argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-15
Topic: Agriculture
Barbara Young (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I repeat what I said in Committee about this part of the Bill. It is a bit like a Christmas tree that everybody wants to hang their favourite bauble on. Indeed, many of these baubles are very admirable, but we risk getting to the point where the list of the purposes for which the Government can give support becomes so long and detailed that the Bill threatens to collapse under its own weight, and, as noble Lords have said, give undue prominence to those elements that just happen to have had a handy pair willing to put them on to the list However, I must give myself a moment of indulgence on this one—while I am ticking everybody else off—and say that, if I was asked which one candidate bauble I would favour, it would certainly be the agroecology- and agroforestry-related Amendments 8, 21 and 23, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, which he very eloquently introduced. However, to be honest, the environmentally sound practices included in several of the amendments in this group, including my favourite bauble, can already—and hopefully will be—supported by the new ELM scheme and the list of purposes already listed in Clause 1(1), and I am sure that is what the Minister will say I am afraid I cannot support Amendment 12, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Northbrook. Food security is important, but an amendment here is not the way to secure it. Even in the interests of food security, food production is already supported by markets, as the Minister said in Committee, and we must not erode the already skinny funding needed for the environmental and other public goods that are already supported by public funding and would simply be diminished if funding for food security were to be added to that list.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-15
Topic: Agriculture
Jeffrey Rooker (Labour, Centre-left): The reason that I put my name to this group was a single amendment—so I will resist pontificating on the others—and that was Amendment 11. Looking down the notes of the points I was going to raise, every single one can be ticked off in the speeches of the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, and the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, so I do not propose to repeat them. What I will do is give them my 100% support One point I will raise concerns the point of the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, about younger people being tech savvy. I remember that, in my last session at Defra from 2006 to 2008, the noble Lord, Lord Curry, organised a seminar for young farmers. There were about a dozen or 15, as I recall. I remember being absolutely gobsmacked and overwhelmed by the technical language they were using, which was way above my pay grade. That gave me considerable confidence that the future was in good hands because technology was going to be used, and that reinforces the point the noble Lord made about the change in attitude and culture The fact of the matter is that those two speeches encapsulate all the points I want to make, and I say to the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, that, if you push this, I will vote for it.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-15
Topic: Agriculture
Christopher Suenson-Taylor (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, at the start of my remarks on Report on amendments to the Agriculture Bill, I declare my interests as recorded on the register, including as being in receipt of funds from the CAP under the present system. As with the first group of amendments, I thank noble Lords for tabling their further thoughts after Committee with these amendments today. Once again, they highlight the very broad nature of agriculture, which, in many ways, interacts with economic activity from many sectors and interests in the rural economy. This in turn has a bearing on many government departments Several of the amendments focus on matters related to food security and, indeed, insecurity. We agree that these are important matters that we will come to later in the Bill. In relation to the Minister’s concessions—which are very much welcomed—and to Amendment 58 on the national food strategy commissioned by the Government, I can add that I too was very impressed with the initial report recently published by Henry Dimbleby. We consider that the Government have a very clear focus on the issue without requiring the specific Amendment 12 so eloquently spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Northbrook, which we are unable to support from the Labour Benches. However, we have regard to Amendment 11 in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, and others, which overlaps with Amendment 70 in the name of my colleague and noble friend Lady Jones of Whitchurch on the Front Bench. Ensuring opportunities for young farmers and new entrants is incredibly important and underlines the future prosperity of the sector In outlining the purposes for which financial assistance can be given, we consider that Clause 1 gives a fair balance and appreciation of the many options that may be developed over time. It provides a good way forward, rewarding the production of food while protecting the environment. I am sure that the Minister will be able to provide the extra information and assurances that we are all looking for, and that he has taken due note of all the important points raised for sustainable agriculture into the future.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-15
Topic: Agriculture
Barbara Young (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 14, in my name and those of the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, the noble Lord, Lord Randall, and the noble Earl, Lord Devon. I am very grateful for their support. Currently, all farmers in receipt of common agricultural policy payments have to deliver, under the cross-compliance regime, a range of standards described as "good agricultural and environmental conditions"—a snappy little title. Some of the standards have now been enshrined in UK law but some have not, and would disappear when the good agricultural and environmental conditions provision disappears with the end of direct payments to farmers and the end of the cross-compliance regime The standards that would be lost are primarily those covering the management of hedgerows, the protection of soils and the provision of watercourse buffer strips. My amendment is aimed at ensuring the delivery of all the standards for good agricultural and environmental conditions, which were previously assured by cross-compliance and which all farmers receiving subsidy had to respect, and to make sure that they will continue to be a condition of receiving public money under the new system. The Minister very kindly organised a meeting with himself and Defra officials, and they acknowledged that the holes that I have identified, which would be left by the cessation of the cross-compliance regime, were indeed holes, and that something would have to be done to plug them. The Minister has indicated that the Government plan "an intensive consultation on standards in the autumn, laying out what standards should be achieved by all farmers receiving public subsidy, but there is not yet any agreement on the mechanism for enforcing such standards and the design principles and regulatory strategy are still being worked up." As noble Lords know, direct payments are due to start to taper shortly, though the date will be a subject of debate in this House later on Report. It is not entirely clear when cross-compliance requirements may disappear. Can the Minister clarify that date? Whenever it is, we could well end up with a gap in hedgerow, watercourse and soil protection during the transitional phase, and possibly beyond, depending on the results of the intensive consultation on standards. I suggest that the holes that the Minister acknowledges in environmental protection would be very easily and, if I may say so, elegantly plugged by this amendment, so I hope that he will accept it. I beg to move.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-15
Topic: Environment
Margaret Beryl Jones (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lady Young for moving this amendment and making the case so persuasively. She is raising an important point about what will happen when the environmental standards, which are currently required through cross-compliance, no longer apply when we leave the EU and the existing payments regime is phased out. We agree that it is vital that the standards that apply, such as to hedgerows and buffer strips to watercourses, should not be lost by accident or intent It all forms part of the promise made when we left the EU that our environmental standards should be at least on a par with what went before. It is also part of the bigger promise of the Government that they will leave the environment in better shape than when they inherited it. So we cannot afford to go backwards on this issue As my noble friend has made clear, these issues are part of a bigger project to review standards and develop a new regulatory regime. This is fine as far as it goes, but the clock is ticking and we know that these reviews take time. The review will be taking place against intense activity to get the new ELMS regime up and running, with all the supportive secondary legislation that will be required to make that happen So there is a real danger that the provision of new regulations will be delayed, and a regulatory gap will occur. My noble friend’s amendment provides a neat solution to ensure that those standards not yet required by UK law will be safely assured for the future To be honest, as other noble Lords have said, we do not understand why the Government have not put something similar in the Bill, and there is still an opportunity for them to accept this amendment today. But if the Minister is not so minded, I would be grateful if she could provide sufficient reassurance that the review and its outcomes are on a fixed timetable. Can she also guarantee that our environmental standards achieved by cross-compliance will not be compromised in the meantime? I look forward to her response.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-15
Topic: Agriculture
Barbara Young (Labour, Centre-left): I thank those noble Lords who contributed to this debate. The majority recognised that there was a real hole to be plugged and that something needed to be done I thank the Minister for her remarks, but before I talk about them in a little detail, I want to address the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh. This is not just about soils, and paragraph (j) alone does not provide the required protection. To give a couple of examples—one of which has been raised already—one of the provisions in the GAECs concerns cutting hedgerows in the breeding season. Alas, I see that happen too often these days. If there were no requirement for that to be prevented, other than the Wildlife and Countryside Act, I am not sure that farmers would recognise that issue in all cases. The other example is even more germane, because it can impact on the economic profile of a farm business. At the moment, farmers are required to provide two metres of green cover in each direction from the centre of a hedge. If that provision disappeared, we could see the wholesale ripping-up of farm headlands, which would not be protected by any existing legislation I very much welcome the letter from the noble Lord, Lord Gardiner, after Committee on the good agricultural and environmental conditions, but many of the schemes that he outlined in the letter are not statutory requirements but voluntary or guidance schemes—that is, schemes that people need to sign up to. They do not have the statutory and regulatory clout of the GAECs and cross-compliance I take the Minister’s point on taking the time needed to get the new regulatory system right, but 2022 is not very far away for the delinking of payments and the abolition of the good agricultural and environmental conditions requirements, so I hope that she means getting it right in terms of both timing and content. Personally, I would welcome the entry requirement for ELM being a statutory provision—as the Minister mentioned—with the maintenance of standards and adherence to a basic range of standards being a requirement for ELM. Of course, the big problem is that ELM is a voluntary scheme and bears down only on those farmers who take up that provision There is a lot to be done to get a good regulatory framework. The one thing that we do not want to do is pay for measures that farmers have come to know and love—they have got used to them; they have built them into their farm businesses; they see them as giving them legitimacy in the eyes of public and showing that they are looking after the farmed environment; and they are proud of the fact that they have wildlife and habitats on their farms. We cannot then go back in time and see them as something that farmers must be paid for, rather than the minimal social contract with the nation on how farmers will deliver basic environmental conditions I will restrain myself and wait for the consultation in the autumn. I hope that it happens quickly. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-15
Topic: Agriculture
Barbara Young (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I start by begging the forgiveness of the noble Earl, Lord Devon. I feel a slight rat in that, having had his support of my immediately previous Amendment 14, I am going to speak against his Amendment 15, as well as Amendment 26 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering Farm businesses and farmers will be the primary recipients of payments for public goods, but the environmental land management scheme will be one of the main ways of delivering the objectives of the 25-year environment plan and should not be limited in scope to agricultural land and farmers. It must support wider land management and multi-objective uses of land, since we now have land needs in excess of the land we have. We will have to get land to work several times over for its living if we are to meet all these land use needs Farmers need to think of themselves as land managers in the future, delivering multiple objectives—food, obviously, but also carbon sequestration and storage, biodiversity management, water quality management, soil management, flood risk management and a whole bundle of access, recreation and human health benefits. We need to see that farmers of the future are not just going to be about farming for food but delivering those multiple objectives I will give a couple of examples of the sorts of thing that would be prevented if the payment restrictions were only to farmers. One is non-agricultural habitats like blanket bogs, which often occur in farm holdings but may not. They are pretty crucial to combating climate change, and they are cost-effective ways of improving water quality. I should declare an interest as chairman of the Woodland Trust: a second example is support for owners of non-commercial woodlands, such as community woodlands, to plant more trees in the interests of biodiversity, climate change and all sorts of other benefits that trees deliver, which ought to be embraced within the scope of these schemes. I cannot support Amendments 15 and 26.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-15
Topic: Agriculture
Jeffrey Rooker (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I am now unmuted; the order seemed to have changed As in Committee, I support the thrust of the amendments. I may have misread the technicalities of Amendment 15, compared with Amendment 26, but I do not see how Amendment 15 would ignore tenant farmers. It may be that I have misunderstood the effects of Part 6 of the Bill I remember farm visits as a Minister, at both MAFF and Defra, when on more than one occasion tenant farmers had a chat with me, out of earshot of others, to say that they were doing things with the land that encouraged other activities; maybe they had done something that encouraged its use as a set for a film or an advert. The landlord would then come chugging down the lane—on one occasion in the form of the National Trust, I remember—demanding a big slice of the extra money, which they had done nothing whatever to create the environment for. This is an important point As I say, I am not sure about the difference between the two amendments in that respect, but the Minister has to have a very good case for putting the view that those who take the risk—a point made quite strongly by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh—in farming the land and producing the produce should not be the recipients. I obviously agree with the noble Earl, Lord Devon, that this covers producer organisations and others, but it does not cover external landlords who might own the land and receive money from tenants This is more or less exactly the same point I made in Committee, and I am glad this has come back. I am not sure whether there will be a Division—I know we are under instructions about various things—but there has to be a point at which, unless the Minister has a really good case, one or both of these amendments should be forced into the Bill.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-15
Topic: Agriculture
Deborah Wilcox (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, we welcome the tabling of these amendments, which will allow Ministers to go into more detail on the balance between direct support for agriculture, and other related purposes, and the emphasis that the noble Earl, Lord Devon, puts on the word "agriculture". We understand that the National Farmers’ Union supports this amendment as a means of ensuring that the Agriculture Bill is truly agricultural in nature Following the first two groups, where there were amendments focusing on areas such as countryside access and public health, we understand the concerns of some that, with a limited pot available to Defra, it is important to ensure that the lion’s share delivers for farmers. We certainly want farmers to get the support they need, and to ensure the Government follow through with the many promises they have made to rural communities in recent years. However, as my noble friend Lady Young of Old Scone so clearly noted, there will have to be a wider purpose for land, as it will have to work several times over to deliver its multiple objectives However, as we have all said during the Bill’s progress, our departure from the CAP is an opportunity to do things differently. Two of the biggest criticisms of the CAP are about its rigidity and the fact that it has not kept pace with real-world developments. Many concerns stem from the lack of detail and certainty regarding the new schemes that are due to come on stream in 2021. In this respect, my noble friend Lord Grantchester’s Amendment 41, which would require the Government to demonstrate the readiness of year 1 schemes before commencing the seven-year transition, may be of interest.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-15
Topic: Macroeconomics
Frank Ashcroft Judd (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I simply want to say that I strongly support Amendment 30, because where the end is wished, the will must be provided. There is altogether too much hollow rhetoric and good intention in this area. We need firm commitments, and that involves the discipline of preparing the budgets that are necessary to deliver them. I congratulate the noble Lords concerned on having emphasised this vital point.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-15
Topic: Agriculture
Christopher Suenson-Taylor (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I have retabled Amendment 29 from Committee, as it could be said to reflect very well on the wide-ranging debate we had on the many challenges and opportunities faced by the rural economy as the focus changes towards providing support for production to be recognised for its environmental and welfare impacts. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, and the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, for adding their names to the amendment after tabling their amendments in Committee, and to my noble friend Lord Whitty, who has widespread experience of the sector from his excellent service as an Agriculture Minister in a previous Labour Government All sides of the House and all shades of opinion acknowledge that, as we move to new funding schemes, there will be a lot of new information, terminology and conditionality that farmers and land managers will need to become familiar with, all accompanied by complex administrative processes that will need to be complied with. Of course, it will be understood that there will be pilots and guidance available to participants but, given the relative speed of the transition proposed, it does not seem unreasonable to expect Defra to recognise the responsibilities it should perhaps take towards those wishing to take part in the schemes by playing a more active role in educating, clarifying, guiding, encouraging and assisting the sector Many pitfalls could be encountered. In Committee, discussion also covered the sometimes disproportionate punitive actions that can be taken against farmers when they act in good faith but fall short in some small regard. I was particularly struck by the words of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, who spoke of "the importance of allowing failure".—[Official Report, 14/7/20; col. 1654.] The Government are well placed to step in, whatever the circumstances, should it be necessary. They can pick up on bad experiences and eliminate misconceptions that could quickly deter applicants through social media Of course, it is understood that participation in schemes is voluntary. However, we would wish to see the full participation of the agricultural community to enhance our environment and to benefit businesses.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-15
Topic: Agriculture
John Lawrence Whitty (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I have attached my name to my noble friend’s amendment. As other noble Lords have said, farmers will be faced with the most fundamental changes in the way that they operate—the biggest change for half a century. Although there is a seven-year transition, some decisions will have to be taken early. Decisions will have to be taken at different paces through the transition period and there are huge complexities. The old system of production subsidies and the current one of area payments are simplicity itself compared to what is being put forward in the Bill, which I broadly support. Most farmers, particularly smaller ones, will require guidance and support. Many will need bespoke help. As the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, said, it is up to the Government to ensure that they have the help and guidance to face up to these revolutionary changes. The Government and the agencies which will apply the changes have some responsibility here. It is reasonable for a modest slice of the savings from CAP to be used to ensure that that happens When I was a member of the first ministerial team in Defra, it was the habit of farmers to bemoan the disappearance of ADAS. I still find the odd farmer who complains about that. A very eminent Member of your Lordships’ House once confessed to me that he was the MAFF Minister who introduced the abolition and privatisation of ADAS. The theory at the time was perfectly respectable: that a large number of consultancies and specialist support for farmers would spring up if there was a competitive environment. It did happen in some specialisms but, in general, it did not I am not saying that we should go back to a state-run operation such as ADAS but that it is the responsibility of the state to ensure that there is advice, not only on regulations and subsidies but on a lot of the technology, economics and accounting that will be required under the new system. The translation from fringe environmental systems to the new ELM system will be pretty complicated for most farmers. I am not really concerned whether private companies, the agencies or the Government themselves provide it. The amendment is designed to ensure that the Government take responsibility for that advice being there, because it will be a bumpy ride for a lot of farmers. There will be some failures and we need to ensure that those failures are not terminal—and that if necessary, that advice is backed by not only government support but government resources. I support Amendment 29.