Agriculture Bill

Lord Holmes of Richmond Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 16th July 2020 Lords Chamber

I have noticed particularly in the last few years that thousands of trees, as in the Lake District National Park, are being chopped down: people buy a house and then they chop the trees down—not even in their own garden but on associated land—to improve the view. That is wrong. It is defeating the object of what we are trying to do. I am not asking the Government to do anything today, but will the Minister discuss the problem with the Forestry Commission and local authorities to see whether that legislation needs to be applied more rigorously?

[Lord Holmes of Richmond (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, I venture to say that the amendments in this group can be summed up as: what purpose profit if there is no habitable planet to spend it on? What purpose fine produce if there is no habitable planet on which to enjoy it? Does the Minister agree that the potential to achieve net zero will completely depend on the combination of talent and technology? I thank the NFU for all the work it has done in this area; it is ahead of a number of curves in this respect. Does the Minister recognise the need for far greater consideration of and investment in all the elements of 4IR, not least distributed ledger technology and robotics? If we are to achieve the purposes set out in these amendments—or indeed the overall governmental purpose—we need to accept and be proud that nuclear will be part of that mix. Would the Minister care to say something on the investment potential, not just for small modular reactors to assist in this but in the race for nuclear fusion? This could enable such innovation, not just in agriculture but across the economy. I will be very interested to hear the Minister’s comments.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Duncan of Springbank) (Con)]

For the benefit of Members tuning in remotely, it might be helpful to know that the Minister responding will be the noble Baroness, Lady Bloomfield. I call the next speaker, the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes of Cumnock.