Food Security

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Thursday 31st March 2022 Westminster Hall

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered food security.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for recognising the importance of food security and allowing this debate. A debate on food security was needed before the crisis in Ukraine, and it is even more urgent now. Before I turn to issues of food security in the UK, I want to address the situation in Ukraine, which remains absolutely critical.

Our immediate focus must be on doing everything possible to support the people of Ukraine and address their humanitarian needs. Russia’s brutal war is now into its second month. The United Nations World Food Programme estimates that at least 30% of the Ukrainian population is in dire need of lifesaving food assistance, and early data indicates that 90% of the people remaining in the country could face extreme poverty, should the war deepen even further.

Of course, the humanitarian emergency does not end in Ukraine. We urgently need to get to grips with the real threat of a global food shortage. Russia and Ukraine are ranked among the top three global exporters of wheat, maize, rapeseed, sunflower seeds, sunflower oil and fertiliser. There were already food shortages in parts of north and east Africa, which sourced almost of all of its imported wheat from those two countries.

Ukraine is also the single biggest supplier of food to the World Food Programme, which might be forced to cut distribution in places such as Yemen, Chad and Niger, while taking on the feeding of millions of hungry people in and around Ukraine. According to WFP officials, all of that points to 2022 being a year of catastrophic hunger. Without urgent funding, the programme’s director predicts a hell on earth in some of the most impoverished regions in the world, potentially resulting in famine and destabilisation in parts of Africa and the middle east, as well as mass migration.

The scale of the crisis cannot be understated, so I am eager to hear any indications at all from the Minister of how the UK Government are preparing for such a global security emergency.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

There is another thing that exacerbates the issue. If the Ukrainians are to put the harvest in, they have 10 days from now to do it. That focuses attention on where the problems are.

[Deidre Brock]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. That point very much sharpens our minds.

An immediate reversal of the cut to foreign aid might be an obvious first step to help with all of this, but we need to go even further if we are to prevent the hell on earth that the UN has warned of. At the same time we need to examine how best we safeguard domestic food security by supporting our farmers, producers and consumers while continuing to uphold our commitments to sustainable, nature-friendly food production. Even before the war in Ukraine and the sanctions on Russia, our farmers faced a tidal wave of costs for fertiliser, fuel, energy, seed and feed.

The price of fuel, which continues to play a critical role in UK food production and infrastructure, has risen even further as a result of the war, and farmers who were already warning of increasing fertiliser costs have seen the Russian invasion send prices rocketing even further. Yes, we need to reduce our reliance on artificial fertilisers, pesticides and fuel in food production and agriculture, and tackle the many challenges that, as Nature Friendly Farming reminds us, are the result of

“a global food system that is already in crisis”,

but the transition to sustainable, holistic food systems will not happen overnight.

Ministers recently suggested that there is enough manure and slurry to compensate for the fertiliser price increases, but that suggests a lack of understanding of what is actually happening on the ground. Are the Government considering securing the supply of fertiliser for UK farmers, at least in the short term, by subsidising costs and protecting the ability to produce the 40% of fertiliser produced domestically? I am interested in the Minister’s answer to that.

On top of that, as the National Farmers Union of Scotland and others have highlighted, grain price increases will impact on both the costs of livestock production and shop prices for consumers. The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs recently acknowledged that the price of wheat, which the pig and poultry sectors rely on heavily for feed, had already doubled since Russia’s invasion.

Meanwhile, with Ukrainian workers making up around 60% of seasonal agricultural staff, the war is compounding the existing labour crisis in the industry. The Scottish National party has asked repeatedly for immigration to be devolved to Scotland—so far to no avail—but at the very least we want to see immigration policy greatly overhauled, so that we can set up the humane and practical approach that, among other benefits, would see us attract the seasonal and permanent staff that our industries require. Agriculture was already suffering from post-Brexit shortages of such workers, as well as haulage drivers and processing staff. That was the message that the Scottish Affairs Committee heard loud and clear on our recent visit to horticulturists and soft fruit providers in Perthshire and near Dundee.

This all points to the great likelihood of reduced yields, with a knock-on impact on supply. I am already hearing of Angus farmers deciding not to plant wheat this year because the costs do not make it viable any more, and of others forced to reduce their livestock numbers. If that is repeated across the country, there will be far-reaching implications not just for farmers, but for food processors and manufacturers, and ultimately for prices in supermarkets.

Of course, millions of households across the UK were already struggling with soaring food bills long before the crisis in Ukraine. A 2018 report by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation revealed that 2.2 million people in the UK were severely food-insecure—the highest reported rate in Europe—and the situation has worsened since the pandemic. The Food Foundation reports that the percentage of food-insecure households increased from around 7.5% pre covid to almost 11% by January 2022, affecting nearly 6 million adults and 2.5 million children. That is a national scandal and is set to intensify, with the Office for Budget Responsibility forecasting the biggest annual fall in living standards since records began in 1956. The Food and Drink Federation reminds us that February 2022 saw the highest rate of food inflation in a decade, with folk on the lowest incomes, who spend more of their household budget on food and fuel, hit the hardest, as seems to happen so often. Worryingly, the forecasts do not yet account for the possible effects of the conflict in Ukraine on food or other commodity prices. The FDF estimates that cost rises could take seven to 12 months to feed into consumer prices.

These cold, hard statistics reflect a bleak reality in which more and more households are indeed being forced to choose between eating and heating. Unbelievably in 2020s Britain, we are hearing of food bank users declining potatoes and root vegetables because they cannot afford to boil them, so it was disappointing that the Chancellor’s spring statement made what I have to describe as very little effort to grapple with food insecurity and poverty. The increase in cash in the household support fund is of course welcome, but I am afraid that it is nowhere near adequate. The Trussell Trust, the UK’s largest network of food banks, has warned that the failure to bring benefits in line with inflation will drive more people to emergency food parcels. The Chancellor protests that he cannot do everything to help the UK’s poorest households, but uprating benefits is one thing that he could do right now as a lifeline for some of our most vulnerable constituents, and I beg him to do something about it immediately.

Unfortunately, I have to say that the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions did not seem to recognise the link between the benefit system and food security. At a Work and Pensions Committee hearing last month, my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens) cited a 2018 study showing that the poorest tenth of English households would have to spend 74% of their disposable income if they followed the Government’s guidelines for a healthy diet, compared with just 6% for the wealthiest decile. The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions repeatedly opted not to respond to the points raised by my hon. Friend, deferring to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs on these issues.

I was therefore very pleased that the media reported last night that the Minister responding to us today would be chairing a crisis meeting this morning to discuss food prices and related issues. The Minister looks puzzled, but it was in The Guardian last night—I am sure she will be able to address that when she responds. We look forward to hearing more about that, and we certainly look forward to hearing about the outcomes and the actions that the Government will take to address the shocking reality of food poverty and inequality. Those in DEFRA really must work more closely on this issue with their counterparts in the Department for Work and Pensions. According to the Trussell Trust, 47% of people using food banks are indebted to DWP, and yet it has taken until this year to add questions related to food aid to the DWP’s family resources survey. That is a pretty sorry oversight. The response to the pandemic has shown that holistic, cross-departmental action can be mobilised when the moment calls. Given the scale of this crisis and the confluence of threats, we must see a similar approach taken to food security both domestically and internationally.

The Scottish Government issued a position statement on a human rights approach to tackling food insecurity in February 2021. In October, they began a consultation on a national plan to end the need for food banks; they have introduced the Good Food Nation (Scotland) Bill, which lays the foundation for Scotland to become a good food nation. I look forward to hearing from the Minister that there are similar levels of commitment to similar actions from the UK Government. I also look forward to hearing when their overdue response to the national food strategy can be expected. A Scottish food security and supply taskforce has been set up jointly; it will meet frequently over the coming weeks to identify and respond to disruption to food security and supply resulting from the war in Ukraine. I am interested to hear from the Minister whether an equivalent is being set up by the UK Government.

We really do need to prioritise self-sufficiency once again and support our farmers to sustainably maintain production levels. NFU Scotland and many others have also warned about the domestic impact of what many see as a laissez-faire approach to post-Brexit trade deals and importing cheap foods with lower environmental and animal welfare standards. We should be building resilience in domestic food production, not threatening it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

First of all, I thank the hon. Member for Edinburgh North and Leith (Deidre Brock) for setting the scene so very well. I do not agree with all her comments in relation to Brexit, of course; she knows that. However, I understand the importance of this debate. When she said to me, “Jim, can you come down to the debate?”, I said, “Yes, I definitely will, because I want to make a contribution”. That is because my constituency of Strangford is a food producer that produces way above what we use, which I will refer to later.

I am aware that we are perceived as a nation that has plenty of food; unlike some countries, where there is not enough food to go round, we have an ample supply. The UN has a goal of zero hunger by 2030 and produced a report to that effect. The UN has said:

“The latest edition of that report, which was published mid-2021, estimated that between 720 and 811 million people went hungry in 2020. High costs and low affordability also mean billions cannot eat healthily or nutritiously. Considering the middle of the projected range (768 million), 118 million more people were facing hunger in 2020 than in 2019”.

Those are the figures when it comes to food security, because I believe that our obligation is not just to ourselves and people back home—we have that obligation because we are constituency MPs—but to the rest of the world as well; we have a duty in that respect, too.

Other speakers have already touched on Ukraine; we know what the issues are very clearly. I understand that we want the war in Ukraine to finish as soon as possible, because that will mean getting some sort of normality back—not just in Ukraine, which is important, but to return to the food security we had before.

In Northern Ireland, we export 80% of our products across the UK and the world. I am thinking of Lakeland Dairies—the Minister might know many of these companies by name—which exports many products all over the world, and of Willowbrook Foods and Mash Direct. Those three companies alone, including those who work in them, probably create somewhere between 2,500 and 3,000 jobs in my constituency.

I am aware of the global problem, but I am also aware of the problem in this country and in my constituency. I will give a couple of examples, if I can, to reflect where we are back home as well. One teacher spoke to me recently about getting the threshold of benefits lowered this year, because she was concerned about her pupils. She said that she could see that pupils from working families were under pressure. How could she see that? During covid, she sat alongside her children as they ate their lunch together—that is what they are doing, as they are not yet back in the assembly hall—and she noticed a pattern among a few children, in terms of the amount and quality of their lunch in tandem with the time that wages are paid. She said to me:

“Jim, I believe that some of my children are hungry during school and it breaks my heart.”

That teacher has since taken to bringing in a bowl of fruit for the children. They are allowed to pick a piece to snack on at lunchtime, if they want. The school cannot fund that, but she does it because she is burdened and that is commendable—commendable, but also lamentable. The hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard) referred to that, and others will.

No child in Strangford or anywhere across the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland should be hungry, and a proportion of the population are now not entitled to benefits. Some are parents who have to tighten their belt when it comes to the groceries. My mother had four children, including me. She said that there were not enough potatoes in Comber to fill us. In Comber, they plant a lot of potatoes and they sell over Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland and the UK. I do not now show the excess of eating too many potatoes, but in my younger days perhaps I did—I used to be 17 stone, and am now a very trim 13 stone. I have got it down and will keep it that way, if I can.

This morning on the TV, people were talking about the prices in chip shops; this is an example. I am sure everyone saw it, but if they did not, try to watch it tonight if possible. Fish and chip shops are under incredible pressure. For every £100 they spent last year, they now spend £150 this year. That is a 50% increase, and some chip shops will not be here—that is the fact of it.

I understand that growing children are voracious, but when we realise that it is cheaper to buy four packets of crisps than a bunch of bananas, we understand why children are nutritionally challenged and some have challenging weights. This would not be a debate if I did not mention the Northern Ireland protocol, but I do so because we have special challenges because of it.

Some companies do not want the hassle of the documentation resulting from the protocol, but those that bother charge more per item—not per shipment—to cover it. That has led to less variety and less ability to shop for value. People take what is on offer and scrape the pennies together to cover it, so £1 items are now £1.29—we do not have to be mathematicians to work it out, but that is a 29% increase. Children pay the price of the Northern Ireland protocol with the sacrifice of high-quality, affordable and nutritious food and its availability.

I always ask the Minister, and I ask again: have discussions with Cabinet colleagues to address the issue. In Cabinet Office questions today, a colleague asked the question, and the Minister responded, but whatever the response we want, I believe in seeing the finished article, rather than the words.

Last year, the Trussell Trust provided some 79,000 parcels in total to children and adults in Northern Ireland. In all, 2.5 million food parcels were given out across the UK. I will finish with this comment: yes, we might be able to get access to food security as a nation, but families simply cannot do it all. The hungry child at lunch making do with half a sandwich and a yoghurt, while watching other children tuck into full meals, is a reality in my constituency and others. That needs to change radically. We have the capacity to do that, and we must have the will to do it as well.

Minister, I look to you—I always do, because you are a lady and a Minister who understands the issues—to work with colleagues to do the right thing and to make lives better.