Agriculture Bill

Baroness Wilcox of Newport Excerpts

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

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville [V]]

The amendment in the names of the noble Earls, Lord Caithness and Lord Shrewsbury, seeks to allow farmers to have compensation for damage caused by some public access. I have a lot of sympathy with this amendment. There have been many times when, walking footpaths, I have seen saplings damaged, litter strewn around and gates left open. The National Trust, during lambing season on its land, warns walkers to shut the gates and keep their dogs on the leash. Most do this, but occasionally some thoughtless person does not.

We heard in our debate on Tuesday from the noble Earl, Lord Devon, and other noble Lords, who gave some examples of damage done by those who treat the countryside carelessly, and the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, gave more details today about the litter left at Durdle Door and Bournemouth. In April 2019, the National Trust issued a plea for the public to follow the Countryside Code after a fire started by a barbecue tore through Marsden Moor, destroying blanket bog and vital habitats for ground-nesting birds. It is estimated that more than £200,000-worth of investment in restoring wildlife habitat in the area has been lost. Curlew and mountain hare populations are believed to have been hardest hit by the blaze, which covered more than 1,500 hectares. People can make all the difference in limiting this risk by just following simple measures included in the Countryside Code.

I envy the noble Earl, Lord Shrewsbury, living as he does so close to Dovedale, which I have visited on several occasions. Fly-tipping is a scourge and should be heavily penalised. Often it is down to sheer laziness on the part of the perpetrators. Clearing up after visitors and fly-tippers can cost landowners and farmers many thousands of pounds.

Some of your Lordships have advocated notices warning walkers to keep gates shut and respect the land they are walking on. However, on Tuesday, the noble Viscount, Lord Trenchard, felt that the countryside would be spoiled if it was, as he put it, “littered with signage”. Signage is not as intrusive as fire damage. It is much better to have signs inviting people to be more careful and not damage the countryside than to have it ruined by thoughtlessness.

The noble Lord, Lord Cormack, promotes compulsory education of a countryside code or a passport for young people. It is certainly true that the younger people are when we educate them into respecting the countryside, the better that will be. However, I would not make that compulsory. Those living in blocks of flats are unlikely to have been to the countryside; nor, sadly, are they ever likely to go. A much better way would be to promote and regenerate the Duke of Edinburgh’s scheme, which, due to a lack of youth service funding in many areas, no longer takes place. That is an excellent way to encourage young people into the countryside and into respect for it.

If damage, including littering, is done, landowners should be compensated and the perpetrators found, prosecuted and fined to help cover the cost of rectifying the damage they have caused. The legislation is there for this to happen now but it is not enforced, and it should be. ANPR could help with that, as the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, said. I have sympathy with all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate, but I fear that the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, probably did not help his case with some of the examples that he mentioned. Nevertheless, I support this amendment.

[Baroness Wilcox of Newport (Lab) [V]]

This amendment is to examine whether, or indeed how, a better balance can be struck between the interests of landowners and members of the public who wish to access the countryside.

The ability to access so much of Britain’s countryside is one of our great national traditions, and it plays an important role in leisure, education and our wider economy. I am indeed fortunate to live in a country within the wider UK where so much natural beauty is literally on my doorstep. From the Vale of Usk to the Brecon Beacons and the magnificence of the post-industrial south Wales valleys, the beauty and elegance of our countryside is a joy and treasure that must be protected and balanced for the preservation of our future generations. Indeed, as noble Lords have noted in the debate, rights and responsibilities must be evenly balanced. As a former leader of a local authority, when residents’ complaints came in, I was often quoted as saying that the council does not have a littering department; it is in fact people who litter their rural and urban environments and leave it to councils to clear it up afterwards.

The Countryside Code is a readily available and easily accessible document which aims to ensure that guests are respectful of the local community and to continue the preservation of the condition of the countryside. In addition, we welcome the fact that a revised Covid-19 code was published in an attempt to drive home the key messages at a time when more people may have been visiting the countryside. We hope this simpler messaging will be carried forward, even as the public health situation improves.

However, as with any form of ownership, owning land involves a balance of rights and responsibilities; rights of access are established, and the responsibilities and costs associated with them should therefore not come as a surprise to the landowner. As my noble friend Lord Rooker said, access is here to stay but it has to be managed, and serious fly-tipping must be followed up and traced back to where it came from. Indeed, the police should take a greater role in such enforcement. There may be some merit in exploring what more can be done to minimise extra costs on landowners, but that should not necessarily come at the expense of wider support for agriculture and horticulture.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, I believe that we all share the concerns of my noble friend Lord Caithness about the cost to landowners, local authorities and the National Trust and other bodies of littering and fly-tipping. Indeed, the noble Earl, Lord Devon, spoke powerfully about this issue on Tuesday. He was also very generous in not seeking to prevent others enjoying his land so long as no damage is done—a positive approach also promoted by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker. As we just heard from the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, rights come with responsibilities. However, I point out that the provision of access to private land is still voluntary.

As we discussed on Tuesday, public access to the countryside provides a huge range of benefits, including improving physical and mental health and supporting local communities and economies. I understand that, at times, providing such public access can bring about some extra costs and risks to land managers. We will be working closely with stakeholders to understand the full costs of providing access, to make sure that the system works for land managers.

I thank my noble friend for raising this issue. It is important to make sure that the Countryside Code is as effective as possible in promoting responsible behaviour. As my noble friend the Minister said on Tuesday, and my noble friend Lord Cormack also mentioned, Natural England will soon start work on refreshing the Countryside Code to ensure that these messages are communicated effectively.

It is vital that young people are taught about the environment, and a number of noble Lords mentioned the importance of education. For that reason, related topics on the environment and the countryside are included throughout the geography and science GCSE curriculums. As part of that, the national curriculum programme of study recommends that pupils should use the local environment to support their learning in these areas.

A number of noble Lords mentioned enforcement, and a number of bits of legislation that cover littering are already in place. The main piece, which covers littering and refuse, is Part 4 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. Crucially, Section 87 of that Act states that it is an offence for a person to drop, throw down, leave or deposit litter in a public place, and it carries a maximum fine of £2,500 and can be tried in a magistrates’ court. Furthermore, current by-law legislation allows local authorities to restrict and enforce the use of disposable barbecues in public parks and spaces. There are existing powers in legislation which can be used by authorities. I should point out that in our manifesto we committed to increasing the penalties for fly-tipping.

The Bill includes powers to provide financial assistance to promote better understanding of the environment. Better understanding of the environment could include, for example, help for land managers to communicate to visitors the types of messages which are in the Countryside Code. All these actions will help to ensure that the impact of public access is as positive as possible and that any risk of damage is kept to a minimum.

A number of noble Lords mentioned fly-tipping and the hazards it has created in the countryside. I, too, have observed hideous instances of fly-tipping in my small village where farm gateways are regularly used to deposit mattresses and fridges which then get burned out, so I share the concerns raised by my noble friends Lord Trenchard and Lord Shrewsbury and the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, but I do not agree that it is just laziness, as suggested by the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell. This is criminal behaviour which is addressed through the criminal courts.

It would be good to think that eventually, with education, we can change the culture of whoever it is, from the dog owner in Richmond Park to the people who at the end of lockdown enjoyed the beaches but left so much litter behind. With that emphasis on education and with proper enforcement, littering will become as anti-social as drink-driving has now become.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville [V]]

My Lords, the amendments from my noble friend Lord Greaves in this group encourage financial assistance for the reintroduction of native species or animals and plants that have become extinct, and I thank him for the opportunity to debate this. He has set out what rewilding is and what it is not.

The noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, mentioned the rewilding at Knepp. This has led to a large number of rare and beautiful butterflies and insects returning to the land. The Rare Breeds Survival Trust provides the information that, between 1900 and 1973, the United Kingdom lost 26 of its native breeds of livestock. I welcome the return of the red kite, the sea-eagle and the golden eagle in Scotland. The breeding programmes for these birds require a delicate balance. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, about the beauty of these birds.

Currently, there are about 30,000 herds and flocks of native breeds in the UK. They contribute over £700 million to UK local economies. Native breeds were bred for the British landscape and can thrive on even marginal grassland with a minimum of expensive inputs. It is important to preserve our national identity and heritage and, where possible, to reintroduce native breeds. All this can assist biodiversity, as my noble friend Lady Scott of Needham Market has said. Balance is everything, and butterflies are much more welcome than beavers.

The Crop Protection Association tells us that the crops that our farmers grow must compete with around 30,000 species of weeds and 10,000 species of insect pests and countless diseases. However, statistics show that nine out of 10 adults in England are concerned about the increasing threats to the natural environment, with nearly two-thirds specifically worried about biodiversity loss. Farmland birds have declined by 54% since 1970. So is now the time to be thinking about rewilding schemes?

A huge amount of investment is needed to get rewilding started, and often huge grants are required to keep the funding going. As the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, has indicated, that could be through fencing. In the last couple of years, there has been an increased interest in rewilding from landowners, including farmers, not only here in the UK but throughout Europe and indeed across the world. However, it is not a short-term fix and it has proven to be economically unviable on a large scale. It is undoubtedly true that rewilding has a place in agriculture and in the make-up of our land as we go forward, but the way in which it will be funded is not straightforward.

The Rare Breeds Survival Trust tells us that the meadows and pastures we value so much came into being because they were grazed by our native livestock. If we want to restore or even create more of them then the Government should be incentivising farmers to keep native livestock, but a softly-softly approach is needed. In addition, native cattle, with their unusual appearance, horns, long coats, colours and so on, add much to the quality of the landscape.

Wholesale rewilding without thought to neighbouring landowners and farmers is not likely to find favour. It is undoubtedly true that the countryside is a much more interesting and attractive place when it has been rewilded, but will that be sufficient for the practice to become more widespread than is currently the case? I look forward to the Minister’s comments, as I am in two minds about this group of amendments.

[Baroness Wilcox of Newport [V]]

I thank all noble Lords who have spoken. We have had a very interesting debate on this amendment. While the core focus of the Bill is on agriculture and horticulture in terms of food production and environmental improvement, the cultural and heritage aspects of agriculture also deserve our attention. We therefore welcome the tabling of Amendment 19, which would support the reintroduction of native species that have become locally or nationally extinct. I note the comment by the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, that that does not include bears and wolves but, as the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, said, we already have wild boars in nearby Gloucestershire. I am delighted to inform noble Lords that Wales is one of Europe’s best wildlife watching secrets and can rival anywhere in the world. These wonders might be anything: rare sightings of ospreys, a frenzy of red kites, the world’s largest Manx shearwater colonies or one of the best places in Britain to see puffins and porpoises.

On Amendments 52 and 102, we are indeed sympathetic to the arguments for providing some form of financial assistance to large-scale rewilding schemes where such schemes would bring tangible benefits in terms of biodiversity. Could the Minister confirm what schemes, if any, are already available? What kind of budgets do such schemes attract? Is it his opinion that such schemes fall within the scope of the Bill, or do powers to initiate or fund exist elsewhere?