Oral Answers to Questions
James Paice Excerpts(13 years, 11 months ago)
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Greg Mulholland (Leeds North West) (LD)
1. What progress her Department has made on increasing the efficiency and reliability of the Rural Payments Agency.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
The agency is implementing the key recommendations from the independent review of the organisation, which was published on 20 July. That involves six priority projects designed to improve customers’ experience, establish an efficient operation and make essential preparations for the expected 2013 CAP reforms. Progress is being closely monitored by the RPA oversight board, which I chair.
Greg Mulholland
I thank the Minister for that answer and for attending the sustainability event the other evening. He is well aware of the chaos in the past few years with the single payment scheme system, and the Rural Payments Agency’s inability to pay farmers promptly—three alone in the Arthington area of my constituency. Can he please give an assessment of the Rural Payments Agency’s ability to carry that out and sort out the mess?
Mr Paice
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. As the House knows, there have been some dreadful performances by the RPA in years gone by, and they have not yet all been eliminated. There are still some long-standing cases, which we are trying to work through. We will do that as soon as possible. The board is making arrangements to speed up that process, but I am happy to tell my hon. Friend and the rest of the House that between 1 December, when the payment window started, and 3 December some 83,300 farmers were sent their single farm payment in those first three days—that is 79% of all claimants by volume. It is ahead of last year’s achievements, despite all the problems of mapping changes.
Mr Mark Spencer (Sherwood) (Con)
2. What recent representations she has received on her Department’s funding for the educational access programme.
Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)
4. If she will bring forward proposals to prohibit the sale of primates as pets.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
The Government do not encourage the keeping of primates as pets, but a code of practice for the welfare of privately kept non-human primates lays down robust guidance for primate owners and keepers. Failure to follow that code would put the owner at risk of prosecution under the Animal Welfare Act 2006.
Mark Pritchard
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that response, but self-regulation is not working. There are currently 5,000 primates kept as pets in the United Kingdom, many of them in cruel and cramped conditions. It is hard to believe that in the 21st century the party of Wilberforce, who apart from abolishing slavery set up the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and the coalition Government are not doing more to end that barbaric and outdated practice.
Mr Paice
I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for his determination on this subject and his rightful concern about animal welfare. I must point out that his figure of 5,000 is at the top end of the estimate. We do not know how many there are, but the estimate is between 1,200 and 5,000. If, as he says, many of them are being kept in cruel circumstances, that is not a matter for self-regulation; it is an offence under the Animal Welfare Act. If he or anybody else knows of primates being kept in what they believe to be cruel conditions, the owners are almost certainly in breach of providing the five freedoms, which is an offence.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)
What discussions has the Minister had with counterparts in the Home Office on measures to ensure that primates that are brought into the UK for sale as pets are not caught in the wild and then diverted and used for research purposes in particular?
Mr Paice
I am very glad that the hon. Lady has asked me that question, because I asked it of myself yesterday when I was going through the information. In reality, primates are not coming in from the wild. I understand that only one animal in the past decade is believed to have been wild-caught and then brought into this country. Of course, they are all covered by the convention on international trade in endangered species anyway, so there are restrictions in place. Anyone wishing to import a primate into this country has to have a licence, and there are very strict conditions. I am happy to write to the hon. Lady if she would like to know about them.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
5. What discussions she has had with the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills on the roll-out of superfast broadband in rural areas.
Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)
6. What her policy is on issuing dog control notices on private property.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
As I think my hon. Friend is aware, a proposal to issue dog control notices on private land was included in the dangerous dog consultation, the responses to which we have now published. The Department will respond to the issues raised in the consultation, including wider matters, and will make an announcement about the Government’s approach in the new year.
Angie Bray
I thank the Minister for his answer. As he will be aware, the vast majority of those who responded to the consultation expressed opposition to the idea of dog control notices on private land. However, does he agree that we need to find a way of protecting workers, such as postal workers, who have to access private land to carry out their official duties?
Mr Paice
The answer has to be yes. Of course we feel responsible for public service workers who, to a degree, put themselves at risk from dogs on private property. I cannot prejudge the outcome of the discussions, but I can tell my hon. Friend that what is important is that, since the end of the consultation, the Home Office has announced a review of all antisocial behaviour tools. DEFRA is represented on that working group, which is reviewing all antisocial issues, including the law on dogs.
Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)
I am sure I am not the only Member who has been bitten by a dog while election campaigning. More importantly, several of my constituents have also been bitten or had their dogs bitten by aggressive dogs. It is clear that dogs are being bred and kept for aggressive purposes. The Government have to get that under control. I suggest to the Minister that we need compulsory licensing, chipping and muzzling of dogs, especially for those known to be aggressive.
Mr Paice
In my experience, most letter boxes are dangerous enough on their own without the dog behind them. However, I understand the hon. Gentleman’s point entirely—this is a serious issue. I can only repeat that we have been out to consultation, and that the results of that consultation, including the most popular outcomes, are all on the website. The Government are considering the matter now and, as I said, are working with the Home Office, and will make an announcement shortly after Christmas.
Stephen Gilbert (St Austell and Newquay) (LD)
7. What progress her Department has made on implementation of the recommendations of the Pitt review on lessons learned from the 2007 floods on levels of flood protection for homes.
Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)
16. What recent progress her Department has made on reducing the burden of regulation on farmers.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
One of my first actions was to appoint Richard Macdonald to lead a taskforce to identify ways of reducing the regulatory burden on farmers. The taskforce recently completed a public consultation and will make recommendations to the Government by April next year. I hope that it will bring about a change in culture in implementing our regulations, while at the same time maintaining standards.
Nadhim Zahawi
I thank the Minister for that reply. Farmers in Stratford-on-Avon will welcome the Government’s commitment to the industry-led review of regulation. Can he give farmers a time frame for the review, so that they can begin to enjoy a regime that makes it easier for them to produce the food that we eat and care for the countryside that we all cherish?
Mr Paice
I am grateful to my hon. Friend, as he and many others are championing the cause of reducing regulation in our rural areas. As I said, the taskforce will report to the Government in early April 2011, and we will then have to see how to take it forward. I cannot be absolutely precise about the time scales, but I would like to take this opportunity to say that this is not about reducing standards, but about reducing the burden of process that has become so prevalent over recent years. We have seen an obsession with process, whereas we need to move much more towards making a judgment on outcomes.
Alun Cairns
DEFRA has had a better regulation agenda for many years, but few, if any, farmers have seen any tangible benefit from the reduction in bureaucracy and red tape. What reassurance can the Minister give that the current review will lead to real benefits for farmers in my constituency and elsewhere?
Mr Paice
The reassurance I can give is simply this. When we were in opposition, seeing how the previous Government made noises about reducing regulation but never did it convinced me that we had to find a new way. It is not just a question of abolishing regulations—although if they can be abolished, they should be—but how we implement and enforce them. We have become obsessed with requiring farmers to fill in countless forms, tick loads of boxes and read legions of guidance notes when what really matters is whether the benefit expected from the regulation is achieved. That is what we have to focus on now.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Minister for his responses. One big concern of many farmers and landowners over the years has been about red tape, particularly filling in grant forms such as for, among other things, single farm payments. Sometimes they inadvertently fail to tick a box. Can we have some flexibility in the system to ensure that those who qualify for the grants get them and do not lose out because of one small mistake?
Mr Paice
The hon. Member puts his finger on an extremely important point. I have studied many cases in which farmers have been penalised because, as he said, they omitted to put a figure in a particular box or something like that. Although I have pushed back hard on this front, we are unfortunately constrained very much by the European Commission’s Court of Auditors, which is very robust. The disallowances are completely out of proportion. We are working with the Commission, and I have chased up these matters with it to try to get a more proportionate sense of penalty. Hopefully, we will then be able to move forward.
Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP)
One key issue repeatedly raised with me by farmers is cross-compliance and the heavy penalties they face for minor infringements that are of no material consequence whatever. Does the Minister share my view that these penalties are out of all proportion? Will he raise this issue with the Commission as a matter of urgency?
Mr Paice
Yes, I entirely share the view that these penalties are out of all proportion. I have raised this with the Commission and, more importantly, I and many other Ministers of Agriculture have raised it in the context of the review of the common agricultural policy, which has just commenced. We have firmly expressed to the Commission our view that the next system of CAP support must be simpler, both for individual farmers and for member states to implement.
Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)
Having met Richard Macdonald, I am confident that he will undertake a thorough and comprehensive review of the regulatory burden on farmers. When he reports, will my hon. Friend ensure that he receives support from other Government Departments and that that these matters are discussed, if necessary, with the European Union as well?
Mr Paice
I can assure my hon. Friend that I am in close contact with the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, my hon. Friend the Member for Hertford and Stortford (Mr Prisk), and, as I said in answer to an earlier question, with the relevant Commissioners across Europe. We are determined that if this industry is to flourish and succeed in the face of increasing world demand for food over the next decades, it must be freed up from unnecessary burdens of regulation.
John Robertson (Glasgow North West) (Lab)
10. What representations she has received on her Department's plans for its project to plant 1 million trees in the next four years.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
13. What representations she has received on the proposed provision of a super-dairy in Lincolnshire by Nocton Dairies; and if she will make a statement.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
I have received numerous letters on this subject from animal welfare organisations, Members of Parliament and individual members of the public. I recently met a group of Members and others to discuss their concerns. However, I must emphasise that the proposal is for planning consent, on which I cannot comment.
Bob Blackman
Animal welfare organisations, dairy farmers and all who care about natural food in this country rightly fear that this is the thin end of a very thick wedge, with the potential for activities such as those that go on in California. What action will the Minister take to ensure that that does not happen?
Mr Paice
I readily understand that the idea of mega-dairies creates strong emotions, although I cannot talk about a specific example. I believe, however, that we should be led by the real evidence and the science, which is why DEFRA has commissioned a three-year study at the Scottish agricultural colleges of the issues surrounding mega-dairies. A separate study of the directly related subject of the genetics of high-yielding cows is also taking place. I promise the House that if the outcomes of those studies—we should have the first results towards the end of next year—precipitate the need for action, action will be taken.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
When I have raised the subject with the Minister in the past he has made it clear that this is a planning issue, but he has also said that he personally has no objections to mega-dairies. Could there not be a moratorium on the granting of planning applications for big schemes that are in the pipeline, such as Nocton’s, until the results of the reviews that he mentioned have been made public?
Dr Daniel Poulter (Central Suffolk and North Ipswich) (Con)
14. What recent representations she has received on provision of funding for permissive access routes under higher level stewardship schemes in rural areas.
Mary Creagh (Wakefield) (Lab)
The right hon. Lady’s colleague the Minister of State, who has responsibility for forestry, wrote to all MPs in October saying that he would consult the public on the sale of England’s forests before the end of the year. We now hear that he has postponed that consultation until the new year—yet in a parliamentary answer to me he revealed that he is busy meeting forestry companies on this very issue. When will the public get their say on the future of England’s forests?
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
The hon. Lady is getting a bit carried away. The consultation will start in January, and it is perfectly reasonable for us to discuss with experts in the field the possible implications of all the things that we are thinking of doing before we firm up the ideas that we put to the public for consultation. The hon. Lady must be extremely careful on this subject, because we have just discovered that the previous Labour Government sold 12,000 hectares of forest without any form of sustainable protection for any of it.
Priti Patel (Witham) (Con)
T2. Essex landowners and farmers contribute £1 million annually to the Environment Agency for sea defence and maintenance work, and they have provided information for the Essex shoreline management plan, but they have not been able to access the committees that have made the decisions and finalised that plan. Will the Minister ensure that in future my local farmers will have access to those committees and be fully integrated in the decision making? Will he also pledge to meet representatives in my constituency?
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
T6. I am a keen hill walker, but the Government are selling off England’s forests and nature reserves. Why are they selling off those natural assets for a quick buck without getting strong assurances on public rights of way?
Mr Paice
The hon. Gentleman should have listened to earlier answers. We have not announced that we are selling a single hectare yet. [Hon. Members: “Yes, you have!”] We are going out to consultation on that. The Government whom the hon. Gentleman supported, even if he was not a Member then, sold off 12,000 hectares of forest without protecting the access that he talks about. We will make sure—and it will be in the consultation—that whatever we do protects all public benefits.
Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)
T3. Green spaces and trees are vital in our cities, and I am fortunate that my constituency has many beautiful parks, including Dukes meadows, Gunnersbury park, Osterley park, Boston Manor park, Syon park and Hounslow heath. Can my right hon. Friend tell me what plans the Department has to plant many more trees across the city of London?
Jim Sheridan (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (Lab)
T7. This Con-Dem Government propose to abolish the Agricultural Wages Board—a proposal that even Mrs Thatcher refused to implement. The Prime Minister suggests that because of the minimum wage the AWB is just a quango, but that “quango” covers workers’ wages, holidays, sick pay, overtime, standby arrangements and even bereavement leave. Does the Secretary of State agree that it is just a quango?
Mr Paice
The hon. Gentleman should be aware that until the Warwick agreement, when the trade unions forced the Labour party to back down, it was Labour party policy to abolish the Agricultural Wages Board. I should make the point that agriculture has changed dramatically in the 60 years since the board came into being. The previous Government did not reinstate any of the other wages boards when they had the chance to do so. Instead they instigated the Low Pay Commission, and we believe that that is the right body to manage agricultural wages, as it does everybody else’s wages.
Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)
T4. Following the successful Nagoya conference on biodiversity and against the background of the current very important climate change conference in Cancun, can the Secretary of State tell us how she intends to take forward the protection of biodiversity, both in this country and internationally?
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
T10. Given the Minister’s acknowledgement on Second Reading of the Sustainable Livestock Bill of the serious nature of the deforestation caused by the production of soy for livestock feed, what position will the Government take on reform of the common agricultural policy to reduce UK imports of soy?
Mr Paice
The hon. Gentleman rightly raises an important issue. We want to reduce our dependency on imported protein, but not if that means, in the short term, destroying our domestic livestock industry only to have to import product fed on soya from the very sources we are trying to protect. On the CAP, it is very early days because the Commission has only just published its early proposals. However, I can assure him that agricultural sustainability, in the dramatically changing circumstances foreseen over the next 40 years, is right at the heart of our position. We want to make sure not only that we have money for research to find alternatives to imported soya, but that we can continue to provide for our domestic needs and those elsewhere.
Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)
T5. Does the Secretary of State agree that monitoring agencies such as the Environment Agency need sharper teeth, so that they can step in more forcefully when pollution rises to unacceptable levels, particularly in residential areas such as Horn lane in Acton?
Mr Paice
I am delighted to tell the hon. Gentleman, and to remind the House, that two weeks ago the food industry produced a voluntary set of principles to which all major retailers and respective organisations have signed up. The code involves making clear the country of origin of meat, meat products and mainstream dairy products. Alongside that, we have the European negotiations in which the prospect of mandatory labelling is also being considered.
Roger Williams (Brecon and Radnorshire) (LD)
Much organic matter still finds its way to landfill, where it is not only a hazard but a great waste of sustainable energy. What progress has the Department made in promoting anaerobic digestion as a good way of dealing with such waste?
Single Payment Scheme
James Paice Excerpts(13 years, 11 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
The Rural Payments Agency (RPA) will today begin payments under the 2010 single payment scheme (SPS). Over the next few days payments totalling over £1 billion are expected to be made to some 80,000 claimants. This represents over 75% of eligible claimants.
Further progress towards the agency’s 2010 SPS payment targets—to pay 85% of eligible SPS claimants by the end of December 2010 and to pay 95% of the value of SPS payments by the end of March 2011—is being closely monitored by the RPA oversight board which I chair. Against the background of the additional workload created by the update last year to Rural Land Register and reduced staff numbers, it is clear that meeting those targets represents a significant challenge.
Farmers may be assured that outstanding payments will be made as individual claims are verified. But that will not mean cutting corners: I am determined to bring a renewed focus on accuracy to the administration of the scheme so that legacy issues are addressed once and for all and the agency is then able to deliver a better quality of service to farmers in the medium term. Equally, we need to ensure taxpayers interests are safeguarded by ensuring our actions represent good value for money and further discussions will take place with the National Audit Office to that end.
As we progress through the payment window, I will keep the House informed on the agency’s progress towards its targets and any related decisions by the RPA oversight board. At an individual level, the RPA is writing to farmers where it appears unlikely that payment will be made during the course of December.
Shoreline Management Plans
James Paice Excerpts(13 years, 11 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
I shall begin by congratulating, as other hon. Members have done, my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey) on obtaining the debate. I also congratulate my many other hon. Friends who participated. I apologise to my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal for my presence and for the absence of the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon). I particularly apologise if she had not been forewarned that he could not be here. He is in Brussels at a Council of Fisheries Ministers meeting. That of course also affects her constituency, so I hope that she will forgive me and understand the change. I hope that she will also accept that my background was very significantly in her constituency at one time, when I was chairman of the local authority. Without getting into the “Whose is best?” debate, I can say that I am very familiar with the parts of the beautiful area to which she referred.
Almost all the hon. Members who spoke were, of course, from the eastern side of England, where the tilt is taking place and where coastal erosion is at its worst. However, I will pick up some of the specific points that were made. Shoreline management plans raise difficult issues and cause anxiety for people who are affected, especially if those plans point to the fact that, as the hon. Member for Leicester South (Sir Peter Soulsby) said, there is some inevitability about change. Sometimes we have to accept that it is not possible to maintain the status quo. That controversy in relation to the plans is also in some ways their strength. Arguably, if we did not have shoreline management plans, we would have to invent them. They were invented by the last Conservative Government in 1994; they predate the “Making Space for Water” project.
The plans provide an opportunity for local authorities at the coast, the Environment Agency and the various other bodies mentioned to explore options for the future with local communities and to clarify what they might expect from Government and what they can do for themselves. We owe it to people to be honest and open about what we can afford. I am concerned that a number of hon. Members have referred to the consultation process and pointed out inadequacies to do with second home owners, or others who may feel that they are affected but were not consulted. The consultation ought to be pretty substantial. It should run for three months, and the local authorities are required to run a range of processes to try to reach everyone, including employing coastal community engagement officers to support them. Clearly, if that is not happening, we need to pursue that, but it should be the case. I entirely agree with my hon. Friends that no one should feel excluded from the consultation.
When we are examining what we can afford, we must bear in mind the impact that a choice in one place may have on another. That might relate to the community or to the environment. There could even be an impact on coastal erosion, because sometimes if the sea is stopped in one place, it will vent itself in another. There is no doubt—this picks up the point made by the hon. Member for Leicester South—that the Government have fully recognised that flood and coastal defence is a priority. That is why spending on that defence has been largely protected in the spending review. We will be able to invest £2.1 billion over the next four years. We will protect the front-line services, such as forecasting and warning services and incident response, and prioritise the maintenance of existing defences.
It is worth referring to the fact that the threat is changing slightly. Coastal erosion has not changed, but there is now, probably as a result of climate change, an increasing incidence of flash flooding inland. We must also take that into account as part of our overall flood defence programmes. We expect to be able better to protect 145,000 households by March 2015. However, there is no getting away from the fact that times are tough, and it will be difficult to kick off new defence projects over the next couple of years.
I assure hon. Members that the Government are determined to proceed with those projects that are already well advanced. Schemes that are under way will continue and we shall protect the front-line services to which I have referred. However, it will not be affordable or sustainable to maintain the status quo everywhere on the coast, and I do not think that anyone expects otherwise. I entirely appreciate the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal that erosion is permanent. It is a pertinent point for us all to remember, but we must be honest with communities about what can and cannot be done, and provide them with sufficient information to make decisions for themselves. A generation or more of politicians in different Governments have probably given assurances about coastal defences that we have not been able to live up to, and perhaps we need to be more honest. The idea that we could always hold the line on the whole of our coastline in perpetuity was probably wrong from the outset.
I fully take the point about the need to inform homeowners about what might happen to their properties, and also the point that several hon. Members have made about the impact on agricultural land. I shall return to that in a moment. However, it does not make sense do things to manage erosion or flooding in one place without regard, as I said earlier, to the impact elsewhere. Nor is it right to give people the impression that the Government—and only Government—will pay for defences, or that they will pay for those defences if there are no realistic prospects for them.
That does not mean that people cannot take measures to protect themselves with the support of the relevant authorities. My hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal referred to the visit of my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary, and to work in her constituency at Bawdsey, Thorpeness and elsewhere, where a local initiative has created the means of self-help in erosion prevention. The coast has always been changing; my hon. Friend referred to a map suggesting that Cambridge could become a coastal town, and I can tell her that it once was. Much of my constituency, which is to the east of Cambridge, would not be there had it not been for flood defences. It probably would not be there if we had had to get planning permission for them, either, but never mind. There are villages in my constituency called Waterbeach, Landbeach and Reach—all names that show they were once on the coast. Some things come around again; though I hope they will not do so in my lifetime.
I want to respond to points made by hon. Members. My hon. Friend the Member for Newton Abbot (Anne Marie Morris) referred to issues affecting her patch, including the integrity of the sea wall and the railway line to Dawlish—which I, too, would like protected; it is a wonderful rail trip, and I am glad that that the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Norman Baker), is supportive. My hon. Friend discussed Dawlish Warren and the fact that there is a hold-the-line defence until 2025, when the policy will be mixed. That gives me the opportunity to make the point that shoreline management plans are not cast in stone for ever and a day. There is an opportunity to review them every five to 10 years, so changes can be made, to reflect new local priorities or countless other occurrences. I understand my hon. Friend’s comment about the question of who is paying, with respect to the Exe estuary, and will draw it to the attention of my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary.
My hon. Friend the Member for Maldon (Mr Whittingdale) represents another area where I spent much of my earlier life—though reaching the heights of chairmanship of the county NFU is something that eluded me.
Mr Whittingdale
I was at a meeting and saw my hon. Friend’s name in impressive gold letters on a board a few weeks ago, so he is clearly held in high regard.
Mr Paice
I am very grateful for that. I think that my hon. Friend will find that I was chairman of Essex Young Farmers, rather than the National Farmers Union. In those days, believe it or not, I was young. My hon. Friend also referred to the 1953 floods and the memories of them. I am probably one of the few people in the House who remembers them—just. I was a very small child at the time, living just outside Felixstowe. The flood came close to where I was living and it was horrendous. That sort of memory lives on. People will always be frightened if they have been through that awful experience.
My hon. Friend referred to the importance of agricultural land. As a Minister with responsibility for agriculture, and coming from such a background, too, I am very concerned about it. However, I accept that against someone’s home, it comes second; we must all realise that. I hope that the point I will come to in a minute about other Government proposals will reassure colleagues that it is something that we are trying to address, albeit in a different way. I take his point about the involvement of local landowners in shoreline management plans and I am very much aware of the work of Andrew St Joseph in trying to drive that forward and in generating dialogue.
My hon. Friend and one or two other hon. Members referred to the role of Natural England. Although it has a vital role to play, it is important that it adopts a more enabling and supportive role and that it recognises that other issues are involved. We are making some substantial changes to the way in which Natural England is organised and run, which I hope will make it more responsive to local needs and understanding, and I am happy to give my hon. Friend that assurance.
My hon. Friend the Member for Maldon also referred to the difficulty of landowners in doing maintenance work. I am not sure whether that happens just in his constituency, but an Essex farmer, who had better remain nameless, told me that he was given permission by the Environment Agency to do some maintenance work on the sea wall, which involved several hundred tonnes of stone. Natural England then came along and told him that the stone had to go in by helicopter, which stopped the process in its tracks.
Mobile homes, to which a number of hon. Friends referred, are included in the cost benefit analysis, although at a lower rate than a fixed building because they can be moved. My hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Eric Ollerenshaw) referred to the issue of consultation and to the apparent priority of the habitats directive, which allows projects to go ahead, even where damage to protected sites is foreseen as a consequence. Projects that damage European protected sites can still go ahead if there are imperative reasons for overriding that public interest or if there are no alternative solutions and if necessary compensatory measures are in place.
The issue of how cost benefits are calculated, to which my hon. Friend also referred, are addressed on the DEFRA website. I will write to him with more detail, because I fully appreciate that people have a right to know. My hon. Friend the Member for Great Yarmouth (Brandon Lewis) referred to the solidarity fund promoted by the hon. Member for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb). I know that the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury, is, in principle, supportive of that, but it is a matter for local people to take forward. Although the comments from my hon. Friend the Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire (Simon Hart) cover a devolved issue, I appreciate his point about the liability aspect.
As the hon. Member for Leicester South said, no two places on the coast are the same, which is one reason why greater local involvement is necessary if we are to get this job right. The powers of consent for work rest with the local authority, except where there are certain European obligations to achieve, and then the powers rest with the Secretary of State. The House is aware that the coalition Government are determined to be the greenest Government ever, and that includes protecting and enhancing the natural environment. None the less, we need to be more creative in the way in which we serve those interests as well as meeting our international obligations and protecting agricultural land wherever possible.
Greater local involvement is at the heart of the Government’s proposed “payment for outcomes” funding approach, which we launched for public consultation last Wednesday, alongside the joint consultation with the Environment Agency of the national flood and coastal erosion risk management strategy. The consultation suggests changes to the way in which Government funding is allocated to flood and coastal defence projects. That follows recommendations by Sir Michael Pitt in his review of the 2007 flooding. The reforms aim to provide improved transparency and greater certainty over potential funding levels from the general taxpayer for every flood and coastal defence project. They will also allow local areas to have a bigger say in what is done to protect them. Over time, local ambitions on protection no longer need be constrained by what national budgets can afford, and the reforms will encourage innovative, cost-effective solutions in which civil society can play a greater role. This is about saying what the Government think the cost-benefit analysis is and, therefore, what funding might be available from Government. If that is not enough to do the work, the local community has the option to find funding to enable it to happen.
Dr Thérèse Coffey
One of the criticisms that sometimes comes out is about over-engineering and, therefore, the high costs of work. That is a constant refrain from landowners who believe that they could do a lot of the work at a much lower cost.
Mr Paice
I am grateful to my hon. Friend; she makes a point that has been made many times. I know that the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury is conscious of that issue and is working with the Environment Agency to see how we can alter the situation, which I do not think necessarily means reducing the specification of what is done. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising the matter.
The proposals to which I have just referred are subject to consultation and final decisions will be made in the spring after the consultation closes on 16 February 2011. I hope that this will mark a significant step forward in how we go about things. I think I have referred to most of the issues that hon. Members raised; if I have not or if I have answered their concerns inadequately, perhaps Members could let me know.
Sir Peter Soulsby
I referred, at the conclusion of my remarks, to the loss of staff and expertise from Natural England, the Environment Agency and local government. The Minister referred to the role of Natural England as enabling and supporting Government. Will he provide reassurance that the Department is aware if that role is to be played, Natural England needs experts to offer the support that is fundamental to making a success of the plans?
Mr Paice
I cannot give the hon. Gentleman assurances about individuals for obvious reasons. Although, as he says, we are making significant savings across all the arms-length bodies, and within DEFRA, there is no reason why they should not retain the element of expertise to which he refers. We are trying to ensure that those arms-length bodies retain the ability do what they have to do and what Government need them to do, which includes giving scientific advice. Natural England is, after all, the statutory adviser to the Government on such issues, and it will retain that role. Where there are functions that the private or third sector can perform, we should try to make that happen. I know that the hon. Gentleman is not suggesting otherwise, but those bodies have taken their fair share of the reduction in funding that we have had to make as part of dealing with the overall public deficit. I hope that I have addressed most of the issues raised by hon. Members, but if not, I am happy to write to anyone who wishes to raise an issue with me.
Sustainable Livestock Bill
James Paice Excerpts(14 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Nuttall
There is a danger of that happening, and I thank my hon. Friend for that point. The Bill may make that problem even worse.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for allowing me to intervene before I make my main remarks. Many comments have been made about cows and fields and so on, but it would be helpful if I informed the House that the substance of the debate is where we get soya bean meal from. The vast bulk of it is fed to pigs and poultry, not to grazing livestock, so if we are going to discuss that issue we need to recognise that if we do not import such meal, we will not have any pigmeat or poultry meat.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
May I start by reminding the House of my interests, as declared in the register?
I congratulate the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Robert Flello) on drawing second place, I believe, in the ballot. Many of us have been in the House far longer and have never got on the list at all, and there is always an element of envy when people manage to get a high place on it in their very first Parliament.
As the hon. Member for Glasgow North East (Mr Bain) said, the Bill provides the opportunity for a hugely important debate. I hope the House will forgive me if I spend some time going through a number of related matters and explaining what the Government are already undertaking. Before doing so, may I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on what I believe is his first speech at the Dispatch Box? He will forgive me if I am mistaken, but it is certainly the first one opposite me. He made a very good speech, and I agreed with virtually everything he said, which will probably finish his political career completely. The exception was his brave effort to say that the Bill would help. I could see an element of fence-sitting there—I hope it was not too painful.
The hon. Gentleman rightly referred to the importance of agriculture as an industry and to the increasing world demand for food. He clearly agreed with a number of my hon. Friends, who have said that simply pushing for less meat-eating is not the way forward, given the increased demand elsewhere. He rightly said that agricultural growth was the best form of economic growth in poorer countries, and mentioned the 20% fall in agricultural emissions, which is considerably better than in many other sectors. Those were all good points on which I support him entirely. I hope he will forgive me if I chide him slightly by asking why, if the Opposition are so supportive of the Bill, the Labour Government opposed it when it was presented by my then hon. Friend Peter Ainsworth. No doubt they are learning by their mistakes, for which we must all be grateful.
This has been a good debate, and none of us could argue that the sustainability of the UK livestock system is of anything but prime importance to everybody. It has, however, given rise to a number of what I can only call myths and misunderstandings about today’s livestock industry. For a start, there has been a lot of talk about large-scale dairy enterprises. The hon. Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) referred to my remarks at a previous Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Question Time. I am grateful that she remembers them five weeks after I made them—that does not happen very often, so I will bask in the reflected glory. When we discuss the matter, we need to know certain facts. It is not for the Government to be for or against large-scale dairies, and the particular case in question is subject to a planning application, but I hope that the debate can be held on the basis of facts.
The reality is that the animals at the proposed 8,000-unit diary will still be fed largely on roughage, as are all ruminants. The fact is that ruminants—cattle and sheep—cannot survive on all-cereal diets, because their digestive systems cannot cope. They must have silage, grass, hay or something similar as a substantial part of their diet. The difference with the proposition at Nocton is that the grass or silage will be brought to the animals; they will not go out to it, although they will still be on it.
Someone referred to the NFU briefing, and the reality is that ruminant diets contain on average only about 3% soya bean. The fact that a dairy unit is large does not mean that it will use any more soya per cow than a small dairy unit. As I said in my intervention, the vast bulk of soya feeding, and indeed grain feeding, goes on in the pig and poultry sectors, where the livestock cannot live on anything else. Pigs will eat a bit of grass, but they cannot extract the nutrients from it, and poultry, of course, feed on seeds—hence their diet of grain, nuts and things like that, certainly in the wild. If we try to curtail the use of soya or grain, it is the intensive white-meat sector—the pig and poultry sectors—that will be most affected.
As a number of colleagues have said, the livestock sector accounts for more than half the £20 billion gross output of UK agriculture as a whole. That primary production is part of the biggest manufacturing industry in this country. The hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley) is no longer in the Chamber, but he made a pertinent point about the importance of domestic food production. He referred to high-quality, traceable and nutritious food. The word “traceable” is one we must spend a moment on, because the more food that comes from abroad, the harder the challenge of ensuring traceability becomes. As we all know, traceability is critical to food safety and production standards.
The food manufacturing industry employs almost 400,000 people and contributes £20 billon in gross value added. Unless our farming industry produces the raw materials for that industry, we will lose that manufacturing sector as well as our farming sector.
As several hon. Members on both sides of the debate have said, the contribution made by farming is about much more than simply food; it is about creating and maintaining our landscapes and our biodiversity, as well as about our food security. Indeed, it is also about the viability of many of our rural communities, because more remote communities tend to be in areas where livestock is the only form of production possible.
I want to re-emphasise a point that I made earlier, because there is a belief on both sides of the House that if we stopped importing soya, all the stock would somehow go out on to grass and we could return to the chocolate-box days when there were cows in every field. That is not the reality. Cattle is not the sector where the majority of grain and soya is used.
Like everybody in the Chamber, the Government wholly accept and share the objectives and aspiration in the Bill, which is about ensuring the sustainability of our livestock industry, but it is not right to try to do that through a regulatory framework, as the Bill does.
Mr Chope
As my hon. Friend said, there is a public misconception about the link between soya imports and large-scale dairy units. What is his Department doing to put the public right on that and to remove that public misconception? Obviously, his speech today is helping, but what else can his Department do?
Mr Paice
It is not for the Government, directly, to say that one form of production is right and that another is wrong. What matters most—I will come to this in a minute—is that consumers are properly informed about how and where their food is produced. They can then make the right judgment according to their own views and beliefs.
Mr Nuttall
The best way of keeping consumers informed is, of course, through honesty in food labelling. I understand that the Government propose to move the responsibility for that from the Food Standards Agency to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Perhaps the Minister will comment on how that will play a part.
Mr Paice
I will indeed, but perhaps my hon. Friend will bear with me until I get to that point in my remarks.
The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South slightly chided the Government when he said that our structural reform business plan contained no reference to the use of soya, yet there is no reference to it in the Bill. However, the Government’s business plan has a priority of supporting a competitive and sustainable British food and farming industry. That is our No. 1 objective. Alongside it go issues such as enhancing the environment and biodiversity to improve quality of life and support a strong and sustainable green economy that is resilient to climate change. It cannot be made any more obvious that a sustainable livestock industry sits clearly in that framework of ambition.
We support a sustainable future for livestock farming and food production in which the whole chain—the farmers and their representative organisations, food chain businesses, consumers and the Government—plays its part by operating efficiently, sharing information and learning, and, as the hon. Member for Glasgow North East said, eliminating waste. However, I emphasise that we do not believe that the best way of going about that is through the regulatory approach in the Bill, or even, as some have suggested, through a soundbite approach of giving the Secretary of State a duty to ensure the sustainability of the industry. Clearly, that is impossible for any Secretary of State; it flies in the face of common sense.
There has been some debate about the scope of the Bill. Hon. Members have referred to the fact that Scotland and Northern Ireland are excluded, yet clause 5 implies that Wales is included. That is simply another fundamentally flawed aspect of the Bill, because agriculture and sustainability are devolved to the Welsh Assembly.
Taking the matter forward requires clear resolve and determination from the Government. It requires a resolution that we will work with industry in partnership as it delivers its commitments and, when necessary, take steps to ensure that those commitments are fulfilled.
We also need the ambition to realise that Government do not have all the answers. The Government have never pretended—and will never pretend—to know all the answers to everything. It is for those with the best knowledge of their businesses and activities to devise solutions. That is why I am happy today to offer a different approach from the detailed prescription in the Bill, which sets out how and when the Secretary of State should consult and so on. I want to make the Bill’s promoter and sponsors a genuine offer from the Government. I invite them to participate in a broad conference of all those concerned with the sustainability of the livestock industry, to be held early next year, and convened and run by stakeholders in the industry. It will reflect on and debate the activities that are already under way in the livestock sectors, and consider what has been achieved and what remains to be done. I will expand on that shortly.
I shall outline some of the activity that is already taking place and the Government’s approach. Like the previous Government, we believe that a partnership approach is right. First and foremost, I want to show that we can trust farmers to do the right thing. If we trust people, they must accept responsibility. The UK livestock industry is showing its leadership and commitment to operating sustainably. The dairy supply chain forum’s milk road map is a good example of what can be achieved through bringing producers, processors and retailers together to commit themselves publicly to milestones for more sustainable operation on, for example, dairy farm land, and in environmental stewardship, nutrient planning, recycled plastic milk bottles and so on. I look forward to seeing the new targets for sustainability in the updated road map when it is published next spring.
The hon. Member for Glasgow North East referred to the pig sector and the work it has done in producing its own product road maps. The beef and sheep sectors are also working to produce road maps to provide frameworks for measuring the sustainability of their operations. I am genuinely encouraged by their commitment to developing supply-chain approaches to sustainability. The Government will work closely with each of those sectors to encourage the agricultural industry in partnership in England to implement the reductions in on-farm greenhouse gas emissions, which were set out in the frameworks for action earlier this year.
There are other areas where the Government can and do help in respect of the subject matter of the Bill. On public procurement, which was mentioned in the debate, we are developing Government buying standards for food. They will be mandatory for central Government and our agencies, and we will promote them to the wider public sector. The standards will set a clear definition of healthy and sustainable food procurement and will allow us to lead by example in influencing procurement practice.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall) said, labelling is also a key priority for the Government. Ensuring the integrity of the information that labels provide to consumers is crucial to a sustainable livestock industry. That is why the Secretary of State and I want to ensure that unprocessed meat is clearly labelled with the country of origin and information on where the animal was born, raised and slaughtered. We also want to ensure that processed foods that are labelled as made in the UK show the origin of their main ingredients if they come from outside the UK. Again, that is to avoid any confusion for the consumer. I am very encouraged by the response that I have had from the food supply chain businesses in developing the principles in that voluntary code, but more work remains to be done to ensure clarity for consumers, and the Government have always made it clear that we reserve the right to legislate if we cannot achieve what we want voluntarily.
Tackling food waste is a Government priority. The Secretary of State has already announced a thorough review of all aspects of waste policy and delivery in England, including household and business waste and arrangements for recycling collection. The hon. Member for Glasgow North East referred to anaerobic digestion. We want to see a big increase in renewable energy from anaerobic digestion of both agricultural and human waste. We are working on the steps to achieve that through the rural development programme, which will knit in with the feed-in tariff system. DEFRA’s support for a sustainable livestock industry is, I believe, shown through its commitment of significant resources to research to improve our knowledge base of what works.
The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South, among others, mentioned soya, but we need to be clear what we are talking about. We import something like 2.2 million tonnes of soya bean meal, and 0.8 million tonnes of soya beans—a total of 3 million tonnes. Of course, not all of that is for animal feed. Virtually all our processed food—soya is a major ingredient of vegetarian food—contains soya. Not all soya is fed to stock. In fact, about two thirds of all our manufactured food products contain derivatives of, or ingredients made from, soya. Nevertheless, the debate has focused on the livestock use of soya.
The 3 million tonnes should be seen in the context of current UK cropping and we must look at the implications of the ultimate objective of the Bill, which is to produce all our protein within the UK. A yield of 5 tonnes per hectare of the equivalent of soya—the nearest we have are dried peas and beans, which we already grow—is quite high, but with that assumption, the 3 million tonnes of soya imports equate to 600,000 hectares of British farmland. We currently grow about 1.8 million hectares of wheat, just over 1.1 million hectares of barley, 581,000 thousand hectares of rape and only 233,000 hectares of peas and beans. It does not take much working out to see that if we were to replace that soya import, our cropping practices would need to undergo a massive change, with the consequential increase in imports of whatever crop is displaced to grow some form of protein to replace soya.
What we are doing as a Government is to co-fund research with the livestock industry on the environmental consequences of replacing soya with home-grown legumes in diets—for pigs particularly—and on the life-cycle analysis of poultry production systems, on an analysis of nutrition regimes for ruminants to reduce greenhouse gases, and on work to improve the welfare and health of dairy cows, including in the large-scale units that we have debated at other times.
Mr Chope
Has my hon. Friend seen the report “Pastures New—A Sustainable Future for Meat and Dairy Farming”, produced by Friends of the Earth? In it, quoting research by the Royal Agricultural College, Friends of the Earth says that we could use 2.25 million hectares of land to provide crops as an alternative to soya imports, rather than the lower figure to which my hon. Friend referred.
Mr Paice
I do not think I have actually seen that figure, but if it is to be taken as the correct figure, that is half our arable land. So the increase in imports of all the crops that would be displaced by that crop would obviously be dramatic and would have other implications; we would probably have another Bill trying to stop that.
On top of the research that I referred to, we are committed to tackling the deforestation that the Bill rightly aims to reduce, and which has accompanied some soya production. But we must recognise that soya consumption is not all about livestock. DEFRA is leading a programme of work, with businesses and non-governmental organisations, on another major food ingredient that has not been debated this morning—palm oil. We want to support production without the forest footprint of replacing rain forest with palm oil production.
We are also working closely with our European and other international partners. Much has been made of Brazil; in particular we are working with that country to tackle the drivers of deforestation. We are also working with EU partners to tackle illegal logging, which destroys forests and biodiversity and contributes, as we know, to CO2 emissions.
Jane Ellison (Battersea) (Con)
I have attended this morning’s debate with a genuinely open mind, in accordance with the commitment that I gave to my constituents—we are very interested in the Bill. I suspect that what drives much of the sense of urgency of the Members who spoke in favour of the Bill, is a sense that we are hearing merely warm words and promises, and among working people everyone is a little concerned that those timelines will slip. The Minister has conceded that he agrees with a great deal of the sentiment behind the Bill. What reassurance can the people who support the sentiment behind the Bill have that progress will be made in a reasonably rapid time frame?
Mr Paice
I am grateful for that question, part of which I will come to in a few moments. First, let me say that the issue is not about the principle of ensuring that our livestock sector is more sustainable; the debate is about how we go about it—whether to adopt the highly regulatory approach proposed by the Bill, or to continue with the approach that, as has been said in all fairness, was begun under the previous Government—and continued and emphasised by the present Government—to achieve the aim with partnership working throughout the sector. A lot of progress is being made, and in a few moments I shall outline how I think the Bill could be counter-productive in achieving that.
I was saying that we are working closely with the EU, Brazil and others. In particular, bringing us right up to date, we made great strides forward at the recent conference in Nagoya, not only in agreeing targets for reducing the loss of habitats including forests, and for tackling forest degradation, but in making real progress on the links between climate change and biodiversity. The Government announced as part of the spending review that we will provide £2.9 billion towards tackling international climate change. A significant proportion of that will be used to address forestry issues, and that meets and goes beyond the commitments made at Copenhagen by the previous Government.
Kerry McCarthy
Could the Minister tell the House what conversations have taken place on this issue between DEFRA Ministers and Ministers in the Department of Energy and Climate Change? I was a bit concerned that when I raised this issue at yesterday’s DECC questions, the Minister who was answering did not seem to have the slightest idea that the Bill even existed. This is important in terms of putting the issue on the agenda at the international climate change talks.
Mr Paice
Obviously, I cannot comment on what may have taken place in the Chamber yesterday, but I assure the hon. Lady that those discussions do take place. I know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has engaged in a number of conversations with the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change about our stance, and did so before going to Nagoya, so we had an agreed Government position. Further discussions are taking place—some have taken place—prior to the meeting at Cancun in two or three weeks’ time. I can assure the hon. Lady that those discussions most definitely are taking place.
The £2.9 billion going towards tackling international climate change that I mentioned is obviously very significant, but the key international mechanism for tackling deforestation and ensuring that forestry contributes to our action on climate change is the REDD+ programme—reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation—in developing countries. Part of making that programme work will be an examination of all the drivers of deforestation, including forest conversion to agriculture. The progress that we made at Nagoya on ensuring that a successful REDD+ programme delivers benefits for biodiversity was a major breakthrough, in which the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs played a key role. As I have just said, we need to build on that at Cancun in a few weeks’ time.
In addition, I can tell the House that the Technology Strategy Board, in conjunction with DEFRA and the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council, is planning a call of up to £15 million for business-led applied research projects that will help to deliver a sustainable future supply of protein for the UK. As I announced last week, DEFRA and the devolved Administrations are committing £12.6 million to research to improve our understanding of greenhouse gas emissions from farms across the UK. At the same time, we are working with our partners in the Global Research Alliance of 30 countries to collaborate on research into agricultural greenhouse gas emission reductions, including from livestock.
It is important to emphasise that a range of different views about agricultural emissions still exist and that this is an extremely complicated field, because it involves many interacting purposes. For example, grassland, which has been the subject of a lot of discussion today, is itself a huge reservoir of carbon and so it is arguable that the more grass we have, the better. However, if ruminants graze that grass, they emit methane and so a balance needs to be worked out. We must also consider an issue that is very relevant to some of the conversations that have taken place in the Chamber this morning: intensive versus extensive. I am not advocating this necessarily, but it is part of the dilemma faced by the industry that if we keep stock in an enclosed building, we can then deal with the emissions. By contrast, if the stock are kept free range, the emissions are emitted into the atmosphere and we can do nothing about them. That is just part of the conundrum that we need to try to resolve, hence that further investment of £12.6 million that I announced last week.
The Government’s commitment to a sustainable future for UK farming is, as I have said, right at the top of our business programme. So it is very clear, particularly at a time of fiscal restraint. However, I suggest—this comes back to the point made in an intervention a few minutes ago—that if we were to adopt the Bill as it stands, we would find that much of it is completely undeliverable and unachievable. Expecting the Secretary of State “to ensure” certain things is an impossibility, because all these things fall way outside the Secretary of State’s real powers. The Bills states that it is the Secretary of State’s duty
“to ensure the sustainability of the livestock industry”
That is not just down to the Secretary of State; it is down to countless other businesses, individuals and so on. Clause 1(3) states that the Secretary of State
“must ensure that policies in relation to negotiations and other activities…including at the European Union, are consistent with sections 1(1) and 1(2).
I suggest that that, too, is impossible. Many other factors bear down on our negotiations, and giving the Secretary of State a duty
“to ensure that the steps taken in accordance with this Act do not lead to an increase in the proportion of meat consumed in the United Kingdom which is imported”
is clearly impossible. We live in an open market economy, thank goodness—I believe that the Opposition share that perception these days—and we could not, because of European and World Trade Organisation laws, simply put up the siege barriers and say, “We are not importing any meat.” That might be what Mr Putin has done about wheat, but it is not realistic to expect us to do it for meat.
I am afraid that some aspects of the Bill are clearly outwith what would be sensible legislation, which is one major reason why we oppose it. Another is that if the Secretary of State were to divert considerable DEFRA resources to do everything required by the Bill, that would slow down our progress. As I have tried to illustrate, we are making considerable progress in a range of ways and I want to drive that forward because I believe strongly in that agenda.
Mr Nuttall
Has the Department assessed the likely cost of trying to enforce the Bill’s provisions?
Mr Paice
The honest answer is no, but the costs would be considerable. In this time of major economic constraint, DEFRA clearly does not have the resources for this; a reduction in its overall budget has already been announced. Also, as my hon. Friend said in his excellent speech, the cost of the measures and of regulating them would have a considerable impact on the industry.
There are a number of reasons why the Bill is not the right way forward. I believe in the partnership approach of working with the industry that I have outlined. We are ready to show the necessary leadership and resolve to challenge the industry to act sustainably. That is the best way of producing the results to which we and the Bill aspire. Most of our farming leaders and the farming and food businesses they represent understand the Government’s resolve to ensure a sustainable future for livestock, farming and food.
We hope and expect the agricultural industry’s climate change task force to deliver its commitments to a greenhouse gas action plan with tangible measures for on-farm abatement. I hope that the plan will be published in the next few weeks. We will review it in 2012 and be ready to take the necessary steps should it seem unlikely to deliver the progress on farm-level abatement that we need.
We want to encourage all parts of the livestock industry to challenge themselves in thinking about the sustainability of their sectors and to set challenging goals for pro-environmental behaviours. In this time of restraint, and with the Government’s overriding priority of reducing the deficit, we need to focus resources on where they can make the most difference rather than on the statutory reporting and monitoring envisaged in the Bill.
Unsurprisingly, I repeat that the Government cannot support the Bill. Although its general sentiment is admirable, its terms are too broad, the duties it would impose on the Secretary of State are too ill defined and, indeed, undeliverable, and it is not consistent with the partnership approach that we want to engender. Let me return, therefore, to my earlier offer. Rather than impose additional layers of reporting, we would like to offer something substantive: our participation in a conference of interested parties in the first half of next year to take stock of the progress made by the UK livestock sectors in delivering sustainability objectives. I look to interested parties to set up and host the conference, but I give a commitment that either the Secretary of State or I will attend it. A year after the conference, DEFRA would report on the role of all parties with an interest in the sustainability of our livestock industry.
Ian Paisley
The conference proposal is valuable, but will the Minister ensure that it will be open to the devolved regions and organisations such as the Ulster Farmers Union?
Mr Nuttall
On the point about the guest list, bearing in mind the confusion that arose this morning about the extent and scope of the Bill in the United Kingdom, will the Minister confirm that he will invite interested parties from not just England, but Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland?
Mr Paice
I have just answered that point. I do not want to control the guest list, but I certainly think that the conference should be seen as a UK event.
Before I conclude, I want to refer to one or two comments made by hon. Friends. We have heard some good, solid speeches; my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North made a very solid speech. He was interrupted a couple of times for very relevant purposes. My hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) was, as we have very quickly come to learn, exceedingly perceptive, particularly about some of the shortcomings and illegalities of the Bill, to which I, too, referred. My hon. Friend the Member for Orpington (Joseph Johnson) referred, quite rightly, to the importance of biodiversity, but we need to look at what the Bill actually says, rather than at what we might imagine it could do, say or achieve. In this House, we are responsible for the detail of legislation. In my time here, far too many Bills have gone through without adequate scrutiny that would enable us to understand what they truly say. I stand second to nobody in recognising the importance of recognising biodiversity in our agricultural policies, but passing the Bill would not be of much assistance.
We heard a superb speech from my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry), the last surviving Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Minister in the House. He brought to the debate his tremendous knowledge of the developing world. To be fair, the hon. Member for Glasgow North East referred to agricultural growth as the main driver of economic growth there. My hon. Friends the Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire (Simon Hart), and for Truro and Falmouth (Sarah Newton), referred to the importance of agriculture to rural Britain, and to local food production.
I will conclude with one or two comments on the speech of the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South, who introduced the Bill. I mentioned that the bulk of soya and grain goes to pigs and poultry, a fact that I think had eluded him, judging by the way that he spoke. I want to make sure that a couple of statistics that he quoted are corrected; I am afraid that they were fundamentally wrong, and it would be irresponsible of me to leave them on the record unchallenged. He said that agriculture now uses 20 million tonnes more animal feed than it did 20 years ago. In fact, the figure is 2 million tonnes. He also said that it takes 20 kg of cereals to produce 1 kg of beef, but in fact it takes about 6 to 7 kg of cereal, or concentrate food, to produce 1 kg of beef; that is the real conversion rate. In any case, as I said earlier, no ruminants are fed entirely on grain and soya, because their digestive systems could not cope with that. Clearly, if one takes out the roughage—the long material that they are eating—the consumption of cereals goes down.
The hon. Gentleman also referred to the situation in Paraguay. I do not in any way want to diminish the importance of deforestation in Paraguay, but we do not import any soya from there, so the Bill would not have an impact on Paraguay. I think that I heard him say that we should not be feeding cereals to livestock at all, all of which would mean, as I said, that we would have no pigmeat or poultry meat in this country.
We have had a lot of debate, and this is an important issue. I repeat my congratulations to the hon. Gentleman on bringing the issue to the House. I do not in any way decry his having done that; it has been a valuable morning. I hope that I have been able to persuade hon. Members on both sides of the House that the Government are totally committed to ensuring, developing and improving the sustainability of our livestock industry, but the Bill is not the way to go about doing that. We are determined to proceed in the way that I described, working with our partners to make livestock production sustainable, without the need for the regulatory process suggested in the Bill.
I hope that the hon. Gentleman and others will accept, participate in, and welcome the constructive alternative way forward that I have already offered him. I am the first to admit that the proposals have been a matter of great debate in Government, because we share the fundamental objectives of what the Bill is trying to do. We would have liked to support it if we could, but after careful analysis, some of which I have shared with the House, I am afraid that we cannot do that. Nevertheless, the debate is worth while, and the Government remain determined to proceed with the overall issue.
Mr Chope
The hon. Gentleman is usurping the position that should be occupied by his hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South. I hope that the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South will have a chance to respond to the debate and to explain to Members who are interested in the subject whether the Minister’s offer is a good one, and whether, on the basis of it, he wishes to seek leave to withdraw the Bill.
I shall give way to the hon. Gentleman if he wishes to tell me that he wants to withdraw the Bill, because we can then move on to the next business, but I cannot force him to intervene. I am giving him the opportunity to do so, but he is declining. The hon. Member for Ealing North (Stephen Pound) knows very well the procedures of the House and exactly what the Bill’s promoter and sponsors can and, perhaps, will do between now and half-past 2 if they do not want to accept the Minister’s offer.
Considering that my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North spoke for an hour and a quarter, I am just getting into the beginnings of my contribution. I thought that it would be helpful not to make a speech de novo, but to make a speech that built on what my hon. Friend the Minister said. We are meant to be having a debate rather than a dialogue of the deaf, and it is a pity that at the moment there is no indication that any more Opposition Members want to engage in it.
My hon. Friend the Minister went on to say that he was keen to ensure that the Government introduce mandatory standards for the public procurement of food, but I am not sure that I am. I can understand the desire in relation to Departments, but not in relation to going further and trying to impose such a demand on the whole public sector.
Mr Paice
If I did not make it clear at the time to my hon. Friend, I should like to clarify the Government’s proposal. The guidelines would be mandatory on central Government and their agencies; local government and other aspects of the public sector would be encouraged to adopt them, but they would not be mandated.
Mr Chope
I am most encouraged by my hon. Friend’s response. I am glad that he recognises that it would be a mistake to impose on local government and other parts of the public sector.
My hon. Friend went on to talk about labelling. I agree wholeheartedly that we should try to get better labelling, but I fear that unless we can renegotiate our position in relation to the European Union, we will not be able to do that as easily or quickly as my hon. Friend would like.
I still do not understand why we are not able to feed food waste to pigs, as we always used to. There was an unnecessary health scare about all that, and it would surely be much better if we fed our food waste to pigs, rather than putting it into landfill or disposing of it in some other way. I hope that in due course the Government will readdress that issue.
Pigs will eat almost anything. As you may recall, Mr Deputy Speaker, it was not that long ago that a citizen was murdered in Wimbledon and it was discovered that his body had been fed to pigs. I am sure that you will be advised that that point is far outside the remit of the Bill, and, funnily enough, dealing with such issues will not be one of the burdens put on the Minister if the Bill passes into law. That is fair enough. I am illustrating the point that pigs are omnivores. It is a pity that we do not allow pigs to devour food waste and thereby the reduce the amount of soya that they consume.
Beak Trimming (Laying Hens)
James Paice Excerpts(14 years ago)
Ministerial CorrectionsRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
I am today laying an amendment to The Mutilations (Permitted Procedures) (England) 2007 before Parliament, principally to extend the use of routine beak trimming of laying hens beyond 31 December 2010, while restricting the method used to the infra-red technique only. I know this is a significant issue for the House, as demonstrated by the large number of signatures for my right hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West (Peter Bottomley) (EDM 260). I therefore want to set out the background behind these amending regulations and explain this Government’s determination to work closely with the objective of making a ban on beak trimming possible in 2016.
Currently, the UK makes use of a derogation in the EU Council Directive 99/74/EC on the welfare of laying hens, which allows for beak trimming of laying hens that are less than 10 days old if carried out by qualified staff. The procedure is only permitted to prevent feather pecking and cannibalism. The Mutilations (Permitted Procedures) (England) Regulations 2007 implements this derogation but only allows routine beak trimming to be carried out until 31 December 2010, after which beak trimming of laying hens would be banned. The ban was put in place when the laying hens directive was implemented in the UK in 2002, allowing eight years to develop a strategy to manage birds without the need to beak trim. At the same time, the previous Government established the Beak Trimming Action Group, comprising representatives from industry, welfare groups, DEFRA, and scientific and veterinary professions. The group’s task was to devise an action plan which would work towards the ban on beak trimming by the end of 2010—looking at changes to management practices or selecting birds that are less prone to feather pecking. However, progress in the control of injurious pecking under commercial conditions in England has not been sufficient to implement a ban on beak trimming without causing a significant risk to animal welfare. In the meantime, a new infra-red technique was developed and is now used to beak trim birds commercially, as an alternative to hot blading. Currently, the infra-red technique is the method used on 95% of all beak trimmed laying hens.
The Farm Animal Welfare Council reviewed the evidence in 2007 and 2009. On both occasions it recommended that, until an alternative means of controlling injurious pecking in laying hens can be developed, the proposed ban on beak trimming should not be introduced, but should be deferred until it can be demonstrated reliably under commercial conditions that laying hens can be managed without beak trimming, without a greater risk to their welfare than that caused by beak trimming itself. The Farm Animal Welfare Council recommended that infra-red beak treatment should be the only method used routinely, as the evidence indicated that it does not induce chronic pain.
While the Government’s long-term goal is to ban routine beak trimming, the Farm Animal Welfare Council’s advice represents a sensible and pragmatic approach in the circumstances we have inherited and is in the interests of laying hen welfare. A ban on beak trimming for laying hens at this current time would result in significant welfare problems through outbreaks of feather pecking and cannibalism. The Government consider it is therefore right that the legislation needs to be amended to remove the impending ban on routine beak trimming, which would otherwise come into force on 1 January 2011.
However, I want to emphasise that the Government see the proposed removal of the ban as very much an interim solution. The previous Government’s consultation on proposals to amend the legislation, did not propose any date to review the policy or any date for a future ban. This Government have taken heed of the strength of feeling on this issue and decided to adopt the Farm Animal Welfare Council’s recommendation of setting a review date of 2015. We will assess the output of this work, with the objective of banning routine beak trimming in 2016. We are committed to working with the Beak Trimming Action Group to find solutions to this very complex issue and to establish an action plan, which will include the following key milestones leading up to a full review of beak trimming policy in 2015:
November 2010—Industry to be asked to carry out study tours to those European countries, such as Austria, Finland, Sweden, Norway and Switzerland where beak trimming is not carried out.
January 2011—The Beak Trimming Action Group (comprising key representatives from industry, welfare groups, scientific and veterinary professions) will be reconvened and I will attend the first meeting which will establish an action plan to develop a strategy to manage birds without the need to beak trim.
Spring 2011—Industry to feedback the experience of other countries to a meeting of the Beak Trimming Action Group.
Summer 2011—Beak Trimming Action Group to begin to consider the outputs of a three year intervention study by Bristol university, funded by the Tubney trust, on strategies to reduce the need for beak trimming with a view to ending the practice by 2016.
1 January 2012—the EU-wide ban on the keeping of laying hens in conventional cages comes into force. As the impact of feather pecking is greatest in systems of management which do not house birds in cages, the risk to the welfare of laying hens from injurious pecking is likely to increase after this time.
2012-2014—Hold regular meetings of the Beak Trimming Action Group to gather data from producers on their experiences in managing flocks over two cycles in alternative systems, which will be fed into the review.
2015—Review established to assess the achievements on the elimination of beak trimming to date. The review will advise whether a ban on routine beak trimming of laying hens will achieve the maximum welfare outcome, with a view to reinstating the ban in 2016.
2016—Provisional date for the ban on routine beak trimming of laying hens.
Beak Trimming (Laying Hens)
James Paice Excerpts(14 years ago)
Written StatementsRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
I am today laying an amendment to The Mutilations (Permitted Procedures) (England) 2007 before Parliament, principally to extend the use of routine beak trimming of laying hens beyond 31 December 2010, while restricting the method used to the infra-red technique only. I know this is a significant issue for the House, as demonstrated by the large number of signatures for my right hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West (Peter Bottomley) (EDM 260). I therefore want to set out the background behind these amending regulations and explain this Government’s approach to working towards a future ban on beak trimming.[Official Report, 12 November 2010, Vol. 518, c. 4MC.]
Currently, the UK makes use of a derogation in the EU Council Directive 99/74/EC on the welfare of laying hens, which allows for beak trimming of laying hens that are less than 10 days old if carried out by qualified staff. The procedure is only permitted to prevent feather pecking and cannibalism. The Mutilations (Permitted Procedures) (England) Regulations 2007 implements this derogation but only allows routine beak trimming to be carried out until 31 December 2010, after which beak trimming of laying hens would be banned. The ban was put in place when the laying hens directive was implemented in the UK in 2002, allowing eight years to develop a strategy to manage birds without the need to beak trim. At the same time, the previous Government established the Beak Trimming Action Group, comprising representatives from industry, welfare groups, DEFRA, and scientific and veterinary professions. The group’s task was to devise an action plan which would work towards the ban on beak trimming by the end of 2010—looking at changes to management practices or selecting birds that are less prone to feather pecking. However, progress in the control of injurious pecking under commercial conditions in England has not been sufficient to implement a ban on beak trimming without causing a significant risk to animal welfare. In the meantime, a new infra-red technique was developed and is now used to beak trim birds commercially, as an alternative to hot blading. Currently, the infra-red technique is the method used on 95% of all beak trimmed laying hens.
The Farm Animal Welfare Council reviewed the evidence in 2007 and 2009. On both occasions it recommended that, until an alternative means of controlling injurious pecking in laying hens can be developed, the proposed ban on beak trimming should not be introduced, but should be deferred until it can be demonstrated reliably under commercial conditions that laying hens can be managed without beak trimming, without a greater risk to their welfare than that caused by beak trimming itself. The Farm Animal Welfare Council recommended that infra-red beak treatment should be the only method used routinely, as the evidence indicated that it does not induce chronic pain.
While the Government’s long-term goal is to ban routine beak trimming, the Farm Animal Welfare Council’s advice represents a sensible and pragmatic approach in the circumstances we have inherited and is in the interests of laying hen welfare. A ban on beak trimming for laying hens at this current time would result in significant welfare problems through outbreaks of feather pecking and cannibalism. The Government consider it is therefore right that the legislation needs to be amended to remove the impending ban on routine beak trimming, which would otherwise come into force on 1 January 2011.
However, I want to emphasise that the Government see the proposed removal of the ban as very much an interim solution. The previous Government’s consultation on proposals to amend the legislation, did not propose any date to review the policy or any date for a future ban. This Government have taken heed of the strength of feeling on this issue and decided to adopt the Farm Animal Welfare Council’s recommendation of setting a review date of 2015. We will assess the output of this work, with a view to banning routine beak trimming in 2016. We are committed to working with the Beak Trimming Action Group to find solutions to this very complex issue and to establish an action plan, which will include the following key milestones leading up to a full review of beak trimming policy in 2015:
November 2010—Industry to be asked to carry out study tours to those European countries, such as Austria, Finland, Sweden, Norway and Switzerland where beak trimming is not carried out.
January 2011—The Beak Trimming Action Group (comprising key representatives from industry, welfare groups, scientific and veterinary professions) will be reconvened and I will attend the first meeting which will establish an action plan to develop a strategy to manage birds without the need to beak trim.
Spring 2011—Industry to feedback the experience of other countries to a meeting of the Beak Trimming Action Group.
Summer 2011—Beak Trimming Action Group to begin to consider the outputs of a three year intervention study by Bristol university, funded by the Tubney trust, on strategies to reduce the need for beak trimming with a view to ending the practice by 2016.
1 January 2012—the EU-wide ban on the keeping of laying hens in conventional cages comes into force. As the impact of feather pecking is greatest in systems of management which do not house birds in cages, the risk to the welfare of laying hens from injurious pecking is likely to increase after this time.
2012-2014—Hold regular meetings of the Beak Trimming Action Group to gather data from producers on their experiences in managing flocks over two cycles in alternative systems, which will be fed into the review.
2015—Review established to assess the achievements on the elimination of beak trimming to date. The review will advise whether a ban on routine beak trimming of laying hens will achieve the maximum welfare outcome, with a view to reinstating the ban in 2016.
2016—Provisional date for the ban on routine beak trimming of laying hens.
Oral Answers to Questions
James Paice Excerpts(14 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)
10. What plans she has to sell or lease part of the Forestry Commission estate.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
There is an ongoing programme of sales run by the Forestry Commission, year on year, to achieve operational efficiency. In the 2009-10 accounts, the public forest estate in England was valued at £700 million. That is the net book value; it does not necessarily reflect the true market value. I intend to consult on proposals for new ownership options for the public forest estate in England, and on how to secure the important public benefits that they provide.
Kerry McCarthy
I think that for once, given the answers that we have heard today, The Daily Telegraph might be right, because it says that the Government cannot see the forest for the fees. However, can the Minister give a categorical assurance that, contrary to other press reports, if Government-owned forest is sold off, it will not be sold off to developers to be turned into things such as Center Parcs and golf courses?
Mr Paice
I am delighted to have the opportunity to debunk that absurd notion. As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has said, before trees can be felled, one requires a felling licence from the Forestry Commission. The Forestry Commission will continue to have that role, even through those disposals, if that is what happens; and, of course, planning consent would be required to undertake any of those things, such as golf courses or Center Parcs. We have no intention of seeing our forest damaged; we want to maintain the public benefits that we already have.
Caroline Lucas
Will the Minister make a commitment that all land transferred from the Forestry Commission’s control will be covered by legally binding commitments on new owners to maintain current policies for environmentally and socially beneficial use, especially those on the restoration of planted ancient woodland and on public access? Can he also put on the record what will happen to the funds raised from the proposed new programme to sell off those woodlands?
Mr Paice
There would be no point in having a consultation if I were to announce the results of it now, so I am not going to do so. However, I can tell the hon. Lady, as my right hon. Friend has said and I have just said, that we have absolutely no intention of allowing any public benefit of our woodland, be it access, biodiversity or carbon storage, to be damaged by whatever action we take on public ownership.
Miss Anne McIntosh (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)
Is the Minister aware of the Forestry Commission’s involvement in a pilot flood protection project to protect Pickering from future floods by planting a great number of trees to soak up the excess water and prevent it from entering Pickering? Will he give me an assurance today that that project will not be at risk from any future cutbacks and that the Government will continue with their tree planting programme?
Mr Paice
It is worth making the point to my hon. Friend that under the previous Government the amount of trees and new woodland planted in this country fell dramatically. The Opposition, as they now are, need to account for that. My hon. Friend is absolutely right; trees have a vital role in flood prevention and alleviation, and although I do not know the detail of the scheme to which she refers, I have no doubt that it will continue in some guise.
Roger Williams (Brecon and Radnorshire) (LD)
ConFor, the Confederation of Forest Industries, represents sawmills and other processing businesses, and it values the supply of timber that it receives from the Forestry Commission estate because of its quality and consistency. As he considers the sale of some of that estate, will the Minister consult ConFor and the timber industries to ensure that their interests are taken into consideration?
Mr Paice
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I assure him that I have already had consultations and discussions with ConFor. I have discussed various options with its representatives, who, obviously, will submit a response to the consultation when we launch it. My hon. Friend is absolutely right that a number of the timber trade businesses rely on a constant supply of timber from the Forestry Commission, and I am very much aware that that factor will have to be taken into account to ensure that our important timber industry gets continuity of supply.
Mr William Bain (Glasgow North East) (Lab)
I thank the Minister for his letter of last week about the future of Forestry Commission land, even if it is regrettable that it has not been accompanied by a full statement to the House.
The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and the Woodland Trust have said that the sale price for that ancient forest land does not match its environmental or social value and that they lack the resources to purchase the land. Why has the Minister failed to give the House any assurance that the money raised from this fire sale of English woodland will be reinvested in environmental protection or green jobs, rather than simply ending up in the Treasury’s coffers? Is not the reality that big business, not the big society, will benefit from this land grab?
Mr Paice
I welcome the hon. Gentleman to his new position—and long may he hold it, if that is the best that he can do. I had hoped that we could have a rational debate about the future of our forests. Much of what the hon. Gentleman said is absolute nonsense. As I have repeatedly said, we are determined to protect our forests and increase the rate of new planting in this country, beyond the failure of his Government, whom he supported. That is what has to be done. Working towards new ownership does not in any way countermand the important value of our British forests, which we intend to maintain.
Anne Marie Morris (Newton Abbot) (Con)
13. What steps her Department is taking to assist the farming industry to become more competitive.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
The Government are determined to help our farming industry play its full role in the food supply chain by clawing back markets lost to imports and by increasing exports. We are therefore changing the whole culture of regulation to one of trust rather than one of threat. We provide investment assistance under the rural development programme and we are working with the industry on knowledge transfer, skills development and sustainability issues.
Simon Hart
I thank the Minister for his answer. Will he reassure members of the Farmers Union of Wales, whom I met earlier this week, that he is making progress on the creation of a supermarket ombudsman?
Mr Paice
As my hon. Friend knows, the legislative aspects of that issue relate to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, but I assure him that I am in close contact with my colleagues. We are determined to press ahead with the supermarket adjudicator, as recommended by the Competition Commission a year or so ago.
Anne Marie Morris
Animal disease is costly to the Government and farmers, both financially and emotionally. In 2009-10, the Government spent £330 million on animal health and welfare, and the foot and mouth outbreak in 2001, which devastated the local farming economy in Devon, is believed to have cost the UK £8 billion. I recently had a meeting with farmers in Newton Abbot, and they are very concerned that the Government will not listen to them about shaping plans, going forward, for cost and risk sharing—
Anne Marie Morris
Will the Minister meet me and some of my local farmers to discuss their ideas on how to reduce cost and risk sharing?
Mr Paice
Yes, I will happily meet my hon. Friend. If you will allow me one more sentence, Mr Speaker, under the cost and responsibility discussions I am absolutely determined, and I will reassure my hon. Friend’s farmers on this, that they will have a major role in formulating disease control policy.
Joan Walley (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab)
May I ask the Minister how the Government will use their new buying standards for food in the public sector to support British farmers in the 88% of public sector food purchases not covered by the new Government standards? My private Member’s Bill next week is the ideal opportunity for a detailed debate in Committee where we can discuss how we can support farmers.
Mr Paice
I can tell the hon. Lady that I am certainly looking forward to next week’s debate on her private Member’s Bill and I congratulate her on introducing it to enable us to have that debate. We will consult on the Government’s buying standards in the next few weeks and we will be launching them early next year. They will apply compulsorily to central Government—we have determined that we should drive these standards forward—and they will include the need to ensure that food procured by the Government is produced to the standards that we expect of our own farmers. That is the best way to ensure fair competition in public procurement.
Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)
Does the Minister accept, in the interests of what he has said about competitiveness, that the decision to abolish the national Agricultural Wages Board will not contribute to competitiveness but will simply reduce the living standards and wages of our agricultural workers?
Mr Paice
I am afraid that I do not agree with the hon. Lady. That legislation has been in place for 60 years and industrial relations and wages negotiations have changed dramatically over those years. It is worth pointing out that the previous Government, in office for 13 years, did not bring back any of the other wages boards that we had abolished. The present wages board does not allow salaries, it does not allow proper piecework rates and it does not allow annualised rates. Those are all measures that modern labour relations require. That is why it needs to go and all workers will be protected by the national minimum wage regulations, which apply to every other worker in this country.
Laura Sandys (South Thanet) (Con)
5. For what reasons her Department has instructed the under-10-metre fishing fleet to maintain log books.
Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)
7. When she plans to respond to the recent consultation conducted by her Department on dangerous dogs; and if she will make a statement.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
The consultation closed on 1 June and received 4,250 responses. The Government will be publishing a summary of those responses and will make an announcement on the way forward very shortly.
Luciana Berger
In 2008, almost 6,000 people needed hospital treatment for injuries sustained by dangerous dogs. The Communication Workers Union reports that every year between 5,000 and 6,000 of its members suffer injuries by dogs. Every month, three guide dogs are attacked. In the past three years, five children have been killed by dangerous dogs, including John Paul Massey in my constituency. Will the Minister seriously consider the draft legislation proposed by the Association of Chief Police Officers, the RSPCA and the National Dog Warden Association in order adequately to deal with this problem?
Mr Paice
I do not think anybody in this House can be unaware of the increasing problems of dangerous dogs to which the hon. Lady refers, and the tragedy of John Paul Massey and other children who have been killed by dogs in recent years. Clearly, we do have to act. I can assure her that my noble Friend Lord Henley, who leads on these matters, will be taking account of the proposals to which she refers. We should understand that we need to find a way forward that addresses the real problem of people who are already, in many cases, disobeying the law by holding dogs which are classified as dangerous dogs. It is those people we need to attack rather than the much larger number whose dogs are perfectly harmless.
Dr John Pugh (Southport) (LD)
We do not let a criminal or unsuitable person have lawful possession of a firearm or a weapon. Given the known temperament of certain breeds of dog, could we not insist on a fit and proper person test as a precondition of owning a dangerous dog? After all, criminals seem to have a proclivity for precisely these breeds.
Mr Paice
As I have said, that proposition and many others are being considered by my noble Friend, and he will make his announcement shortly. My hon. Friend needs to recognise that to take that approach would require an immense amount of regulation and control about who was able to purchase dogs, which would then feed back through the whole supply chain of puppies and become quite a mammoth undertaking. Nevertheless, it is worth considering, as with all other propositions.
Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)
8. What recent discussions she has had with her EU counterparts on reform of the common agricultural policy.
Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)
12. What assessment she has made of the likely effects of the abolition of the Agricultural Wages Board on wages and working conditions in the farming and food production sectors.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
Abolition of the board will allow modern employment practices within the agricultural and food packaging industry, which will help the industry develop and provide more job opportunities. Workers will retain any existing contractual rights in place at the time of abolition. New workers will be protected by general employment legislation, including the national minimum wage, as with workers in all other sectors of the economy. A full impact assessment and equality impact assessment will be made available during the legislative process.
Tom Blenkinsop
How does abolishing an organisation that ensures that workers get 2p above the national minimum wage support growth in rural communities such as mine in east Cleveland and in the rural economy?
Mr Paice
The hon. Gentleman puts his finger on the nonsense. What is the point of having the whole superstructure of the Agricultural Wages Board simply to provide a 2p-an-hour premium over the minimum wage? That is part of the justification for saying that the board is not necessary. I stand with the hon. Gentleman and other Opposition Members in wanting to see all farm and agricultural workers treated properly and receive a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work, but we need to bring agricultural wages regulations into the present day so that the modern, efficient businesses in my constituency and his can grow, expand and provide more job opportunities, not fewer.
Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
14. What recent representations she has received on the proposed cull of badgers to reduce the spread of bovine tuberculosis.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
A public consultation is currently under way on a badger control policy to tackle bovine tuberculosis. As of yesterday evening, we have received 1,613 responses from a variety of individuals and organisations. I would encourage anyone with a view to respond to the consultation, which closes on 8 December. We will be making a decision on the Government’s approach early next year.
Mrs Glindon
What public order advice has the Minister received on badger cull licences?
Mr Paice
We have been consulting the Home Office and police forces in areas where we think culls might occur, and we will obviously take their advice forward. I do not want to prejudge the outcome of the consultation or, indeed, our consideration of it, but the hon. Lady puts her finger on a very important point, which has to be addressed in the overall approach that we adopt. I can assure her that we are talking with the relevant bodies and authorities.
Mr David Ruffley (Bury St Edmunds) (Con)
15. What steps her Department is taking to support the sugar beet industry.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
As my hon. Friend knows, supporting the farming sector is fundamental to my Department’s business. The sugar beet sector remains heavily regulated by the common agricultural policy, and it is expected that it will be considered during the forthcoming round of CAP reforms in response to the European Union budget review. The UK Government will seek an outcome where our sugar beet industry can thrive in a more competitive and sustainable environment.
Mr Ruffley
The Minister will understand that the greater use of biofuels in this country will not only cut CO2 emissions, but give a vital boost to East Anglian sugar beet growers. British Sugar would like to know what the Government are doing to provide incentives to companies such as itself to invest in future biofuel production. Can the Minister tell us?
Mr Paice
Incentives for biofuel production are primarily a matter for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, but I can assure my hon. Friend that we fully recognise the pioneering work that British Sugar has done at the Wissington factory in Norfolk, where it produces biofuels and uses the heat generated as a by-product to grow tomatoes in glasshouses. I can also assure him that we are determined to encourage and enable our sugar industry to contribute just as much to biofuels as to our sugar supply. However, in terms of the detail, he needs to address himself to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change.
Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)
16. What discussions she has had with ministerial colleagues on progress by the Government towards its performance objectives on environmental sustainability.
Gordon Banks (Ochil and South Perthshire) (Lab)
17. What recent discussions she has had with the Gangmasters Licensing Authority on the use of child labour in the farming and food industry sectors.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
The Gangmasters Licensing Authority licenses labour providers in the agriculture, food processing and shellfish-gathering sectors, and also enforces the Gangmasters (Licensing) Act 2004. It does not have responsibility for enforcing legislation on child labour—that falls to the police, who work alongside local authorities’ children’s services departments. Nevertheless, the GLA played an important role in liaising with the relevant authorities in the recent very shocking case of Romanian children found picking spring onions in Worcestershire.
Gordon Banks
The Minister is right that we are all shocked at the news of those Romanian children. I take on board what he said about the GLA, but does he feel that, given the remoteness of some locations where people are expected to work in the agricultural sector, managing the possibility of child exploitation is difficult?
Mr Paice
As the hon. Gentleman knows, children below the age of 13 are not permitted to work other than in certain parts of the entertainment industry. He will also know that restrictions apply to the number of hours that 13 to 16-year-olds can work and that a licence must be obtained from the local authority before such employment begins. Let us therefore be under no doubt that if children are employed in agriculture, they are employed illegally, unless they are licensed in the way I described.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned the remoteness of much agricultural activity. I entirely understand his point, but I do not think that we should allow that incident—I cannot comment on the detail—to make us think that such practices are rife all over the country. The vast majority of farmers and fruit and vegetable growers behave properly towards their work force and ensure that they comply with employment legislation. We need to ensure that breaches in the law, as might have happened in that case, are dealt with appropriately.
Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)
The Romanian children were found working in my constituency. Many of the local farmers use migrant labourers. Has the Minister any general advice for those farmers on the employment of migrant labour?
Mr Paice
I can say to my hon. Friend quite clearly that the most important thing that anybody who wants to employ migrant labour—or, indeed, any non-local labour—should do is ensure that they are dealing with a licensed gangmaster. They should ask to see the certificate or licence of the gangmaster proposing to bring the labour on to the farm. That way they can all be reassured they are doing the right thing.
Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)
18. What steps her Department is taking to assist the farming industry to become more competitive.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave a few moments ago.
Neil Parish
This country has a highly competitive pig and poultry industry that is completely unsubsidised and relies heavily on imported feed. Will the Minister assure us that we can get a greater threshold when allowing imports of non-genetically modified feed into the country, otherwise we will export our industry abroad?
Mr Paice
My hon. Friend makes an important point. Discussions are taking place in Europe about the threshold for the import of GM soya, predominantly, which is what he is talking about, and I can assure him that we will be taking a constructive view to those negotiations. Quite clearly it would be pointless to deprive our livestock sector of something in a way that simply means we import more livestock products that have been fed on GM food.
Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)
Farmers clearly cannot be competitive if supermarkets have got them in an arm lock. In response to the question from the hon. Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire (Simon Hart), the Minister rightly supported the Government policy of enforcing the grocery code supply practice. However, will he acknowledge that there is anxiety in the farming community about the fact that the Government may not be introducing this legislation soon enough. Can he reassure us that they will take the earliest opportunity to bring it forward?
Mr Paice
May I recognise and pay tribute to the sterling work that my hon. Friend has done on this matter over a number of years in bringing forward this proposition, which is now Government policy? I can reassure him that I am constantly talking to my colleagues in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and urging them to bring this forward, because I fully recognise its importance to the whole of the agriculture industry.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
T1. If she will make a statement on her departmental responsibilities.
Kerry McCarthy
In June, the Secretary of State said that the Hunting Act 2004 had not been a demonstrable success and was difficult to enforce, but figures published by the Department last year showed 57 prosecutions in 2009—an average of one every week—and more convictions than any other piece of wildlife legislation. How do Ministers square that with her belief that it has not been a demonstrable success?
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
If the hon. Lady examines those figures more deeply, she will find that most of them are to do with what is known as illegal hare coursing on land where the owner has not given permission for that to take place—let alone the fact that the process is currently illegal under the 2004 Act. The Government have said that they will bring forward legislation. It will be a free vote in the House, and she will have an opportunity to make her statements and to vote accordingly when the Government introduce that legislation.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
T2. The European Food Safety Authority has concluded that the major factor causing poor welfare in dairy cows is genetic selection to produce high yields. Given proposals to intensify milk production for higher yields, such as those planned at Nocton, will the Secretary of State agree urgently to review the welfare code for dairy cows in the UK, and to meet a delegation of cross-party MPs and non-governmental organisations to discuss how her Department can ensure that its code takes into account the latest scientific advice and ensures that any new dairies do not compromise cow welfare?
Mr Paice
I am happy to meet the hon. Gentleman and others to discuss the matter, but I assure him that the Department puts welfare at the top of our agenda, as I hope our record to date shows. However, we must be guided by science, which is why I am looking forward to the results of the three-year study being carried out in Scotland on intensive dairy farming, and the work at Harper Adams university college on the same issue. After that, we will be in a better position to know the precise answers. I remind him that the Farm Animal Welfare Council, which the Department normally listens to, has said clearly that welfare is a function more of management than of scale.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
T4. Given that the Department would like all animals to be stunned before slaughter, may we please have some food labelling regulations to mark halal and kosher products as such, so that those of us who object to ritual slaughter do not inadvertently buy such products in shops and restaurants?
Mr Paice
As my hon. Friend is aware and as the House fully understands, this is a highly emotive issue, and I understand the demand for labelling. As he rightly says, the Government would like all animals to be properly stunned before they are bled to slaughter. There is a discussion at European level about food information regulations, but we do not believe that that is the right vehicle. Next year, we will consult on implementation of the European animal welfare regulations, and the labelling issue will certainly be examined as part of that. I recognise the strength of feeling to which my hon. Friend refers.
Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP)
I am sure that Ministers share my disappointment that last week’s talks aimed at resolving the mackerel dispute between Iceland, the Faroe Islands, Norway and the EU ended without resolution. The ongoing uncertainty is causing great distress to the pelagic fleet and parts of the processing sector in my constituency, where much of the industry is based. Those people have much to lose and little to gain in the negotiations. Will the Minister update the House on the outcome of those negotiations, and assure us that the Government will take a robust line in those talks to defend our historic fishing rights and to ensure that the EU does not acquiesce to the unreasonable and environmentally destructive demands being made by Iceland and the Faroes?
Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)
Does the Secretary of State accept the findings of the independent scientific group on bovine TB, in particular when it says:
“Scientific findings indicate that the rising incidence of disease can be reversed, and geographical spread contained, by the rigid application of cattle-based control measures alone”?
Mr Paice
The hon. Gentleman needs to recognise that that study ended several years ago. We now have more science, which has superseded those conclusions reached by the independent study group. I have laid out the new scientific evidence from ongoing studies in the consultation document, and that is the reason for the proposal that we have put forward.
Annette Brooke (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)
T6. The Prime Minister responded to a question from my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Martin Horwood) on 15 September about the Campaign to Protect Rural England’s report on a bottle deposit and return scheme, and gave an indication that the Government would be looking at it. Given the potential to increase recycling and reduce litter, will the Minister give some views on the report and say what action might be taken?
Margot James (Stourbridge) (Con)
T7. Can my hon. Friend advise the House on whether he has had any discussions with independent animal welfare organisations about the prospects for intensive dairy farming of the sort proposed by a planning application in Lincolnshire?
Mr Paice
I have had no specific discussions or meetings on the matter, nor have I received any specific representations, but it has arisen in other discussions that I have had with animal welfare lobbies, which have all put their views forward. I should point out that, as I understand it, a planning application has not even been made yet. That will be a planning issue, and I cannot comment on the detail.
Tom Greatrex (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Lab/Co-op)
I am sure that the Minister will share my disquiet at the reported comments by the Icelandic negotiator last week. Will he do everything in his power to ensure that next week’s meeting of the North East Atlantic Fisheries Commission is used as another vehicle to try to find a solution to the dispute about the mackerel quota in the North sea, which is vital to many communities in Scotland?
Zac Goldsmith (Richmond Park) (Con)
Does the Minister share the concerns of a number of farming organisations—in particular smaller farming organisations, such as the Small Farms Association and the Family Farmers Association—that plans to build a mega-dairy in Nocton will fatally undermine the viability of a great number of small and family farms?
Mr Paice
Obviously I understand those concerns, and as my hon. Friend knows, I have been in the industry for most of my working life. Two points need to be made. First, it is good news that somebody thinks that the dairy industry is worth investing in, given that so many dairy farmers have given up over the past few years. Secondly, I genuinely believe that there is huge scope for reclaiming much of our domestic market, which has been lost to imported dairy products. If through expansion and greater efficiencies we can do that, there will be room in the industry for both large and small producers.
Joan Walley (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab)
Given the reference made to the Environmental Audit Committee, I hope we can return to the issue of resources in due course. On a constituency matter, I met the Staffordshire wildlife trust last week and it is looking to make a submission to the EU LIFE+ programme to enhance biodiversity in Stoke-on-Trent. Will the Secretary of State commit DEFRA officers to give support to any proposal that comes out of that?
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
The heart of the new national forest lies in my beautiful constituency of North West Leicestershire. Will the Minister assure the House that any sale of Forestry Commission assets will not reduce public access or enjoyment of our woods and forests?
Mr Paice
I am happy to give yet again the assurance that if any disposal of Forestry Commission land takes place—it is a matter for consultation—it will not be at the expense of any existing public benefit. I make the point that the National Forest Company, to which my hon. Friend rightly refers, has done a superb job. The discussion does not include the national forest, much of which is, of course, already in private hands.
Natural England
James Paice Excerpts(14 years ago)
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The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
I welcome the opportunity to say a few words about Natural England, and it is appropriate for us to have this debate a week after the public spending review. I welcome and congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Liddell-Grainger) on obtaining this short debate; it has allowed him to practise his rhetoric, to which we are all well accustomed.
I would like to go back to the origins of Natural England and emphasise that its setting-up had full cross-party support. Unsurprisingly, I was Opposition spokesperson at the time, and I can recall the debates on the legislation in Committee. We did not support all the fine detail of the provisions, but the overall idea of setting up the body received cross-party support. The idea was to bring together a number of activities that were synonymous and complementary to a degree, and that carried a risk of duplication.
Let me elaborate a little on the role of Natural England. It is the Government’s statutory adviser on landscape, biodiversity and the natural environment. Previously, that function was largely carried out by English Nature. Natural England will continue to carry out a range of important functions that support and contribute to all three key priorities outlined in the structural reform plan published by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs in July. Those are: to support British farming and encourage sustainable food production; to enhance the environment and biodiversity to improve quality of life; and to support a strong and sustainable green economy that is resilient to climate change.
Natural England’s role in delivering for DEFRA on the landscape, biodiversity and the natural environment includes, as my hon. Friend has said, managing the stewardship and green farming schemes that come under the rural development programme for England. It also includes reducing the decline of biodiversity and managing the licensing of protected species across England; designating national parks and areas of outstanding natural beauty; and notifying sites of special scientific interest, as was mentioned by my hon. Friend.
The Government’s response to the Public Accounts Committee report, to which my hon. Friend referred, stated clearly that a fair criticism had been made at the time, but that the world had moved on. Natural England had addressed those issues, and by the end of March 2009 it had successfully completed the programme to develop conservation objectives for all SSSIs. Criticism was fair at the time, but it is now out of date.
Natural England also works for the Government in making recommendations to DEFRA on the designation of sites, such as special areas of conservation under the EU habitats directive, and special protection areas under the EU birds directive. It acts as a statutory consultee to competent authorities that are considering proposals for plans, projects or other developments that might affect biodiversity. It provides conservation advice on the selection of marine protected areas, and monitors progress towards the achievement of conservation objectives for those designated sites, thereby contributing to the development of proposals for marine conservation zones.
Natural England is required to work with farmers and land managers. One of the points on which the then Opposition challenged the Government during the stages of the Bill to set up Natural England was ensuring that the organisation worked with those who relied on the land for their living. The Government of the day did not really accept that, and I remember that some amendments we proposed were rejected. Nevertheless, we feel strongly that Natural England must work with farmers, land managers, business, industry, planners, developers and everybody involved in improving the environment. That is a bit of the history.
Let me now bring hon. Members up to speed with where we are under the new coalition Government. We are working with Natural England to implement a radical and comprehensive package of measures to transform it—I am sure my hon. Friend will welcome that—into a much leaner, more efficient delivery body, focused strongly on our ambitions for the natural environment. Significant changes across the organisation will create a new delivery model that is more effective and cost-efficient in delivering on those objectives. For a start, as my hon. Friend requested, Natural England will dramatically reduce its back-office costs, while keeping to a minimum any reduction in delivery. It will work much more closely with the other arm’s length bodies to eliminate any duplication in work.
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)
My hon. Friend the Minister mentioned a significant reduction in backroom costs. The total staff costs for this year for Natural England are £96,460,000. Can he give an assurance that there will be a dramatic reduction in that figure?
Mr Paice
Yes, I can. I cannot put a precise figure on it, because we are still working through the implications of last week’s announcement for all our arm’s length bodies, but we have made no secret of the fact that all of them will have to carry their fair share of the 33% reduction in DEFRA administration costs, which applies right across the DEFRA family. I can give my hon. Friend that assurance.
Natural England will be required to work much more closely with arm’s length bodies to eliminate any duplication in work and to focus the collective resources available on delivering on the priorities. One matter on which we are working hard is ensuring that Natural England works much more closely not just with arm’s length bodies, but with the many non-governmental organisations in the field of conservation and biodiversity, many of which have very competent advisers on the ground with the credibility and experience to work closely with farmers and land managers. We want Natural England to involve them much more in delivery. We also want to see the demonstrable culture change to which my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset referred, and innovative ways of working that embrace the Government’s objectives of localism, the big society and improved customer focus.
Natural England is considering the options for improving the management of our national nature reserves in a way that is more consistent with our big society ambitions while ensuring continued environmental protection, and the options for sharing sponsorship of areas of outstanding natural beauty with DEFRA, cementing the accountability with Ministers—an issue to which my hon. Friend also referred.
I can assure my hon. Friend that we have made it clear that there must be an end to any policy-making and lobbying activities. We cannot have the situation that we had in the last Parliament, in which Natural England was lobbying for amendments to legislation using taxpayers’ money. That will stop.
We are working with Natural England to minimise any impact on the Government’s natural environment objectives. Despite the pressures on public expenditure, Natural England will become much more effective in contributing to the biodiversity objectives, not only through its own functions but because it needs better to engage with and support the important contributions made by civil society bodies, local communities, businesses, farmers and so on.
As a result, Natural England is considering a number of ideas to involve civil society partners in all aspects of its work—delivery on nature reserves, volunteering, access and ensuring continued environmental protection. It is committed to developing a much stronger focus on integrating the engagement of civil society in the delivery of Natural England’s duties and on looking for further opportunities. It already has a number of partnerships with big society organisations—for instance, in its work to co-ordinate the input of those bodies into the England biodiversity group on behalf of DEFRA—and it needs to do more.
My hon. Friend rightly paid attention to environmental stewardship. That plays a pivotal role in delivering on DEFRA’s priority of enhancing the environment and biodiversity to improve the quality of life. Last week’s spending announcement made that clear, with an increase in the money available for higher-level stewardship schemes. DEFRA and Natural England are already working with farming and environmental partners to improve the effectiveness of stewardship, including through such initiatives as the campaign for the farmed environment. That was launched under the previous Government, partly as a result of pressure from the then Opposition, because we made it clear that we would not support an increase in statutory set-aside; we wanted a voluntary approach. That is working very successfully, but more effort needs to be made. There is considerable scope for more work with various outside partners and, again, we are making that clear to Natural England.
Higher-level stewardship funding, which delivers significant benefits for biodiversity—everyone recognises that it is the most effective scheme—will increase by 83%, compared with this year, by 2013-14. I have to accept that the rate of growth is slightly slower than would otherwise have been the case. Nevertheless, it is growth, which should be welcomed.
Entry-level stewardship remains open to all farmers, but our aim must be to seek improvements wherever we can. We aim to improve the targeting and focus of entry-level stewardship agreements, because we want better outcomes and to concentrate a little of the effort on achieving specific outcomes. That will provide a large-scale uplift in their environmental value. Of course, we must take account of the Government response to the Lawton report as we do all this.
I am well aware of the criticisms of Natural England. My hon. Friend made a number of them. He has made them in the past, as have many others. Indeed, I have made them myself in the past, and will continue to do so if I do not believe that it is achieving its objectives. However, against the targets set by the previous Government, it has performed well. We can argue about whether the targets were right, but it did achieve what it was told to do. However, there is no doubt in my mind that under the previous Government and the previous leadership, Natural England allowed itself to expand and develop into areas that it should not have got into. My hon. Friend referred to the present chairman of Natural England, Poul Christensen, whom I believe is very cognisant of the fact that it needs to look again at what it is doing and to be reined back to its key functions. I am quite confident that he will do that.
Whatever Natural England has achieved, it cannot go on working in the same way because of all the pressures to which I have referred, and the concern about its direction. It must maximise its effectiveness against the background of a reducing budget—a fact to which I referred. Therefore, although we have decided that Natural England should be retained as a public body, neither the public nor Natural England should be complacent or rest on their laurels. It must be substantially reformed through a structural process and through cultural change to become a much more efficient and customer-focused organisation with clarified accountabilities.
By the time we publish next year’s White Paper on the natural environment—probably in April or thereabouts—which will be an important step forward in the coalition’s commitment to the environment, Natural England will be in a much better position and will have a better arrangement with which to deliver on the objectives that we set out in the White Paper. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for allowing me to put on the record how we see Natural England developing over the next few months and the way in which it will continue to play a vital but, we hope, more focused and targeted role in delivering on the Government’s objectives.
Incinerators
James Paice Excerpts(14 years ago)
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The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
Thank you, Mr Dobbin, and good afternoon to you.
I want to start by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) on securing a debate on an issue that is important not only for her constituency but, as has been shown, for a number of my hon. Friends, whom I think have differing views about the issue of incinerators. However, it is a big issue and last week’s comprehensive spending review announcements obviously impact on it.
My hon. Friend is probably aware that, despite her kind words at the beginning, this issue is not part of my portfolio. However, the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon), is at a Council of Ministers meeting in Luxembourg. Therefore, responding to this debate falls to me, but I will pass on to him the detail of what my hon. Friend has said.
Before I get into specifics, I want to make a few points that I hope will calm some concerns, even if they are not necessarily exactly what my hon. Friends want to hear. First, I want to give some facts about waste incinerators. We appreciate that there are huge concerns about incinerators, including their effect on air quality, the natural environment and the health of communities in the vicinity. My hon. Friend referred to the proximity of residences to incinerators in her area.
However, I must emphasize that all modern waste incinerators are subject to extremely stringent pollution controls. They have to comply with the waste incineration directive, which sets strict emission limits for pollutants. As my hon. Friend knows, the Environment Agency must grant the necessary permits for an incinerator to operate if a facility is not compliant with that directive. In other words, such a facility would have to get a permit, and I understand that the permit for the proposed Middlewich incinerator has not yet been granted; in fact, the Environment Agency is still considering the application. All of that means that emissions from waste incinerators are probably more heavily regulated than emissions from coal, gas and other forms of power generation from combustion.
I also need to make it clear that studies have failed to establish any convincing link between the emissions from incinerators and adverse effects on public health. Only last year, the Health Protection Agency reviewed the existing evidence and concluded that any effect on people’s health from incinerator emissions is likely be so small as to be undetectable. The agency also affirmed that adverse health effects from modern, well-regulated waste incinerators do not pose a significant threat to public health.
David Mowat
I hear what the Minister says about the level of pollution from incinerators, which is correct and broadly in accordance with reports produced, inter alia, by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers on this subject. However, it is not true of landfill sites, which sometimes cover many hundreds of acres and are regulated to a much worse standard, creating a much more significant public health issue. This is not a plea for incinerators to be built in the wrong place—the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton are very valid—but we need to understand that we are not comparing incineration with recycling but with landfill, and that is not acceptable either.
Mr Paice
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point. It is extremely important that we understand what we call the “hierarchy of waste disposal”.
As my hon. Friends know, this Government are determined to be a green Government, and part of that involves moving towards a zero-waste economy. That does not mean having absolutely no waste—of course, that is nonsensical—but that resources are fully valued, and we recognise that one person’s waste may be another person’s raw material.
We are moving closer to zero landfill, and incidentally, I can tell my hon. Friend the Member for Selby and Ainsty (Nigel Adams) that the landfill tax is £48 a tonne at the moment and will rise by £8 a tonne for the next four years. So we do know what landfill tax will be in 2015, although I grant that we do not know what it will be in 25 years’ time. Nevertheless, that point might be a little helpful.
We are carrying out a thorough review of waste policy, which we will publish next spring. I cannot pre-empt the findings, but recovery of energy from some waste through incineration and other technologies such as anaerobic digestion is extremely important. That process has a role to play as we move towards the zero-waste economy that I have talked about.
At one extreme of that zero-waste economy is precisely the issue that my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South (David Mowat) referred to: getting rid of landfill. We cannot go on dumping material in the ground. Not only is it bad in all the ways he described; leaving waste as a legacy for the generations to come, who would have to dig it up, is a pretty impolite thing to do.
So we have a hierarchy of waste disposal, and the preferred option is obviously to prevent waste being created. The next most preferable options are reuse, recycling and recovery—either of the waste itself or energy from it. Landfill must be the very last resort and hopefully, it will be eliminated altogether. Clearly, that hierarchy can change for different individual waste types if it makes environmental sense. However, wherever possible we must set our face against landfill.
In other countries, such as Scandinavian countries and the Netherlands, recycling and the use of energy from waste operate in co-existence. In the Netherlands, recycling rates are around 65%, with 33% of energy coming from waste. The figures are similar in Scandinavia.
The waste hierarchy will shortly become UK law through the revised waste framework directive, under which we will have legal targets to meet. The Climate Change Act 2008 sets new targets for carbon budgets, and waste cannot be excepted from that process.
My hon. Friend the Member for Congleton concentrated on local issues and it is entirely right that she did so. However, before I turn to them I cannot stress too much the fact that we can recover energy from waste not only through incineration but through other technologies. Nevertheless, incineration is a proven way of getting energy from waste, although nobody should pretend that it is some sort of “silver bullet”.
My hon. Friends the Members for Selby and Ainsty and for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Andrew Jones) raised the issue of the Allerton Park project. I am afraid that I cannot answer all their questions, but I will happily write to them about the details of that project or ask my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary to do so. However, I point out that, as we said last week, we will publish the methodology through which the 11 remaining sites with projects were left in the private finance initiative allocation, and through which the others were taken out. I therefore think we will be able to answer most of my hon. Friends’ concerns about the Allerton Park project.
I turn to the issue of the community. Of course, this Government make great play of the importance of decentralisation. It is an absolute commitment and we want to implement it as much as and wherever we possibly can. As my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton recognised in her speech, I cannot comment on the particulars of the Middlewich application, which will go to a planning appeal and ultimately, because it is affected by Government policy, to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government. Nevertheless, the question of communities having their say and—if I understood my hon. Friend correctly—the planning authority’s rejecting the application unanimously are important issues that will have to be taken into account in the inquiry.
We want to ensure that where such applications are made, there is a proper, informed and vigorous debate within the local community, so that it can make the right choices. I fully understand that there is a great deal of public concern about this issue. Concern about incinerators is probably exceeded only by concern about the proposed siting of a Travellers’ camp next to people’s homes—and that might be a marginal difference.
It is important that I stress what I said earlier: that there are no public health issues related to having an incinerator in the vicinity. There may be other planning matters, and that is why I cannot comment on detailed planning issues, but we need to have these debates based on the facts. The fact is that all communities produce waste, and responsibility must be taken for dealing with all that waste in a way that best balances the needs of the community and the environment, while allowing those best placed to take such decisions to take them in as balanced and informed a way as possible, with as little red tape as possible.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton on securing this debate and on opening up what is an emotive and important issue for many local communities. I should have made it clear—although I think she is already well aware of this—that the PFI decisions made last week do not affect the Middlewich application because, as I understand it, it is not a PFI application so that aspect does not come into it. Nevertheless, I am sure that the my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will take note of what has been said today and will ensure that the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government is aware of all the facts when he makes his final decision, which will be based purely on the planning issues. As I have said, we are determined to be the greenest Government ever, which means that we must find a satisfactory alternative to landfill.
Question put and agreed to.
Veterinary Products Committee
James Paice Excerpts(14 years, 1 month ago)
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The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr James Paice)
I have received the annual report of the Veterinary Products Committee and its sub-committees 2009, which has been published today.
Copies of the report have been placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
I am pleased to acknowledge the valuable work done by the distinguished members of the Veterinary Products Committee and its sub-committees and thank them for the time and effort dedicated in the public interest to this important work.