Agriculture Bill

Lord Whitty Excerpts

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

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB) [V]]

Rather unusually, my Lords, I speak not to support an amendment but to oppose some. I live in Devon, owned Dartmoor ponies and share the concerns of the Dartmoor Pony Society and other Dartmoor groups about some of the amendments to Part 1 on financial assistance. These groups have no criticism of the present clauses and the financial assistance proposed is much welcome. We are concerned, because the amendments should not be accepted. There are two in the first group about which I wish to speak, Amendments 17 and 27.

The effect of these amendments is either to exclude or to reduce the preservation of the semi-wild ponies on Dartmoor. Amendment 17 does not include native ponies, because the definition of wildlife does not include it, so there is a problem with using “conserves”. Amendment 27, by leaving out “native livestock” and “native”, would completely exclude the semi-wild Dartmoor ponies, which are such an iconic part of Devon and English heritage. I therefore hope that these two amendments are not accepted.

[Lord Whitty (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I asked to intervene on this group primarily to make a few general points, which relate to Clause 1 and the amendments to it, in this and subsequent groups. I also register my strong support for a couple of amendments that have already been spoken to. First, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, spoke about the amendment relating to air pollution, which I strongly support. Secondly, Amendment 51 and other amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, relate to the public good that farming provides in relation to the rural community and economy.

I speak having been Agriculture Minister when the last dramatic change to the EU—and hence UK— subsidy policy was made in 2005 with the official reform. That did not go entirely well. As the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, said, it was introduced with administrative shambles here, although not quite so much in other countries. It was based on two premises that proved not to be the case. The first was that abolishing production subsidies would deliver us a multilateral trade agreement—the Doha round that never materialised. The second was that moving subsidy from production to the land would enable us to effectively ensure the environmental and agricultural status of all agricultural land, through a system of cross-compliance. Theoretically that has been the case and has worked in some places, but in many it has not, because of a lack of enforcement and clarity in the bureaucrats who were supposed to support it.

I strongly support the concept of public good in Clause 1 itself. However, we cannot get away from the fact that this introduces a system of subsidy that is substantially more complex than previous systems. The additional amendments, many of which I support in principle, probably make it more complicated. There is a need for farmers to relate to a much wider range of bodies than currently, not just in the way they practise farming but in their receipt of the subsidy—ranging from the Environment Agency to the water companies, private companies, local authorities and, presumably, the office for environmental protection and other bodies that will be set up by the Environment Bill and which we have not yet seen.

The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, warned us against putting everything into silos, and I recommend that the Government observe a number of principles in introducing this system. First, they should take it in stages. I therefore oppose any slow-down in the seven-year switchover period. Secondly, they need to require a system of whole-farm certification, in one form or another. That does not necessarily have to be onerous. It could include framework agreements for receipt of subsidies and be based on existing voluntary and commercial schemes. Thirdly, they need to provide a better system of advice and support to farmers. I mention ADAS; it does not have to be the same as ADAS, but farmers will need additional support. Fourthly and crucially, it needs to be made clear which bodies are responsible for which forms of support, and which for the responsibility of enforcement of standards and the conditions attaching support.

I favour multiple forms of support for farming, because farming has multiple outputs, but it is complex and the Government need to be clear, early in the process, what the bureaucratic structure is, how agencies will be co-ordinated, to what degree we can rely on commercial or voluntary arrangements and whether the agencies are adequately resourced and have adequate powers. If we do not get this right in the first year or two of switchover, there will be multiple problems later. The Government need to make this clear, because farming is not solely confined to itself. It is part of the rural economy and community, the food system, the nation’s health and diet, and the local, national and global environment. Government support needs to reflect all these dimensions but, for it to be a success, we need to be a lot clearer than the Bill and the Government currently are.