Dairy Industry

Debate between Simon Hart and Julian Sturdy

Wednesday 5th November 2014 Westminster Hall

[Simon Hart]

The short answer is yes. This is a matter of the sustainability and the long-term health and vigour of the dairy industry, which at the moment is facing yet another crisis. I take on board my hon. Friend’s comments, and I will cheerfully pass the buck to the Minister so that we can hear what he has to say about that idea.

Before I sum up, I want to talk about a couple of short-term proposals that could have an instant and positive effect if the Government implemented them. The first is continued improvement of food labelling and procurement policies in the UK. Despite commitment after commitment and promise after promise over a long period, we are probably not where any of us would like to be with procurement and labelling policies. I hope the Minister will concede that we could do better. I know that is his own ambition and an ambition of the Government—I suspect it is an Opposition ambition as well—but there has never been a better time to stop talking and start delivering on procurement and labelling.

The Government should press ahead with implementing the Macdonald review and deregulation. Regulation is simply an added cost to farmers and there are not necessarily any positive benefits. There is layer upon layer of regulation, so the more we can strip away, without compromising food safety or animal welfare, the better.

The Government should continue with measures on the difficult and often controversial issue that we discussed in this Chamber only yesterday, namely wiping out bovine tuberculosis. TB still casts a huge cloud over the dairy farming industry in a few parts of the world, particularly west Wales. I do not want to make a cheap political shot, as that is something that hon. Members will know I am not prone to do, but one or two Members were in here yesterday shedding what seemed to be crocodile tears for the dairy industry over an issue that affects relatively few—albeit a significant few—dairy farmers. Where are those Members today? If they are that committed to the dairy industry, why are they not here today to talk about a subject that affects every dairy farmer and every household? I suspect I know the answer, which is that they are not the slightest bit concerned about dairy farmers; they are concerned about badgers. I do not mind that, but they should at least be honest about it.

[Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing a really important debate for our dairy industry. He is absolutely right to focus on short-term measures, which he has set out articulately. Does he agree that we also have to tackle the long-term problems? In the UK dairy industry, those problems stem from the fact that over half the milk produced goes into the fresh liquid market. The Government can help by allowing farmers to diversify into other schemes. I know that it is not always easy, and that some producers and farms do not have the capability, but we have to tackle the problem: we are over-supplying the fresh milk market.

[Simon Hart]

That point is accepted by the farming unions, but as my hon. Friend rightly points out, offsetting those difficulties through diversification schemes is often easier said than done. The uncertainty of the future of dairy farming gives rise to the issue of whether farmers can obtain the necessary funding to enter diversification schemes or more adventurous marketing schemes on the back of a dangerously fluctuating short-term horizon. However, I take on board his well made point.

Some solutions have been put forward by the retailers themselves, so there are silver linings to one or two clouds that we have referred to. To cite ideas from one particular retailer—I am trying to avoid naming individual companies, so that I am not bombarded with rebuttals and the like when I leave the Chamber—those solutions include working with processors to create greater transparency in the supply chain, and enabling farmers to see how prices are set in order to create better trust within the supply chain. That is a new way of working that has not been seen before in the industry, and it will create benefits for farmers, consumers and the industry. For example, the price paid to farmers will be worked out every three months, based on a rolling average of indexed butter and milk powder prices. Those commodity prices are publicly quoted, and in each case there is a futures market, allowing farmers to look ahead and hedge or protect themselves against price movements. That will allow dairy farmers better to predict milk prices and plan accordingly.

That idea comes from an e-mail from somebody who took the trouble to contact me recently. However, if I may use a rather clumsy analogy, it aligns what we are discussing with the principle of a fixed-term mortgage. If the industry is prepared to enter into an arrangement in which it can play the futures market, we can have contracts that are perhaps fixed for a longer period. If contracts can be fixed both between retailer and processor and between processor and farmer, we will be able to look at one-year or two-year contracts, or perhaps—maybe I am being over-optimistic—even further ahead than that.

Yes, of course, there are risks. There are risks to each person in the chain, but surely we can inject a degree of certainly into the industry to eliminate the risks and the downside from which people are suffering, which affects not just farmers, but everyone who relies on farmers in some shape or form.

It is a promising way forward if the retailers are beginning to recognise that there is a need for a transparent contract system based on being able to look ahead and take an average price over a future period. There would then at least be recognition that we are looking at the end of the unacceptable practice of simply sending a text message to a producer to downscale their milk price in two or three weeks.