Agriculture Bill

Lord Grantchester Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 10th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Grantchester (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for his introduction to the Bill. I declare my interests in having a career from dairy farming, through processing and manufacturing to retailing, as well as serving on a public-private partnership.

Agriculture has been subject to many crises and constant change, albeit incremental, shaping and responding to each reform package as a member state in the EU. With all areas being repatriated, the House rightly recognises that the Bill creates a rare opportunity to make a clear strategic leap into new but familiar territory by designing new support systems to underpin sustainable agriculture.

I congratulate the Government on this second, revised version of the Bill after the one originally proposed. The first Bill was roundly criticised for being a misnomer of a Bill. Although it was called an Agriculture Bill, it did not include much agriculture and provided only a delivery mechanism for environmental payments. That would have been a tremendous lost opportunity. This improved Bill provides better balance. It recognises the importance of food production in ongoing reforms, balanced with the need to refocus on environmental sustainability. With all trading blocs around the world supporting their agriculture, Labour recognises that the UK’s departure from the common agricultural policy creates a unique opportunity to change the way that the UK supports its domestic farms and food producers, and welcomes the environmental focus underlying aspects of the new policy. We will work across parties to ensure that the final version of the Bill strikes the right balance between production and environmental protection. Labour endorses the concept of public money for public goods.

The Government set out their changed priorities in two important policy documents in February this year: Farming for the Future, and Environmental Land Management. My first question to the Minister is: having written these before the arrival of the coronavirus pandemic, do they wish to amend their approach in the light of its experience? My second question seems to follow: is food a public good? These two documents do not explicitly recognise that it is, yet with the experience of severe disruption in supply chains, access challenges to food banks and challenges to safeguarding vulnerable and shielded persons, debate may well move in the future towards recognising food as a fundamental right, with its provision in some aspects becoming a public service.

The additions in the Bill now include provisions on safeguards on the support of domestic food production by focusing on soil protection, investments in technology and equipment, improving environmental sustainability, and innovation through future research and development; while reducing carbon emissions. Additionally, the Government have recognised the importance of food security by commissioning Henry Dimbleby to lead an independent review into the UK’s food system. It could be argued this review should have appeared before the Bill to provide a back-cloth to the Bill’s provisions. This review, with recommendations for a national food strategy, must not be delayed.

Does the Minister also recognise the importance of the UK’s self-sufficiency? His department has been reluctant to do so in the past, such that the UK’s self-sufficiency in food has declined to 53%. We welcome the Bill’s provision that the Government must report on food security, but call on the Government to recognise that, in relying on imported food, it is exporting decision-making on food policy to overseas countries with differing priorities. This may not be consistent with the Bill’s focus on the environment.

We also welcome the importance of providing a better balance of economic returns to agriculture through transparent and fair markets. The coronavirus disruption to supply chains once again has exposed poor behaviour, especially in the food service sector, where enterprise risk was pushed down on to the primary producer. While recognising the benefits that have come through the retail market with the work of the Groceries Code Adjudicator, how and through what mechanisms will the statutory code of practice for contracts, outlined in the Bill, be enforced in this food service sector?

Competition law needs to be re-examined in light of the pandemic experience. How will the obligation to establish fair dealing be brought forward? Bearing in mind the Groceries Code was the responsibility of the Department for Business, can the Minister say which department will take overall responsibility for business practice enforcement to make it effective?

The key feature of the Bill is to replace direct payments with environmental land management, characterised as providing public support for public goods. While we welcome these provisions, the policy document and the Bill are both scanty on the final details of what ELM will look like. I know these provisions will form the basis of many questions for other speakers. Everyone will praise the intentions of the Government. Environmental degradation is abhorrent. But there are many concerns regarding baseline standards without meaningful enforcement through cross-compliance for basic environmental conditions to receive payment and how this can be replaced with meaningful incentives to enhance the countryside if the food producer does not want to enter into any scheme.

Direct payments have provided a large element of financial support to a lot of farmers, especially in the uplands. The first change to agricultural experience in the transition is a cut next year to its funding, with few alternative schemes being ready. If agriculture is to be encouraged to take up environmental improvements, these schemes must be seen to pay, with schemes recognising opportunity costs of value rather than being based on income forgone. The Government must learn from having already experienced a huge shortfall in the expected take-up of environmental stewardship schemes recently.

Aspects regarding climate change mitigation must also be a fundamental priority. I welcome such projects as the carbon credit schemes on woodlands and warn against fixed, bureaucratic approaches that fail to recognise local farming conditions.

The improved balance of the Bill will nevertheless be a severe challenge to achieve. The Bill omits, and needs, a vital third element and focus to provide better stability. This key element would be provided by the introduction of food standards into the Bill. For agriculture to thrive, for the countryside to be enhanced, food standards must underpin the provisions in the Bill and be maintained. I want to make it clear that dealing with the issue of standards is one of our top priorities. Domestic standards of production are a clear commitment and all imported produce must comply with food, environmental and animal welfare standards that domestic production has to adhere to. This has been the key concern of every submission, letter and email I have received on the Bill. I thank everyone and all the organisations who have sent me their thoughts.

The joint letter issued recently from the Secretaries of State of Defra and DIT still does not recognise the strength of feeling that a clear majority of the public want the certainty of the law to put this commitment beyond dispute, prevarication and back-tracking. Labour will look to support this commitment by writing amendments also into the Trade Bill. We will be tabling an amendment on the matter, and I expect to see several others tabled at Committee. We wish to work with all voices around the House who share this concern, to find the correct formulation to write this into law, be that through a food and trade standards commission to adjudicate on equivalence of standards or through other statutory provisions.

The Bill has been recognised as a framework Bill that is scantily dressed in detail. Your Lordships’ Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, in its 13th report of the Session, outlines the major transfer of powers from the EU to Ministers, bypassing Parliament and devolved legislatures. The skeletal framework of the Bill gives extensive powers for future regulatory changes without clear detail and with correspondingly few duties. Yet the Government acknowledge that the new agricultural support system will take time to develop. We will wish to draw out in Committee as much detail as possible on relevant principles, policies and criteria underpinning ministerial decision-making that will eventually arrive through statutory instruments. As your Lordships know, statutory instruments are not generally subject to amendment.

There are so many aspects of the Bill that time precludes me from discussing. This is a significant piece of legislation, and it is disappointing that speakers are under such time constraints. The three key tests of the Bill are that: first, it must secure a safe and traceable supply of nutritious food; secondly, it must ensure ELM schemes are effective, supporting jobs, investment and research for a sustainable environment and planet; and, thirdly, it must insist on high standards, clear equivalence and a level playing field to enhance the health of the nation.