lists. I confess that I am a very keen allotment holder—I do not think my nails will ever be the same again after this lockdown—so I know how wonderful they are and encourage the Minister to include allotments in Government plans for our food systems. A housing estate should not be built these days without some sort of allotment close by so that people can get out, grow food and get their hands dirty.

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[Baroness Humphreys (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 160 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, and Amendments 164 and 167 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hain. Along with farmers’ leaders in Wales and many noble Lords who have spoken today, I very much welcome the inclusion of Clause 17. The duty upon the Secretary of State to prepare a report on the UK’s food security is welcome. However, I share their concerns about the frequency of the reporting requirement and have questions about the purpose of the report. I am sure that when the Government initially drafted this clause, they did not dream of the situation we are now in and the challenges to our food security that we face in the short and the longer term.

The Covid-19 pandemic has thrown into sharp focus the fragility of our supply chains and their susceptibility to disruption, and we face the challenge of preparing for a possible second wave of the virus. The increasing inevitability of the negotiations around our future trading relationship with the EU coming to an abrupt halt without a favourable trade deal at the end of the transition period raises real concerns over the possible disruption of food supply chains at our borders. Also, the impact of climate change on global food availability will increasingly demand our attention. These three challenges and others could present the Government with problems. They need to demonstrate that they have responses to events such as these and can deal with them with confidence and agility, but I am afraid that on two counts, Clause 17 fails to allow for that.

As I highlighted at Second Reading, there is merely a requirement for the Secretary of State to lay a report before Parliament

“containing an analysis of statistical data”.

But what then? There is nothing in this clause to require the UK Government or the Welsh Government to publish a report and to act in response to its findings. We will have data, of course, but how will it be used?

The second weakness in this clause lies, of course, in the inadequacy of the reporting frequency, and I support those who have their names to Amendment 160 in their call for the first report to be prepared within 12 months of the Act passing, to be followed every three years thereafter by similar reports.

The Government’s intention to lay a report every five years appears to border on complacency, when we are still learning lessons from the present pandemic; we are still waiting for the Government to show how they will avoid chaos at our borders and the climate change crisis moves ever closer. But perhaps I am being unfair in accusing the Government of complacency. As I said earlier, this clause was written before the pandemic struck, and I am conscious that I speak with the benefit of hindsight, but I hope it illustrates the need for agility when emergencies arise, the need for up-to-date information to aid decision-making and—as the Prime Minister said at the weekend—the need to prepare for the worst. It would be interesting to hear the Minister outline the Government’s view of how they envisage the information the report would contain would be used to improve food security.

I turn briefly to the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hain—Amendment 164, to which I have added my name, and Amendment 167. I support both of them. They highlight the need for co-operation and consultation between the UK Government and the devolved Administrations in the production of a food security report. The suggestion was made to the Senedd’s scrutiny committee that the Welsh Government should be

“included in the methodology planning for the report so that Welsh (and other Devolved Administrations) are able to extrapolate their own data to inform future policy making”.

I welcome the co-operative approach taken by the Minister and the Welsh Minister in securing the recognition of devolved competence throughout this Bill, and hope the noble Lord will assure me that the role and responsibility of the Welsh Government, in the production of a food security report, will be recognised as well.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, I will keep my remarks short. I have signed only two of the amendments in this group, 162 and 171. In fact, they all improve the Government’s reporting and planning provisions. A regular comprehensive food report setting out targets and action plans would help the country move towards a resilient, flourishing and sustainable food system.

[Lord Addington]

I am not sure I can be quite that brief, my Lords, but I will give it a go. I have added my name to the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, about food waste. To deal with that first, identifying and removing waste is the easiest way to improve any supply chain. I hope that the Government give serious consideration to this.

I hope they also start to address the marketing chain. The just-in-time delivery system, which produces something that we are perceived to want at the right point, without any capacity for things going wrong, has been exposed for not taking many bumps to be put off course. The fuel crisis did it, as did a pandemic. As pandemics go, this is not as frightening as some that we have been threatened with before—the bird flu crisis and others. Covid-19 is a very unpleasant disease that kills people; it is not the Black Death. The scientists tell us that worse is out there. How good would any supply chain be when put under even greater pressure? Other noble Lords have talked about war and political decisions. A few natural disasters and a breakdown in the food chain is a good way to start a war or political crisis.

Can we have greater frequency of checking? Three years is about right. Can we also take a good long look at waste in the chain? If we can manage to identify the waste, we will suddenly have spare capacity and our supply will look a little more secure.

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[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering]

My Lords, I first thank the Government for including this chapter on intervention in agricultural markets and exceptional market conditions, as set out in Clause 18. The purpose of Amendment 174—I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb and Lady Ritchie of Downpatrick, and the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, for their support—is entirely complemented by Amendment 285, supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb and Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, and the noble Lord, Lord Carrington. The latter amendment refers to Wales, but both amendments deal with ensuring that financial assistance can be provided to the farming industry at times of crisis caused by natural phenomena and in chronic situations, alongside the acute economic situations already covered in the Bill.

Why is there the need for this amendment and to probe the Government in this regard? While I welcome the provision in the Bill, which would allow the Government to provide financial assistance where there is a disturbance to markets of agricultural commodities causing producers to face reductions in income, I am nevertheless concerned that the Bill as drafted will not provide the Government with sufficient ability to intervene in markets where disruption is being caused by environmental factors, such as weather. This year has been quite extraordinary and is a great example of how environmental factors can cause precisely the conditions set out in this amendment. For example, we saw floods in late winter, right into January and February this year, only to be replaced more recently by potential drought. These matters continue on a chronic rather than acute basis, which would cover, for example, animal diseases such as bovine TB.

The amendment does not require the Government to intervene in these widened circumstances but provides a mechanism for them to do so, which seems sensible in a Bill that contains so much about providing the Government with the powers to act when necessary. Not having the power to intervene in markets where environmental or chronic issues prevail could render the Government impotent in responding without bringing forward further primary legislation. It must be better to ensure that powers are available now, on a forward-thinking basis, rather than having to take powers at the time an issue needs to be addressed.

My noble friend the Minister, in concluding the last debate, referred to comments made by other noble Lords about the implications for food companies. We must recognise here, and in the previous debate, that we are talking about farmers and the conditions that farmers have to meet, not those on the food shelves of supermarkets and others. The farmers are of necessity exposed to all sorts of pests and pestilence and I believe that they need the measures set out.

I pay tribute to those charities that will reach out to help farmers in the circumstances set out in this amendment. The Yorkshire Agricultural Society, the Farming Community Network and the RABI do outstanding work. One great regret from the pandemic is that there will not have been any country shows that bring the rural and farming communities together. I also want to recognise the role that national parks and areas of outstanding natural beauty play. I beg to move.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, has explained this issue extremely clearly. Essentially, Amendments 174 and 285 would greatly improve the definition of when exceptional market conditions exist, which would be a very sensible thing to include in the Bill.

My Amendment 176 would prevent financial assistance in exceptional market conditions being given to producers who do not meet animal welfare standards. I set out the arguments for restricting this assistance in the debates on previous groupings but, in short, public money should not be given to producers who fail on animal welfare—in fact, such producers should not be in business at all.

[Lord Hain [V]]

My Lords, it is always a pleasure to speak after the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, who speaks with such authority and passion on these agricultural questions.

I wish to speak to my Amendment 175; I am grateful for the support of the noble Lord, Lord Cormack. The agricultural sector has always been subject to the whims of nature and climate. However, recent years have seen an increase in disruptive weather patterns, such as prolonged, unseasonal periods of flooding, extreme cold and heat, and drought—often with different challenges at the same time in different areas of the country. We have also experienced the impact that invasive diseases, such as bird influenza, blue tongue and ash dieback, can have on plants and animals.

These unexpected, often catastrophic, events can deliver significant damage to our agriculture businesses, both individuals and whole sectors. A year’s worth of income can be decimated by one bad storm or a few rain-free months during a growing season. In Wales, the 2013 heavy spring snow is a good example; by the way, England was even worse hit then. Another example in Wales is the long summer droughts of 2018 and 2019 that caused even secure water sources to dry up and arable yields to drop significantly as water for irrigation was unavailable. These farming “natural disasters” are at such a scale that there is a case for state sector intervention of the kind that this amendment proposes—especially with the growing impact of climate change, which is undoubtedly a cause of them.

These uncontrollable factors uniquely affect the products that we grow from our land. Increasingly, it is not just the market conditions of the globalised agricultural commodity markets that affect our core industry of food and farming; it is the untameable elements of nature that are getting increasingly erratic and wild. This new reality, already acknowledged and understood when we look at actions around climate change adaptation, needs to be extended into the thinking on how we support farming businesses affected by these situations. The drivers of exceptional circumstances have changed, and we must change with them. I hope that the Government take heed of that.

Indeed, that imperative is underlined by official Defra statistics showing that our food sector is heavily reliant on imports. We export £2.1 billion of meat but import £6.6 billion, and we export £1.3 billion of fruit and veg but import a massive £11.5 billion. We are so vulnerable as a nation over our food supplies; that is made worse by the ravaging effects of climate change.

The policy objective of this Bill is admirable. It is to encourage and incentivise our farmers, the custodians of our countryside and the managers of our land, to deliver more environmental benefits from their land use and use new trade opportunities and markets to increase economic sustainability. This ambition must be balanced with a fresh look at how, when and why the Government are willing to provide additional support to a key economic sector in crisis. That means looking beyond the traditional and narrow definition of what drives economic failures. It also means acknowledging and providing emergency support tools to deal with the reality that our climate, our weather and our environment are changing and that businesses operating in the natural environment will be detrimentally impacted by factors completely beyond their control—indeed, beyond our control—including the Covid-19 pandemic, an unexpected crisis that has shaken the world economy beyond anybody’s imagination. We should be using this opportunity to make sure that we have the tools and powers in place to allow us to support those businesses if and when a natural crisis occurs, which is what Amendment 175 seeks to do. I hope that it finds favour with the Minister, who has played such a constructive role in his sympathetic handling of this Bill.

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Moved by

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb]

208: Clause 32, page 29, leave out lines 36 to 44 and insert—
“(1) The Secretary of State must by order under section 87(1)(a) establish a body to be known as the Animal Food Product Traceability Authority (“the Authority”) with the functions of monitoring and regulating the labelling and marketing of animal food products in accordance with regulations made under section 35 of the Agriculture Act 2020.(1A) The Authority may be assigned functions that are exercisable in relation to England, Wales, Northern Ireland or Scotland under section 87(1)(b) and relate to—(a) collecting, managing and making available information regarding the identification, movement and health of animals, or(b) the means of identifying animals.”

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, Amendment 208 would turn the wishy-washy wording of Clause 32 into a clear requirement to establish an animal food product traceability authority.

The need for an authority such as this is clear, the horsemeat scandal being just one manifestation of a badly broken system. It would create a trusted system of information for consumers to make better decisions on what they are eating, how the animals are treated and where they came from. The key difference in my amendment, between my wording and the Government’s, is that it would turn a power into a duty, meaning that this authority would definitely be established. I do not understand why it is not already written like that, but perhaps the Minister can reassure me on this issue. I beg to move.

[Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I raise this amendment to probe the Government on the intention behind Clause 32.

Some 27 years ago, as a Member of the Commons, I moved an amendment from the Opposition Front Bench for the establishment of a cattle identification and traceability service. I did so having been prompted by the British Cattle Breeders Club. In 1998, the scheme was set up in Workington, in my former constituency, in the form of the BCMS—the British Cattle Movement Service. At its peak it employed over 1,000 people, although with efficiency savings and the application of new technology, it now employs some 400 people and is one of the largest employers in west Cumbria. It was with some surprise that we noticed reference in the Bill to

“Identification and traceability of animals”


under Clause 32. The Bill having cleared its Commons stages, I was asked to seek some assurances in the Lords.

The Explanatory Notes, in describing the proposed amendments to the legislation for identification and traceability, state:

“The purpose of the clause is to prepare for the introduction of a new digital and multi-species traceability service, the Livestock Information Service (LIS), based on a database of animal identification, health and movement data. Subsection (1) … will allow the Secretary of State to assign to a board … functions related to collecting, managing and sharing certain information in England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland. This information is identification, movement or health data of animals. It will also allow the assignment of functions relating to the means of identifying animals such as issuing individual identification numbers to animals … These amendments enable the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) to be assigned the function of managing the new Livestock Identification Service.”


First, what is the driver behind the introduction of a new digital and multi-species traceability service, now to be called the livestock information service? Secondly, what is the construct and day-to-day role of the board in the new

“data collecting and sharing functions”?

In what sense would it be able to

“enable the assignment of functions relating to the means of identifying animals”,

and

“disapply … EU legislation on the identification and traceability of cattle, sheep and goats”?

What are the implications of that disapplication here in the United Kingdom? Thirdly, where it states that the board will be able to assign

“functions relating to the means of identifying animals”,

does that have implications for the management of the current service in Workington? On that matter, we are told that the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board will

“be assigned the function of managing the … Livestock Identification Service”.

What is the thinking behind that?

Why am I asking these questions and probing Ministers for answers? I am simply trying to establish, for the benefit of the people in west Cumbria, what stands behind these proposals. At the same time, I seek an assurance that the high-quality service currently provided in Workington will be retained in the long term and will perhaps be further developed with additional services now that we are leaving the European Union.

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[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, for Amendment 208. Clause 32 enables the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board to run the new livestock information service, which will provide a multi-species traceability system in England. As animals can and do move across borders, Clause 32 also provides for the AHDB to exercise functions, such as handling data on animal movements, voluntarily shared by the devolved Administrations, to provide a complete picture of livestock movements across the whole UK.

The new service will replace separate species-specific systems and allow faster, more accurate livestock traceability, benefiting disease control and trade. This is a point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, but I emphasise, as the Minister for Biosecurity, that I place the highest importance on having as accurate as possible a livestock traceability system as we can provide. The service is not designed to cover food products or govern labelling and marketing of animal products. Powers relating to the labelling and marketing of animal food products are set out in Clause 35.

On Amendment 210, Clause 32(1) inserts new Section 89A into the Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act 2006 to assign functions to a body established under that Act that are necessary to run the new livestock information service. There is an existing duty under Section 97(5) of the NERC Act to consult organisations representative of affected interests. In 2017, Defra set up the livestock information traceability design user group, a partnership of interested industry and government bodies, which have been involved throughout the design and development of the livestock information service. Having attended some of those meetings, I know that the active endorsement and engagement is strong and clear indeed. Defra is consulting organisations representative of affected interests on its plans to make an order under subsection (1).

I am also well aware of the important work of the BCMS at Workington, and am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, for referring to its important and productive work. It is our intention to carry on using the valued staff there, who have a good reputation with farmers, as part of the new service, subject to arriving at an agreement between the RPA and Livestock Information Limited. It is worth noting that some of the work of the BCMS will transition to Scotland and Wales at the same time, as the BCMS currently serves England, Scotland and Wales.

I have tabled a government amendment requiring that the Secretary of State should secure approval from the devolved Administrations for functions of the livestock information service, such as the handling of movement data shared with AHDB by those Administrations. This amendment would enable colleagues in devolved Administrations to recommend legislative consent to their respective legislatures. These UK-wide functions are vital for purposes such as disease control.

I am very much available to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, and the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, for further discussions about this new system, if there are any outstanding points. I actively endorse it and think it will be of great benefit. With those assurances and confirmations, I ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate and especially at such a late hour—it is certainly late for me anyway. I thank the Minister for his assurances. I am afraid it is too late for me to be coherent on anything; I will pore over Hansard tomorrow to see exactly what his assurances were. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 208 withdrawn.

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[Lord Wigley (PC) [V]]

My Lords, I am delighted to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie. I very much support her points. She can add my name to the list of those she mentioned as supporting her amendment. Again, I declare my registered interests, as I did in earlier Committee debates.

Government Amendment 209, on identification and traceability, which recognises the need to work with the devolved Governments, is of course welcome. I know that this provision was requested by Welsh Ministers. However, this group of amendments goes way beyond identification and traceability. As I indicated in the debate on the very first group of amendments in Committee, I acknowledge that my Amendment 291 sits more comfortably with Amendment 290 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, which proposes an agricultural co-ordination council; perhaps we will hear the arguments in favour of that later in this debate.

In fact, that amendment then stood as the lead amendment of a group that lent itself to such a purpose. Tacking Amendments 290 and 291 on to government Amendment 209 makes less sense, but we are where we are. However, I very much add my support the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, and the noble Lord, Lord Hain. The theme has already begun to emerge and it goes way beyond Amendment 290.

None the less, the general setting in which these two amendments arise represents a dimension much broader than the agricultural setting. The issue of a UK single market replacing the European single market goes to the heart of the relationship between the four nations of these islands. If Westminster gets this wrong, it will have far-reaching constitutional implications. However, addressing the issue in an agricultural context is a good starting point.

As the noble Lord, Lord Hain, emphasised a moment ago, the whole rationale of devolution was to create political structures that can facilitate different policies in different parts of these islands, responding to the different needs and circumstances that exist. That is most certainly the case in the context of agriculture. Because of our mountainous terrain in Wales, the nature of our agriculture is different from that of England, as indeed is much of the farmland of Scotland. Northern Ireland is again different, with its links to the Irish Republic and into the European single market. Our farming in Wales is much more dependent on the livestock sectors—sheep, beef and dairy farming. Unless a free trade agreement can be reached before the cliff edge of 31 December is upon us, our departure from the EU will have absolutely devastating effects on our agriculture, particularly our hill farms, as has been mentioned in several debates in this Committee.

It is totally inconceivable that any Welsh Government of any party or combination of parties would stand by and allow the devastation of our rural life that would ensue. They would be expected to intervene—that would be a political imperative—but, of course, intervening to help Welsh agriculture in such dire circumstances would inevitably have a knock-on effect on agriculture in England and Scotland. Likewise, initiatives by Westminster to help any particular sector in England would have consequences for the other three devolved regimes, so there must be a framework mechanism for the UK single market. On that much we are probably agreed across this Committee.

The problem is to determine the nature of that mechanism; that becomes a political question. The nationalist Benches in the other place are sometimes taunted that we are happy to see our nations conceding power to a European single market but not to a British single market. That gibe ignores the geopolitical reality within the UK compared with that within the EU. If all the rules and priorities within the EU single market were dominated by a single member state—Germany, say—and the German Government had a veto over all other member states, the EU single market would have long since collapsed.

Our fear, shared among many and across parties in the devolved Parliaments of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, is that England will insist on determining the policies and priorities of the UK single market at the expense of the ability of the devolved Governments to secure and implement policies needed by their own people—in this case by their own farming communities.

To that extent, Amendment 290 provides a requirement for unanimity between the four Governments in making any changes to the framework; that is welcome. It had been my hope that by the time we were debating these issues in the context of this Bill we would have made progress on the general trading structures alongside which any agricultural provision has to exist. We are not there yet, though there may perhaps be a greater indication of government thinking before we get to Report on the Bill. We may therefore need to come back to it.

In conclusion, I press upon the Government to approach this whole issue from the viewpoint of seeking an agricultural framework compatible with a broader framework of relationships between the four nations of these islands and to accept that, if there is to be a stable ongoing relationship, it has to be based on a partnership of equals. A larger population does not give any nation the right to impose its policies on all others, or we would now be acknowledging that China—by dint of its size—has a right to impose its will on the international order. A framework solution within the UK will inevitably have some form of federal or confederal relationship between the nations of these islands, based on transparent and equitable mechanisms and underpinned by mutual respect, not population size.

I hope that, by the time we come back in September, the Government will have developed their thinking along these lines. If they do not, it bodes very badly not just for co-operation within the agricultural dimension but for the future constitutional outlook of the four nations of these islands.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Wigley. I will keep my comments very brief. I have already spoken to similar Amendments 147, 148 and 154, highlighting the risk of these potential cost-cutting and corner-cutting clauses—but I welcome the opportunity to prompt the Minister to reassure me, as he so often does.

House resumed.

Agriculture Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 6th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 6th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 23rd July 2020 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb]

211: Clause 33, page 30, line 32, leave out subsection (1) and insert—
“(1) The red meat levy is to be known as the animal slaughter levy.(1A) A scheme under this section (“the scheme”)—(a) may make provision for amounts of animal slaughter levy collected by the levy body for one country in Great Britain to be paid to the levy body for another such country, or(b) may amend, suspend or revoke an earlier scheme made under this section, and (c) must by regulations make provision so that the levy is applied to all meats and carcasses from animals slaughtered in the United Kingdom.(1B) For the purposes of subsection (1A)(c), regulations are subject to the affirmative resolution procedure.”

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees]

I remind noble Lords that anyone wishing to speak after the Minister should email the clerk during the debate. Anyone wishing to press this or any other amendment in this group to a Division should make that clear in debate. I should inform the Committee that if Amendment 211 is agreed to, I cannot call Amendment 212.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP) [V]]

My Lords, here we are, back again with renewed energy and enthusiasm.

My Amendments 211 and 213 to 216 seek to improve Clause 33. I can also see the power and value in Amendment 212 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hain. My amendments would require an animal slaughter levy to be established for all animals slaughtered in the United Kingdom. The funds raised from that levy would then be used to support farms to transition from livestock to plant-based food production.

As many Peers have said, meat consumption in the British diet is, on average, far too high. It is too much meat for our health. If all other countries in the developing world aspired to eat as much meat as we do, we would need dozens more planets to accommodate that meat production. As we have only one planet, reducing meat production and promoting plant-based foods are major steps in creating a fair and sustainable world.

Tucked into Amendment 211 is a requirement that the animal slaughter levy actually be set up, since the current drafting of Clause 33 grants the power to establish a red meat levy but places no duty on the Government to implement it. It is worth noting that creating a red meat levy is a big step for the Government; it is the kind of thing that, until very recently, us Greens have been mocked for even suggesting. Can the Minister be bolder than just red meat and go the whole hog to make this a full animal slaughter levy? I beg to move.

[Lord Hain (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for her comments, specifically those on Amendment 212, standing in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Wigley, which seeks to

“provide for repatriation of the levy collected in the United Kingdom supply chain to the devolved administration of origin.”

The agricultural processing sector in Wales, from whence I am speaking, is relatively small in comparison to the agricultural output of Welsh farms. The red meat sector is the predominant agricultural activity in Wales, and the processing facilities servicing this sector are strategically placed throughout the UK to maximise accessibility in a system that is heavily reliant on roads and HGV transportation for the movement of livestock.

With levy funding allocated according to place of cull rather than an animal’s point of origin, the centralised processing system disadvantages farmers in Wales. Furthermore, key products such as Welsh lamb and beef, which benefit from the protected geographical indication status—PGI—and derive a greater market share due to this status, are culled in other areas of the UK. It is these locations, not Wales, that receive the levy funds. This imbalance, driven by the streamlining and consolidation of the red meat processing and supply chain sector, is causing additional stress on a red meat sector already under significant financial strain in Wales. Levy Boards, with their increasingly important role in promoting the food products of Wales and working with the agricultural sector to improve efficiency and profitability through knowledge and best practice, should receive an equitable share of levy funds that allow them to work effectively in their respective areas of the UK.

As the UK seeks to negotiate new trade deals with other nations, it is the successful marketing and promotion of our flagship products in Wales, such Welsh lamb, 92% of which is currently exported to the European Union, that could deliver transformational change for farmers there. It would be unfortunate if these opportunities could not be delivered due to a poorly structured levy funding mechanism.

The issue of fair levy funding dispersal is also an important consideration when looking at the delivery of sustainable food production in the UK, a point referred to in passing by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones. A proportionately funded levy body could look beyond helping farmers and the supply chain with economic performance towards a focus on environmental and social considerations, especially sustainability.

Looking further ahead, we would all like to see a food supply chain based around local production, processing and consumption; that would provide potential benefits not only for the farmer but for the climate change mitigation agenda, which is so crucial. That is the long-term goal. In the meantime, having resources allocated fairly to the levy bodies will enable them better to support our agricultural producers as they move towards economic and environmental sustainability. I hope the Minister will accept this amendment and indicate that when he comes to reply.

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[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, for Amendments 211, 213, 214 and 216. Perhaps I could tell her at the outset that we have the red meat levy; it was established in 1967 under the Agriculture Act.

The term “red meat”, or “cig coch”, is written into Welsh legislation to describe the cattle, sheep and pig industries and has been used regarding the levy for those sectors for many years. Changing the name of the red meat levy in the Bill would necessitate amendments to related legislation across the UK and risk confusion and complications with the existing provisions. A further levy extending to all meats and carcasses of animals slaughtered in the UK would probably require a new levy body to be established, or the scope of the existing levy bodies to be broadened, to cover the additional species, such as goats and deer, that do not fall within the remit of the existing levy bodies. Consultation to determine the need for, and the benefit of, such a levy would also be required. This is set out in the Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act 2006. More importantly, agriculture is a devolved matter, as are these industry levies. It would therefore be for the devolved Administrations to choose to take forward their own regulations in this area, should they wish to do so.

Turning to Amendment 215, plant-based food production already benefits significantly from the UK levy system. The Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board collects levies that are used to fund activities in this area, valued at approximately £27 million. Legislation providing for our levy bodies clearly sets out the collection of these levies and that they are to be spent to benefit the industry from which they are collected.

My noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering also asked some questions about how they are collected, and I should say that the red meat levy collected in one country can be spent only to benefit the contributing industry in that country. For example, any pig levy that is collected in England must be spent to the benefit of the pigmeat industry in England. Currently, levy cannot be spent for the sole benefit of producers in another jurisdiction.

Clause 33 addresses an acknowledged unfairness in the GB red-meat levy system that has existed for a number of years. It is not intended to change the way these levies are collected or spent. The Government wish simply to right the wrong that has been identified in the red-meat levy system. My noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering also asked when we would have the government response to the AHDB consultation. The government response to the request for views on this was published in April 2020.

Turning to Amendment 212, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Hain, Clause 33 was introduced to provide for a scheme that allows for the redistribution of red-meat levy between the levy bodies of Great Britain. It will provide a fair approach to resolving an inequity that has been acknowledged by the Governments of these Administrations for several years. The provision in this amendment is based purely on the origin of the animal, rather than where it has gained economic value. It will allow for the repatriation of levy to the devolved Administrations themselves, whereas the scheme established using the provisions in Clause 33 would allow for the redistribution of levy between levy bodies in the three Administrations. By widening the provision of the scheme from that of Great Britain to that of the United Kingdom, the amendment extends the repatriation of red-meat levy to Northern Ireland. However, the scheme is to be made jointly by Ministers of England, Scotland and Wales, and is not needed by Northern Ireland.

In addition, the repatriation of levy is restricted by this amendment to the devolved Administrations. This could create a disparity between the devolved Administrations and England, as the devolved Administrations will be allowed to repatriate levy dependent upon origin, but England will not.

The noble Lords, Lord Blunkett and Lord Wigley, also brought up the question of small abattoirs, and the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, made the point that slaughtering animals close to the point of production is an important consideration in animal welfare. I am delighted to say, since they may not have heard my earlier response to this issue, that they are included in Clause 1(5) of the Bill, which provides for small abattoirs, under “preparing” and “processing”.

With this reassurance, I ask that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate, which I have very much enjoyed. I spent almost the whole time smiling. I note the comments from the noble Lords, Lord Hain and Lord Wigley, about Wales, and their other comments. As I have said, there is a lot of value in that. I will say to the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, that I am proselytising not for vegetarianism but for the future of the planet and the health of the people who still survive. I am happy to debate that with him.

The noble Viscount, Lord Trenchard, seems to have misunderstood my amendment, because I am not doing anything about his citizen’s freedom to eat meat—first, because we do not have citizens in this country but subjects, and secondly, I am a meat eater myself and, were I standing for election anywhere, that would probably lose me a lot of green votes. I was a vegetarian for 20 years and I have stopped. I now eat a minimal amount of healthy organic meat.

The noble Lord, Lord Cormack, made some kind comments. No one has ever accused me of surreptitious means—in fact, quite the opposite usually—so I feel very flattered. I also note that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, made comments about an impact assessment, which would obviously be a very valuable addition. I note that the Minister has pointed out all the difficulties that this would cause with legislation, but it would surely be just a tidying-up exercise, just like her Brexit Bill, and should not take long at all.

With all those comments in mind, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 211 withdrawn.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Randall of Uxbridge (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I added my name to that of my noble friends Lady Fookes and Lady Hodgson of Abinger. I did so slightly warily because I was not convinced that the Bill is the measure in which we should be adding this provision, but I do not doubt the need for it. As we have heard, it was a commitment in the Conservative manifesto at the last election, and I admire the doggedness of my noble friend Lady Fookes in keeping on this subject for a long time. She has been incredibly patient, and it is time that we looked at this matter seriously. It is incredibly complex to legislate for this and is not quite as simple as it might seem, for a variety of reasons that I am sure the Minister will tell us.

However, as regards travel within the UK, I can remember—not as far back as 1973 but in 1979—travelling on the “Good Shepherd” between Shetland and Fair Isle, where sheep were being transported. It was stormy, and I remember that sheep are not good sailors on small boats. I will not go into the result, but it is not easy to transport animals.

Our worry is, as has been said, that while we are told that inspections take place once animals leave our shores, we have great doubts that that has been done properly. Onward transport, not just across the channel, but to Bulgaria and elsewhere, and then on to the Middle East is of concern. I should like the Minister in his reply to say exactly where we are with this.

I should also add that I cannot support Amendment 277 in this group. However appalling the production of foie gras is—I am no great fan— criminalising people who might have some in their luggage as they come across the channel is not the way forward. It should be more about education.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, I support both amendments in the group. On the first, it was a pleasure to hear the noble Baroness, Lady Fookes, and her long, noble and sincere fight to protect animals that are exported.

Amendment 277, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, is about foie gras. I strongly disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Randall, that we should not penalise people who import it. We would not like it if people brought back bits of dead dog in their luggage. We hate the thought that, in some countries, dogs are eaten; yet, somehow, it is okay with ducks and geese. Foie gras is a brutal and horrific system of animal abuse. The practice is illegal in this country, but it can be circumvented by allowing people to import it from elsewhere. The simple point is that it does not matter if the animal abuse happens here or abroad; it is still animal abuse. A duck or goose is harmed just as badly in another country as it would be here.

I echo the noble Baroness, Lady Fookes, in asking why both these provisions are not already in law. Why will the Government not commit to amending the Bill on Report on these issues? It would get a lot of public approval, which the Government are probably in need of at the moment. Banning live animal exports was always a given by Brexiteers, who gave it as an example to lure green-minded people to support Brexit. It is time for the Government to make good on that and give us what we voted for.

[Lord Trees (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Fookes, for this important amendment, Amendment 220, and for her continuing commitment to animal welfare. I realise that the Government are committed to reducing livestock journey times for slaughter and fattening, and that a consultation is expected. I sincerely hope that the amendment will hasten action in that aim.

Since the basic tenet of the EU is free movement of people, capital and goods—and goods include animals—it has been impossible to act decisively with regard to export limitation. However, post Brexit, as the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, indicated, there is now that opportunity. There are also nuances and complexities, as the noble Lord, Lord Randall, stated.

With regard to the transport of animals and their welfare, as a recent report of the Animal Welfare Committee emphasised, the aim should be to reduce as much as possible the length of travel. However, other factors such as the health of animals at the time of travel, the quality of the travel vehicle and the conditions, and the frequency of loading and unloading are important elements. Transport is physically stressful. There are rules, and for export they are somewhat stricter than for in-country movement. But as has been said, there can be failure to enforce those rules. Whatever maximum time is set for a journey, if it is suspended before that, it can resume after a short rest.

The export of sheep to the continent can involve journeys of 18 to 29 hours or more, with the longest uninterrupted period of travel between stops of up to 14 hours. Therefore, because we cannot control what goes on outside the UK, there is justification to restrict the export of live animals that originate in the UK at least to an absolute minimum, as may be required for breeding. We also need to be mindful to minimise journey times and the number of journeys in each animal’s life within the UK, because some animals also undergo long journeys here. Although that is without the terms of the amendment, there needs to be a consistent approach to animal transport in general.

Returning to the issue of exports as covered by the amendment, we need to ask why we make live animals cover these distances. Data shows that, in 2018, nearly 25,000 live cattle were exported to Spain for “production”. Is there clear justification for this? Was this number necessary for breeding purposes? With cattle, we can now export frozen embryos and semen. Why are any live animals exported for slaughter? In recent years, thousands of sheep have been exported to France, ostensibly for slaughter. Why are they not killed in the UK and exported on the hook, not on the hoof, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, argued? I strongly support the amendment and look forward to the Minister’s response.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Whitty [V]]

My Lords, earlier in this Committee stage, a number of noble Lords—I remember, in particular, speeches by the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, and the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay—spoke movingly about the impact of pesticides on human beings and the distress that it had caused. I thank them for that. I also thank my noble friend Lady Jones of Whitchurch, the noble Lord, Lord Randall, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, for co-signing what is clearly a multiparty amendment.

The amendment is a vital but limited attempt to protect residents in rural areas from exposure to the spraying of pesticides and herbicides by requiring spraying to be carried out well away from homes and public buildings and from spaces where the public congregate. I am well aware that there is a wider background to this, which I will partially comment on, and it can be quite controversial, but this amendment is straightforward and, as such, I hope that it will be adopted by the Government at the end of this debate.

Much of the Bill is about the protection of wildlife, the health and welfare of farm animals, biodiversity, plant conservation, and water and air quality, but there is little recognition of the terrible damage to humans of ingesting chemical pesticides directly into their lungs, eyes and bloodstream. Many chemicals used in agriculture, including on UK farms and elsewhere, can, on their own or in combination, cause the breakdown of parts of the human immune system. They can poison the nervous system and cause cancer, mutations and birth defects. Rural residents are well aware of the problems. Campaigners on this have dossiers on rural families who have suffered, and I shall give your Lordships a couple of examples of the testimonies.

One is from a woman in the countryside in the north of England:

“I have brought up my family of three next to a frequently sprayed arable field. On many occasions, the spray has gone over the children as they’ve played. It has covered our washing and gone through our windows. We are long-term tenants on this land, yet we are treated as if this has nothing to do with us. We do not know what these chemicals are, only that the farmer, when mixing them and pouring them into his tank, wears full protective clothing and then sits in a protected cab.”


Another says:

“I live in a rural area and have done all my life. The spraying of crops has been carried out almost daily. I suffer from two chronic diseases, one of which is likely to be fatal.”


Another resident says:

“My neighbour sprays so close we can sometimes feel the drops on our faces and there is nothing we can do. My children are at risk.”


However, there is something that we can do. At the moment, manufacturers, rightly, attempt to label their pesticide, insecticide and herbicide products with warnings. These comes in various forms, with labels saying “Very toxic by inhalation”; “Do not breathe spray, fumes or vapour”; “Risk of serious damage to the eyes”; or “Harmful: possible risk of irreversible effects through inhalation”.

Farm workers are covered under health and safety laws and by manufacturers’ advice to wear protective clothing, and most do so, but residents are not so covered. Guidance has been given to users that they should inform residents in advance of spraying and that the chemicals used should be clearly identified and communicated to residents. That advice is normally ignored and pretty well never enforced.

Ministers and others have, in debate on this Bill and elsewhere, lauded the UK pesticide regime as one of the best in the world. Frankly, that is not a great accolade given the exposure of whole populations in much of the world to pesticide damage, as recent reports by the United Nations have emphasised. It is wrong to claim that the EU or UK systems are safe. In particular, they do not protect those who live close by.

When I more or less did the Minister’s job 20 years ago, I inherited the responsibility for pesticides, and I was concerned then about the degree to which the pesticide industry influenced the regulatory structures, and particularly enforcement. There was a degree of producer capture, and that anxiety has not gone away. Now that we are so-called free of EU regulations, there is a danger that that influence will grow further and that the lives of residents in the UK will be less safe. There have been occasions when the UK has been the country least keen on EU regulation in these areas. Whereas in most of the Bill, and in most of the Government’s vision for the future of agriculture, we are trying to go further than the CAP straitjacket in order to protect the environment and animal health, there is a danger that we will relax the pesticide regulations. However, we should be adopting strategies that enhance protection.

The amendment would at least have the effect of protecting residents and the public from the hazardous health impacts of spraying near buildings and spaces used by the public. As I said, it is in a sense a relatively small step, but it is absolutely vital for those families and populations. Ultimately, we need to see a longer-term strategy to develop non-chemical methods of crop protection, but this is an improvement that we can impose now, and one which should be part of the Bill.

Crucially, it establishes the principle that there must be minimum distances between pesticide spraying and occupied buildings. The details would be subject to wide consultation and to secondary legislation. A number of noble Lords have asked me why we do not specify the distance in this primary legislation. As we know, there will be some discussion about that and it would be normal for the details to come in regulations. However, there will be differences of opinion between farmers, manufacturers and campaigners for rural residents, and it is best that the precise distance is left for consultation and scientific measures. I myself would be inclined towards a substantial distance, but there will be other views about the practicality of that.

Tonight, let us establish, as part of the Bill, the very basic principle that human life and human health are protected and need to be protected. In the longer run, we need a proper strategy to reduce and eventually eliminate chemical pesticides, or at least the wholesale use of them, and to replace them with non-chemical forms of plant protection. However, that is a wider issue. Immediately, we need to protect the rural residents who are at risk. My amendment is a very small but vital part of the journey and I hope that the Government will be prepared to accept it, either this evening or on Report, for the sake of those rural residents who feel, and are, unsafe, and the many who have been distressed by the impact of pesticides on them and potentially on others. I beg to move.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Whitty. I have signed his amendment, which he has explained extremely eloquently. I also support—although I have not signed—the other amendment in this group, because both recognise the harmful effects of pesticides on human health and the health of our wildlife and countryside. This comes just days after Monsanto/Bayer agreed an out-of-court settlement of $10 billion in compensation to farmers who claim that Roundup caused their cancers.

Agricultural chemicals is a huge industry, and big agri-businesses are spending billions of dollars to avoid a court finding that their products cause cancer and other health problems. These two amendments are common sense when it comes to protecting our health and that of our countryside from these dangerous chemicals. Banning the application of pesticides in areas of human habitation, work and education will directly protect people from their toxic consequences.

Amendment 226 would help us shift more broadly from pesticide use towards alternative farming practices. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response, and I would be very happy to work with noble Lords to bring these amendments back on Report, because they need to be included in the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Carrington [V]]

I tabled Amendment 247, which relates to marketing standards, after discussion with the National Farmers’ Union. It is important and appropriate to be clear about why we should have marketing standards for agricultural products. This is something that the European Union has undertaken, with our full support. It therefore follows that, on leaving the European Union, we too should ensure that the provisions for establishing marketing standards in the UK are clearly set out in the Bill.

The precise wording of the amendment is taken from the purposes in the common market organisation EU regulation 1308/2013. If the purpose of marketing standards is clearly defined then subsequent regulations could be brought in only for legitimate purposes, as defined in Clause 35. I would therefore be grateful if the Minister could give his reasons for departing from this previously agreed and acceptable wording, as set out in the CMO.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 248, 250, 251, 252, 254 and 266 in my name, some of which are supported by my noble friend Lord Holmes. I will speak also to Amendment 256 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering.

Agricultural products, especially animal products, should all be raised to and maintained at the highest possible standards. While the Government prefer to leave so much to consumer choice, good and informative product labelling on foods is absolutely essential. People deserve to have reliable information about the food they are eating that is rigorously tested and independently verified, and there should also be appropriate fines for misleading labelling.

Too much greenwashing and misleading information is put out by big companies and trade bodies, which trick consumers into thinking that things are healthier, happier or fairer than they actually are. This needs to be sorted out so that truly great producers thrive without false competition.

[Lord Holmes of Richmond [V]]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 250, 251 and 252 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, and Amendment 253 in my name.

As the noble Baroness said, there is tremendous and as yet largely untapped potential in labelling, not least in the use of QR codes. With technological advances, such codes contain so much information and have such positive uses for producers, consumers and indeed everybody in the chain. This takes me to the purpose behind my Amendment 253. It is in the marketing section of the Bill but is about more than that. It is about what we can do in agriculture and horticulture for all the products in this Bill, and speaks to products way beyond it in terms of the digital opportunity to drive efficiency and information for all in the chain.

When I speak of digitisation, I do not mean what is all too often the case, where a form gets put on to a database and that is called a digital transformation. That is doing nothing different; it is merely taking something on paper and putting it into electronic form. We need to consider what data is required, whether on welfare, provenance, ingredients, or the type of soil where the product was grown. What do we need, how can we then best collect it and at what stage of the production or supply chain can it be best provided?

Amendment 253 relates specifically to VI-1 forms for wine products to give a specific example but also to underscore the point that this is about all agricultural and horticultural produce. Indeed, it is about all goods and services. It could not have more resonance for the autumn and winter that we are about to go into. Currently, wines coming into the UK from Europe do not have to go through the VI-1 process or have lab tests. Given that 55% of the wine coming into this country comes from Europe, come 1 January, this is absolutely what will be required.

I am grateful for the background notes from the Wine and Spirit Trade Association, which makes these points extremely clearly. It should be noted that the British wine trade is worth some £19 billion and provides 130,000 jobs. In fact, wine is the UK’s sixth-biggest export in the food and drink classification. We are a world hub for wine import and export. With this amendment, rather than just going for a form that would impose extreme levels of friction on the process, we have the opportunity for a digital solution: digital passports for wine coming into the country, leaving it and going anywhere in the world.

Agriculture Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

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

This amendment has nothing to do with any trade commission and is set up independently of the other amendments being tabled on a trade commission. The simplest way to decide this matter is by enshrining the UK’s position here in law. The Conservative voters who read the Conservative Party manifesto can be forgiven for thinking this is what they were going to get, when they voted to get Brexit done. The Conservative Government are happy to enshrine Brexit twice in legislation; they are happy to enshrine the position on Huawei into law and to do it again on wearing face masks. I would welcome the Minister’s U-turn on food standards as well, as soon as he can make it.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP) [V]]

My Lords, here we are on day seven of four—Douglas Adams would be proud of us. But seven days in Committee, for a Bill of this importance and relevance, with the huge impact it will have, is not particularly long.

My Amendment 273, which is supported by the noble Lords, Lord Randall, Lord Greaves and Lord Addington, for which I thank them, is relatively simple. It would simply ensure that UK standards regarding food safety, the environment and animal welfare cannot be undermined by imports produced to lower standards. That seems self-evident to me. In fact, this group of amendments is one of the most significant in the whole Bill, because it is the one area that is strongly supported by the public. It is a fact that the Government have managed to ensure that there is an opposition of green groups, farmers, NGOs, producers, supermarkets—a whole mix of people who would not usually share a particular view. If the Government tried to ignore this issue, I hope there would be a Back-Bench revolt, because it is incredibly important.

There is huge recognition out there that trade deals are a threat to standards. We need protections in law to ensure that these standards are not undermined. The US Secretary of Agriculture has described our environmental and animal welfare standards as protectionism which should be removed in a trade deal. Well, I am with the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, on this: I want to protect. That is a very good word and we should all be proud of and want to use it on issues that the majority of Britons really care about. I am terrified that our Government, desperate for the political victory of securing a US trade deal, will give in to the Americans on this issue. It is not just the United States, of course. What about future dealings with, for example, Brazil, which burns huge swathes of the Amazon rainforest to make way for cattle pastures? Trade policy is a huge tool for international diplomacy. Your Lordships must be able to trust the Government to make the right decisions when they make these deals.

The merits of these amendments aside, we will have to have this same fight again on the Trade Bill. The Minister might even say that the Trade Bill is the proper place to discuss these issues. But one has only to read Hansard on the Trade Bill in the other place from last week to see that Ministers told MPs that the Agriculture Bill had dealt with all these issues and that MPs had nothing more to worry about. It is normally considered out of order to refer to proceedings in the other place, but it is very important when the Government simultaneously tell each House the opposite thing. That is exceptional and needs drawing to your Lordships’ attention.

I hope the Minister will commit to working constructively to bring forward an amendment on these issues on Report. I am certain that we will pass one of these amendments, and it might as well be one that the Government can accept. We will pull together on this, along with the British public, to make sure we protect our farmers, our farming regimes, our standards on animal welfare and the way our food is produced.

[Lord Hain (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I agree with what the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, said about public interest in this particular issue. I also follow my noble friend Lord Foulkes in thanking the Minister, the public Bill staff, the Government Whips and the broadcast facility staff for their marathon effort and courtesy.

My Amendment 276 would require new international treaties on the import of agricultural and food products to comply with World Trade Organization safety rules and the UK’s own standards. It was first proposed by the chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee, the Conservative MP Neil Parish, and is backed by the British Veterinary Association, the National Farmers’ Union, the RSPCA, the Wildlife Trusts, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, the Soil Association and the World Wide Fund for Nature. It reflects a lack of trust that we can rely on the Conservative Party manifesto, which promised:

“In all of our trade negotiations, we will not compromise on our high environmental protection, animal welfare and food standards.”


Sadly, the amendment was voted down by government loyalists in the other place. We note that whenever Ministers have been challenged in debates on the Bill to back up this pledge with legal protections, all that has been offered have been vague aspirational murmurings. I hope I do not give any offence to the Minister, who is diligent on these matters, but that is the truth.

The legal protections that European Union membership provided in these and many other areas, including agricultural workers’ rights and targets for reaching net-zero emissions for the agriculture industry, are nowhere to be found in the Bill. It has become clear that the Government regard such protections for our farmers and the environment as a barrier to a trade deal with the United States. So desperate are the Brexiteers to declare UDI from the EU that they are prepared to prostrate themselves at the door of Donald Trump’s “America first” trade and sell out our farmers, while turning a blind eye to environmental degradation and poor animal welfare standards abroad.

Now we are no longer part of a major trading bloc —the biggest trading bloc in the world—the Brexiteers’ sacred cow of sovereignty will not prevent Washington using its superior economic weight to set the terms of any deal with an isolated United Kingdom. British farmers and our food processors would be undercut by imports of food whose production is banned here. Of course, cheap, poorer-quality US food imports will remain cheap only as long as our domestic production proves viable enough to provide a meaningful competitive market. Farmers would face a choice between lowering standards and seeing their livelihoods destroyed. Minette Batters of the National Farmers’ Union has said:

“Farmers are going to feel betrayed … I don’t recall anyone selling a vision of post-Brexit Britain as one involving lower-standard food filling shop shelves while British farmers … go out of business.”


If UK agriculture cannot survive, prices of imports will rise, leaving the country dependent on imported food of dubious quality.

Lowering UK standards will, in turn, create barriers to agreeing a trade deal with the European Union, which is needed to preserve farmers’ important EU export markets, since US food standards are incompatible with those of the EU. Europe is not only the most significant destination by far for our agricultural exports; in addition, the EU has negotiated international trade agreements on our behalf with our most important non-EU trading partners, so replacement deals will also have to be negotiated to ensure continued agricultural access to those markets. The EU is also our largest source of food imports, providing fully 30% of our food supplies, so more empty shelves could be in store.

Even before the Brexit decision was made, UK farming already faced major challenges, including increasing globalisation, international competition, changing consumer expectations and preferences, accelerating technological innovation, and longer-term pressures brought about by climate change. As everyone knows, farmers are subject to price volatility and market pressures that continue to put their livelihoods at risk. The added uncertainty of future trade deals with the EU puts their future export markets at risk. The EU provides a vital destination for UK food exports, with the Irish Republic, France, Germany and the Netherlands being the principal markets.

A trade deal with the US would also threaten the National Health Service and would be imposed without consent. The Trade Bill, which had its First Reading in your Lordships’ House last week, makes no provision for parliamentary scrutiny of future trade deals and will grant the Government Henry VIII powers to change the law on trade agreements without parliamentary approval. The devolved Administrations do not have any role in negotiating or approving international trade treaties.

Rather than taking back control, the UK could even become a satellite state of Donald Trump’s US in a race to the bottom. That is the reality of these harmful plans for a hard Brexit, which threatens not just our food producers but animal welfare and the environment. The pandemic has shown the importance of food security, a healthy diet and a harmonious relationship with nature. These plans need to be opposed before it is too late.

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[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, I have stayed up until what is for me a very late hour in order to do two things at the time of these amendments being moved. The first is to join in the accolades for the noble Lord, Lord Gardiner, and I would like to spread that out to the digital team, all the staff, the Bill team and everyone who has helped to keep the House of Lords going. I felt personally that the noble Lord’s patience began to fray once or twice during some of these late debates, but he held it together and has been amazing, and of course I thank his deputy, the noble Baroness, Lady Bloomfield.

The second reason why I have stayed up so late is to support the noble Lord, Lord Carrington. I signed these amendments yesterday because, over the past few months, I have been infuriated by the actions of this Government, who seem to think that now they have a majority of 80-odd in the other place they can behave as they like. Many of us do not think that is true. I had thought about not contributing to this debate and just asking Hansard to cut and paste the other speeches that I have made about the Government’s use of Henry VIII powers, but I felt it was perhaps more responsible to repeat the points myself. I just do not understand why the Government keep coming to Parliament asking for permission to rewrite primary legislation without needing to go through the full process of amending it. That is rule by diktat; it is anti-democratic and dictatorial. I shall always be opposed to it unless the Government can give some overwhelmingly important reason for it. I do not expect the Minister to answer that question, but I think this Government are taking too much power into their own hands and it is time they accepted that they are vulnerable to scrutiny. The British public will not like the fact that they are so overbearing.

[Lord Thomas of Gresford (LD) [V]]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the indignation expressed by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb. Sir Edward Leigh summed up the Government’s attitude to a Henry VIII clause admirably when he said in the other place, when speaking on the then current European Union (Withdrawal) Bill:

“We have heard a lot about Henry VIII. When I was a rebel I used to care about these things. Now I am a loyalist I let the Government get away with it … Henry VIII is a bastard, but he is my kind of bastard.”—[Official Report, Commons, 11/9/17; col. 466.]


The Proclamation by the Crown Act 1539 was the work of Thomas Cromwell, Henry VIII’s Secretary of State—very well delineated in Hilary Mantel’s trilogy. He sometimes had trouble getting his Bills past Parliament. The Act said:

“The King for the time being, with the advice of his council, or the more part of them, may set forth proclamations under such penalties and pains as to him and them shall seem necessary, which shall be observed as though they were made by act of parliament”.


Importantly, even Henry’s proclamations could not interfere with existing legislation and rights. It did not give power, as this Bill does, to repeal existing legislation, so Clause 47 is a Henry VIII-plus provision. Under King Henry’s Act, an offender could be subject to forfeitures or imprisonment for not obeying an article of a proclamation and, what is more,

“if any offending will depart the realm, to the intent he will not answer his said offence, he shall be adjudged a traitor.”

That meant hanging, drawing and quartering in those days. I recall that it was part of the Conservative Party’s manifesto in 2019, as part of its push to modernise itself, to reintroduce treason into our courts as an active criminal offence.

Back to Henry VIII: his Statute of Proclamations was one of the first statutes to be repealed in its entirety following his death in 1547. “Rightly so”, noble Lords may think. It lasted only 12 years before it was immediately repealed. Sir William Blackstone in his Commentaries on the Laws of England vol. 1 chapter 7, published in 1765, said that Henry’s Act was

“a statute which was calculated to introduce the most despotic tyranny, and which must have proved fatal to the liberties of this kingdom, had it not been luckily repealed”.

In case noble Lords think I am lost in history, I move from Henry VIII and Sir William Blackstone to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge. Speaking in a debate on a report of the Constitution Committee, he said caustically,

“we are giving these powers to the Prime Ministers of our day which the men of the 1539 Parliament were not prepared to give to the dictating ogre who ran the country in theirs. We give powers that Parliament would not give to the great king.”—[Official Report, 12/6/19; col. 460.]

With that background, let us look at the current Bill and its amendments. Clause 47(3) states:

“Any power to make regulations under this Act includes power … (d) to make supplementary, incidental, consequential, transitional, transitory or saving provision.”


Subsection (4) says:

“The provision which may be made by virtue of subsection (3)(d) includes provision modifying primary legislation, retained direct EU legislation or subordinate legislation.”

“Modify” is a weasel word against which the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, of which I was a member up to last year, has inveighed on many occasions. It dare not speak its name in its place in the Bill. Noble Lords have to turn to Clause 48—the definitions clause—to discover what it really means. That clause says that

“‘modify’ includes amend, revoke and repeal (and related expressions are to be construed accordingly)”.

Noble Lords may think there is not much more you can do to existing legislation, although the definition, by use of the word “includes”, leaves it open for further interpretation.

That, of course, is not the end of it since Clause 50 permits the Secretary of State or the appropriate authority—the Welsh Government or whoever—to modify the Agriculture Bill itself when it becomes an Act, so there is the power to modify this Act by a simple statutory instrument, hence Amendment 298.

At Second Reading, I said:

“At some unknown future time, the Minister will slot a package of policies into this frame as and when he has worked them out. He will introduce a series of unamendable SIs for minimum scrutiny and, save for one issue only, with no consultation.”—[Official Report, 10/6/20; col. 1811.]


I suspect Sir Edward’s “my kind of bastard” will do just that. The noble Lord, Lord Carrington, is entirely right to inquire how the power in this Bill will be used.

Agriculture Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Report stage & Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords & Report: 1st sitting & Report: 1st sitting: House of Lords
Tuesday 15th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, I shall speak very briefly to two amendments: Amendment 2, in the names of the noble Earl, Lord Devon, and the noble Lord, Lord Addington, and Amendment 5, in the name of my noble friends Lord Caithness, Lord Dundee and Lord Randall of Uxbridge. I agree entirely about the beneficial effects of being able to enjoy the beauties of our countryside; that should go without saying. But I also very much agree with my noble friend Lord Caithness and, indeed, the noble Earl, Lord Devon, about the position of the landowners and farmers in question.

As we begin what I hope will not be quite such a marathon stage of the Bill, I very much hope that we will never, at any stage of our deliberations, lose sight of the fact that this is the Agriculture Bill, and its prime purpose is to protect and enhance British farming and those who earn their living from it. It is to underline their duties to be custodians of the countryside; it is to underline their responsibility to enable people to enjoy the countryside.

But we have only to reflect briefly on some of the ghastly things that have happened since Committee to realise how important it is that not only are farmers and landowners responsible but that those who enjoy the countryside are responsible. We have witnessed some, frankly, despicable scenes over the last two or three months—people going into the countryside and not enjoying it but pillaging it, defacing it, neglecting what it truly is and creating horror and squalor where there is, and always should be, beauty. I hope we can bear all those things in mind as we go through Report.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, who has been exceptionally kind to me in previous debates. It deeply saddens me that I do not quite agree with him: I think there will always be a tension between town and country, and some of that comes down simply to a lack of information available to those who despoil the countryside, and that is something we should think about.

It gives me great pleasure, even joy, to be speaking on Report on this Bill, with such a broad consensus on shaping a greener future for British farming and land management. The sheer volume of amendments on the Marshalled List is testament to the scale of ambition shared by noble Lords across the House, and it is unfortunate that your Lordships may not be able to divide on as many amendments as we might have liked.

I was going to speak only to Amendment 4, because I thought it was the most radical, in terms of opening up new paths and new opportunities for people to walk, but now that my noble friend Lady Bennett of Manor Castle has given me the opportunity to range wider, I shall speak to some of the others.

I am pleased by the cross-party, non-partisan way in which the House has come together to focus on some of the most important issues, so that the Bill addresses some of the most pressing issues facing the health of our people and our planet. I felt that the noble Earl, Lord Devon, was very brave in going to California. I have watched with horror the pictures and the testimonies from a California that is clearly suffering and will clearly have a problem feeding and nurturing its own residents in the near future.

The amendments in this first group can be broadly categorised as improving public access to the benefits and beauty of British land, and anything that can be done to expand the public’s access and use of the land is a positive step. The Bill already makes broad overtures in that regard. Despite having a great respect and liking for the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, I am not quite sure about the word “voluntarily”. On a path that I regularly walk, the farmer puts all sorts of impediments in the way, and that footpath has been there for many centuries. For example, one often finds wire fencing, flocks of geese or cows that are about to be milked—it makes it quite difficult for the average walker.

Some of the other amendments are simply common sense. It would be perfectly logical for the Minister to go back to the Government, and when the shadow, the spectre, of Dominic Cummings looms over him, I think he should say “Dom, you know nothing about this—go away, and let us improve the Bill”.

[The Duke of Montrose (Con) [V]]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to be able to contribute to this Bill, and I declare my interests as a farmer in Scotland and a member of NFU Scotland. Even so, Part 1, to which most of these amendments apply, only affects England and Wales.

I add my support for Amendment 2 in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Devon. This is one of a number of amendments noble Lords have referred to which are aimed at bringing the benefits of agriculture to health and well-being. It will be important if this Bill gives official recognition to this element.

I have been listening with much interest to the proposals surrounding Amendments 3 and 24, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Addington, particularly his extensive list of what constitutes “water”. The noble Lord, Lord Greaves, asked that financial assistance be sought for access—it is a bit of a longer shot to diagnose what assistance is actually needed for the water itself. It might be necessary to define the context in which the words listed should be taken, as they are likely to have different meanings in different parts of the country.

The noble Lord, Lord Greaves, drew your Lordships’ attention to the legislation in Scotland, which gives unlimited right of access to land and water, but allows access only by foot, horseback or bicycle. Motor-driven transport can go only where there is an appropriate right of way, unless the occupant is disabled. We have yet to learn if this distinction will apply to water, but this needs to be thought about. This helps to ensure that the countryside is accessed in a way that provides the most benefit. Even so, there are already examples of the approach of different users conflicting, in spite of the fact that, with one-tenth of the population of England, one might expect there should be less of a risk.

Something which deserves consideration when talking of extending access is that historically, Scotland had a more general right of access before our current legislation was introduced, whereas in the majority of England any access is limited to defined rights of way. During the Bill’s passage, it has been only proper that we give these proposals some consideration. However, the extent and location of acceptable access has not been discussed.

The changes envisaged in these amendments are a complete departure from the current situation. My noble friend Lord Caithness pointed out the way in which they extend the present position. The subject should be introduced with more care than we can readily give in the context of this Bill. I would not be prepared to support the amendments at this time.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Judd (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I hope that even at this late stage in our proceedings, the Minister and Government will be able to take this group of amendments seriously and give them serious consideration, with a view to making necessary adjustments to what they finally bring forward. In supporting this interesting group, I emphasise my support for Amendments 7, 16 and 48.

On Amendment 7, I simply say this as a former president of Friends of the Lake District and a vice-president of the Campaign for National Parks. I cannot speak for those organisations, but all my experience with them and with my own family and friends is that, in many parts of our national parks and beautiful parts of the country, livestock are an important part of the scenic setting. I and my family—I speak subjectively—always feel a sense of contentment when we see cattle grazing, but one big condition of all that is that I cannot allow my enjoyment to mask my anxiety lest the farming is not of the highest quality. From that standpoint, this amendment is very valuable indeed.

What is put forward in Amendment 16 is just straightforward sense. I hope that my colleagues agree and that the Government can take it on board. We constantly talk about the relationships between landscape and climate change, countryside and climate change and agriculture and climate change, but this enables the Minister to take practical action to provide support in that context.

We also worry very much about what is happening to the condition of our soil; this is dealt with in the amendment. I have just spoken about landscapes. To encourage members of the farming community to see their role as trustees of our national inheritance in this sense is very important indeed.

How can I—living in Cumbria, five miles from Cockermouth—possibly overlook the importance of flood protection measures? What happened at the time of the great floods in Cockermouth was that the valley up where I live was filling up with water. I was stuck in London at the House and was ringing my neighbours, asking, “What’s happening? How’s it going?” A very great friend of mine, a hill farmer, said to me on the phone: “Well, Frank, all I can say is that I have never seen the valley fuller of water, and it’s got to go somewhere.” That is quite a dramatic illustration of what happened. It went somewhere. The bridge broke at the bottom of our section of the valley and the water poured through and down, out of control, towards Cockermouth.

Wildlife and the environment are concerns we frequently speak about, but we must not just sentimentalise. Here we are giving power—authority—to the Minister to take appropriate action, but it must be appropriate action. I hope the Government will feel able to make some adjustments to meet those points.

On Amendment 48, I have become deeply concerned about the neglect of common land. We may sentimentalise about it and some people may find it controversial, but for any of us who have an ongoing and lasting relationship with and deep commitment to the countryside, common land and the encouragement of a community approach to agriculture are tremendously important. Again, what is envisaged here is underlining the authority of the Minister to take necessary supporting action.

This is a thoughtful group of amendments and I hope the Government will take them seriously.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, for those of us who have spent decades advocating for human society to work with instead of against nature, the specific references to agroecology in these amendments represent a great success. These amendments would each expand the principles of agroecology and ensure that ecological outcomes were delivered.

In particular, I have attached my name to Amendment 7 from the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, which would specifically support pasture-fed livestock systems and the improvement of landscapes and biodiversity linked to pastureland. This is all about a farming and ecosystem format that can help to move us towards some sort of food security.

Food security will be an absolutely huge challenge. Anybody who watched David Attenborough’s programme on Sunday will be aware that he mentioned several times that biodiversity is falling. We need biodiversity drastically. If we do not have it, growing food will become harder and harder. We are at a point in the world where some of it is burning, some is melting and neither of those things is good for the human race.

In addition, the world has not even fully met any of the 20 biodiversity targets set a decade ago by Governments globally. Nature protection efforts have been ineffective. We already have 1 degree of warming and are heading towards 3 degrees of warming. It will be a world that we simply will not recognise.

I am delighted to support Amendment 16 from the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, and Amendment 11 from the noble Earl, Lord Dundee. Amendment 16 would ensure that agroecology was truly nature friendly. Amendment 11 would support farming opportunities for new entrants and young farmers, ensuring a healthy supply of innovative and motivated farmers ready to take on the challenges and opportunities of greening our farming and land management.

I hope that in his response the Minister will set out specific and deliverable plans for each of these issues.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 8, 21 and 23. I say again that I am very pleased that the Government have added a definition of the word “agroecology” to the Bill. That is a great step forward. I not only thank the Government but congratulate them on recognising this type of agriculture as something that is not just from the past—although it looks to the past for many of its methods and ethics—but is an important way to move forward. The motive of the amendments I have put forward—and I thank the noble Earls, Lord Dundee and Lord Caithness, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, for their support—is to reinforce that message within the Bill.

The area that is not mentioned is agroforestry, which is equivalent. This is not the forestry that the Forestry Commission is into—not that I have anything against that generally—but is around integrating forestry into whole-farm management. Benefits from water management include biodiversity, crops from those trees, silviculture and even energy. So the motive of these amendments is to up a style of whole-farm management that looks to the future and entirely fulfils the reason for having ELMS and this new funding structure. I very much hope that the Government, having taken this one step forward, will be able to take it further forward as well.

My Amendment 21 adds to the word “agroecology” at the top of page 3 of the Bill, which states that

“‘better understanding of the environment’ includes better understanding of agroecology”.

I am just suggesting that we add “and agroforestry” to the Bill. I am sure that that is something the Government would wish to promote in the new financing structures and I can see no reason why it would change the meaning of the Bill in any way. If the Minister could do that, I would be hugely grateful to him, knowing of his commitment to the future of farming and ways of farming that promote biodiversity.

That biodiversity and quantum of nature, which the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, just mentioned, are crucial to how ELMS rolls out. I will be talking about this later, so I will not say more about it now, but biodiversity is something that agroecology and agroforestry can promote to achieve what the Government want.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Naseby (Con)]

My Lords, since Committee I have reflected on two aspects of the broader farming area that we did not really look at in any particular depth at that stage. So I would like to place on record that, in my judgment, horticulture will play an ever-increasing role in the broader farming area. It is land, but of course it may be under glass or may use some of the new techniques for intensive production, particularly of certain vegetables.

Secondly, there is the small but ever-growing viticulture industry. I have done a bit of an inquiry and I declare an interest as a mini-grower, with 100 vines. There are now some major players in the UK who are producing in volume and looking for opportunities to export, which is a very important dimension as we set off on our journey on our own. There are also a lot of micro-growers who are looking for opportunities to develop. So I do hope that land and farming will remember that there is horticulture and, particularly now, viniculture.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, one of the issues that has persisted in this Bill, and in others, is the lack of regulatory underpinning, particularly here with regard to the ambitions of Clause 1. This could be characterised as an ideological obsession that the market can save us and an attempt to squash agricultural policy into that market mindset.

The truth is that without minimum standards some areas of land will fall into very poor condition. It is unfortunate that the Government have not engaged with your Lordships’ House to address this fact. The noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone, presents a sensible off-the-shelf solution, which she explained extremely well. I think the Minister would be hard-pressed to justify the Government’s opposition to her amendment. I support it very strongly.

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)]

My Lords, I would like to congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone, on bringing forward this amendment. It shows what a sense of humour she has: having torn to shreds all the amendments in a previous group as being “little baubles”, she now comes forward with a bauble of her own.

I would like to put on the record that I am quite content with Clause 1(1)(j), which calls for

“protecting or improving the quality of soil.”

I can understand the basis behind the amendment, but for all of us who are concerned about the content of the soil and about good agricultural and environmental condition, I think that it is actually all contained in Clause 1 as it stands.

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Amendment 18 not moved.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

Can I move it?

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Morris of Bolton) (Con)]

No, you cannot.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

I can.

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Morris of Bolton) (Con)]

I apologise—it is always bound to go wrong if I am on the Woolsack—but I have already said that Amendment 18 is not moved.

--- Later in debate ---

Moved by

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb]

28: Clause 2, page 3, line 42, leave out subsections (8) and (9) and insert—
“(8) The Secretary of State must by regulations require specified information to be published about financial assistance under this Act.(9) Information which must be specified includes—(a) the full legal name of the recipient of financial assistance;(b) the amounts of payment corresponding to each measure financed by the funds received by each beneficiary in the financial year concerned;(c) the purposes of the payment corresponding to section 1(1);(d) the geographical boundaries of the land corresponding to the amounts and purposes under paragraphs (b) and (c);(e) any other information that in the view of the Secretary of State is appropriate to enable the public to evaluate whether the purposes in section 1(1) are met.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment ensures that the public may evaluate whether the Act’s purposes in providing public goods are in fact being fulfilled.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

I shall speak to Amendment 18, which has not been moved, and to my own Amendment 28. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Allan of Hallam, for signing it as well.

The common agricultural policy is a huge item in the EU’s budget, making up around one-third of all EU expenditure. The system of payments established under the Bill will be similarly huge, with large sums of public money being paid to private individuals and businesses in exchange for providing public goods. With such huge expenditure, it is, frankly, outrageous that the Bill is so lacking in measures for public scrutiny and accountability for that money. My Amendment 28 seeks to redress this huge accountability deficit by requiring the Secretary of State to publish information about expenditure under the Bill. That does not seem unreasonable to me. Probably every Peer in this House would expect that if they spend money then generally, they will understand where it goes.

That publication would include basic information such as who is receiving how much money and for what. Without that information, I do not see how taxpayers can be expected to trust that public money is being put to good use in fair and proper ways. In particular, I worry that the whole system of public money for public goods will be undermined, resulting in a rolling back of the progress that the Bill represents.

If the Conservative Party were in opposition, they would expect such information to be provided and would want it in the Bill—they would insist that basic accountability be included—so I am horribly disappointed that there is nothing to that effect. I eagerly await the Minister’s explanation as to why a prudent and fiscally responsible Government would avoid publishing such basic information, which would enable the public to ensure that their taxes are being spent properly and effectively.

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

My Lords, I thank noble Lords for their forbearance—I was sitting in a bus that had been slowed down due to the requirements of Transport for London. Amendment 18 concerns the lack of an impact assessment for the Bill. I thank my noble friend Lord Lindsay and the noble Lord, Lord Curry of Kirkharle, for their support. Both are distinguished experts in the field. I also thank the Minister for a very useful meeting and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, for the support of the Opposition in Committee. Other amendments in this group look at various aspects of evaluation and financial assistance, including a welcome government amendment of plans relating to the latter.

Impact assessments are a vital vehicle for evaluation and scrutiny of government actions on a coherent, structured and quantitative basis. They provide good guides to how different groups and businesses will be affected by a Bill or a proposal. They are, rightly, a firmly established part of the landscape, with that on the Immigration Bill being the most recent useful example in our House. This Bill represents a huge change in farming and countryside management in the UK, as we have heard. This needs to be quantified. We need to look at the economic costs, benefits and risks that the new agricultural policies entail. That observation applies to the whole Bill but is most important in respect of Clause 1.

Impact assessments could have been invented with such a Bill in mind—I know because I headed the Cabinet Office deregulation unit that pioneered them. Yet on 20 February, the Regulatory Policy Committee, which independently assesses impact assessments, was forced to publish a little slap in the face to Defra. Having considered the matter, it came to the following stern conclusion:

“The RPC has considered the proposals in the Bills and believe that in both cases”


—they were also referring to another Bill—

“these could have significant impacts on business when they come into effect (as set out in the annex to this statement) and that therefore IAs should have been produced by the Department, submitted to the RPC for independent scrutiny, seen by ministers and presented to Parliament. We expect that, in future, government departments will submit IAs to the RPC before the relevant bill is laid before Parliament. We remain open to DEFRA submitting IAs for both of these bills to the RPC, in order to allow us to provide an opinion on whether or not each IA is fit for purpose.”

Matters have moved on a lot. Will the Minister consider making available the draft that was prepared for ministerial discussion? I suspect that much of the material was an updated version of the economic material he published and referred me to in Committee, but of course, in a much more useful and structured format. I would also welcome details of Defra’s plans for secondary legislation made under different parts of the Bill. We agree on the need for collaboration with the farming sector and others in developing the regulations, and I know that IAs can be useful in bringing out risks and opportunities for the wider economy—for example, businesses supplying the rural economy. This leads to better feedback. I always remember persuading the then DTI not to require the minimum wage to be shown on payslips, because of the cost to businesses of reprogramming all their IT systems to make this happen.

This is not a sexy amendment. It is one devoted to the cause of responsible and coherent government, and I suggest that it is none the worse for that. Allied to proper, timely consultation, impact assessments can identify important factors that have been overlooked in policy formation. I look forward to the Minister’s comments.

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[Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con)]

I would love to give your Lordships a precise date. The Government understand the need to bring forward this information as soon as possible; I said autumn. We in Defra are seized of that importance. I will look at Amendment 30. All I can say is that our lawyers looked at it and advised me that that was the case but, if my noble friend would permit, it might help to have some legal expertise on why there was that interpretation.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

I thank the Minister for his summing up. The noble Baronesses, Lady Jones of Whitchurch and Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, have summed up extremely well, but there are a few points that I will add. First, I tried to move Amendment 18 on behalf of the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, because I supported it, but unfortunately I was too slow; that is not something you can often say about me. I was entranced by the argument between five and seven years. Honestly, the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, swayed me with his wartime analogies; they were worthy of the ERG. I was lost slightly by the noble Earl, Lord Devon, and Moses. I thank all Peers who have spoken. It was a slightly mixed group.

The Minister asks your Lordships to trust him and almost every Peer in this House does but, when he asks the House to trust the Government, it is a completely different matter. If it is not in the Bill, it does not exist. It is all very well to talk about what the Government will do later but, if they are not bound by the Bill, I do not trust them to do it. With that in mind, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 28 withdrawn.

Agriculture Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Report stage & Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 17th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Finlay of Llandaff) (CB)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, had requested to come in, and I understand she has not been able to. Therefore, I now call the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, before the Minister responds.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

Thank you— I was scrubbed by mistake. I am sure your Lordships are very happy that I have been slotted back in.

[A noble Lord]

Hear, hear.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

Thank you very much. I would like to say that these amendments are so obviously a good idea for the regulation and adjudication of this part of the Bill. There is nothing else to be said; I hope the Minister accepts them.

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con)]

My Lords, this has been an interesting debate, and I thank all noble Lords for contributing toward it. Of course, I regret that the noble Lord, Lord Curry of Kirkharle, is not with us. He sent me a note, and I will have further discussions and considerations with him, because I am very keen to hear what he would have said in this debate.

Turning to Amendments 63, 64 and 67, I would like to assure noble Lords that work is ongoing to determine the most appropriate mechanism of enforcement for the provisions under this part of the Bill. No decisions have been made about who will be appointed as the enforcement body for Part 3. It is important to note, with particular reference to Amendment 67, that while all the measures contained in this part of the Bill will collectively work to improve supply chain fairness, the Government believe enforcement will work best when each particular policy area in Part 3 can be addressed individually. I say that because it is very important that we get to grips with the issues in each sector, identifying those that are distinct as well as those that may be common. I think that would be a pragmatic consideration.

On the suggestion that the Groceries Code Adjudicator should be given enforcement responsibilities, it is important to note that one of the key factors in the adjudicator’s success is its targeted focus on the behaviours of the UK’s largest supermarkets with their direct suppliers. This has enabled the adjudicator to work closely with the industry in developing supply chain solutions. I join other noble Lords in acknowledging in the work of the Groceries Code Adjudicator. It has been a considerably successful tenure of office.

A government call for evidence in 2016 explored the possibility of extending the adjudicator’s remit beyond those directly supplying the largest retailers. The review found insufficient evidence of widespread problems further down the groceries supply chain and concluded that there was no justification to extend the remit. However, it did identify some remaining concerns. These were sector-specific and predominantly concerned with the first stage of the supply chain. Following on from this, we feel that such issues are best addressed with the appropriate and targeted interventions included in the Bill.

Preliminary analysis of the responses to the Government’s consultation on the dairy sector has shown that there are a range of views about appropriate enforcement. I emphasise that an adjudicator-style model is only one of many potential means to resolve contractual disputes and ensure compliance with any new regulations. Amending the Bill to appoint the Groceries Code Adjudicator as the enforcement body would serve potentially to tie the Government’s hands to only one of the many possibilities available. This would also preclude the ability to listen to the views of industry and respond accordingly, which is really important and, we think, critical in creating effective solutions.

The Government are, of course, aware of the issues that farmers face in the supply chain and that is not confined to the dairy sector. To answer one of the questions from the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, the Government will carry out similar consultations to explore the issues facing other sectors in turn. Discussions with stakeholders have already begun, to look at the situation in the red meat sector and what sort of interventions could improve the position of producers in that supply chain.

On Amendments 65 and 66, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, for highlighting the importance of a robust enforcement regime to ensure that the fair dealings obligations are effective and sustainable. It is important to state that no decisions have been made about the nature of enforcement, or the body responsible for enforcement. The reason is robust and strong: the Government want to work with industry and listen to its ideas and concerns before any final decision is made.

The noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, asked about the consultation on the dairy sector. To be precise, I can confirm that the consultation closed on Tuesday. The consultation included a specific question about dispute resolution and, while the detailed analysis is still being carried out, it is already clear—this is broad-brush, because I asked whether there are any indicators—that stakeholders have a broad range of views about the most appropriate form of enforcement and finding the best solution will obviously require some consideration. The Government aim to publish a summary of responses later this year, which will be very important and will provide greater detail about the views shared and the options available. I hope it will not be too long before there will be scope for that consideration. The Government will exercise due diligence in designing the enforcement regime and appointing a regulator.

I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, that I do not recognise her description of the rigour with which I and other Ministers consider appointments to public bodies. It is a very serious matter; we recognise that it is a matter of people coming forward to help in the public service. I reassure her that it has no input other than that it must be done rigorously, and the right people need to be chosen.

The Government intend the fair dealing obligations to create positive change for the industry. That is why we are doing it and why this is such an important feature. I am very glad that the noble Lord and other noble Lords have raised this, because this is all part of the prism of this Bill. A lot of people are worried that we are talking too much about the environment, but a lot of the guts and detail of what will come out in the provisions of the Bill are designed to help the farmer in the great production of food, and so that we can help the farmer get fairer dealing.

I have a note relating to the remarks of my noble friend Lady McIntosh on the GCA launching its own investigations. The Groceries Code Adjudicator can launch its own investigations, if it has reasonable grounds to suspect that a large retailer has broken the code. Again, I think the adjudicator’s work has been essential. I think and hope that, in the spirit of this debate, the reason the Government would at this time resist putting forward a particular body, however successful the adjudicator has been in this area, is that the best way to deal with difficulties in certain sectors is to work with the sector to see what is the best mechanism for enforcement. Let your Lordships be in no doubt that these are provisions that we recognise must be attended to, and in short order, because they are the way that will help the farmer in this situation.

In that spirit, I very much hope that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendment.

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[Lord Judd (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I strongly support this amendment, as indeed I did in Committee. I thank my noble friend for being so resolute in standing by it. I express my appreciation for the way in which she so warmly welcomed my small but important amendment in Committee; it is now incorporated in the proposals before us.

The position on housing can be dire for those who wish to work on the land. It is simply impossible to find housing that is affordable. The absence of other public services and support services is a great hazard too because, let us face it, so much of the countryside has been turned into a middle-class urban extension.

Affordable housing is crucial, but the main point that I want to make in support of the amendment as a whole is that we can debate how we want the land organised, arrangements for ownership and so on, but in the end it is the motivation, quality, training and preparation of the workforce who are going to work the land that is crucial. This amendment is the result of an utterly sensible understanding that if we want to have successful agriculture, we need an enlightened, positive approach to the preparation of people, particularly young people, wanting to enter the profession in order that they may be as well equipped as possible to work it effectively.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, this is indeed an excellent amendment. I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, and the other noble Lords who signed it. It would make a fantastic improvement to the Bill and to the future of our farming industry because it takes such a wide-ranging and holistic look at the agriculture and land management workforce, including training, mental health, financial health and, of course, affordable housing. Affordable housing is hard enough to find anywhere in Britain, but on the land it is even harder.

Noble Lords know that the Bill represents quite a sea change in our approach to land management and is an opportunity to craft a much greener future. We need to train and develop what one could call a new land army to seize this opportunity. The future needs new skills, new knowledge and a new passion for our natural world. Without a workforce plan we will fail to deliver the intended changes, so I think the Government should embrace this opportunity and accept the amendment.

At the very least, the Minister should undertake to conduct a broad and far-reaching workforce review and planning process. I know that we keep asking for plans for definitive actions but they really are necessary and they are so lacking in the Bill. In particular, what conversations has the Minister had with colleagues in the Home Office about the post-Brexit migration system and the availability of highly motivated people from all over the world who would like to come to Britain to contribute to what I hope is going to be our greener farming system?

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD) [V]]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb. I have added my name to Amendment 70. The noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, laid out the case for it very well and I support her comments.

Both at Second Reading and in Committee, Members of this Chamber raised the issues of the safety of agricultural workers and their access to training. Despite safety measures, it is not uncommon for farmers to have fatal or life-changing accidents during the normal course of their working day. The noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, referred to the levels of mental illness and suicide among the farming community. Training is important to help prevent this, and it is vital, too, to ensure that new methods and technological advances which could make their lives easier are also readily available.

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[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)]

My Lords, I am delighted to follow the noble Lord, Lord Judd. I am full of admiration for the doughty campaigners who have tabled this little group of amendments, and I pay tribute to them. I support the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Palmer of Childs Hill, on Amendment 71. It is misplaced and would open a can of worms if it were pressed.

I am grateful for the comments of my noble friend the Duke of Montrose, who is a hands-on farmer, which focused on animals for export. As I said in Committee, I have had first-hand experience of this issue. My noble friend Lady Hodgson of Abinger referred to Compassion in World Farming, an organisation that I first came across in about 1994. At that time, a mother and daughter ran that marvellous organisation with the support of Linda McCartney, bless her. They engaged a lot of students to come along to the port of Brightlingsea after their success in closing down the Port of Dover to live exports. Brightlingsea took all the remaining livestock due to go to the continent of Europe. As I mentioned in Committee—I shall not labour the point—I boarded the ferry and saw the disembarkation of the livestock, mostly sheep. They were happy and extremely comfortable. It was stress-free.

I pay tribute to the role of successive Governments and this Government in making sure that we have about the strictest animal welfare provisions across the European Union—my noble friend Lady Hodgson referred to this—and we have been in the vanguard of that. Everything that my noble friends are setting out to do in Amendment 72 has already been achieved. When he sums up, I am sure that the Minister will confirm that this will continue to be the case in retained legislation after the end of the transition period. We have reached an understanding through the Northern Ireland protocol, and I should be particularly alarmed if we sought to reopen that. Potentially, with all the amendments in this group, we could open a can of worms that would lead to major unintended consequences.

My noble friend the Duke of Montrose made a compelling point about the consequences of closing the abattoirs. More than 10 years ago, I was an MEP when the EU directive on abattoirs and slaughterhouses was made, and it was our gold-plating in this country that led at the time to their closure across the United Kingdom, with devastating consequences at the time of the foot and mouth outbreak because the livestock had to be transported for much longer distances than would otherwise have been the case.

I believe that we have reached a very good position under the rules that already pertain in the EU rules of animal movement. I would be very reluctant to see those reopened and, in any event, we are bound by the World Trade Organization rules that—I understand—prevent such a total ban on exports. I hope my noble friend will take the opportunity to confirm that this is the case. I pay tribute to the work that this Government, and successive Governments, have done to get us to this animal welfare state we have currently reached.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baronesses, Lady Hodgson of Abinger and Lady Fookes, on tabling these amendments. I assure the noble Baroness, Lady Fookes, that she still thinks like a spring chicken, which is very admirable. I would support these amendments much more strongly if I did not absolutely abhor the whole concept of live animal exports. That we still do this absolutely sickens me, and it is way over time to stop this in its tracks and simply accept that it is inhumane.

However, one thing that annoys me, as somebody who voted for Brexit, is that this was one of the common examples we were given of what could be achieved outside the EU—the banning of live animal exports. These were the sort of promises made to people like me, compassionate Eurosceptics who wanted the freedom to create a better country. We certainly have not done that. Unfortunately, like most of the nice promises made by the Brexit campaign, restricting live animal exports seems to have gone in the bin in favour of the nasty stuff, like restricting immigration. We listen to the racists and we do not listen to the people who care about animals.

Your Lordships’ House really ought to think very hard about these ideas. I was swayed by the points of the noble Lord, Lord Palmer of Childs Hill, on Amendment 71, but I do support Amendments 72 and 73 because they would make huge leaps forward in animal welfare, and end the needless suffering of long, stressful and painful journeys to slaughter. This is one of the many things that people voted for in supporting Brexit. It is the will of the people and should be delivered.

Agriculture Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Report stage & Report: 3rd sitting (Hansard) & Report: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 22nd September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Whitty (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I am speaking to Amendment 78 and I need to make it absolutely clear that I intend to seek the opinion of the House on it when we reach it. I am very much indebted to the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, for her support and her indication that she will back my amendment. She has made a significant part of my case by identifying the medical impact of exposure to pesticides and the doubts about the authorisation process.

I also thank my co-signatories, the noble Baronesses, Lady Bakewell and Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, and the noble Lord, Lord Randall—demonstrating the cross-party support for this vital but very simple and specific amendment.

I should also thank the Minister for the meeting to which the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, referred. It was useful but we did not agree. As the noble Baroness said, it appears that the department’s line is that there is no need for the amendment because, under EU law now transposed and retained in UK law, the Government already have the discretion to come forward with such regulations. Leaving aside the fact that they have not done so over the 11 years since that law was put in place, on closer examination that assertion appears to be only partly true, and from January, as the noble Baroness, explained, it will not be true at all. We therefore need to put such a provision in this legislation.

In this amendment we are addressing the effect of pesticides on human beings—on those who are exposed to doses of chemicals not designed for humans and in many cases, particularly among residents, on those subject to multiple exposures to multiple chemicals. We want to see a regulatory framework imposing minimum distances between the buildings in which people live and which the public frequent, and the spraying operations of pesticides.

Regrettably, we are not talking about unusual events. Most of the harm comes from everyday tractor-based pesticide spraying at certain times of the year. Local residents, schoolchildren, members of the public visiting public buildings, medical facilities and educational buildings, and other bystanders are all vulnerable.

We have rightly spent some time on this Bill talking about protecting wildlife, biodiversity, farm animals, watercourses and soil from harmful effects of agricultural practice. This amendment is a vital but limited step in the right direction to protect human beings—primarily, residents in rural areas—by requiring spraying to be well away from homes, public buildings and places where the public are congregated. In particular, it moves towards protecting those who live, full-time, adjacent to crops that are subject to blanket applications and those who attend public spaces adjacent to such fields. As I have said, this is a very simple amendment. It requires Ministers to come forward with regulations establishing a minimum distance between such applications and the buildings.

The noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, has spelled out the terrible damage that can be done to humans by ingesting chemical pesticides directly into the lungs and bloodstream. Regrettably, pesticides—including some still used on UK farms and elsewhere—on their own or in combination, can cause the breakdown of the immune system and can poison the nervous system, and can cause cancer, mutations and birth defects. The noble Baroness has convincingly spelled that out.

Noble Lords will have received materials from campaigners on this issue, including from the redoubtable Georgina Downs, who has dossiers on rural families who have suffered. In Committee, I cited just a couple of those testimonies; I will now share a couple more. Chris from Sawtry said:

“We have farmers spraying near our home and school. The fumes cause headaches, dizziness and burn the throat.”


Victoria from Curry Rivel said:

“I have witnessed crops being sprayed just metres from my Daughter’s rural school and have had signs of chemical scorching on our fruit trees in our garden … Just meters from my Daughter’s sand pit!”


As I said in Committee, manufacturers rightly and responsibly label their pesticides, insecticides and herbicides with warnings, such as “Very toxic by inhalation”, “Do not breathe spray” and “Risk of serious damage to the eyes”. Farmers and farmworkers are advised under health and safety laws, and by manufacturers, to wear protective clothing, and most do so—but residents are not so protected. Guidance to users that they should inform residents, and that the chemical used should be clearly identified, is very frequently ignored and pretty well never enforced. Ministers and others have lauded the UK pesticides regime as one of the best in the world, but it is wrong to say that it, or the EU system, is safe. In particular, they are not protecting those who live close by.

This amendment would have the effect of protecting members of the public from hazardous health impacts near buildings. It is a simple, straightforward amendment requiring the Government to come up with minimum distances from the application of such pesticides. It is best to leave the precise distance for consultation and scientific measurement, but let us today establish the principle. My amendment is a very small but vital part of the journey to protect our rural populations.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, and of course the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay. I support these amendments wholeheartedly. I would like to speak at length about them, but I will keep my remarks quite short so that we have plenty of time for a vote.

It seems strange that in America, Monsanto—or rather the new company, Bayer—is paying out $10 billion to settle tens of thousands of claims that Roundup causes cancer, yet it still claims that this a perfectly healthy product, does not put warning labels on the product and says that it is safe. It strikes me as very strange that anybody could deny that this amendment is necessary.

The amendment does not do what I would like it to do—that is, ban all pesticides from 9 am this morning—but it protects the more vulnerable people in our country. In particular, it protects children in schools, childcare settings and nurseries, people in hospitals, and people in any building used for human habitation. It seems such a sensible amendment—I do not know why the Government do not see that it is necessary.

I urge all noble Lords to please vote for this and make sure that the Government get the message very clearly.

[Lord Randall of Uxbridge (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I was pleased to be able to put my name to Amendment 78 from the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, and it is a pleasure to follow him. It is of course always a pleasure to follow the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones and Lady Finlay.

There is no need for me to repeat the arguments that have been so ably put, except to say this. As Members who have been following our deliberations will know, I have been speaking about the importance of preserving our wildlife and biodiversity. One of the seminal works that I remember reading when I was very young was Silent Spring by Rachel Carson, in which she highlighted the devastating impacts of DDT on wildlife. However, this is much more fundamental: this is about protecting human life. If we have not yet learned that people sometimes assure us that everything is all right when it patently is not, we need think only of the tobacco industry—as the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, said—and of asbestos. We would be failing ourselves, the public and our fellow human beings if we did not recognise the harmful nature of pesticides.

I am not an expert to know whether they should be banned entirely, as the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, has suggested. I am sure that there are many in the agricultural sector who say that they are incredibly important. However, one thing we can do is to get this amendment into the Bill, because it would protect so many people. It is not just about protecting those in rural communities, because the fumes can waft over other areas. I have not heard so far—although I am willing to hear it—the reasoning of my noble friend on the Front Bench, but from what I have heard so far, I am happy to support the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Whitty.

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[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I support the first three amendments, Amendments 89ZA, 90 and 93, and Amendments 103 and 105. I shall ignore Amendments 94, 95 and 96 because they are inconsequential spoilers, and I think it is wrong to put them in this group.

At the very start of the Bill, I said to the Minister that the Government had managed to unite the National Farmers Union, Greenpeace, consumer organisations, supermarkets, the Green Party and the great British public, and that this probably meant the Government had got it wrong. This is possibly the most important amendment that we will discuss in the whole Bill because it is one that almost everyone in Britain cares about. One of the things that we get knocked around the head with, particularly when we talk about policing and counterterrorism, is Ministers telling us that this is “the will of the people”. Well, Amendment 89ZA embodies the will of the people to maintain our food standards.

When we talk of American standards, we all know that that is an oxymoron; they do not exist. Its farming practices and animal welfare standards are vile, and we should be ashamed that there is any idea that it might be able to import into our country. This is essential protection for British farming. There is no doubt that the amendment has to pass today. I hope that some of the MPs in the Commons will have a bit of backbone and support it as well.

As the internal market Bill, which has not yet arrived in your Lordships’ House, proves, we cannot trust the Government—on anything, really. They are desperate to make trade deals and are happy to bend and break laws and agreements. The Minister has been very helpful and given noble Lords repeated assurances but, as the resignation of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen of Elie, proves, no matter how honourable and trusted Ministers are in this House, Boris Johnson’s Government cannot be trusted and will ignore or overrule Lords Ministers. The only solution to this problem is clear wording in the Bill to protect British farming standards against this desperate Government. Again, I say that this is truly the will of the people.

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[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, has laid out the need for this amendment with great clarity, and perhaps I can inject a little bit of the emotion that this amendment gives rise to for me. Earlier, I said that the amendment on food standards was probably the most important one, but in fact, this is of course the most important from a long-term point of view because it is all about survival. I am trying to save the planet and the people on it; even the noble Viscount, Lord Trenchard, is part of the group that I want to save—from itself, really.

We know that farming is a massive source of greenhouse gas emissions, and it is likely to grow as a percentage of our emissions as we decarbonise other parts of the economy. Therefore, it is going to get worse and worse if we do not have a clear plan for how to go forward. For me, this Government have shown no urgency; I cannot convey the urgency I feel when I think about what is happening to our planet and the destruction caused by our burning fossil fuels. The Government have not shown any logical trajectory towards zero carbon emissions; they are just dabbling, with a good idea here and an idea there that is probably not quite so good. There is no coherent vision.

The Government have to start budgeting carbon in exactly the same way that they budget money. I realise that budgets are out of the window at the moment due to the coronavirus, but the fact is that we do need to think about it like that and say that, if we allow one area to have more carbon, we have to decrease it in another. Actually, the Green Party has been calling for a “carbon chancellor”: somebody who can take an overall look at this issue, understand how the systems and the economy work and try to make a coherent plan.

This Bill has been bouncing around for three years now and has been delayed several times. It was written two years before the Government adopted a net-zero carbon emissions target, which means that we need to update it because it does not reflect the new net-zero target that the Government have set themselves. Amendment 100 is a genuinely cross-party amendment and will set British farming on a trajectory towards net-zero emissions. We desperately need it, and I very much hope that the Government will listen.

[Lord Randall of Uxbridge (Con) [V]]

My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones of Whitchurch and Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb. The hour is late, but it is also late for our planet. While I do not take quite such a pessimistic view of the Government’s actions in this field as the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb—in fact, they should be congratulated in many respects—for many of us, things are not moving fast enough, and we need to encapsulate some of this in the Bill.

I agree that the NFU has brought forward its own ideas, but there is a lot more to this. For example, I know that Defra is looking at the issue of burning blanket bogs, but surely, under ELMS, we will not be able to give money to land managers who consistently burn peat bogs. That should also be part of the Bill.

I will not detain noble Lords any longer. I support the amendment and I recognise that the Government have taken steps towards it. Perhaps we are too impatient, but we need to get on with it.