Agriculture Bill (Ninth sitting)

Simon Hoare Excerpts

Tuesday 13th November 2018 Public Bill Committees

[George Eustice]

That is a very important point. I can absolutely confirm that existing schemes will be honoured for the lifetime of those projects. I know that we will probably come to this when we consider later amendments, but the grant agreements between the Government and individuals will be honoured even after we leave the European Union. The Bill, together with the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, gives us the power to bring across retained EU law and to continue to make payments under it.

[Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)]

Yesterday morning, I met an organic farmer in my constituency. His is quite a small farm, and his question about the stewardship scheme, and others through which he receives payment, was whether size will be important when determining who receives money and how. LEADER+ and other types of support system are important, but there is an anxiety that the small and beautiful smallholding, as it were, is likely to miss out as people look to scale up. Can my hon. Friend assure me that there will be a range of support within the new system that he proposes, irrespective of the size of an operation?

[George Eustice]

Yes, I can. We discussed this when we touched on clause 1, which is about the way in which we will support people. We heard representations from people engaged in small projects, such as agroecology projects, about whether they could have support. They are often not entitled to support under existing schemes, but I absolutely said that clause 1 will enable us to support those. Indeed, this is an area that we are looking at closely. Clause 1(2) gives us the power to award grants to some of those smaller businesses, including new entrants.