Oral Answers to Questions
Danny Kruger Excerpts(1 year, 11 months ago)
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Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
The Second Church Estates Commissioner (Andrew Selous)
The Church Commissioners have provided £15 million to help churches with their energy costs, so that they continue to act as places to worship Jesus but also stay open at other times, if they are able to, to provide practical community support, such as being a warm hub.
Danny Kruger
I thank the Government for ensuring that churches are included in the package of support that businesses receive to pay their energy bills. Will my hon. Friend join me in congratulating the churches across Wiltshire that have opened their spaces to people in the daytime, providing their traditional role as a place for fellowship, community and support? Does he agree that the churches that have found it easier to fulfil this traditional role are those that have ripped out the Victorian pews, which are such an obstacle to the traditional role of fellowship?
Andrew Selous
My hon. Friend is a powerful advocate for exactly this type of voluntary community action. The Church of England will always be at the centre of such endeavours, which can be facilitated by churches that make possible the type of activity he mentions. I am not yet aware of any warm hubs in Devizes, although I have noticed some in neighbouring towns. I am sure my hon. Friend will be encouraging his local churches to facilitate such schemes in his area.
Oral Answers to Questions
Danny Kruger Excerpts(2 years, 4 months ago)
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Andrew Selous
I totally understand the point the right hon. Gentleman is making. He will know that the Church of England absolutely holds to its vision to have a Church of England presence in every community. Of course, he is right that if there are not so many incumbents, it can be difficult for them to go in and do assemblies in Church schools and so on, but the Church is really focused on the frontline and putting the parish first.
Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
Church education is quite rightly a priority for our Church, particularly for its leadership, but can my hon. Friend assure me that significant appointments to the Church, particularly to the House of Bishops, demonstrate that the Church of England is actively seeking to represent the breadth of opinion among its members, particularly those of a more conservative theological disposition?
Mr Speaker
Order. Sorry, but that is not a relevant question. [Interruption.] I know that the hon. Gentleman is shaking his head at me, but I cannot allow open supplementary questions on a closed question.
Ofwat: Strategic Priorities
Danny Kruger Excerpts(2 years, 4 months ago)
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Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Philip Dunne) for securing this debate, and for all the work that he does to champion the cause of English rivers. I do not think that anyone in our country, except possibly the Minister, has done more to preserve, enhance and defend the health of our rivers—not even the Duke of Wellington deserves our thanks in the way that my right hon. Friend does. I am pleased to have helped sponsor the debate.
I echo every point that has been made about the critical state of our rivers and the absolute imperative that we have to act, and to go further. My constituency of Devizes in Wiltshire has a number of rivers that are suffering. In particular, the Hampshire Avon site of scientific interest is suffering increasing phosphate loads every year, which is a complete disaster for the river’s health and biodiversity and for the soil, but it is also a disaster for people whose health is affected and for the wider economy because it stops development.
A brake on inappropriate development in our rural areas is a good thing in many ways, and Wiltshire Council has rightly paused development permissions periodically because it has to mitigate the phosphate pouring into our rivers, but it is harmful to getting the housing we need in our area, so we have to do something. The simple fact is that the offsetting by developers is inadequate, as they cannot possibly offset enough to cope with the phosphate loads going into the rivers.
Many hon. Members have said that investment, particularly in sewage treatment works, is essential. We have to build infrastructure that can cope. My right hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow made the point very delicately that, historically, the overriding focus of the mandate under which Ofwat operates is to bear down on the rates that people pay for their water. That focus on price is ultimately unsustainable. The hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard) is correct that this is not the moment to be anticipating or calling for price rises in people’s water bills. However, in the long term, my right hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow is right. I welcome the strategic policy statement that allows for investment in infrastructure that ultimately feeds through into prices. That is the only way to finance this work.
I echo my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne (Sir Charles Walker) in saying that, when companies are fined for sewage discharges, the money should not just go to the Treasury or to meaningless little reductions in bills. It needs to go into restoring the landscape, because the best sort of sewage treatment, as I have seen in Wiltshire, uses nature-based solutions not big concreate infrastructure. We need green and grey kit.
I have seen a project sponsored by Wessex Water, to its credit, on land owned by the Wiltshire Wildlife Trust. It is a reed bed that processes foul water, and it is very inoffensive. I would hardly call it infrastructure, because it is a field with a lot of reeds growing in it—it is a swamp. It does not smell, and it looks perfectly nice. A person walking past would hardly notice it, but the water flowing out of the reed bed and into the river on the other side is cleaner than the water flowing down the river itself. It enhances our environment when we have good nature-based infrastructure.
I end with a tribute to some people in Wiltshire who have inspired me to take up the mission of cleaning up our rivers. Anglers such as Tom Putnam, a constituent who got in touch with me, and David Bromhead are concerned about the state of the Hampshire Avon. I thank Charlotte Hitchmough, who leads Action for the River Kennet, which is an outstanding charity—I have been out planting trees and supporting its work. And I thank Gary Mantle of the Wiltshire Wildlife Trust.
This might seem a little totemic, but we have amazing volunteers on all our rivers, which is great, and we have lots of water companies, businesses, developers, councils and others. What we really need is river-based co-ordination. Rather than great national, regional or catchment-based policies, why do we not appoint some kind of river god or warden for each river? It should be a volunteer who does not work for the Government and does not necessarily have any power but who has the authority to co-ordinate the voluntary efforts along each river. People think in terms of rivers rather than counties or even water company areas. We could authorise individuals—I have some people I would nominate for the Kennet or for the two Avons—who would take that responsibility to champion the cause of the river and intermediate between power and all the other volunteers who work there locally.
I wish to end on a point I have made in speeches about rivers before. I feel a special responsibility to rivers because I represent Morgan’s Hill, a beautiful spot just north of Devizes. A drop of rain that falls on Morgan’s Hill could end up flowing out west along the Bristol Avon and into the Atlantic, south along the Hampshire Avon and into the English channel or east along the Kennet, into the Thames and out into the North sea. Morgan’s Hill is a hydrological dividing point that waters the whole of southern England, and I feel a particular responsibility to the rivers that flow out of this district of Wiltshire.
Sir Charles Walker
May I say how lucky that drop of water is if it flows through the Hampshire Avon, one of the finest rivers in this country? It is a blessed drop of water.
Danny Kruger
It would be very lucky, except that it would get loaded with phosphate on the way, and that is the challenge we have to mitigate. Equally, the Kennet and Bristol Avon are glorious rivers, and we have a responsibility to try to clean them.
I really do pay tribute to the Minister for the work she does, as she is an indefatigable champion of water health and our rivers. I am also very pleased with the spirit of this debate. I pay particular tribute to the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport, who could have laid into the Government, as he used to do on the Front Bench, but instead paid tribute to the Minister for her commitment on this cause. So I think we are all in the right place.
Oral Answers to Questions
Danny Kruger Excerpts(2 years, 11 months ago)
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George Eustice
As the hon. Lady will know, we have a significant number of staff—more than 10,000—in the Environment Agency. Waste crime and fly-tipping have been a priority for them, and a number of successful prosecutions have been brought.
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (George Eustice)
Improving water quality is a priority for this Government. We are the first Government to work to tackle the historic issue of storm overflows, including by placing a duty on water companies through our landmark Environment Act 2021. That duty builds on the expectation for the water industry to achieve a significant reduction in harm from storm overflows, as laid out in our draft strategic policy statement for Ofwat.
Danny Kruger
I am grateful for that and very much welcome it. The Secretary of State will be aware that Morgan’s Hill in my constituency is the source place for southern England; a drop of rain that falls there could end up in the North sea, the English channel or the Atlantic ocean. The Government are reviewing the mandate for Ofwat. Will the Secretary of State confirm that Ofwat will be directed to ensure that the water companies have the funding that they need—that they can raise the funding that they need—to make the necessary investments in infrastructure: not just the grey concrete infrastructure, but the green nature recovery infrastructure that is needed to clean our rivers?
George Eustice
My hon. Friend makes an important point. I can confirm that the new draft strategic policy statement that we have issued to Ofwat states that there is a clear priority around reducing storm overflows and delivering our environmental outcomes. Yes, in the next price review, such infrastructure will be at the top of its list of priorities.
Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
The Second Church Estates Commissioner (Andrew Selous)
At last month’s General Synod, the Archbishop of York spoke about the revitalisation of the parish in order that parish churches can reach and serve everyone in their community. I can tell my hon. Friend that since 2017, the Church Commissioners have given £130 million to support ministry in deprived parishes.
Danny Kruger
I thank my hon. Friend for that answer. I quickly pay tribute to the Bishop of Ramsbury in my constituency, Andrew Rumsey, who has been appointed by the Church to review the use of church buildings across our country. The bishop is England’s foremost expert on the parish, and I know that my hon. Friend will want to save the parish as much as the rest of us. The Church of England’s vision for future ministry includes the line:
“a Christian presence in every community”.
What is the Church of England doing to ensure that every community has a locally based, theologically trained and well-resourced cleric?
Andrew Selous
I am delighted to welcome my hon. Friend’s new bishop to his post. I can tell my hon. Friend that the Church of England remains committed to providing a Christian presence in every community. Last year, 591 people were recommended for ordained ministry, the highest number for 13 years. Ordinations to stipendiary ministry have increased by 43% since 2013. I also warmly commend the work of the Church Revitalisation Trust and its Peter and Caleb streams, which are increasing the number of clergy from diverse or working-class backgrounds and those in later life.
Oral Answers to Questions
Danny Kruger Excerpts(3 years ago)
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Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
Andrew Selous
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. This is an important question, and I am grateful to get the answer on the record.
The Church of England is not a single institution, so it does not have a single payroll budget. In 2019, £255 million was spent on stipends and pension contributions for ordained ministers in parishes and a further £124 million was spent on clergy housing and working costs, £65 million was spent on staff in dioceses and £30 million was spent on staff in the National Church Institutions.
Back British Farming Day
Danny Kruger Excerpts(3 years, 1 month ago)
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Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
It is very good of you to call me at all, Ms Nokes, as I was late for the beginning of the debate, for which I apologise. I beg your forgiveness and also that of my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Theo Clarke). I am sorry to have missed the first minute or two of her brilliant speech. I served with her on the Agriculture Bill Committee and I remember the incredibly erudite and impressive to and fro between the Front Benchers arguing over what happens when sows roll over and that sort of thing—I learnt a huge amount. During the passage of the Bill I was pleased that food production was inserted as a public good. The principle that the Bill now represents standing up for British farmers and ensuring that the industry can thrive in this new world is to be greatly welcomed.
Let me say a word on our trade policy. It is absolutely right that we pursue a policy of free trade in agriculture. It is the right thing for the world and for our country. Obviously, we have been through this over the centuries. The principle of consumer price and choice and the competition that trade induces, including over quality, are absolutely vital and not to be overlooked. The policy is also an enormous export opportunity. Wiltshire is home not only to farmers who produce glorious food for domestic consumption and export, but to some of the most innovative technology, new engineering techniques and methods of protein manufacturing. Those have enormous potential for our county and our country, in the context of the huge challenge of feeding the world, including the urbanised population of China. I hope that our country can play a role in that through our trade policy. That policy is also of great benefit to the world’s producers. One of the great advantages of being outside the common agricultural policy is that we can genuinely welcome the products of the world, as we are no longer in a protective racket that excluded African producers, in particular.
I am also concerned—I know that the Minister shares this aspiration—that our agricultural policy ensures that we eat more of our own food in this country and that we consume more domestic produce. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Cherilyn Mackrory) about the quality of food eaten by our population. I worry about creating a two-tier system, where wealthy people eat glorious British produce while poorer people are expected to eat lower quality food produced abroad, possibly to lower standards. I know that the Minister shares that concern.
It is good and right that we support production through the new subsidy system. In general, we do not do that—and we should not—but farmers have a role in maintaining this country’s greatest natural asset: our land and countryside. Roger Scruton, who should be quoted as often as possible, said that the beauty of the English countryside is testament to centuries of inherited property rights. The principle of supporting those landowners and tenants is important. Secondly, there is the importance of resilience: we are seeing the rise of economic nationalism around the world, and we have learned in the last year and a half the incredible importance of a secure supply of our essentials, including food. I am pleased that the Government are putting food security at the heart of their strategy and that we are developing a national food security strategy.
My thanks to all Members and to my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford for securing this debate. My thanks to Wiltshire farmers and particularly to my friend Peter Lemon, who started the Southern Streams project in the Marlborough Downs in Wiltshire, which has secured the protection of the streams in my area. Farmers do an amazing amount of work, not only in securing our food but in maintaining our environment.
Oral Answers to Questions
Danny Kruger Excerpts(3 years, 9 months ago)
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Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
Alexander Stafford (Rother Valley) (Con)
The Second Church Estates Commissioner (Andrew Selous)
The Church is grateful to the Government for not imposing another national closure of religious buildings. It is right that parishes take local decisions on what to offer. There were nearly 36 million viewings of the Church’s Christmas “Comfort and Joy” series. For those who prefer the telephone, the DailyHope worship has received 350,000 free calls.
Danny Kruger [V]
It is very encouraging to hear that. It is a matter of deep regret that churches were closed during the lockdowns last year. I very much appreciate that they are allowed to conduct services this time. Obviously we hope that we will all be out of restrictions soon, but there is always a danger of further restrictions. We worry a lot about the provision of online teaching in schools. Does my hon. Friend agree that the delivery of online live church services is enormously important, and—we must be frank—that this is not a skill that might come naturally to many vicars? Does he agree that the Church of England should make an absolute priority the provision of online resources, and the training of vicars and church teams to deliver them?
Andrew Selous
Indeed I do. Over 7,000 people have now attended the Church’s digital training, equipping parishes across the country to stream services on a variety of different platforms. My own rector has now been commended for her YouTube skills by eight-year-olds in her benefice.
Agriculture
Danny Kruger Excerpts(3 years, 11 months ago)
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Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
Madam Deputy Speaker, I rise to discuss the second instrument about direct payments, and I beg your forbearance and that of the Front Benchers, who I expect thought they would get away with being the only speakers this afternoon. I am sorry about that, but I put in because I did not get the chance to speak in the debates on the Agriculture Bill earlier this year. I hope the House and you will indulge me for a few minutes while I speak about Wiltshire farmers and the role I think farming could play in the UK after Brexit.
I much enjoyed the Bill Committee, and especially the erudition and good humour of the two Front Benchers. My hon. Friend the Minister and I have something in common, which is a parent in the public eye—both with some strong farming and food credentials, and both with some suspicions about what the Government are up to it when it comes to agriculture—
Danny Kruger
The Minister denies it. It is true to say that I do not think she had the pleasure of the experience of a convoy of tractors driving through Banbury in protest at the Agriculture Bill, with a huge placard on the front tractor saying, “Daddy knows best”, which is what I had in Marlborough, with a placard saying, “Mummy knows best”. Of course, Mummy does know best; she just did not understand the question in that instance. I did of course disagree with those farmers on the detail of the Agriculture Bill, but I did and do share their concerns, and I want to try to summarise those today. There are basically two: there is a practical concern about farm incomes, and there is a strategic or philosophical concern about the place of farming in this country’s future.
Let me summarise the practical concern first. We are basically moving the subsidy—some billions of pounds—from farming as it is traditionally understood, as the management of land for the production of food, to environmental stewardship. The overall budget might be the same and individual farm incomes may be guaranteed for a few years, but this is a profound change in the business model of farming. I was very pleased to get assurances on Monday from the Secretary of State in his statement that the switch is not intended to reduce food production or to take land out of cultivation and put it to other uses. I believe him, and I am sure that is the intention. I fully support the overall mission of the reforms, which is to enable sustainable food production in this country, but the design and details of the system are essential to make sure that we do not inadvertently make people, against their best instincts and against the traditions of their own land, become unwilling environmental stewards rather than food producers.
We all know the jokes about farmers being asked, “What do you farm?” and answering, “Subsidies, mostly.” I am all for subsidies, and I am all for stewardship and for paying farmers to maintain the forests, the streams and the soil, but let us make sure they farm animals and crops. The details of the scheme are what matters here, and we need to get on with it. The time is tight for phasing out basic payments, and we still do not know the full details of what will replace them. I appreciate and applaud the reason for this—the Government want to consult with farmers on the best system for them—but I hope this can happen soon and finish quickly.
Let me finish with the strategic question, which, in a sense, underpins all the technical debate that we are having about subsidies. The Opposition spent much of the debate on the Agriculture Bill talking about trade deals. Although, in a sense, trade deals had nothing to do with that Bill, which was about support for and regulation of British farms, I appreciate why they discussed them. The fact is that a bad trade deal could undermine a good Agriculture Bill—and it was a good Agriculture Bill, especially once food production was recognised as something worth including.
I applaud the Government for the deal they did to keep the National Farmers Union and the Department for International Trade happy by ensuring proper statutory oversight of the trade deals to make sure that food standards and farming interests are protected. We are now in the process of negotiating those trade deals, and here is where the philosophical difference arises; I fear that there may be a philosophical difference between DEFRA and DIT.
It is right that the Departments have slightly different approaches. DIT is there to maximise trade for British companies so that they benefit from lucrative exports and British consumers benefit from cheap imports. Let me take this opportunity to congratulate my old friends Douglas Carswell and Dominic Johnson on their appointments as non-executive directors of DIT this week. They are great patriots with all the right instincts—so much so that I see that DIT has been dubbed by some Conservatives “the Ministry of Sound”. I am pleased about their appointments, but I am not sure that Douglas Carswell or Dominic Johnson has ever so much as grown a tray of cress, let alone planted a carrot or had anything to do with actual farming. I wish all power to the Minister’s elbow in the ongoing oversight that she will exercise over her colleagues in the trade deals that are being negotiated.
We must not offshore our carbon emissions or animal cruelty to other countries. We must not sell out our farmers. We must make a moral and political decision to rely more on British food. Partly this is about food security—as this year shows, it would be unwise to take land out of production that we might need in future crises—but it is also about a way of life. In a mysterious sense, landscape is a human construct bounded by walls and ditches, marked by copses and fields that have been maintained by people who owned or rented the land for generations. Land is made beautiful and meaningful because it is used, not just for the public good of environmental wellbeing, but for the private good of the people who live on it. That is why there is a special place for farmers as stewards of a landscape in use.
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for your patience; I thank the House too. Let me also express my appreciation of the Minister for her work and my support for these statutory instruments. We must maintain direct payments for our farmers. We must introduce variable tariffs to make it pointless for foreign countries to export to this country food made to lower standards than ours. We must protect our farmers, because their private good is the public good.
Hare Coursing
Danny Kruger Excerpts(3 years, 11 months ago)
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Gordon Henderson
My hon. Friend will be delighted to learn that I am about to come to that in my speech; he has pre-empted me somewhat.
In addition to the adverse effect of hare coursing on the hare population, there is a negative impact on the lives of farmers and landowners, who have to put up with all sorts of illegal acts, such as vandalism of property, theft, intimidation and the destruction of crops, with the consequential loss of income. Of course, those who take part in illegal hare coursing are also guilty of other crimes, such as road traffic offences—including the driving of unlicensed and uninsured vehicles—drug taking, the possession of firearms, and the illegal betting that I mentioned earlier.
I would like to tell the experience of one of my local farmers, a friend of mine. In October, just before harvest time, my friend discovered that vehicles had been driven on to one of his fields, leaving wheel marks and scuffs on the turns. He said that although the marks left by the wheels largely faded away, the scuff marks did not, and he lost crops at harvest, which meant a loss of income and earnings. It was not the first time that that had happened. My friend is not alone: many of my local farmers experience similar problems.
Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
Other hon. Members have made the point that the old game laws need to be reformed to increase fines and the money that the courts can reclaim from those criminals. My hon. Friend mentions the impact of the damage on farmers. Farmers also have to invest quite significantly in defences against hare coursing, such as digging ditches and putting locks and bars on gates. Does he agree that it should be possible for councils or the police to recompense farmers for some of the costs that they incur in defending against illegal hare coursing if, as I hope he will mention, the courts can reclaim far more money from the criminals?
Gordon Henderson
My hon. Friend must have been reading my speech, because my very next paragraph explains that my farmer friend decided to dig ditches around his fields and install locked metal gates wherever he could. Even those sensible actions did not deter the criminals because, as my hon. Friend explained, they now come prepared with battery-powered disc cutters to cut off the padlocks or cut through the metal barriers to get to the fields and continue their hare coursing. How on earth are our hard-working farmers meant to earn a living in the face of these determined thugs who break down barriers to trespass on their land?
The behaviour described by that farmer is not that of opportunists, but well planned acts by people who are motivated by nothing more than greed and money. That is clear from the equipment they carry with them. They are prepared for breaking and entering, invading other people’s land, and causing long-term damage while they are there. That behaviour needs to be stamped out, but the available sentencing powers are insufficient to be a deterrent.
As Members of Parliament, we have a duty to our constituents and hard-working business owners to ensure that their firms are protected. Farmers are businesspeople. These callous acts of criminal damage would not be tolerated against any other business. Why should it be any different for farmers and landowners?
This year has proved challenging for lots of rural businesses, including farms, which have not escaped the pandemic and the resulting economic impact. Farms have also faced the worrying possibility of a no-deal Brexit. They do not need the additional threat posed by criminal gangs, who are increasingly targeting rural communities.
What can be done about hare coursing? The Crown Prosecution Service website admits that
“Hare coursing can cause significant disturbance in the countryside”,
as well as causing a lot of concern to people living in the wider rural community where the activity takes place. Those words are small comfort to farmers who believe that the “significant disturbance” is being ignored, as are the laws that have been put in place to protect them. As hon. Members have pointed out, three pieces of legislation cover the problems that farmers face.
First, section 30 of the Game Act 1831 includes two separate offences for trespassing during the day in search of game. Fines depend on the number of people involved: up to £1,000, or up to £2,500 if a group contains five or more people. Secondly, Section 1 of the Night Poaching Act 1828 sets out two separate offences: the first makes it illegal to go on someone else’s land unlawfully at night to take or destroy game, while the second makes it illegal to enter land unlawfully
“with any gun, net, engine, or other instrument, for the purpose of taking or destroying game”.
Someone caught committing those offences could be liable for a fine of up to £1,000. Finally, the Hunting Act 2004 outlaws activities associated with organised hunts.
Hare coursing, however, was an offence of its own long before the Hunting Act 2004 came into force. I share the view of the Nation Farmers Union and see no reason why the Hunting Act 2004 should have to be used to sort out this problem. Hare coursing is a much wider issue that should be treated in isolation, not in conjunction with the Act. Legal guidance from the Crown Prosecution Service says that more effective tools for prosecuting are either the Game Act 1831 or Night Poaching Act 1828, both of which I mentioned earlier. We have enough legislation to tackle hare coursing, but the problem is how the maximum penalties in those Acts are implemented: the truth is, not very well.
Rural crime, including hare coursing, has escalated in Kent in recent years and policing methods have had to adapt and change with the growing threat this now presents to rural communities. Officers in the Kent police rural taskforce do excellent work in tracking down the perpetrators of rural crime and building cases against them. However, they do not always receive the support they deserve because they are not always backed up by the rest of the justice system. For instance, the Crown Prosecution Service decides whether a crime is worth prosecuting and the courts decide what punishment should be meted out once prosecution goes ahead and somebody is found guilty.
Farmers and other people living in rural areas in my constituency want to see a toughening of the penalties imposed on those found guilty of rural crimes, as my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Danny Kruger) said, because the current penalties are simply not enough to discourage hare coursing criminals. The NFU released some research a couple of months ago that looked at the level of fines imposed on those found guilty of hare coursing. Between 2014 and 2018, the average fine under the Game Act 1831 was £227, when the maximum fine for offences under the Act is £1,000, or £2,500 if five or more offenders are involved. It cannot be right that the average fine imposed by the courts was just £227, and I am sure you would agree, Sir Christopher, that such a penalty is derisory.
As I mentioned, a lot of money is made from hare coursing. Sometimes hundreds of thousands of pounds is involved; surely nobody believes that such a small fine is going to put perpetrators off. Frankly, it is tantamount to a slap on the wrist. How can such risible fines be justified to farmers who, due to biosecurity concerns, may have to scrap tens of thousands of pounds worth of crops damaged by hare coursing? It is just adding insult to injury.
When the victims are brave enough to confront the trespassers—as some of the farmers in my constituency have in the past—they are met with threats of violence and untold amounts of verbal abuse, and it has to stop. We are a civilised nation that relies on its farmers, and we have to protect them from these thugs. They need Government support that they are currently not getting.
In the absence of that support, the NFU has this year worked with other farming business and rural wildlife organisations to create an alliance that aims to produce an action plan to end illegal hare coursing. This coalition believes that some simple changes to the Game Act 1831, together with better guidance for the judiciary when passing fines, would go some way to mitigate the worry, the disruption and the intimidation experienced. For instance, it has been suggested that the most powerful way to get through to the people committing those crimes is to seize their dogs, as my hon. Friend the Member for Strangford mentioned earlier. Currently, police forces are deterred from taking such action because the cost of keeping animals in kennels cannot be recovered from the offenders in the same way as it would be if dogs were seized for their own protection under the Animal Welfare Act 2006.
I understand that police fully support an amendment to the Game Act 1813 and Night Poaching Act 1828 along those lines. These are not controversial proposals, and, unusually, there is widespread agreement and an acknowledgement that something needs to be done as soon as possible. Why, then, have campaign groups been met with reluctance and hesitation by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to take any of this forward?
These are issues that have been raised for many years and, sadly, these types of attacks on farming communities are nothing new. I have raised this subject before in a Westminster Hall debate. On that occasion, I read this letter from a constituent:
“Dear Sir,
The Isle of Sheppey has a population of over 36,000. During the summer this number is more than doubled. We have read in the local newspaper about yet another reorganisation, but the fact remains that police presence on the Island is inadequate.
On Saturday 2nd November…we had cause to phone 999 as there were four men with dogs coursing hares on our farm. Only one patrol was available. No criticism is intended or implied of the individual officer, but he had no realistic chance of apprehending four experienced criminals who were playing ‘cat and mouse’. With assistance from my husband they were caught, but yet again have got away with it.
This incident was not an isolated one. There have been six incidents here since September…We have witnessed them all and found numerous gates open on all six occasions. This is done deliberately so that the dogs have an unimpeded chase after the hares… we had twenty four incidents of this kind, all of which were reported. Some incidents were attended by the police and some were not. Of the twenty four incidents, arrests were made on only two occasions. In the first case the culprits received £250 fines and we are still waiting for the £15 victim cost.
In the second case the CPS abandoned the case only informing us the day before the hearing. This cost us money as we had already made arrangements for someone to care for our animals during our absence. The CPS claim there was insufficient evidence for the charge that was brought. Our view is that the case was dropped to save money. (It has been reported that the CPS drop 500 cases a week)…We are now in despair and have reached the stage where we may as well let these people have their fun without interruption.”—[Official Report, 9 April 2014; Vol. 579, c. 99WH.]
That Westminster Hall debate took place on Wednesday 9 April 2014. If my calculation is correct, that is six years and eight months ago, give or take a few days. Sadly, the woman who wrote that letter is no longer with us. She died a couple of years ago. The scandal of hare coursing, which filled her with such despair, remains.
I do not want to have to come back for a Westminster Hall debate on hare coursing in another six years, so I urge the Government to listen to my farming community, make the necessary changes to the law and, at the same time, vastly increase the maximum fines for what is a truly barbaric crime. The time for such action is long overdue.
Rebecca Pow
I am actually fairly horrified by that. I hope that is hearsay; I hope it is not true. I was raised and brought up on a farm, and to see a hare out in its natural habitat is a great thing. Certainly, my brother has hares on his farm, and I do not think they have had any incidents of this, but that is not anything that one wants to hear.
This is not just about the harm to the creature, of course. This activity causes real harm to rural communities, which is why we are determined to continue our efforts to prevent it, and my Department is working very closely with the Home Office on this. We have heard some very compelling accounts this morning from my hon. Friend the Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey about the serious harm in his constituency; harm to farming families and to others in the community. We have also heard stories of property theft—the joint is cased while the activity is happening, and often the stealing happens later—dangerous driving, and even arson, assaults and intimidation. Only recently in Cambridgeshire, for example, a man engaged in hare coursing was convicted of dangerous driving and criminal damage and jailed for two months, having driven at speeds of nearly 100 mph across the farmer’s field to try to evade the police. It is also fairly horrifying to hear that these events are now being streamed, which is further expanding the audience.
However, I am sure that my hon. Friend would agree that a lot of progress has been made, certainly over these past six and a half years. I commend the work of the police, because they are doing a great deal in many areas to deter hare coursing. The Government support the police’s efforts to tackle this through the National Police Chiefs’ Council rural and wildlife crime policing strategy—that is a big mouthful, but it is definitely there to help, and it aims to target the problem through better preventative action, improved intelligence and enforcement activity. We are now seeing a much more co-ordinated approach across many police forces.
I particularly pay tribute to Chief Inspector Phil Vickers of Lincolnshire Police, who is the national lead for colleagues and other forces on something called Operation Galileo. I do not know whether my hon. Friend has heard of that, but it focuses on the prevention of hare coursing, and it now joins together 21 police forces, sharing information and intelligence from across the whole of the UK to target offenders. It is supported by other, more sophisticated prosecution capabilities, bringing them to justice; it has also invested in drones, which I believe will be very helpful in something like this, and other technologies so that they can track and monitor hare coursers, as well as gather evidence, which of course is one of the key things. It is bearing fruit: for example, the last two seasons have seen the smallest number of incidents on record in Lincolnshire. What they have learned there is something that others can also learn from and share.
Poaching, which includes hare coursing, is one of the UK’s six wildlife crime priorities. Those priorities are set by the UK Wildlife Crime Tasking and Co-ordination Group and the National Wildlife Crime Unit, which I am very pleased is working well and remains in existence; it has just had its next year’s funding confirmed by DEFRA. It is a joint operation between the Home Office and DEFRA; lots of other interested bodies take part in it, and it also gets funding from the Scottish Government, the Northern Ireland Executive and the National Police Chiefs’ Council. They all put money into the pot, and hare coursing is definitely on their radar.
I must just say that this Government are committed to providing more police officers, and recruitment is well under way, with 4,000 already in place and more on their way. That should also make a difference, particularly in our rural areas.
Danny Kruger
Does the Minister share my concern that the increase in police numbers, while extremely welcome, is still being done according to the old formula, which privileges urban police forces over rural ones? We have to get more police officers into our rural constabularies.
Rebecca Pow
It is about priorities, obviously. I urge my hon. Friend to engage with his local police force. They understand rural crime and its big knock-on effects—it is not a one-off thing; it can spread to all these other things. Hare coursing has knock-on effects, from stealing to arson to other issues. That is definitely being highlighted in rural areas.
I have highlighted lots of good work, but I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey that there is more to do. My Department recently convened a roundtable meeting with a range of rural partners, the police and the Home Office to consider what further action could be taken to strengthen the response to hare coursing. Those discussions will continue. The Minister for Crime and Policing and I really value the insights that those meetings provide us with, and the input that we have had from other hon. Members who have written to us. For example, south Cambridgeshire MPs recently sent a letter about the issues in their area.
I am aware of suggestions that the police should be given greater powers to seize the dogs used in hare coursing, and that the courts could possibly confiscate the dogs permanently on conviction. At the moment, they can seize the dogs, and they look after them in kennels—often at vast expense—but when the person is prosecuted or fined, the dogs get handed back, which could allow for further illegal activities. That has definitely been raised, and we are exploring it further. Similarly, it is up to the courts to decide how to hand out fines and how much to fine, and valid points have been raised that some of the fines are not high enough. Sentencing guidance could potentially help with that, especially for these rural areas.
Agricultural Transition Plan
Danny Kruger Excerpts(3 years, 11 months ago)
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George Eustice
I reject the hon. Gentleman’s claim that the budget is not what was promised. We promised to maintain the budget in each part of the UK in cash terms at the juncture where we left. That is exactly what we are doing. It means that Scotland will receive £595 million per year, 22% higher than it would have received had we used the exchange rate at the start of the last EU programme, and 10% higher than it would have received had we stayed in the EU since it has cut the agriculture budget. This is a good deal for farmers. Indeed it will be open to the devolved Administrations to design their own policy and that could include if they wanted an element of coupled payments.
Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
Can my right hon. Friend reassure farmers in Wiltshire that food production will still be supported under the new scheme and that they will not be undercut by farmers, including in the devolved nations, who are subsidised for food production or by area, not just for stewardship?
George Eustice
I can give my hon. Friend that commitment. The aim of this policy is very much to support and reward farmers for farming more sustainably, but the emphasis throughout is on sustainable food production, not on taking land out of production.