Draft Rural Development (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 Draft Rural Development (Rules and Decisions) (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Thursday 21st March 2019 General Committees

[Mr Goodwill]

I am very pleased to respond to the hon. Gentleman’s points, which I have to say are precisely the sort of questions that I have been asking as a new Minister in the Department. It is constructive that we seem to be on the same page about the exciting opportunities available to us as we leave the European Union. I will expand on that in due course.

The two draft instruments will ensure that the rural development programmes funded by the EAFRD continue to operate effectively in the United Kingdom following EU exit. As I said, the development fund is worth some £430 million a year, and the UK—I repeat—has guaranteed that any projects funded from the 2014 to 2020 allocations from the fund will be funded for their full lifetime. The instruments provide the legal basis for continuing to make payments to agreement holders, providing certainty to farms and land managers, and for preserving the existing regime for supporting rural businesses and environmental land management, among other things.

The hon. Gentleman started his remarks by saying that this SI is the one that concerns him most. I have to say, there is nothing to see here. These are not changes; this is maintaining the existing situation so that we can continue the current regime. It is business as usual. The debate gives me another opportunity to reassure right hon. and hon. Members that that is indeed the case.

The hon. Gentleman has not fully grasped the opportunities that life outside the European Union may present. Having sat in the back row in the Agriculture Bill Committee, I know of the tremendous opportunities and the innovative new schemes that will come forward. No doubt those schemes will build on our experience of existing agri-environmental schemes. On my own farm, for example, we are planting nectar plants—the first time that we have ever encouraged weeds, rather than killed them. We need to build on such schemes.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

My recollection of the Agriculture Bill Committee is that the right hon. Gentleman disagreed with rather a lot of the Bill. Now he has been promoted to the Front Bench, has he had something of an epiphany so that he agrees with the Government line?

[Mr Goodwill]

If the hon. Lady analyses everything I said in that Committee, as I have done, it was absolutely in line with the objectives and ambitions of the Bill, and the reassurances that I received from my predecessor established the fact that we are on the right page and that we need to move forward. She must revisit the points that I made—I asked some searching questions during the debate, and I was pleased with the answers that I received. Indeed, I was happy to vote for that piece of legislation.

[Kerry McCarthy]

I assure the Minister that I have gone through what he said in the Agriculture Bill Committee with a fine-toothed comb. I have a very long list of where there might now be some inconsistencies, but we can return to them at a future date.

[Mr Goodwill]

I look forward to that robust exchange of views. Indeed, it might be that, given my particular take on some aspects of that Bill, we look at some amendments. Who knows!

The hon. Member for Stroud made a valid point that not all the funds have been drawn down. That is a great disappointment, because the funds are important to develop not only our rural economy but the public goods and the environment that people wish to see. We need to analyse why that was not done. In the case of some of the capital grant funding for improvements to businesses, the EU structure was often very much based on giving money to co-operatives. Many European Union countries have a much wider co-operative structure among their farmers, particularly in areas where there are small farmers, who can work together only if they co-operate. In the UK, we do not have that same history of co-operatives, which in some cases has prevented farmers from applying, say, for better storage facilities.

Secondly, as the hon. Gentleman mentioned, many EU schemes are complicated and over-bureaucratic. We need to look at how to simplify them. Given the egregious exploitation of schemes in some parts of southern Europe, I can understand why the European Union came to the view, in some cases, that every farmer was out to exploit the system in a way that was not intended. My view is that farmers in this country are much more likely to comply and engage with our common objectives.

I met several landowners and farmers at an event last week. The point has been made that we have not made payments as effectively as we should—there have been delays, particularly in the agri-environmental schemes. Many such schemes involve up-front investment, such as buying seeds or hedging plants, so we need to improve our performance to encourage more people to feel that they can invest in them.

The hon. Gentleman talked about funding. There is the small matter of our contribution to the European Union budget, which we will be able to deploy for our own interests. As net contributors, we will be in a better position to make sure that the money is adequately spent. We will certainly be engaging in the spending review and with the devolved Administrations to make sure that we have a fair share of the available money and that it can be deployed as intended and not top-sliced in some other way.