Rural Payments Agency

Lord Renton of Mount Harry Excerpts

Wednesday 7th July 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, I accept that, as my noble friend says, there have been problems with the Rural Payments Agency. It has been the subject of an NAO report and summoned three times before the Public Accounts Committee as well as twice before the Efra Select Committee and once before the Public Administration Select Committee. We will try to address these problems and offer political leadership for that. I can give an assurance to my noble friend that the Minister of State of my department will, in future, chair the RPA board.

[Lord Renton of Mount Harry]

My Lords, I, too, declare an interest as a recipient of payments from the Rural Payments Agency. Does my noble friend agree that Defra literally passed the buck to the Rural Payments Agency when it was formed? Given that the variety of payments has now increased tremendously, does he think that the RPA will be able to cope, particularly when more EU money becomes available?

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, I would not want to go back into the history of the problems that have faced the agency. All I can say is that a report has been commissioned and we will look at the outcome of the report and see what changes can be made to improve the way in which it operates. I would not want to speculate on what those changes might be at this stage.