Exiting the European Union (Agriculture)

Debate between Sarah Wollaston and Neil Parish

Monday 18th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Neil Parish]

I very much welcome that comment, because two or three weeks ago, the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee went to DEFRA, where we saw the regulations being laid out and had a look at what was happening. I welcome what my hon. Friend said, but I reiterate that as much as I may love our French cousins, they can be very difficult when it comes to trading into the European Union. Much of our produce will have to pass from Dover through into Calais, and we have to be absolutely certain that they will process our food and let it into the EU.

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Ind)]

My hon. Friend rightly makes the point that we can unilaterally decide to be freer about letting goods come across our border. However, surely one issue is that a free-for-all and a lack of proper checking could put the organic sector at risk.

[Neil Parish]

The hon. Lady raises a good point. Milk production is a good example. Organics is a selected market; although a good number of people buy organics, there is a ceiling of around 10% of people who actually buy organics overall. Therefore, exporting organic food is as important as importing it. On the dairy side of organics, the big milk co-operative Omsco trades very successfully into the United States, but that has to be maintained—and we must have the certification, and all these other things must work, in order for that to happen. That is why we have to be very careful to ensure that we can trade successfully in a no-deal situation.

I spent a number of years in the European Parliament, so I know that our great French cousins are able, for example, to stop cheese coming in from Holland when they suddenly decide that there might be a problem with it and that it might actually help the French market to keep it out for a while. The European Commission then challenges them, and eventually they capitulate and the cheese comes back in from Holland. The point that I am making quite clearly tonight is: let us go in with our eyes open to the fact that there could well be a problem in the future if we do not get these rules right and recognised, and if we do not actually get that produce back into the EU. As we leave the European Union, it is very important that we take as much of trade with us as possible, and then we can also have future trading relationships across the world.

Thank you for letting me speak in this debate, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Fisheries Bill

Debate between Sarah Wollaston and Neil Parish

2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution: House of Commons & Ways and Means resolution: House of Commons
Wednesday 21st November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Neil Parish]

As always, my hon. Friend speaks great sense on fishing, and so she should, given her knowledge of it. Zonal attachment is an interesting way of looking at this. When we are managing our own waters, we should be able to manage that much more quickly, so that an area that can be fished can be opened up, or if an area needs to be closed down, for reasons of the environment or fish breeding, we can do so much more quickly.

[Dr Sarah Wollaston]

Further to the point about zonal attachment, does my hon. Friend agree with Brixham fishermen that sprats would be an ideal kind of species to look at, because 90% of them are caught within the 12-mile limit but we have only 52% of the total allowable catch? Does he agree that that would be a much more sensible way to proceed?

Improving Air Quality

Debate between Sarah Wollaston and Neil Parish

Thursday 28th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Neil Parish]

The hon. Lady, a fellow Select Committee Chair, raises a very good point. What I cannot understand is that although the money is not exactly free, it is money we could get from a source separate from British taxpayers, or wherever, to help to clean up a situation created by these vehicles. I urge the Minister today to come forward with ideas about how we can get some money from the car industry, especially Volkswagen; as the hon. Lady says, the Americans seem to be somewhat more effective at that job than we are.

The “polluter pays” fund would mean that the Government could have more money available to improve public transport and speed up the roll-out of infrastructure needed for low-emission vehicles. The emissions scandal showed us that all the manufacturers were prepared to put profit above everything else, including our health, but the Government are shying away from making them pay.

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that such a fund could also be used to build infrastructure for those who walk or cycle—for active transport?

[Neil Parish]

My hon. Friend, who chairs the Health and Social Care Committee, makes a good point. Once we have the money, there are limitless things we can do with it. The unfortunate fact is that we do not have the money at the moment. I think the Government have felt that. Walking, cycling and altering the way we go about our daily lives is all good. It is good for our health, and it gets us out of our cars.

Ambulance Services (Devon)

Debate between Sarah Wollaston and Neil Parish

Wednesday 12th July 2017 Westminster Hall

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered ambulance services in Devon.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. Let me say at the outset that we all pay tribute to our blue light services and that this debate is not in any way intended to criticise them. The intention is to set out the challenges that they confront and to celebrate their professionalism and the work that they do, but also to ask my hon. Friend the Minister to address some key issues that they face in Devon and, in particular, in my constituency.

The debate has been triggered by a number of incidents. People have contacted me either directly or indirectly to raise concerns about long waiting times faced by my constituents; an incident that typifies the situation happened last month. An elderly lady was left for two hours at the roadside, on a baking hot day, waiting for a paramedic crew to arrive. She had serious neck injuries and was in some distress. Were it not for the kindness of passing strangers, things might have been even worse, but a consultant anaesthetist happened to be passing and was able to provide critical assistance at the scene, and the lady also had assistance from the police and from staff from South Hams Community Hospital. As a result, the outcome has been good, but it could have been very different. That has caused a great deal of concern, because it is not an isolated incident. Although much of the focus of my speech will understandably be on the critical, type 1 cases, which require a response within eight minutes—everyone understands that—I would like the Minister also to think about those other cases that we are all coming across in our constituencies which are not immediately life threatening but are nevertheless very serious and where the outcome can be very different unless we see a timely response from our ambulance services.

First, I would like to address demand, which is rising at an extraordinary rate. During the five years to 2016-17, over the area of the South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust we have seen a considerable rise in demand, but there has been a 19.2% increase in the Totnes constituency alone, a 29% increase in Plymouth and a 23.7% increase in Torbay. The challenge is far greater in a rural setting, for obvious reasons. The SWASFT area is the most rural area in England; and if we look at the activity for Devon, we see that 23.5% of SWASFT’s activity is in that county, but that is matched by only 22.2% of its funding.

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

I very much appreciate the debate that my hon. Friend has introduced in the Chamber today. She is making a very good point about the rurality of Devon, which is one of the largest counties in the country. Of course, the issue is not just its size. If one starts going north-south, there are no really fast roads—we need much more done to the north Devon link road. Apart from the scale of the county, however, the issue is about getting an ambulance to an incident in time and our very scattered population. My hon. Friend makes a very good point. I am sure that Ministers are aware of the size of Devon, but there is also the question of the time it takes to get from A to B if one is not going on major roads.

[Dr Wollaston]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. Of course, as we know, demand can escalate considerably during the peak summer times, but many of our roads are single-track ones with passing spaces, and it can be very difficult to get an ambulance resource to the scene in a timely manner.

My first point to the Minister is that there are no concessions for rurality; there is no funding premium to allow SWASFT to meet the extra demands that it faces. In fact, overall, its funding has fallen by 2.46% per incident in 2017-18, compared with 2014-15. It has to meet the huge increase in demand with shrinking resource, in what is one of the most challenged areas in England because of rurality. I would like the Minister to acknowledge that key point and the impact of rurality on response times.

My second point to the Minister is that although overall SWASFT is doing a good job in meeting the performance target of 75% of category 1 calls receiving a response within eight minutes, that does rather mask the picture in the most rural parts of the area. Let us take the South Devon and Torbay clinical commissioning group area as a whole, for which we have some data that show that it just meets the target, with the figure of 75.65% of calls. If we look at the breakdown for the Totnes constituency, we see that during the past three months the figure has been 61%, so my point to my hon. Friend is that, when considering a county such as Devon, he should look not just at the overall, top-line figure, but at the impact in the most rural parts of the constituencies. I hope that he will ask for that as an ongoing measure, as a response to this debate.

English Wine Industry

Debate between Sarah Wollaston and Neil Parish

Wednesday 16th November 2016 Westminster Hall

[Neil Parish]

My hon. Friend has obviously been looking at my speech, because I shall mention that in a minute. There is no doubt that they are buying up land. We have to be careful; we do not want to be entirely overrun by France, especially given the history. Seriously, though, what the French are bringing is the investment and the expertise, so if we can work together, I believe that English wine, in particular sparkling wine, has huge potential.

There is some more good news. Statistics produced by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs show that an additional 75,000 acres of land are suitable for producing English sparkling wine. That is equivalent in size to the whole of the Champagne region, which just shows how much potential there is for growth.

Only last year, the champagne producer Taittinger purchased some land in Kent to establish its first UK vineyard. Prime vineyard land in the UK is actually much cheaper than in France and many of our arable farmers are also beginning to see that attraction. Vineyards are quickly becoming part of farm diversification, and with the added bonus of shops, cafés, tours, weddings and wine tastings, vineyards and wineries can provide a much needed boost for agri-tourism and rural jobs.

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)]

Further to that point, will my hon. Friend join me in congratulating Sharpham Wine and Cheese, which does just that? It is producing not only fantastic wines but fantastic cheeses and is providing a welcome tourist centre for tours, sharing expertise and creating valuable local employment.

[Neil Parish]

I very much commend the Sharpham vineyard, because, once again, it is reaching out. It is producing a good wine, and then we can have good local food and bring more and more tourists down to the south-west, provided that we dual the A30 into Honiton while we are at it and along the A358 to Taunton—that was not part of my speech.

English wine is now of such a good standard that our Government and embassies are confident of promoting English sparkling wine across the world—I am sure we will hear much more about that from the Minister. I even heard on the grapevine—sorry about that—earlier this year that Chapel Down in Kent had become Downing Street’s official wine supplier. Unfortunately, however, less than 1% of wine drunk in the UK is from our shores, so for a start let us ensure that a variety of English and Welsh wines are sold in Parliament, Government buildings and our embassies, and are not just found in Downing Street.

Parliament’s bars and restaurants are selling French champagne and Italian prosecco, as well as wines from Chile to New Zealand. It is great to have these wines here, but we really must have our English wine here. Even worse, the House of Commons-branded wine is not actually from the UK. If we are going to promote English or Welsh wine globally, we really should get our own House in order first.

It is true that English wine is generally a little more expensive, so the Government must look at what can be done to create a level playing field. In the UK, as much as 60% of the cost of an average bottle of wine goes on tax—so I expect our great Minister here to reduce the tax on our wine immediately. That 60% in this country compares with about 21% in France. Excise duty is too high in this country and punishes domestic wine producers the most, who pay duty even before the wine is sold. At the last Budget in March, all other drink sectors received duty freezes, but the wine industry saw a duty rise. There is therefore a serious point to be made: our growers of wine and grapes should be treated fairly. If wine continues to go unnoticed and unprotected by Government, there will be a growing impact on the industry right across the board, from small to large producers.

It is also vital that the UK rejoins the International Organisation of Vine and Wine, the OIV, which is the global organisation for science and technical standards in the wine trade. The British Government left the organisation in 2005, citing cost, but all the big wine producers are members, including most of Europe. OIV members account for some 80% of global production. We need a seat at the top table to help to construct the rules covering this global trade. Will the Minister commit to the UK rejoining the OIV? In addition, the English wine industry reports that there are not enough approved pesticides. The green book of UK-approved pesticides gets thinner every year. Any assistance or reassurance that the Minister can give us and the industry that the issue will be given close attention will be much appreciated. We need a level playing field with our European counterparts.

I want English wine to be a big Brexit success story. The Government are committed to boosting British exports to growing markets around the world. Where better to start than English wine, where many of the top export markets are in Asia? When negotiating a new trade deal with the EU, the Government should look to secure tariff-free access for wine produced in the UK. That should also be a priority for trade deals with other nations. We also need a national scheme equivalent to the EU’s protected geographical status. We must protect our names and the particular association of English sparkling wines as being a high-quality product. The protected geographical indications currently cover British products such as west country lamb and Exmoor Jersey blue cheese. I was pleased therefore to hear that the Government were considering registering the name “Sussex” as a kitemark brand for sparkling wine. What progress has been made on that registration? Where does Brexit leave the opportunity to have protected regional brands? We also need to focus on training and skills. Vineyards must get the necessary labour post-Brexit to realise their full potential.

Finally, if we allow our producers equal competition against subsidised wine industries in other countries, we will definitely need a new farming support regime. We must help and encourage those who produce and export the very best English wine. Minister, there are a lot of them. There is so much more we can do to encourage this growing industry, whether through promotion, name recognition or making tax changes to help exports. English wine can be an even better success, so let us uncork its great potential.

Rural Fair Share Campaign

Debate between Sarah Wollaston and Neil Parish

Monday 4th November 2013 Commons Chamber

Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)

- Hansard -

I am presenting a petition in the same terms on behalf of people from Loddiswell and Dartmouth in my constituency, who speak for my entire constituency in recognising that the cost of providing services in rural areas is far higher and that the settlement should be based on age as well as deprivation.

The Petition of the residents of Loddiswell.

[P001258]

Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)

- Hansard - - Excerpts

I present this petition on behalf of the villages and towns of my constituency. The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urge the Government to reduce the rural penalty in staged steps by at least 10% by 2020. It is delightful to see that the Secretary of State and the Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Great Yarmouth (Brandon Lewis) are here tonight to deal with the matter.

The Petition of the residents of Tiverton and Honiton.

[P001259]

Solar Arrays

Debate between Sarah Wollaston and Neil Parish

Thursday 11th July 2013 Westminster Hall

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Alan. I echo my colleagues in congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston) on securing this opportune debate. It is not anti-solar panels, but it is about ensuring that solar panels are installed on barn roofs, industrial buildings and individual residences, not in huge arrays.

The hon. Member for Wells (Tessa Munt) mentioned solar paddocks of four or five acres. The problem in my constituency is that we virtually have whole farms—I am not exaggerating—of 70, 80 or 90 acres in individual applications. I assure Members that anyone who has bought their house or lived there for years and who looks out on a beautiful hillside does not want 90 acres of solar panels in front of them. There is nothing pretty about them. They have huge industrial fences around them. They are not part of the countryside. People do not come to Devon and Cornwall—or even Somerset, dare I say—to see solar panels; they come to see beautiful countryside and wonderful farming. They do not want to see solar panels; they want to see sheep and cattle. As for the number of sheep that will graze under the panels, I assure the Chamber that it will not be very many. If the light is being taken to produce electricity, how much grass will grow, given that it needs to photosynthesise? A lot of what is being discussed is complete and utter myth.

We have 7 billion people and want to feed the world, and our nation, but all we are doing is taking out acres and acres of good farmland. Solar panels are being proposed for grade 1 and 2 farmland in my constituency; we have proposals for Bampton, Morebath, around Tiverton and around Cullompton. Mid Devon appears to be the solar panel farm capital of the world, and the council is inundated with the number of applications.

[Dr Wollaston]

I have shown my hon. Friend an advert from Farmers Weekly. Does he agree that it verges on being fraudulent? It appears to show lush green grass growing directly underneath ground-mounted, large-scale solar panels.

[Neil Parish]

I suggest that the grass and the wonderful flowers in the picture my hon. Friend has shown me were there before the panels were put up—the panels can only just have been put up for the advertisers to get such a picture. The whole thing is—but perhaps I had better not say what I was going to say.

I echo the words of my hon. Friends: do not blame the farmers for what is going on; blame the companies. Basically, the companies are using a scattergun approach. If they apply as many times and for as many sites as possible, they will not get many applications through, but they will get one or two of them, so they keep going. All they do is terrorise the population of those areas, who see planning application after planning application, costing Mid Devon a fortune to process. The council is now asking for environmental impact assessments, but everything still has to be processed.

The Minister wants the money that we are using to subsidise solar panels—we should not forget that panels can only get into place with vast amounts of subsidy—to go on community projects and individual households, so that people get real benefits. The problem is, however, that the money seems to have landed up in the vast numbers of field projects, because the price of panels has halved. A year or so ago, the Minister got lambasted for reducing the tariff on solar panel production, but in the meantime the cost of the panels has dropped and they have become lucrative. In the end, it is all about producing money, and the panels are too profitable. That is the problem.

I urge the Minister, therefore, to reduce the tariff further, especially for the field panels, although I am sure he is not keen to do so after his previous experience of reducing it. That will ensure that the money goes where he intends it to go. The planning process is good, and I welcome what the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, my right hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr Pickles), and his Department have done, in that local authorities will now have a great deal more say. My argument, however, is simple: if the panels are not profitable, we will not get them. We will not get 90-acre farms covered in solar panels if they are not profitable; if such undertakings are profitable, the companies will try to get them up and running.

Just over the border from me, I have industrial buildings that are covered in solar panels, which is a great place to put panels, and as other hon. Members have said, there are some large farm buildings around the area. That is absolutely right, because farm buildings on the whole are not things of great beauty, and putting solar panels on them might even increase their beauty, and they certainly would not detract from it. Do not take the panels out into acres and acres of land. Where would it stop? If we take all that grade 1 and 2 land out of food production, we will be short of food, and we do not actually need the solar panels.

I take huge issue with my hon. Friend the Member for Wells. The Hinkley power station is already there; I am the first to admit that Hinkley A and B are not things of great beauty, but they are already in place. If we add two new reactors that will produce 8% of the country’s total electricity needs in the same place, no one will notice. In fact, the new power stations will be marginally better looking than the previous ones. They will certainly produce electricity for the whole country—some 8%—and we would have to cover virtually half the country with solar panels in order to produce a similar amount of electricity. Furthermore, during dark times of year when little solar energy is produced, we would not get that electricity, whereas a nuclear power station is a base load, which is there and producing electricity all the time.

People are getting cross, because they feel that they are being sold green energy as a total solution, but I am sure that the Minister will admit that we need all types of green energy in order to balance. We have got the balance wrong. I do not blame him for that, because he has done his best to ensure that the money goes to community schemes and individuals, but we have to do much more. My local council in Mid Devon was successful in putting solar panels all over council and social housing, which has been a benefit of about £3 a week to many of the tenants, who are hard-pressed for cash—that is a great way of using the subsidy.

Finally, I ask the Minister to look at the issue again. All through the valleys of east and mid-Devon we have large power lines in many places. The companies follow the power lines all the way through the valleys, which are right out in the open. Even quite large farms can be accepted in places—if they have trees around them and are reasonably well hidden, that is fine. The companies will carry on following the power lines all through the south-west, because the region—Devon and Cornwall in particular—is especially good for panels, on account of the light and the amount of production possible, making them lucrative. I wish the Minister well, but I want him to do much more than make the DCLG changes to the planning system; we need to alter the tariffs to ensure that those huge solar farms are no longer profitable.

Badger Cull

Debate between Sarah Wollaston and Neil Parish

Thursday 25th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)]

I ask colleagues to imagine a bowl of fresh green salad, but rather than sprinkling it with the salad dressing of their choice, I would like them to imagine sprinkling it with some diseased badger urine—urine from a badger that has lesions in its kidneys, which sadly is commonly the case. Before pasteurisation made milk absolutely safe to drink, countless thousands of people died from bovine TB, because the disease can be spread through ingestion. It is very important to understand that for several reasons, particularly those related to biosecurity.

I absolutely support the comments that have been made about the importance of biosecurity and preventing cattle-to-cattle spread. However, a farmer can take all the effort he or she wants to keep badgers out of cowsheds, but those cattle are still grazing on infected pastures and will still be at risk. We are talking about closed herds with no concerns about TB being imported from outside, which is an important route for transmission.

Reference has been made to super-dairies and huge herds of cows, thousands strong, being kept inside. We do not want that. We all saw last year’s campaign, “Cows need grass, not concrete”, and I absolutely support that. However, in parts of South Hams in my constituency, putting cattle out on to infected pastures is tantamount to a death sentence—a form of culinary Russian roulette. We have to take this very seriously.

Let us look at the figures. In 1998 in my constituency, fewer than 600 cattle were culled; in 2010, that figure had risen to just short of 6,000. This is a dangerous zoonosis that is spreading inexorably year on year; we can look at the geographical maps and see the edge spreading. As other Members have said, sporadic cases are arising elsewhere which are undoubtedly due to the movement of cattle, but the inexorable spread that we see on the charts is due, in part, to the reservoir in badgers. Let us imagine how a dangerous zoonosis like this might spread out to other mammals; we are seeing it increasingly in deer, alpacas and pigs, and now in domestic pets as well. This is a real threat, so why have we not got a grip of the situation?

I should like to say something quite uncomfortable—that we are seeing the rise of the celebrity mammal. Indeed, we have a celebrity mammal here with us today, and very welcome he is too. We are beginning to focus on a single species, and that is unhelpful. I would challenge anybody to come down to south Devon and lay their hand on the side of one of the beautiful south Devon cattle and tell me that that animal is less important than the badger. All these animals are important, but there is a balance to be struck. When I step outside my door of an evening in south Devon, I frequently see badgers; they are a wonderful sight. The last time I saw a hedgehog was over five years ago. That element of balance is sometimes missing from this debate.

The rise of the celebrity mammal has been a barrier to science. Those on both sides of the debate rightly quote scientists, who will disagree about the issue; that is what scientists do. We want a robust debate, and I welcome it. The problem is that there were some flaws in the randomised badger culling trial, particularly regarding the size of the triplets and the edge effect. In that circumstance, the right thing to do is to take matters further and consider pilots that explore the edge effect, but we are prevented from doing so because of the effect on politicians and the public of a focus on the needs of a specific animal, lovely as it may be. We need to tackle that issue head on.

Will the Minister say whether we are exploring the PCR—polymerase chain reaction—test further? We want to have a test of greater sensitivity and specificity that will allow us to test badger droppings, and then perhaps look to a further trial, even on whole-sett humane underground culling. There are also issues to do with perturbation, such as the effect of picking off one animal at a time. I suggest that we would be perturbed in an entirely different way if someone picked off members of our families one by one.

Let us see more focus on the science. Let us tackle this as a dangerous zoonosis. Let us also look at vaccination. The important point is that if any Member in this House developed any sort of TB, they would be looking at weeks and weeks of a complex antibiotic regime. Any doctor who treated them with vaccination would be struck off. It is not possible to cure an infected badger with a vaccination. Of course I want to see vaccination and prevention in disease-free animals. However, we should not pretend that we can extrapolate the results from an injectable vaccine, which may indeed show a slight reduction in the amount of TB excreted in urine by infected badgers, to oral vaccines. Oral vaccines and injectable vaccines are entirely different, and so we must be very careful.

I fully support a move towards greater investment in vaccination, but perhaps that is because I am a people person. I went into medicine rather than go to veterinary school because I think that people matter more. I was rewarded for that—I was never bitten by a patient in 24 years.

[Neil Parish]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Dr Wollaston]

No, I am going to carry on, if I may.

The point is, yes, let us see investment, but we want to see an oral bait vaccine. I want to leave a question in the air: is there something obscene about the amount of money we are going to spend on trapping and vaccinating every single wild badger in this country, year on year, when there are other things that that money could be spent on? I want to see an oral bait vaccine and an improved test, but we have to be honest and tackle a dangerous zoonosis. We have to be honest about the need for further scientific pilots and I am afraid that we have to do it now, because farmers in my constituency are suffering. These are the people who feed the nation—they put food on our plates and care for our countryside.

Larch Disease

Debate between Sarah Wollaston and Neil Parish

Tuesday 3rd May 2011 Westminster Hall

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

It is very nice to have this debate under your chairmanship, Ms Dorries, and it is nice to see the Minister with responsibility for agriculture here.

There is an insidious disease hitting the south-west that, if swept under the carpet, could decimate some of our most treasured ancient woodland, and cost many of the green jobs in the forestry sector that are vital to the rural economy and to the maintenance of our environment. Phytophthora ramorum is a fungus-like pathogen that is causing extensive damage and mortality to plants and trees. In particular, it has infected commercial softwoods such as Japanese larch in the south-west of England and south Wales. It was unknowingly spread by plant movements of ornamental rhododendrons to gardens across the UK.

In 2000, Forestry Commission scientists found similarities between a pathogen that had been causing leaf blotch and dieback in rhododendrons in nurseries in Germany since the early 1990s, and a pathogen in California—and subsequently in Oregon—that had caused the death of more than 1 million oak trees since its symptoms were identified in the US in 1994, gaining it the name, “sudden oak death.” In Japanese larch, the symptoms are that shoots and foliage can be affected and are visible as wilted, withered shoot tips with blackened needles, with the infected shoots shedding their needles prematurely. Trees with branch dieback may have numerous cankers on their branches and upper trunk that can bleed resin.

It is now known that Japanese larch, when actively growing in spring and summer, can produce very high quantities of disease-carrying spores, at much higher levels than those produced by rhododendrons, and they can be spread across significant distances in moist air. In August 2009, the pathogen was found to have infected Japanese larch trees at sites in Somerset, Devon and Cornwall, which was an unexpected change in its behaviour. More recently, in March 2011, the disease was found in the European larch in woodlands near Lostwithiel in Cornwall. The fact that this lethal pathogen has now proved capable of infecting yet another species is a worrying development and a setback in tackling the disease, but given the similarities between the two species, experts were not surprised.

Regarding the threat to the industry, as of January 2011 some 138 statutory plant notices had been issued in the UK requiring trees to be felled due to infections on some 2,200 hectares. An estimated 1,745 hectares in the south-west are affected by the disease. That is a grave threat to our woodlands and to the 2,220 people who are employed in primary production and processing. The 15,000 green jobs in the south-west supported by the forestry sector are under threat.

Japanese and European larch, the primary victims of the disease in the south-west, are extensively used in the manufacture of garden furniture, fencing and pallets, and their value to the south-west’s economy has been estimated at £47 million. Wood prices have been hit, with landowners estimating that the disease outbreak has seen larch prices fall by 35%. Over-supply, the cost of bio-security measures and the need for the diseased timber to be handled carefully only at licensed mills has also affected profitability.

Current actions by the Food and Environment Research Agency include a strategy to control and contain the disease, reducing levels of the infective spores in the environment by felling infected plantings of the principal host—Japanese larch—as rapidly as possible. FERA is also continuing its programme of clearing infected rhododendrons from woodland and other sites. There is also an aerial survey programme in the south-west, Wales and western Britain, where the climate favours the disease, to identify possible sites of infected larch, which is then followed by contact with owners, site visits to check symptoms and laboratory testing to confirm the presence or otherwise of the disease. When the disease is confirmed, there is a programme of clearance on both private and publicly owned sites and the development of a package of short-term help for private woodland owners affected by the disease, which includes a licence system to enable the movement and processing of timber from affected larch.

Other actions include continued scientific research better to understand the disease and the overall risks to our trees, woods and forests, including the potential impacts on the UK forestry sector and its associated industries; a further survey of rhododendrons by FERA, followed up with funded rhododendron clearance agreements when appropriate; and, very importantly, encouraging owners to check their woodland, especially larch plantings, for signs of the disease and to report suspicious symptoms promptly. Owners have a legal obligation under plant health legislation to notify the authorities if they suspect that the disease is present.

Regarding the effect on the forestry industry and the Confederation of Forest Industries, felling diseased larch has accelerated the loss of productive softwood forest, and the area of such forestry is already in decline, with new planting falling to match ongoing losses. A report by South West Woodland Renaissance, a coalition of 35 sawmillers and woodland owners, warned:

“The forecast total softwood availability from the current potential productive growing stock is forecast to decrease”

by up to 50%. The loss of larch trees has caused the acceleration of lost softwood forestry, undermining local green jobs and damaging efforts to reduce carbon emissions and develop a low-carbon economy.

I turn to the felling of diseased larch and replanting. Many landowners are concerned about the considerable cost of clearing woodland of infected trees, and also that the lack of support for woodland creation is inadequate and the resource is diminishing, especially with the value of larch trees going down due to so many of the trees having to be cut down because of the disease. There is a huge disparity in the current grant system, with the grant rates providing a higher contribution to the cost per hectare of planting broadleaves than softwood, and providing no grant at all for replanting softwood in protected ancient woodlands.

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)]

May I back that up by talking about the experience of my constituent, Mr Rob White, who has lost 20 hectares of his Japanese larch under a compulsory felling notice? He is on a planted ancient woodland site and only 50% to 70% of his replanting costs would be covered—even if he planted wholly broadleaf species—and he is seriously considering the extent to which he will replant. He would, of course, like to use his common sense and replant a range of species; he has talked to me about replanting Sitka spruce and Douglas fir, which are relatively disease-resistant, and he would also like to mix in some broadleaf species. Does my hon. Friend feel that we should trust our constituents to use their common sense in that regard?

[Neil Parish]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We have to use our common sense and bring a mixture of trees back into these ancient woodlands, which have suffered from the destructive larch disease. From my farming background, I know that the greater the spread of varieties of tree, the lower the chance of spreading the larch disease that might still be there. I am sure that the Minister heard exactly what my hon. Friend said, and it will be interesting to see whether the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs can come up with a solution whereby we can get the forests replanted, especially the very valuable ancient woodland.