Agriculture Bill

Tim Farron Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments & Ping Pong & Ping Pong: House of Commons
Monday 12th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Prentis]

I will not just at the moment, but I will later.

I am afraid to say that, despite the considerable thought that has gone into the amendments, we have not yet found a magic form of words that will address all the concerns and avoid undesirable side effects. In asking the House to reject the amendments, I will set out the set of solutions, both legislative and non-legislative, that I hope will allay the fears that Members have expressed. In my view, this range of measures, and constant vigilance on the part of Government and, indeed, consumers, are of more use than warm words in primary legislation.

I will start by reiterating that, alongside my colleagues on this side of the House, I stood on a clear manifesto commitment that in all our trade negotiations we will not compromise on our high environmental protection, animal welfare or food standards. As I have said many times, our current import standards are enshrined in existing legislation.

They include a ban on importing beef produced using artificial growth hormones and poultry that has been washed with chlorine. The European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Act 2020 carries across those existing standards on environmental protections, animal welfare, animal and plant health and food safety. Any changes to that legislation would need to be brought before Parliament.

It falls to our independent food regulators, the Food Standards Agency and Food Standards Scotland, to ensure that all food imports into the UK are safe and meet the relevant UK product rules and regulations. The FSA’s risk analysis process is rigorous, completely independent of Government and based on robust scientific evidence, along with other legitimate factors such as wider consumer interests and the impact on the environment, animal welfare and food security.

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

I want to be very clear: the concerns that people have about the Bill and the Government’s decision not to accept the amendment are not about the quality of food. We understand that the product is not a danger. What we are concerned about is the production and the impact on the producer. If we undermine animal welfare and environmental standards, we may well have quality food to eat but we will damage our farmers and the integrity of our farming industry in the process.

[Victoria Prentis]

The hon. Gentleman is partly right. Many of the concerns expressed, perhaps more wildly, in the tabloid press—possibly not by the farming sector—are indeed about the safety of food. I seek to reassure everybody that those regulations are in place, and there is no danger to safety or to the existing standards that we enjoy, and have enjoyed for many years as members of the EU. When we come on to the next argument, which we could perhaps characterise as a more protectionist argument, we need to balance the competing factors of trade deals that we already have, continuity trade agreements and trade deals that we want to enter into in the future, and work out how we scrutinise those trade deals to ensure that our farmers are getting a fair deal. I will go on to set out some of the ways that we hope to do that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Luke Pollard]

I am grateful for that intervention, because it gives me a chance to say that we back our British farmers. Tonight, they will be looking at the votes cast in this place to see whether Members of Parliament that represent farming communities, be they red or blue—these communities are represented on both sides of this House—support British farmers or choose not to do so. That will be a decision for each and every Member, but let me be clear: farmers are watching what happens in this debate tonight and what votes are cast, and their votes are not secured for the next election. Their votes are to be played for. I look forward to that competition.

[Tim Farron]

The hon. Gentleman is making a great series of points. I am sure he would humbly accept that in the election last December the Conservatives made gains from his party in many urban parts of Britain because of the characterisation that Labour had taken those seats for granted. Is the same thing not here on the table tonight: large swathes of blue in rural Britain that the Conservatives assume will vote for them come what may? Is it not the lesson of tonight that at the next election many Conservative MPs will be in the same position as his colleagues were in December?

[Luke Pollard]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. The important thing I have taken away from my discussions with farmers in Devon and on visits to farms up and down the country is that their votes are not guaranteed. The votes of rural communities are not guaranteed and are there to be won, but they need to be won through a strong vision and through delivery. Taking votes for granted is not a good electoral strategy anywhere. We need to look at what farmers will benefit from and what will they not benefit from. I worry that leaving a back door to their being undercut in trade deals is neither a good economic strategy for our country, nor a good political strategy for those people advocating it.

I expect the amendment to strengthen the Trade and Agriculture Commission to be redrafted in the Lords, and I hope it will come back to us soon. Amendment 16, on strengthening the trade commission, and amendment 18, on food standards, are a one-two—they are a classic British double act. I do not believe that the temporary and fragile Trade and Agriculture Commission would be able to stop the International Trade Secretary, Dominic Cummings and the Prime Minister signing a trade deal with America that would include imports of chlorinated chicken and hormone-treated beef. That is why we need that one-two—strengthened scrutiny of trade deals and protection for our farmers—in law.

--- Later in debate ---

Of course, this is not all about export. What about our domestic market? To provide some reassurance to our UK farmers, the existing protections will remain. Food coming into this country will need to meet existing import requirements, as the EU withdrawal Act will transfer all existing EU food safety provisions to the UK statute book. We have a great opportunity, but I believe that stronger labelling and a beefed-up Trade and Agriculture Commission will help, and I am sad to see that Lords amendment 18 is not coming to the House.

[Tim Farron]

Let us start with some common ground. I am pretty sure everybody in the House thinks that the paying of public money for public goods is a good thing and that the environmental land management scheme is—in principle, at least—a good thing. Of course, by the Government’s own admission, the environmental land management scheme, or ELMS, will not be accessible to all farmers until 2028. We are three and a half months away from the scheme that it replaces beginning to be phased out, and 85% of the profitability of livestock farmers in this country is based on the basic payment scheme. My first ask is that the Government be mindful of that. They must not take a penny away from the BPS until ELMS is available to every farmer in this country. Given that fragility and that upcoming change in payments, it is all the more important that we do not put British farming at risk as a consequence of the new arrangements for trade.

Paying for public goods is vital. Those public goods are biodiversity, food security, access, education and so many other things, including the landscape that underpins the lake district’s tourism economy. All of them are at risk if we make the wrong decision here. Amendment 16 is so important because it underpins, and prevents the Government from undermining, British values when it comes to animal welfare, the sovereignty of this place in scrutinising and reviewing legislation and trade deals, and the future of farming itself.

What is the USP of British farming’s food exports? It is quality. If we allow the undercutting of our farmers through cheap imports—cheap because of the poor quality of their production—we undermine our reputation and our ability to trade internationally and be successful. It is important for Members to understand that amendment 16 is about strengthening Britain’s hand in negotiations. If our negotiators say to the US negotiators, “We’d love to help you out, but we can’t because Parliament won’t let us,” that is real strength which allows us to get the kind of deal that is good for British farmers, for the environment and for animal welfare. It would strengthen this Parliament. The Minister said that we have spent 100 hours debating the Bill. That contrasts very worryingly with the length of time we will have to scrutinise trade agreements that will last for generations. It will strengthen our standing and reputation as a country if we write into the Bill our determination to ensure that we uphold animal welfare and environmental standards, as so many Members on both sides of the House have said.

The only reason that the Government would resist the enforcement of minimum standards in the Bill is if they wanted to allow themselves the freedom—the wriggle room—to sell out our farmers. In a letter publicised last week, the Minister said:

“Such conditions would make it very difficult to secure any new trade deals.”

In other words, “If you don’t allow us to throw our farmers under a bus, we’ll not get the trade deal that we want.” If we care about not only farmers, animal welfare and environmental protections but the communities that those farms underpin, such as mine in Westmorland, we are letting down generations of farmers and the heritage that they promote and have protected if we allow the Government to throw all that away in negotiations. If Members want to back British farmers, they cannot just wear a wheat badge once a year—they must vote for the amendment tonight.

[George Freeman (Mid Norfolk) (Con)]

I rise as a Member of Parliament for a very agricultural constituency, and as the product of a farming family—in fact, I think I still have a place on offer at Harper Adams if this career does not work out—as well as a former Minister for agritech, former trade envoy, and chair of the all-party parliamentary group on science and technology in agriculture.

This is a major moment, when we take back control of our farming policy from the EU after 40 years, and of our trading destiny and sovereignty. It is on a par with 1947—the last great reset of agricultural policy—or, indeed, the corn laws. I welcome the Agriculture Bill, and the work of DEFRA Ministers and officials in setting out a framework that supports commercial British farming—a great British industry that is leading in the world—and recognises that its important environmental work, which involves managing 70% of our land area, requires additional support. In broad terms, I strongly welcome the Bill.

I welcome even more strongly the Conservative party’s commitments, both in our manifesto and over the last 18 months from the Prime Minister, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers), who was the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs at the time of the general election. I also welcome everyone who asked about our commitment to ensuring that we do not in any way undermine those standards. The Prime Minister put it beautifully when he said,

“we will not accept any diminution in food hygiene or animal welfare standards… We will not engage in some cut-throat race to the bottom…We are not leaving the EU to undermine European standards”.

He could not have been any clearer.

For that reason, I welcome the comments of my friend and neighbour, the Secretary of State for International Trade, my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss), her agreement to the Trade and Agriculture Commission and her personal commitment to ensuring that we do not negotiate away any standards. This really matters: to the great industry of British farming and agriculture; to consumers watching today, who want to know that we are looking after their interests; to voters, to whom the Conservative party gave those solemn commitments last year; and, dare I say it, to this party, which I have always seen as a party of the countryside, of stewardship, of rural community, and of high standards in animal welfare and environmental farming. That is what is on the table when we vote tonight. Either we are that as a party, or, in the countryside, we are very little.

This should be a hugely exciting opportunity for us to set out an ambition and lead globally, to use our trade leverage to promote fair trade around the world, to give our farmers a level playing field, to embrace variable tariffs, and to ensure that we support growers around the world to follow the standards that we need them to embrace. We have to double world food production on the same land area with half as much water within 20 years. That is a massive opportunity for our agritech industry. Imagine if we used our tariffs variably to say, “We won’t accept food that breaches our minimum standards. We will lower tariffs on decent food, but we’ll zero tariff food produced in ways we know we need as a global community.”

But there is a major problem: the Government, despite endorsing all of that vision, are today stripping out the proper establishment of the commission that the Secretary of State for International Trade herself agreed to, carefully negotiated in the House of Lords. They are asking us to rely on CRaG—a process agreed decades ago that was not designed for this purpose, and which will mean that this House will not have a say on trade deals—and asking us to rely on the WTO, which specifically prohibits animal welfare and food production standards as a legal basis for any trade restrictions. We are saying that we defend farming and the standards that we support, but denying this House the means to guarantee them.