Budget: Implications for Farming Communities Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Simon Hoare
Main Page: Simon Hoare (Conservative - North Dorset)Department Debates - View all Simon Hoare's debates with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Budget: Implications for Farming Communities
Simon Hoare Excerpts(1 day, 23 hours ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Daniel Zeichner
It was striking that under the previous Government the agriculture budget was so substantially underspent. We are fixing that and making it possible for people to access those schemes in the way that my hon. Friend describes. It is interesting that the issue that came up most for him was basic payments. The issue that came up time after time on my visits was rural crime. That is the thing that has troubled so many people on farms and in the countryside. That is why it is so important that this Government are setting up a proper integrated rural crime strategy.
Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)
The Minister is seeing silver linings in the clouds hanging over family farms and tenanted farms in North Dorset, but I must confess that I fail to see them. I will give ask the Minister a simple yes or no question: yes or no, will he come to North Dorset to meet farmers in my constituency and explain these wonderful silver linings that he can see in the clouds but none of us on the Opposition Benches can see?
Daniel Zeichner
I love visiting farms all over the country, and I am sure North Dorset will feature on my list at some point in the future.
On this whole question of optimism, pessimism and the stress and strain in the countryside, my hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Andrew Pakes) earlier warned about some of the things that are being said. I urge people to be temperate in their language on these issues, because people are stressed, anxious and worried. My task is to be calm, sensible and reassuring to them, and to remind them that the vast majority will be able to pass on their farms just as they have before. Just as pressing is to tackle those other real issues that they face. I do not underestimate the challenges that people face—of course it is difficult, and we know it is hard, but this Government will do everything we can to support people and to maintain their prosperity into the future.