Fertilisers and Ammonium Nitrate Material (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2021

Lord Clark of Windermere Excerpts

Tuesday 26th January 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Clark of Windermere (Lab) [V]]

I thank the Minister for providing the Grand Committee with a comprehensive explanation of this SI, which he has given in his normal courteous and lucid manner. As he said, this SI is not particularly controversial, but it is certainly fiendishly complicated in places. I am a great supporter of science having a major role in agriculture, horticulture and associated activities, but it is very important—I know the Minister agrees with me on this—that any such use is carefully monitored because there could be a knock-on effect into the future. I will come back to this point in a moment.

It is our task, as a legislature, to examine SIs and ensure that they match the Executive’s declared intent. The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee looked at this SI on 5 January and decided not to draw it to the attention of the House. That is a fair indication that it contains only what we believed to be there. Therefore, that is a second line of defence, and it gives us some guidance.

There is no impact assessment for this SI because, as stated, it has been judged that

“no significant, impact on the private, voluntary or public sector is foreseen.”

Therefore, in the light of these assurances, I am inclined to accept the SI at face value, but there are a couple of things that I should like to raise with the Minister.

I was reassured that once we get past January 2023 and are dealing with only UK fertilisers, the language used will be English for all fertilisers sold in the UK. It is important that farmers can see how to use the fertilisers and at what levels. May I ask about a small point on that? What is the position in Northern Ireland? I understand that with the Northern Ireland protocol there is some distinction, but is any of the fertiliser which might be shipped from Great Britain to Northern Ireland likely to end up in the Republic of Ireland? If so, how does that affect the labelling?

My last point—I do not think I will take up my full time—is about ammonium nitrate, especially ammonium nitrate fertilisers, which may contain more than 28% nitrogen. I do not want to labour this too much but, bearing in mind the terrible explosion in Beirut, does the Minister feel that sufficient guidance is given in this SI and associated ones about the storage of ammonium nitrate fertilisers, which can have such devastating effects in terms of explosions, as opposed to in their use as fertilisers?