Agriculture Bill

Victoria Prentis Excerpts

Wednesday 10th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Prentis (Banbury) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives (Derek Thomas). He started his speech with a very controversial statement, with which I think no Member of the House agreed, but I think that everybody will agree with me when I say that British food is the best in the world, and I think that our constituents would be pleased to agree that our prices are among the lowest in Europe. Although I have no financial interest in farming, I should declare that I am a hobby farmer—a continual irritant to the many generations of my family who farm properly for money. I therefore do not have an interest to declare in the register, but I do have the soil of Oxfordshire under my fingernails.

I feel extremely strongly that we must get this right. On the day after the referendum, my first worry was for the environment. In fact, as the previous Prime Minister was resigning, apparently I was muttering something about hedgerows. Whatever else we might think of our friends in Europe, we must admit that their farming lobbies have always been extremely strong.

I am a big fan of the Secretary of State, and of course of the Farming Minister—anyone who farms South Devon must be a great farmer. The Department has certainly got the environmental message, and I have confidence in its ability to make good decisions on the future of subsidies, but I urge both Ministers to make these decisions quickly. Stability and long-term planning are really important to farmers. Farms are not just businesses; they are somewhere to live, and they often provide work for the next generation. We need as much notice as possible of the direction of travel.

Other Members have spoken about the importance of workforce planning.

[Nigel Huddleston (Mid Worcestershire) (Con)]

Given that I represent many of my hon. Friend’s relatives who work in fruit picking in the Vale of Evesham, I had better be careful about what I say. On workforce planning, does she agree that seasonal workers play a pivotal role? Are they receiving sufficient attention?

[Victoria Prentis]

I will always give way to the representative of my many relations who grow soft fruit and vegetables in the Vale of Evesham—our family history is called “Not only cabbages”. I agree that workforce planning is critical. That is one issue about which I hope to learn much more in the coming months. We need 95,000 seasonal workers. We grow asparagus in Oxfordshire as well, and this issue is important to many of our farmers, although not all.

To keep prices low and the food supply secure, we need to focus on food production as well as the environment. We are proud of our local housing record in my constituency. That is important, but it is literally true that we are losing productive ground to housing—apparently the national equivalent of about the Isle of Wight every year. It is important when we make all these decisions that we look at real evidence. For example, the ban on neonics was widely welcomed. I keep bees on my hobby farm and I know how fragile they are and how important they are to my cider and perry orchards—my cider is definitely the best in the country. The ban on neonics may well be right for them, but the flip side is that some local farmers have sprayed their oilseed rape seven times this year with alternatives to neonics and killed far more of the surrounding eco-structure as a result. Very little rape will be grown in my constituency next year, and of course we all need fields of wheat to continue in Oxfordshire. It would be ludicrous if the new system allowed crops sprayed with neonics to be imported without restriction. If an environmental restriction is right for us, it is right for the produce that we import from around the world. We must assess the evidence rather than be swept up by environmental campaigners.

I would also urge caution around rewilding. It sounds sexy and is gaining ground and celebrity endorsement, but the object is to remove all human impact on the environment. It comes with environmental risk, including species loss, and would completely alter significant national assets such as the Lake district and the North Yorkshire Moors, where nature and farmers have worked together for thousands of years.

I should end by focusing on the corn bunting, which my right hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon) mentioned earlier. I am proud to be the species champion, but the corn bunting is in peril, with numbers dropping by over a third since 1995. These are farmland birds, which breed mainly in cereal crops and depend on farmers helping them by providing cereal grain over the winter, given that they do not migrate. Tailored agri-environment schemes, such as mid-field double-drilled strips in winter cereals, are perfect for them. We can get it right, but in order to do so, food production must be considered every bit as important as environmental protection. Food may grow on trees, but trees grow better with care and attention. We must listen to the voices of the countryside when making this new policy.