Farming
Debate between Jamie Stone and John Lamont(2 weeks, 6 days ago)
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Jamie Stone
My hon. Friend brings knowledge from the past, which is very valuable to the debate. My right hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland is also a champion of this cause, and what he says strikes a chord among farmers in my constituency. Getting a fair deal is fundamental to making farms viable for the long term. It is not that we want to do everything, but I hope that the Government will engage constructively with my right hon. Friend on this. It is too important to let this one go, and it could be an easy win for the Government and for all of us.
John Lamont
The hon. Gentleman is making an excellent speech, but does he agree as a fellow Scottish MP that our farmers are facing a double whammy? Not only do we have to deal with the vindictive family farm tax being imposed by the Government opposite, but we face the hostile environment that the Scottish National party Government are creating towards our farming communities in Scotland.
Jamie Stone
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his contribution, and what a pity it is that our SNP colleagues are not with us at this point, because we both might have something to say about that. There has been a lack of knowledge north of the border—or a lack of understanding, I believe—of things that are fundamental to the way of life in the constituencies we represent at the different ends of Scotland.
Time is short, but I want to conclude by mentioning three things that are causing my constituents some anxiety. In particular, I spoke with farmers this week and there has been recent publicity about what is known as lab-grown meat, produced from cells in a laboratory environment. It is thought that this could be upon us within two years. Yes, it is a way of producing food, but what does that mean for our livestock farmers? That needs to be looked at very carefully indeed.
The second thing I am duty-bound to mention is the low price of malting barley. This is the highest-quality barley and is used to make whisky. It is low priced because not so much is being bought by the whisky distillers, a reflection of the fact that they are not selling so many bottles of whisky.
Scotland’s Economy
Debate between Jamie Stone and John Lamont(5 months, 2 weeks ago)
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John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Dowd. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Glasgow East (John Grady) for bringing forward this important debate on the state of Scotland’s economy. As he highlighted, there can be no doubt that Scotland’s economy has suffered from 17 years of SNP rule. It is impossible for me to mention all the many contributors to this morning’s debate, but I want to mention a few.
First, the hon. Member for Dunfermline and Dollar (Graeme Downie) rightly highlighted the multiple failures of the SNP over the last 17 years, not just in relation to economic policy, but in other areas too. The hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone) talked about the importance of skills, particularly in rural areas such as his, and the same applies in my own area in the Scottish borders. Another challenge we face in the borders is access to childcare, which prevents young women from going back to work.
Jamie Stone
Does the hon. Gentleman accept my point that these skills are ageing? We still have them but, if we do not pass them on, they could vanish and it will be much harder to train a new generation of welders and fabricators.
John Lamont
I totally agree. We need to invest in the skills we have; otherwise they will be lost, particularly for more traditional industries. If the skills are lost there, they might never return.
I do not often agree with the hon. Member for Aberdeen North (Kirsty Blackman), but she highlighted an important point about the gap that is emerging, with skills in the oil and gas sector potentially being lost if the renewable sector does not accelerate more quickly. Those in the sector up in the north-east, in Aberdeen, highlighted that point repeatedly during my time as a Minister. They were concerned that there was such a stigma attached to the oil and gas sector now that new people were not moving into that area and would not then be able to move over to the renewable sector when that opportunity arose.