Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-07-16
Topic: Environment
Natalie Bennett (Green Party, Left): My Lords, I associate the Green group with the very useful amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Addington, about transparency and accountability, and Amendments 131 and 133 from the noble Earl, Lord Devon. He displayed a touching faith in the regularity of the electoral cycle in his comments, but none the less a seven-year timeframe is much more realistic. I will speak primarily to Amendment 112 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, to which I was pleased to add my name. This is a simple and practical amendment which says that financial assistance should be rolled over if it is not spent in one year. The noble Lord referred to the risk of funding going down if it is not spent. There is the other risk—as I am sure Members of your Lordships’ House will know, having spent much time over their lives on committees—of the rush that often happens at the end of the year to spend money before it runs out or disappears. That is something we do not want to see happening and do not want to encourage. Thinking particularly about farming and growing, dependence on the weather will mean that sometimes things simply cannot be done in a particular year I was also pleased to add my name to Amendment 227, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone. She has not yet had an opportunity to speak to that amendment, which is also backed by the noble Earl, Lord Caithness. I briefly reflect that this calls for a land use strategy for England and focuses on the two key issues of carbon storage and biodiversity. I am sure that most Members of your Lordships’ House would agree, for example, with the phrase "the right tree in the right place". To get towards that goal we need a strategy to head in that direction I also suggest to your Lordships that any land use strategy would have to consider whether there are some existing land uses in England that cannot be allowed to continue because of the environmental damage they are doing all round. I refer particularly to driven grouse shooting, which has real issues as regards carbon storage and flooding, and which is spatially very closely associated with illegal persecution of raptors, which we saw this morning with the police releasing horrific information about the killing of a goshawk I was pleased to add my name to Amendment 228, tabled by the noble Earl, Lord Dundee. This refers to supporting landowners to make land available particularly to new growers, new farmers—new entrants into the industry. We are seeing some exciting developments. I know that in Suffolk there is discussion of the concept of jigsaw farming, whereby a farmer or landowner might be able to welcome on to their land a large number of different growers occupying small parcels and developing their businesses. We have seen how organisations such as the Biodynamic Land Trust and the Kindling Trust have had to work very hard to find land to make it available to people who want to enter the industry, and we have had reference to county farms Of course, we have a huge problem in England with the massive concentration of land ownership. Your Lordships have heard me refer before, and will again, to land reform. We need to come back to that, but for landowners who wish to make their land available to others, it is important that the Bill includes provision to make sure that that happens, and financial assistance where that would be useful Briefly, I support Amendments 127 and 134, which are backed by my noble friend. Again, they look at strategic priorities and multiannual plans, creating certainty for farmers.