Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between George Eustice and Andrew George

Thursday 12th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[George Eustice]

I know that the right hon. Gentleman has been pursuing this issue. As he will know, at the December Council we argued strongly for measures to be taken on bass. We pressed the European Commission to take emergency measures to ban pair trawling, which was done in the new year. We are currently discussing with other member states and the Commission the possibility of a bag limit for anglers, and also catch limits for the remainder of the commercial fleet. I can also tell the right hon. Gentleman that we are considering raising the minimum landing size nationally.

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

May I urge my hon. Friend to review the application of the rules relating to the ban on the return of fish that might survive, particularly hand-lined mackerel? I have some experience of this, and I know that the vast majority survive. It is absurd for fishermen to be told that they cannot return those fish.

[George Eustice]

Mackerel were included in the pelagic discard ban that was considered last year, but we are giving serious consideration to the survivability rates of white fish, particularly flatfish such as sole and plaice. I shall be happy to look into the specific issue of mackerel hand-lining in Cornwall, and to keep it under constant review. We did manage to secure an exemption for the Cornish sardine industry, which was a big success.

--- Later in debate ---

[George Eustice]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. There will be short-term cash-flow pressures on farmers who are currently receiving low prices and in some cases have quite high costs. I have had a meeting already with the banks to discuss this and to encourage them to show forbearance. As the Secretary of State said earlier, we have also been encouraging HMRC to show forbearance to those farmers facing difficulties, and I will continue to monitor the issue closely.

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

May I urge the Government to reconsider their policy? Although they offer support for bovine TB badger vaccination projects in edge areas, they do not provide that same support in so-called hot-spot areas. I have been working with the Zoological Society of London on a project which has just been very successfully rolled out for its first pilot this year in Penwith. I urge the Government to look at that seriously, because projects in hot spots could make a telling and important contribution to bearing down on bovine TB.

[George Eustice]

I have met the hon. Gentleman to discuss this issue. He is aware that we have made an offer at DEFRA to give some support to that project in his constituency, notably to provide it with free vaccines and some equipment. However, the edge area vaccination scheme is in the edge area for a very good reason: the vaccine does not cure badgers that already have the disease. There is logic to using the vaccine in the edge area, to create a buffer to prevent the spread of the disease, but less so in the high-risk areas.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between George Eustice and Andrew George

Thursday 29th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[George Eustice]

The evidence does not bear out what the hon. Gentleman says. On delays to payments, benefit payments are now made more quickly—93% are paid on time—and hardship payments are now available alongside sanctions.

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

What percentage reduction in badger numbers did the two pilot culls achieve, and would it be inaccurate to say it was far more likely than not that both culls failed to meet the target of a 70% reduction?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between George Eustice and Andrew George

Thursday 27th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[George Eustice]

I will follow up with a response to my hon. Friend’s letter. The Department for Transport is looking at what support may be made available to help with ports. We are considering whether fishermen will be able to receive additional help from the business support fund, which, as I said, is being administered by local authorities, but I am happy to look into the individual cases he raises.

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

Welcome as the package is, I seek further reassurance from the Minister. Fishermen are having difficulty engaging with the scheme. If they have purchased the replacement pots already, they cannot receive any recompense, and the pots also have to have been lost on land.

[George Eustice]

On the latter point, I do not think that that is the case, but the Marine Management Organisation might want to see some evidence that the pots have been damaged or lost. In many cases, the MMO accepts a straightforward statement signed by a fisherman. There is an issue with retrospective payment, as the European Fisheries Fund does not allow for retrospectivity and we have had some discussions with the Commission. We are trying to get a better handle on how many fishermen are affected—we think it may be somewhere between 15 and 20 fishermen—so we are looking into this issue, and I had a meeting with officials on it just yesterday.

Badger Cull

Debate between George Eustice and Andrew George

Thursday 13th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[George Eustice]

I want to say a little about what we have done to progress an oral vaccine. We are spending £1.6 million a year—

[Andrew George]

The Minister referred to the trials that were about to commence in the Penwith area with the support of DEFRA, which is providing the vaccine ampoules, which is much appreciated. He said it was only seven. It was only a small trial of the methodology, not of the numbers.

[George Eustice]

I expect my hon. Friend will do better next year.

As I said, we are spending £1.6 million a year developing an oral vaccine. We have made some progress on the dose required for that vaccine, and it is around 10 times more than would be needed for an injectable vaccine. We have also made some progress towards identifying a bait that would be successful, and we have made some progress towards linking the vaccine to fats that can help get it through the digestive system. But there are drawbacks even to an oral vaccine. Not all badgers will take it, and some badgers may eat more of it than others, so it will never be 100%. But we accept that nothing in this challenge is 100% and that is why we are pursuing it.

On injectable vaccines, I have had representations from my hon. Friends the Members for Morecambe and Lunesdale (David Morris) and for Brighton, Kemptown (Simon Kirby) to look again at whether we could refocus some of our vaccination efforts, either in the edge area, as the right hon. Member for Hazel Grove (Sir Andrew Stunell) suggested, or around the east Sussex area. I have said that we will look closely at that. As several hon. Members have pointed out, we are doing some work in that area now, and we would be willing to develop that further.

On cattle vaccines, the Secretary of State met the commissioner on this just last week. We are continuing to do some work to develop a DIVA test. Field trials will take three to five years, so as a number of hon. Members have pointed out, it will be eight or nine years before we can get export clearance for the use of such a cattle vaccine. However, we are committed to taking this forward.

I agree with hon. Members that improving the control of cattle movements is an important tool in the fight against TB, but I simply point out that we have done a lot already. We now have annual testing in the high-risk area, and four-yearly testing across the whole country. We have banned practices such as approved quarantine units. We now have radial testing in the low-risk areas where we get an outbreak. We have stopped cattle going to major shows since July 2012. We have introduced risk-based trading to help farmers manage the risks. We have an ongoing consultation about restricting movements and introducing pre-movement and post-movement tests to common land. We are introducing deductions for farmers who are late in having their TB test, and we have reduced the pre-movement testing window from 60 to 30 days. So we are doing a huge amount, but I accept that we should be constantly looking to improve and do more, and we are looking, as the hon. Member for Torbay (Mr Sanders) suggested, at whether more could be done, for instance, on biosecurity measures.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between George Eustice and Andrew George

Thursday 13th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[George Eustice]

I regularly debate the issue—a debate was held in Westminster Hall before the Christmas recess—and we are now waiting for the independent expert panel to produce its report. When that report is concluded, we will make further proposals and announcements about the next step.

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

Even if the independent expert panel concludes that the Government’s cull policy is effective, which is highly unlikely, does the Minister not accept that the Government must consider a plan B that includes the vaccination of badgers, which they must get behind, as well as moving forward as quickly as they can with cattle vaccination?

[George Eustice]

We published a draft TB eradication strategy at the end of last summer and we will shortly publish a final version of that strategy. It accepts that there is a range of measures we should pursue, including developing vaccines, and we are doing some work to develop an oral vaccine for badgers as well as on cattle vaccines. We are considering other measures such as contraception for badgers and increased cattle movement controls, so we are covering a range of issues as we try to solve this difficult problem.

Fishing Industry

Debate between George Eustice and Andrew George

Thursday 12th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[George Eustice]

It is important to recognise that the setting of the total allowable catch will remain a European competence, but the management measures will be decided by the member states. On the signing of those management measures, the Commission’s role will be to ensure that we are fishing sustainably. There is an issue—my hon. Friend highlighted this—that, legally, a competence can reside either directly with the Commission or directly with member states. A hybrid system is difficult, but I think our agreement enables us to do that. The Commission can use mechanisms to make agreements between member states legally binding.

[Andrew George]

Will the Minister give way?

[George Eustice]

I want to press on; otherwise we are going to get a bit tight on time and I want to deal with as many of the points that have been raised as possible.

The UK has been leading the way in Europe in trialling schemes that tackle discards through managing fisheries by what is caught, not what is landed. Catch quota schemes have been very effective in reducing discards, and following the success of those schemes I want to continue to help vessels with the transition to the landings obligation under the reformed CFP.

With the aims of the reformed CFP in mind, we will enter the negotiations at the December Council next week, where fishing opportunities will be decided. As my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Miss McIntosh) highlighted, it tends to end up being a late night. In fact, when anybody who has experience of the December Council describes it to me, they do so with a bit of a grin. I am not quite sure what to expect, but I will get some sleep over the weekend.

We aim to negotiate a fair and balanced package of fishing opportunities consistent with our high-level objectives, which are, first, following the best available scientific evidence; secondly, achieving maximum sustainable yield; and thirdly, minimising discards. A range of issues will be UK priorities in the negotiations.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between George Eustice and Andrew George

Thursday 21st November 2013 Commons Chamber

[George Eustice]

Perhaps I can help hon. Members out by saying that the combined estimated worth of pork, beef and lamb to China and Russia is £230 million over three years. In September this year, the Secretary of State visited Russia to help open these markets.

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

12. What progress he has made on reform of the common agricultural policy; and if he will make a statement.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (George Eustice)]

A common agricultural policy reform deal has been agreed between the European Agriculture and Fisheries Council, the European Parliament and the Commission. Overall, the CAP package does not represent a significant reform, but we did improve the Commission’s original proposals, increased flexibility and fended off attempts by others to introduce a number of regressive measures. Our formal consultation on CAP implementation in England was launched earlier this month and will run until 28 November.

[Andrew George]

I am grateful for that reply. In order for British farmers to remain competitive in world markets, it is important that the CAP helps them to meet the reasonable constraints that stop them simply turning the British countryside into ranch and prairie. Is the Minister content that, as drafted, the CAP will deliver public goods without simply giving money to large farmers who do not need it?

[George Eustice]

One area we are looking at in our consultation is how to develop an agri-environment scheme in pillar two. We are keen to build on the fantastic track record we have in these areas. It has always been the Government’s position that we can do more for the environment by spending through pillar two rather than through pillar one. That is why we have aimed to keep as simple as possible the greening measures in the conditions for the single farm payment.

Badger Vaccines

Debate between George Eustice and Andrew George

Wednesday 16th October 2013 Westminster Hall

[George Eustice]

I do not want to get drawn too far into cattle vaccination, but the hon. Gentleman is right that we need to perfect the so-called DIVA test that differentiates between the two. It is clear that it will take some time. The European Commission has put a time frame of 10 years on getting to that stage. I would like that to be quicker, but we have to be realistic—there is a lot to be done.

I come back to supporting badger vaccination. DEFRA operates a badger vaccination fund; in the current year, that has prioritised support for vaccination in the “edge area”. The fund offers start-up grants of 50% to fund the first year of vaccinations. Having said that, it is true to say that applications this year have been a bit disappointing. We are now looking to understand precisely why that is, so that we can get it right next year. Coming back to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale, we are keen to work with all those groups, including voluntary groups, who would like to participate, and to work out how we can get them engaged in that.

I also intend to discuss a plan that the hon. Member for St Ives has on the issue—I have promised to meet him and Rosie Woodroffe. The Department has made a modest commitment to support some vaccination in that regard and he has some ideas; we are keen to pursue that option and look at it.

[Andrew George]

I put on the record my gratitude to DEFRA for the initial funding of the pilot, which is proceeding this week. The intention is to cover the whole 200 square miles of the Land’s End peninsula, and we are increasingly gathering the co-operation of farmers in the area.

[George Eustice]

I know that, and I look forward to discussing the matter further when I meet the hon. Gentleman. The training scheme has become more popular since, as part of the DEFRA-funded badger vaccination fund, we have offered grants of 50% to voluntary and community sector volunteers to train as lay vaccinators. That is another area that we would like to look at.

Finally, I want to say a few words about our work on developing an oral badger vaccine. A badger vaccine could be administered orally through baits. It would be more practical and potentially cheaper, which is why DEFRA continues to fund that. It is not true, as my hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) said, that we have cut expenditure on that. We are, as I say, still spending about £4 million a year in total on developing cattle and badger vaccines.

There are things that we would need to resolve when it comes to the development of an oral vaccine. We would need to work on the safety and effectiveness of the vaccine formulation and make sure that we can deploy the bait to attract the maximum number of badgers. One of the problems is that badgers will not take the bait that is used, so it is important to have the right bait.

Another problem can be that one badger might eat all the bait and another badger might not get any, so there are challenges. We also have to deal with the potential impact and safety for other wildlife. There is still further work to do, but we are committed to taking it forward, and we are clear that that ongoing work will play a role in our strategy.

Agricultural Wages Board

Debate between George Eustice and Andrew George

Wednesday 24th April 2013 Commons Chamber

[George Eustice (Camborne and Redruth) (Con)]

I worked in the farming industry for 10 years and was involved in this debate when the issue was last discussed some 20 years ago—I will come back to that in a moment. It is worth noting—this has been alluded to by some, including the Secretary of State—that in the early ’90s, all other remaining wage councils and wages boards were scrapped. There was no rationale for them. Some 26 remained in about 1993, and all were abolished. Many covered sectors such as hotels, catering, retail, hairdressing and clothing manufacturing, but as the Secretary of State said, there were also some rather odd-looking boards such as those for the ostrich and fancy feather industry, or rope and net manufacturers. One has only to read lists of some of the industries to which the boards applied to realise that the whole concept is anachronistic and out of date.

[Andrew George]

I should have said that, like my hon. Friend, I too was an agricultural worker and worked on our farm. He says that the agricultural sector is the one sector that has been left alone, but it is also the sector into which the Gangmasters Licensing Authority was introduced, which demonstrates that it requires some underpinning with regulation.

[George Eustice]

Equally, we could say that the introduction of the Gangmasters Licensing Authority deals with some of the working conditions problems that Opposition Members have highlighted in a way that makes the AWB ever more redundant.

To return to the 1993 debate, the then Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, Gillian Shephard, held a consultation. A small number of us in the farming industry said that the AWB should go; that it was out of date and anachronistic; that farming should not be treated as a special case; and that the AWB read like something from the 1950s. It tended to be the larger, more forward-thinking farmers who took that view, led by a large salads company, the G’s group, which was run by Guy Shropshire. It was not one of my most successful campaigns. The Government had some 3,500 responses to the consultation, of which only 11 were in favour of abolition. I was one of those 11. That highlights the massive swing in opinion. Opposition Members have highlighted the current consultation, but 40% of people who responded to it have said that abolition is the right thing to do.

Wave Power

Debate between George Eustice and Andrew George

Tuesday 15th February 2011 Westminster Hall

[George Eustice (Camborne and Redruth) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone, in this important debate on the funding of wave-power innovation and technology.

Let me start by saying a little about the potential of this new industry. About 25% of all wave and tidal technology development is going on in this country. Our marine resource is second to none, and that is nowhere truer than in the south-west of England. The extraordinary resource around our coastline is backed up by lots of the skills and expertise that we need to develop the technology. The Carbon Trust has estimated that wave power could eventually meet 15% to 20% of our current power needs and that it might produce enough electricity over time to power 11 million homes. Furthermore, with the extraordinary development of this new energy resource comes a lot of economic potential. It is estimated that the industry could be worth £2 billion by 2050 and that it could create more than 16,000 jobs. Some estimates suggest that the wave and tidal power industries together might employ 10,000 by as early as 2020.

My constituency is home to the wave hub project, which is the first project of its kind anywhere in the world. It is the first time we will have a commercial-scale facility to test arrays of wave-power devices at deep-water locations. The project consists of a long cable 16 km off our coast at Hayle, with a plug anchored on the sea bed to take up to four arrays of devices for testing. Currently, the maximum power produced by each device is 4 or 5 MW, but it will be possible to expand capacity over time so that the wave hub could feed no less than 50 MW into the network. One company has already signed up to plug into the wave-power device. Ocean Power Technologies will test a commercial-scale version of its PowerBuoy system, which is one of the leading systems being developed.

My constituency is also home to the Peninsula Research Institute for Marine Renewable Energy, or PRIMaRE, to give it its short name. The institute is based at the Tremough campus near Falmouth. At the institute, academics from Exeter university and the Camborne School of Mines are doing a lot of important work, which is needed to support the development of wave-power technology. I visited last summer to see some of the work that is being done on moorings. The Cornish coast is famous for wrecking boats, and the sea can be quite choppy at times, so getting the strength of moorings for wave-powered devices just right is an important part of the development of wave power. PRIMaRE is also doing a lot of tests on new devices to see how each device works in commercial situations.

That brings me to a point about the importance of developing and funding technology innovation. The marine renewables deployment fund will be phased out in March 2011, although according to those in the industry, this £40 million fund was never very satisfactory. It was notoriously difficult to access; in fact, I am not sure whether anybody ever successfully accessed it. The reason is that one of the criteria stipulated that a device had to have been actively and successfully working in commercial situations for at least three months before someone was eligible to apply for a grant. However, the key thing about wave-power technologies is that developers need support before that point; they need support before they get to the stage of keeping a device in the water for three months, not after they have achieved that extraordinary feat. Some estimates suggest that the cost of developing and deploying a commercial-scale device is in the region of £30 million, so developers need support much earlier in the process.

Some improvements were made under the marine renewables deployment fund, which was deliberately designed to come in a bit earlier. However, we now need to think carefully about how we move from the proving stage—testing small devices at the European Marine Energy Centre—to the stage of developing wave power on a much bigger scale.

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

My hon. Friend is making a good case. In the previous Parliament, my constituency included the Hayle area, so I was involved in the development of the excellent project he is talking about. However, does he agree—I think he is coming to this—that if the project, which enjoys perfect conditions, is to become a commercial success, we need public sector support, such as renewables obligation certificates or other means, to bridge the gap between where it is now and where it needs to be?

[George Eustice]

Yes, I absolutely agree. Although the wave hub technically comes ashore at Hayle, my hon. Friend has told us once before that it is actually in St Ives waters, and we have both had discussions with representatives of the fishing industry, who have concerns about where the wave hub is located. However, I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend, and I was coming to the point he raises.

The Government have announced a review with the Technology Strategy Board. They have also announced the new idea of technology innovation centres. Those involved with the wave hub and the PRIMaRE institute at Tremough are keen to develop a TIC for offshore renewables in the south-west. What I want from the Minister today is some idea of the criteria that will be applied. We know that a technology innovation needs assessment—TINA, in the jargon of the trade—is being carried out for projects that want to put themselves forward for a TIC. I was recently pleased to hear the Minister repeat his pledge about trying to develop a marine energy park in the south-west, and there is no better place for that than Hayle. A lot of infrastructure improvements are being carried out on the north quay, and a small marine business park will be located near the wave hub project.

I am keen, however, to understand the criteria that will be applied. I am not a big fan of ring-fencing these budgets and pots of money. Some in the industry say that we should make x amount of the £200 million available for wave-power development, but it is much more important to apply the right criteria to determine where to allocate the funds. The marine renewables deployment fund failed because we were far too risk averse. The whole reason for having public subsidy and public investment in these areas is to bridge the gap between risk and potential. When it comes to wave power, we have extraordinary potential, with a source of energy that could meet 15% or 20% of our energy needs. However, there is also a large risk in that it is much harder to develop devices to use out at sea in difficult conditions. As I said, it can cost up to £30 million to develop these technologies. The Government’s role should be to come in and bridge that divide between risk and potential.

The second key point about the criteria is that they must look at what stage the development of the technology has reached. Those involved in wave power have just gone past the phase of testing devices in a tank in the laboratory and have moved to testing commercial-scale arrays, so the industry really needs some additional funds to help it make the next step. A lot of the other renewables industries that will be competing for the same funds are quite a bit further along the development road, and we should be making much tougher demands on them so that they start getting private sector investment. We should also remember that providing public sector investment can unleash a lot of additional private sector investment. The £100 million that the Government have already invested in wave power has brought in an additional £200 million of private sector investment. There is private sector money, but those concerned need to know that there is a commitment to develop things to the next stage.

Finally, geography is another factor to take into account in relation to the capacity to develop an industry, and I want to say a little about ROCs. In Scotland five ROCs per megawatt-hour are paid at the moment for wave power that is generated, but there is not the capacity on the grid to develop an industry there. We need to avoid a situation in which all the development of the industry takes place in Scotland, but in a few years we find that there is insufficient capacity in the grid to capitalise on the industry properly. It would be far better to develop the industry in the south-west where there is capacity on the grid to upscale and expand the industry.

I believe strongly that in addition to the right technology push we need the right support framework to create the pull conditions to enable the industry to go beyond the development stage. There is no doubt that the answer is to increase the number of ROCs that we pay on the commercial devices to five ROCs per megawatt-hour, so that we match Scotland. That would give a level playing field.

[Andrew George]

My hon. Friend has got to the nub of the biggest hurdle to taking the project forward. As the Government are reviewing the ROC regime it is clear that some intense negotiation is needed between the UK Government and the Scottish Executive, to give sense and sanity, and an even playing field across the border.

[George Eustice]

I agree with my hon. Friend. There was quite a bit of criticism of the decision by Scotland to go unilaterally for the five-ROC regime. Others in the industry say that perhaps five are not needed and perhaps three or four would be acceptable, but we need that level playing field, so that the people developing the technology can make rational judgments rather than just chasing those paying the highest amount of money.

We are clearly entering an era of energy needs in which there is no magic bullet. We shall need many different sources of energy to come on stream. The Minister once told me that wherever he goes, and whatever conference he attends, people say “This is the magic industry that is the future” whether it be biomass, anaerobic digestion, nuclear or something else. The truth is that we shall probably need a range of sources to supply our energy needs in the future. It is clear that wave power could be one of those important sources, but only if we are willing to back it to the next stage, to get it to a commercially viable situation.