Farming

Keir Mather Excerpts

Monday 4th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Keir Mather (Selby and Ainsty) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to speak in this much-needed debate on farming, especially as I am the proud representative of what I believe to be the most rural Labour constituency in the country, although my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Alistair Strathern) has spent the past hour hotly disputing that claim. It is crucial that my local farming communities know that I hear their concerns and priorities, and that I am fighting for them in this House. Despite the Conservatives’ claim to be the voice of rural communities, the reality is that many farmers feel short-changed by this Conservative Government and, like the rest of the country, are desperate for change.

The Prime Minister said to farmers a few weeks ago,

“you don’t do it for the money…you do it because you love it.”

He conjured a nostalgic image of an artisanal age, rather than the reality that we should be proud of: a serious, powerful, £14 billion industry that is vital to our national health, our national security and our national heritage.

Farmers love what they do, but farms cannot run on love alone. Since 2017, more than 6,000 agricultural businesses have collapsed, paying the price for the Tory failure to provide them with the support that they deserve. A farmer in Britain today endures insufficient flooding support, uncompetitive prices, botched trade deals, and labour supply challenges. As consolation, they are left with the bitter encouragement: “Not to worry, because the Prime Minister knows you love what you do.”

That is not good enough, it has never been good enough, and it is a desperate legacy of 14 years of Conservative Government. We need to turn the page in this country and provide a real offer for farming communities. In his speech two weeks ago, the Prime Minister said one thing that I thought rang true—there is a first time for everything. He said that one reason farmers do what they do is that they “feel a responsibility,” but I do not think he quite realises how deeply that responsibility is felt by farmers in my constituency.

As I mentioned in a Westminster Hall debate, and will continue to mention until I am blue in the face, farmers in my constituency who live between Wistow, Cawood and Kelfield work every day to hold back hundreds of acres of floodwater on their land, year after year, to stop it reaching people’s doorsteps in Selby. They are losing hundreds of thousands of pounds in doing so, their crops are being drowned on prime arable land, and they are receiving zero compensation for it. In one case, not only was a farmer holding back floodwater on hundreds of acres, but he found that the Environment Agency was pumping more water on to his fields from its floodwater infrastructure, which had reached dangerous levels of capacity. He asked me what he should do: continue to have his livelihood ruined, or let the water reach and ruin people’s homes? If someone could tell me in what universe piling responsibility on to farmers whose sector is facing a mental health crisis is a logical way to carry out flood management in this country in 2024, I would be eager to hear their answer.

In such grave circumstances, farmers in my community deserve clarity. I would welcome the Minister providing an update on how discussions are progressing with the RPA on the farming recovery fund, and setting out the extent to which eligibility for the farming recovery fund will go beyond that provided in the flood recovery framework. I cannot begin to express how unacceptable it would be for Yorkshire farmers to be excluded from the help they so urgently need after enduring such a hard winter and having protected communities like Selby from flooding for so long.

That said, it remains the case that longer-term support for the farmers storing floodwater is needed—support that goes beyond what the FRF can provide and that recognises the inherent public good that farmers do in protecting homes from risk. As with so many of the crises that this Government have presided over, we are left with a similar challenge: to take immediate action to counteract the freefall that they have created while also producing the change that is so desperately needed to provide a long-term future for the farming industry.

Some of these things could be done in the near future. The Prime Minister said that he would implement an annual statutory food security index when parliamentary time allowed. I do not wish to be rude, but the Government are not presiding over an era of unflagging legislative vigour. If they cares about the nation’s food security, they should get on with it and legislate for it now. If they are not up for the job, we have a Labour party committed to doing right by farmers. We on the Labour Benches will happily step up and take the action that we need. A Labour Government would pursue a new veterinary agreement with the EU, back the NFU’s Buy British campaign to source 50% of food in the public sector from British farmers, simplify the ELM schemes so that more farmers can enjoy economic and environmental benefits, and encourage DEFRA to meet its own departmental spending ambitions in a way that provides value for money for the taxpayer.

Most importantly for my local area, a Labour Government would be committed to creating a flood resilience taskforce to stop the buck passing between the Government, the EA, the internal drainage board and the water companies, to ensure that farmers know that when bad weather strikes, the Labour Government will stand four-square behind them with a joined-up plan to have their backs. Farmers in my constituency need to know not that they will be admired for their work by the Government, but that they will be fairly remunerated for what they do and given the support, tools and respect that they need not just to survive, but to thrive. I look forward to fighting alongside the farmers of Selby and Ainsty, every single step of the way, to achieve that.