Budget: Implications for Farming Communities

Priti Patel Excerpts

Monday 4th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Daniel Zeichner]

The hon. Lady raises an important point. I suspect that in the months ahead it will come out that, actually, over the last few months there has been a big uptick in the number of people making sustainable farming incentive claims. That says to me that we are now on track to make these systems work for people. I do not disagree with her that under the previous Government it was a very long painful process, but we are now making progress and we need to make it work.

[Priti Patel (Witham) (Con)]

Does the Minister recognise that the changes not only break the Government’s previous promises on APR to farmers, but that they will add significant burdens and costs to family farms and disincentivise food production?

[Daniel Zeichner]

I also wish my fellow East Anglian MP, the right hon. Lady, good luck in the coming hours. The reason we can look forward to a successful and stable future for farmers across the east of England and the rest of the country is that we have absolutely committed to stability. The reason things have had to be different is that we found—I found this in my Department, just as fellow Ministers found it in their Departments—that the situation was far worse than we had been led to believe. We had to tackle that problem.