Common Organisation of the Markets in Agricultural Products (Wine) (Amendment, etc.) Regulations 2021

Lord Moynihan Excerpts

Thursday 15th April 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Moynihan (Con)]

My Lords, it has taken me a while to come to terms with the reality that my noble friend the Minister has taken responsibility for an error in his department—a very rare occasion indeed—but his outstanding speech and excellent explanation of the GIs completely carried the Committee. We fully appreciate the way he has come back to us to give us the background.

I had the privilege of serving on the European Union Committee’s sub-committee in 2007 that undertook a detailed analysis of European wine, entitled A Better Deal for All. I had the great privilege of working with Lord Plumb at the time. I stand by all the committee’s recommendations, many of which are still relevant in the context of a post-Brexit UK, but possibly more relevant to the bureaucrats in Brussels. I am also a long-standing unpaid member of the Haberdashers’ Company’s wine committee.

These are simple and straightforward regulations and, as my noble friend the Minister said, they clarify a technical error, which is welcome. However, my noble friend’s presence at the Dispatch Box on this subject provides the Grand Committee with an opportunity to hear about a key issue during the current round of trade negotiations with wine-producing countries, being ably led by the Secretary of State, Liz Truss, who is doing excellent working securing future arrangements between the UK and a number of countries producing new world wine.

The issue in this context that should concern your Lordships is the future regime for wine import certificates, first in the context of the EU and separately in the context of all wine-producing countries with which we trade. Now that we have left the EU, I can see no national interest in nor justification for the retention of wine import certificates. Freed from unnecessary bureaucracy, the retention of these forms is a cost on the Exchequer and on the industry. In fact, they are no use, so much so that my noble friend the Minister would find it difficult—I would go as far as to say impossible—to name any other bottle of potable alcohol from vodka to rum that requires them. All are well served by standard customs paperwork.

Yet the retention of wine import certificates, which is exclusively a decision for government and Parliament, is to place an onerous and costly process on those merchants and buyers—the restaurants, pubs and bars—that buy a wide selection of wines as their unique selling point and which now have to face the bureaucratic process of obtaining a physical stamp for wine imported, which has no safety benefits and above all no consumer protection advantages. After all, if there were any consumer protection gains, we would have them for imports of every other bottle of alcohol.

With safety and authenticity being guaranteed by the importer, I am a loss to understand why the Government are looking to retain these import certificates. After all, one significant advantage of Brexit consistently argued by the Government with which I was in complete agreement was to ensure a substantial reduction in unnecessary red tape, freeing Parliament to promote freer trade and erasing unnecessary bureaucracy.

I ask my noble friend the Minister just one simple question: why does he of all people—bright, questioning and perceptive as he always is—want to keep VI-1s? What is their benefit? Can it possibly be greater than the bureaucratic costs and processes that they cause? These forms require a physical customs stamp on entry into the UK, duplicating everything that is necessary in normal commercial documentation. They do not address the historical challenge of counterfeited wine since, should there be another Australian scandal, that would not be discoverable on the face of the certificate. Counterfeited wine would be stamped at the customs point, so I cannot see how possible issues of fraud are in any way covered by these certificates.

Possibly this bureaucracy is to be retained to protect English producers, but surely my noble friend the Minister and the Committee would not conceive of resorting to red tape to protect our outstanding English producers, who can succeed on merit and quality even if they currently produce less than half a percent of total wine consumption in the UK. So what do the Government see as the benefit of VI-1s?

A simplified version of the form is good for the European Union, but the answer to that challenge is to welcome the deferred date for the EU introduction, which is now the end of the year, and use that time to introduce digital forms, moving with pace from the CHIEF to the CDS system. That is the least bad outcome with Brussels and is surely acceptable to everybody in the industry. However, importing to the EU is, of course, different from the rest of the world, where surely there is no need for these forms at all. After all, most of the wine imported from Australia is in bulk. While there may be 10,000 or more suppliers in the EU supplying major retailers in the UK, only a handful export from Australia, and the majority do so in bulk.

What can it possibly be that would make the exceptionally popular and able Liz Truss so unpopular in bars and restaurants the length and breadth of the UK, not to mention the dent in popularity of my noble friend the Minister when the Bishops’ Bar reopens? The only answer I can come up with is that this is a pawn in an otherwise much larger series of trade negotiations. If so, the Minister will understandably have little to say, particularly in answer to my only question of what is the value of a VI-1 certificate. If that is the case, I totally understand and would not wish to weaken the Government’s negotiating position in the trade negotiations under way this year. If I am wrong, then I hope this House will return to the subject in due course and be united in seeking to end this unnecessary and costly bureaucracy—costly to the Government, to the wine industry in the UK and, above all, to the consumers, who will pay the price for the bureaucracy we hoped we had left behind on 31 January 2020.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Moynihan Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansarad) & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansarad): House of Lords
Tuesday 7th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, I support the general aim of Clause 1 to move to a system of public payments for public good, and putting in the Bill a list of purposes for which assistance could be provided. Amendments 6 and 9 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Addington, add to this clause that measures which would ensure enhanced public access to the countryside can qualify for financial assistance. This is welcome and necessary as, despite improvements to our beautiful countryside in recent years, in many places access is not guaranteed. This can be because the routes are inaccessible or do not exist. By introducing these amendments, landowners and others will be encouraged to support greater access to the countryside by improving rights of way, stiles, gates and signage and developing new paths along field margins. If the noble Lord, Lord Gardiner of Kimble, is not minded to accept these amendments, can he set out clearly how the Government intend to achieve the intent behind them and encourage greater access to the countryside?

[Lord Moynihan (Con)]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Addington, the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, and others on their focus on access to and enjoyment of the countryside, and the sport and recreation policy element, which I know the Minister shares.

These amendments seek to establish a clear commitment from the Government that, under these new arrangements, public funds will be directed towards delivering improvements in public access to the countryside in a balanced way for all users, as the noble Earl, Lord Devon, rightly emphasised, particularly for those engaged in sport and recreational activities which have over the years established a good, close and effective working relationship with farmers and landowners, particularly where rights of way exist, not least to and on water. I am pleased that point was emphasised by the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson. It is also important to recognise in this context the strength of argument put forward by my noble friend Lady Hodgson on the important equestrian issues at stake. The Bill provides an excellent opportunity to bring improved public benefits. I hope farmers and landowners will be encouraged not to restrict access for any person on any inland waterway or lake which forms part of that land for the purpose of open-air recreation.

I hope the Minister will find ways to ensure fair and equitable access to our countryside for all sustainable recreational pursuits on land and water at a time when fitness and activity levels are in crisis. I hope he will also agree that we should strive to deliver a new and improved regulatory regime that drives and enhances improvement and access to the maintenance of existing public rights of way for all users of the countryside. Enhanced access to the countryside and improved protection of the existing path network have been called for today in your Lordships’ House. I hope the Minister will signal his support for these objectives, to which I add my strong support. I believe he can, because I hope he will emphasise that in Clause 1(1)(b) it is possible to deliver these aims. In future, I hope that we in this House will hold this and future Governments to the important effect that that clause should deliver in the interests of a wider sport and recreational policy and an enhanced enjoyment of the countryside.