Flood Prevention: Farmers

Earl of Devon Excerpts

Thursday 10th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Devon (CB)]

My Lords, my thanks go to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans for calling this debate—he is an excellent servant of the rural countryside. Inspired by the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, yesterday, I will seek to extemporise today, so I hope noble Lords will excuse me if I am not as fluid as the title of our debate. I hope not to get lost, however, as I will take noble Lords around my own experience of farming, hopefully to illustrate some of the issues that are raised by this topic.

I live at a place called Powderham. It is a medieval settlement, “the village on the marsh”, and we are therefore very used to issues of flooding. During my tenure, we have dealt with many such issues. We are based on the junction of the River Exe estuary and the River Kenn, and one of the tributaries of the Kenn is called the Slittercombe, which runs through the village of Kenton. This time last year, on a Sunday, we suffered the most dramatic rainfall ever experienced and a flood surge of some four to five feet rushed through the village of Kenton, flooding about 20 houses and the village primary school, which sits in a building that has been there for over 400 years. The primary school will never return to that building. It is currently resident in the Powderham Castle estate office and hopefully will have its own home soon on some playing fields up the hill and away from this danger.

This is a tragedy. The landscape above the village of Kenton holds the Slittercombe. That watershed is only about three miles long. Powderham farms a considerable amount of that watershed and all of the valley bottom is grassed. The steep banks alongside the valley bottom are subject to high-level stewardship and are managed under the EJ5 regime, where you have grass on the steep hills to prevent erosion and flood issues. Despite this, we had this most dramatic incident, and I do not think that anything we could have done on the farmland could have prevented it. It really is a desperate issue for the school.

The upper reaches of that valley, however, are the Haldon forest, which is of course inundated with deer—our nation is inundated with deer. The deer eat all the understory, so there is nothing on the ground in the woodlands and nothing to soak up the water that falls in the woods. In the higher ground on the valley, there is a considerable amount of farming for energy. That is maize growing, which is possibly the worst thing to be doing on a steep hillside. The land that is not growing maize tends to be growing horticultural vegetables—which, again, is a terrible thing to do on a steep hillside. But those farmers are not fortunate, like the Powderham estate, to be able to get a countryside stewardship scheme and are therefore desperate for the profits necessary, so they farm in that way.

Coming down the valley, we get to the River Kenn, which has long been a major tributary into the Exe. It is a managed landscape that has been canalised and managed for watercourses over many centuries. Of course, many of those watercourses are now failing and getting old and flooding is beginning to appear, so the fertile land within the valley is getting more and more boggy. There is an ongoing land management discussion among neighbouring farmers up the Kenn valley, seeking to find how to manage the land in a contiguous sense to better improve the outcomes. Of course, the only thing that the farmers have been able to agree on is carbon markets, because issues such as flood prevention and biodiversity are so complicated. I think that, as farmers begin to seek to work together, we really need to provide them with options that are not just the sale of carbon credits, which is the only marketplace that seems to be functioning at the moment.

As you go further down the valley, you reach the Powderham and Exminster marshes. This is an area of land that anyone who has taken the train down to Cornwall will be familiar with, because it is where the Great Western Railway first hits the water of the River Exe estuary. There is a large embankment that runs up from Powderham church to the Turf locks that is currently almost inundated. Both Network Rail and the Environment Agency are taking desperate measures to try to prevent the entirety of the Exminster marshes flooding. Among the difficulties we are seeing there is that animals—mammals—are undermining the banks and obviously, with climate change and sea level rise, those Powderham banks will not be fit for purpose. The Environment Agency, as we have already heard, does not really have the budget to do the work necessary to restore those banks and it is a terrible challenge.

The other threat that is coming is the beaver. The River Otter is obviously ground zero for the release of beavers, and if you get beavers burrowing into the Powderham banks and blocking all the drainage across the Exminster marshes, I dread to think what will happen to that very productive farmland that is the source of famously early Devon spring lamb and many different heritage productions. How we manage beavers following their release into the wild is an important issue that I hope the Minister will consider.

Then there is the broader Exe estuary. We have a project under way with Natural England, the National Trust, the Environment Agency and others to work out how to manage the whole lower Exe, which is silting up remarkably. The river is becoming almost impassable in some respects. The Exe, as I mentioned yesterday in our debate about water companies, used to be “the river of fish” in Roman times. We no longer see any fish, and that is largely due to run-off. As I say, the river is silting up due to run-off and management of the land. It is also the essential flood defence for Exeter. The city is growing rapidly and the management of the river is essential for the appropriate expansion of that city.

To follow up on a matter that the Minister and I debated yesterday, it is essential that we work out a way for the water companies to work really closely with the farming community to enable our urban centres to expand, survive and have healthy, fresh water. I pray in aid the south-west peatland project I mentioned yesterday and this ability of the water companies, as we review the water industry, to work closely with agriculture.

Water (Special Measures) Bill [HL]

Earl of Devon Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 9th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Devon (CB)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness. As explained, this is one step in a multistage water industry reform aimed at fixing, once and for all, the parlous state of our rivers and fresh water supply, which is damaging the environment and our well-being, and which acts as a significant drag on our national development ambitions, particularly for housing.

This step is aimed at giving teeth to the regulators to control water company conduct, enforce regulation and punish bad behaviour. It is to be followed by a full review of water industry regulation, which is yet to come, but by which the Minister promises transformative change. Let us hope so. I ask at the outset for the noble Baroness to provide more detail on the timing and the parameters of that full review. As the noble Earl, Lord Russell, noted, it is urgently needed.

I am concerned that the punishment and shackling of water companies inherent in this Bill will not provide the solutions that are required and may only encourage a talent and capital flight from the industry. We would all benefit from a better understanding of the long-term solutions to this decades-old problem. This Bill has an unfortunate hint of short-term tarring and feathering of the water industry management for past sins. Perhaps it is His Majesty’s Government proving that they are not chicken faeces.

I note my interest as a farmer and land manager in rural Devon, with fundus interests in the River Exe estuary, which is blighted by sewage leaks. Areas of the estuary are unsafe for commercial shellfish due to human faecal contamination, and a local swimmer in Exmouth has launched a civil lawsuit against the local water company for her inability to swim off the shore. I am, as we all are, a water company customer. I also work at a law firm that has a number of major water companies as clients, albeit that I do not work for them directly. I therefore see this issue from all sides.

I am minded that water companies have long been wrestling with ageing infrastructure, considerable increases in demand and the need to be competitive in the international marketplace for capital. Moreover, they serve one regulator, Ofwat, which is keen to control consumer prices, and another, the EA, which has suffered a rollercoaster of funding and target changes over the last 20 years. While they have indeed paid excessive bonuses and dividends, it is too simple a narrative to blame corporate greed for the state of our waters.

Given that this Bill is only part of a broader water industry reform, it is obviously not a panacea, and it will not address many of the egregious issues we face. It focuses mostly on the stick, without providing carrots to encourage and support the investment and good behaviour needed. For example, take the provisions regulating executive pay, which we have heard so much about, and sentencing and liability. The pay provisions take power from shareholders and put it in the hands of Ofwat, while the liability and sentencing provisions increase dramatically the jeopardy and peril associated with working for a water company.

To echo the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, with these provisions in place, how on earth will water companies recruit the expertise needed to implement the fundamental changes that will be required once the full review is complete? Who on earth would want to become a water company director if they will become subject to punitive sanctions and strict limits on performance-related bonuses? Surely, as the noble Lord, Lord Sikka, noted, this will result in considerable increases in basic salaries to attract the necessary talent. This will impact profitability, increase prices paid by customers and limit the funds available to invest in essential infrastructure.

I am grateful for all the briefings we have received, which accept that the industry’s principal challenge is infrastructure investment. Since privatisation in 1989, and doubtless long before that, the water industry has simply not invested at the rate required to keep up with population growth. This Government are determined to put a rocket under housing development, with their promise of 1.5 million new homes, and yet I see no provisions within this Bill to improve long-term infra- structure investment. I understand that the Environment Agency is already rejecting substantial housing developments across the country on the basis that the provision of water and sewerage cannot be guaranteed. We are all aware of the impact of the nutrient neutrality rules blocking development in sensitive catchments. Could the Minister expand upon the Government’s plans to enable the much-needed increase in capital spending to free these constraints?

As for the provisions on special administration regimes, they are clearly designed with the perilous state of Thames Water in mind. I note that no impact assessment has been published. Is there any risk that the introduction of these provisions may encourage water companies to seek the solace of insolvency sooner than they might otherwise do and thus hasten their collapse?

With respect to environmental matters, I am grateful for the briefing on water industry impacts on national parks, including in the Lake District and Lake Windermere. These provide a good case study of the water industry’s travails. It is noticeable that some of the issues identified, including the heightened nutrient run-off in the summer months when fresh water is scarce, are the product of the popularity of the lakes for visitors and not necessarily due to inadequate provision of services to the resident population. Is this, therefore, not necessarily a problem of the water company’s making but rather due to the popularity and success of the national parks in encouraging the huge influx of visitors into these very sensitive ecosystems? Noble Lords who followed our debates on agriculture and the environment will know that I am passionate about access to the countryside. But that needs to be access that is funded and supported by investment in infrastructure, so as not to damage the vulnerable ecosystems that we so cherish.

I have heard similar issues raised in discussions regarding the River Exe, in which concerned communities bemoan the terrible state of the once abundant river, named “Isca” by the Romans due to its surfeit of fish, which is no longer. These communities blame the farmers for their run-off and the water companies for their sewage leaks, without ever truly reflecting upon the mass of population who consume the food that the farmers produce and then produce the waste that the water companies remove—while insisting on ever-lower prices for both services. Ultimately, it is we who are the polluters. We need to invest properly in both our agriculture and in our water companies if we are to care for ourselves, our land and rivers.

Finally, I note the considerable environmental investments that have been undertaken by various water companies over the years, such as the south-west peatlands project, which has re-established over 1,000 hectares of peat on Dartmoor since 2020. Could the Minister explain how the Government intend to build such upon excellent pilot projects to seek nature-based solutions to the infrastructure challenges that the water industry faces?

Environment and Climate Change Committee Report: An Extraordinary Challenge: Restoring 30 per cent of our Land and Sea by 2030

Earl of Devon Excerpts

Wednesday 11th September 2024 Grand Committee

[The Earl of Devon (CB)]

My Lords, it is an honour to bat clean-up in such an esteemed debate as this. It is difficult to say something new, but I have a different angle to offer—perhaps that of a critical friend.

What an extraordinary challenge it is to restore 30% of our land and sea by 2030. Some might suggest other adjectives for it: a grandiose challenge, possibly a hubristic challenge, a distracting challenge, maybe an unnecessary challenge, and quite possibly an insurmountable challenge. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, and the Environment and Climate Change Committee for throwing such a forensic and unforgiving light upon it. I hope the Government reflect upon this excellent report and the important contributions to this debate, and ask themselves why exactly we are doing this, can we do this and do we necessarily even want to do this.

Environmental protection and the restoration of our nature-depleted nation is vitally important, but signing up to arbitrary targets that are unsuited to the character of our densely populated island, and which our fragile rural economy simply cannot deliver, will distract from the more important tasks of sustainably feeding the nation while protecting our wider landscape from the degradations of climate change and an expanding population, and the pressures of the Government’s ambitious economic agenda.

We are nearly half way through the 10-year 30 by 30 programme and yet we cannot even agree what we are seeking to achieve and what success looks like. The committee says that we have achieved 6.5% protection as of July 2023, “at a maximum”. Defra countered in December that 8.5% counted towards 30 by 30, and it produced a map identifying an additional 26.8% as potential 30 by 30. Meanwhile, Wildlife and Countryside Link suggests we had merely 3.11% coverage in October 2023, but that number, according to a recent briefing, has since fallen to just 2.93%.

The disparity in numbers proves only one thing: we have no idea what we are doing. We have an alphabet soup of landscape “protections”—SSSIs, SACs, LNRSs, Ramsars, OECMs, HLS, CS, SFIs, NRPs—overseen by a squadron of statutory bodies, each with different targets and ambitions, but no one can agree what qualifies even as “protected” status, let alone the “restored” status required for 30 by 30. SSSIs are considered the baseline, which cover 8% of our landscape, but so few SSSIs are in favourable condition, and the monitoring is so sparse and intermittent that we cannot evaluate progress. Either we agree to a readily identifiable and measurable metric and stick to it, or we should abandon 30 by 30 altogether.

Today is Back British Farming Day—I note my interests as a Devon farmer and land manager. The next five years will be a crucial for our farming industry as we bed in the Government’s two key farming objectives: food security—which we all know is national security—and environmental land management, the transition to which should be completed by 2027 or 2028. Given that land enrolled in agri-environment schemes does not count towards 30 by 30, we simply cannot achieve these two key objectives while also “protecting” an additional 25% of our land. The maths simply do not work. We cannot create more land, and yet the Government also want to build 1.5 million homes, improve infrastructure, increase access to nature and expand onshore renewables. We cannot do it all.

Of course, had we a developed and functioning land use framework, we might have the ability to assess this and to weigh the competing demands upon our limited and vulnerable land supply—but we do not, and without it such grandiose and complex ambitions as 30 by 30 are not achievable. They should be shelved. We cannot run before we can walk, and currently we can barely crawl. Could the Minister please confirm when the Government plan to launch their land use strategy, and honour the tireless work of the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone?

Who or what is going to pay for this challenge, other than the farmers deprived of their economic opportunity? The Government are yet to confirm even the agri-environment budget for this Parliament, and, given the fiscal black hole and the strains on the public purse, I cannot see any more money becoming available. Private finance is much heralded but it is struggling to work out the relatively simple carbon and nutrient neutrality markets, let alone the complexities of biodiversity and nature restoration. Farmers’ incomes are decreasing and, to recall a hackneyed truth, they cannot go green while in the red. Can the Minister please clarify whether the Government have conducted any assessment of the cost of 30 by 30?

The most compelling evidence of the state of our protected landscapes is the Independent Review of Protected Site Management on Dartmoor, commissioned by Defra and chaired by the truly extraordinary David Fursdon, which reported in December 2023. It is current and is based on detailed evidence gathered from a broad array of stakeholders. It is well researched and clearly articulates a complex and very sorry account of the state of one of our country’s most iconic protected landscapes. I highly recommend it to all noble Lords and specifically request that the Minister read it in detail.

Much of Dartmoor has been protected via SSSI and other designations for nearly 50 years—as long as the Green Party has been in place—yet the review concludes that Dartmoor is

“not in a good state”

and that its protection needs

“to change radically and urgently”.

There is no record of the condition of the land when it was designated, so there are no means to determine whether it is now better or worse. Worse still, there are no staff available to monitor and manage the protected land today. Dartmoor was once served by 12 Natural England staff but now has only one and a half. Relations between farmers, commoners and Natural England are poor, communications are fraught and trust has all but disappeared. No one can even agree what land management prescriptions are required to restore this vital and yet fragile landscape; stocking densities are allegedly too high and yet also far too low.

The solution is long-term data collection, sensitive and skilful management and the building of genuine partnerships and trust, underpinned by committed funding over multiple years. This is not something that can be fixed by 2030 with grandstanding, ill-informed designations backed up by inadequate financial and regulatory support.

In the interests of time, I have largely confined my comments to the terrestrial elements of 30 by 30 and have not ventured out to sea. That is not because I see the marine environment as any less important; it is not. Given the ambitious programme of offshore wind revealed in our recent debate on the Crown Estate Bill, the marine environment is in as much need of protection as the land, if not more. To that end, can the Minister please confirm where Defra has got to on marine net gain? I know that a consultation concluded last year but I have heard nothing further. Just as BNG has been rolled out for all land-based development, MNG is essential as we seek to harness the renewable power of our seas and oceans.

In conclusion, this Government have quite rightly made some bold decisions on a number of fronts in their first few months in office, jettisoning policies at an impressive rate, driven by budgetary constraints and an eye to the practical and the possible. Can we hope that they might make a sensible and brave decision and shelve this undoubtedly worthy but impractical and unobtainable goal of 30 by 30?

Water Companies: Licence Conditions

Earl of Devon Excerpts

Wednesday 1st May 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)]

The noble Earl knows that it would be improper of me to comment on the details about Thames Water. I assure him and the House that we are taking an extremely close and careful look at this. It is in all our interests that the financial resilience of our water sector, as well as the individual players within it, is maintained and enhanced to ensure the level of investment required to improve water and address the issues related to sewage.

[The Earl of Devon (CB)]

My Lords, given the increasing regulatory and compliance burdens on water companies due to the Environment Act and such other essential recent legislation, is it not simply becoming unprofitable to invest in the water industry, which surely will make nationalisation at some point inevitable?

[Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)]

I do not think that I agree with that assessment at all; it certainly is not this Government’s policy to nationalise the water industry or indeed any other industry. Environmental issues around water companies are certainly highlighted more greatly than they ever were in the past. The Government have put a huge effort into monitoring the level of sewage and other pollutants going into the water systems. That, in part, is leading to much greater awareness of issues that have probably been going on for a very long time, and we are committed to fixing those issues.

Land Use Framework

Earl of Devon Excerpts

Tuesday 12th March 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)]

I thank the noble Lord for his question. Several government departments have targets with land use implications, and we are working with them to understand and take account of their land use expectations, as well as those within Defra. That includes the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, the Department for Transport and the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology. We are in consultation with all those departments at the moment.

[The Earl of Devon (CB)]

My Lords, I attended a soil health conference this morning which was excellently chaired by the noble Baronesses, Lady Hayman and Lady Bennett. Soil health is synonymous with appropriate land use. The repeated refrain from the experts was the importance of localised knowledge to manage our essential soils, including at individual field levels. In developing that land use strategy, what steps will the Government take to ensure that local land managers, who know their land best, are properly and actively consulted?

[Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)]

The Government are not currently planning to consult formally on the framework. We are not convinced that the benefits of formal consultation outweigh the burdens it could place on the many sectors involved in land management. We have engaged with relevant groups during the development of the land use framework, including other government departments, as I said, the devolved Administrations, and academics, including the Royal Society. We intend to engage more widely ahead of the framework’s publication. Most importantly, the development of the framework has also been informed by those managing land and farming. We have worked with farmer groups and investigated the decision-making processes of those farming in different landscapes across England.

Environment Agency: Flood Defence Expenditure

Earl of Devon Excerpts

Tuesday 20th February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Douglas-Miller (Con)]

The issue relating to flooding is not so much where we build our houses but how we build them. Historically, there have been some real challenges putting the right defences in place when houses have been built on flood plains. The reality is that if we banned any housebuilding on any flood plains, we would build very few houses going forward.

[The Earl of Devon (CB)]

My Lords, I live and farm in a community that was inundated by inches of rain in a couple of hours last September. The 400 year-old school is no longer usable and ancient houses are uninhabitable. The cause of this was a simple lack of maintenance of culverts, ditches and drains by National Highways and local government. They simply do not have the budget to do that. What are the Government going to do to address this and ensure that local government has the money it needs to do the jobs we need?

Land Use in England Committee Report

Earl of Devon Excerpts

Tuesday 25th July 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Devon (CB)]

My Lords, what a privilege to be sandwiched between the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Carlisle for his valedictory speech—two Members of your Lordships’ House who have contributed so much to rural issues.

I point out my interests in the register, and thank the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, and the whole committee, for their excellent work on this important topic. There is so much to debate but, as has been mentioned, it is the last day of term, so I will contribute solely to three matters: the three Ms of multifunctionality, mud, and medieval land tenure.

As to multifunctionality, I note the Government’s reluctance to agree to a separate land use commission, which I am sure is disappointing to the committee. I suspect the next Government might be more attracted to the idea and I look forward to hearing the views of the Front Benches around the House. I am, however, somewhat sympathetic to their reluctance. Not only does a land use commission suggest connotations of a 1930s command economy, where the Government dictate what shall or shall not be done with each piece of land, but a land use commission may add unduly to a sense of bureaucracy and confusion surrounding land use.

The NFU has highlighted farmers’ overwhelm by the plethora of competing demands and, as a farmer and land manager, I have to agree. Since I started farming at home in 2015, the flood of acronyms that has deluged us is exhausting—from the relatively comprehensible BPS, ELS and HLS, we now have ELMS, SFI, BNG, LNRS, EIA, EIP, NbS, NRNs and SEAs, and that is just part of the glossary. The sector is drowning in well-intentioned initials and is confused. Are we farmers making food? Are we ecosystem services managers offering sequestration? Are we habitat bankers trading biodiversity? Are we public enemies responsible for climate change thanks to our belching livestock and river pollution due to our slurry pits? Are we purveyors of access, health and well-being? Are we rural business proprietors seeking to diversify into tourism and hospitality? Or are we simply stewards of our green and pleasant land, trying to get by and leave something for the next generation? In truth, we are all these things, and the sooner government policy and public perception can embrace the multifunctionality of these roles, the better.

For that reason, I applaud the committee’s emphasis on multifunctionality. I am, however, somewhat concerned that, despite its breadth of aspiration, it has been somewhat blinkered as to the extent of land and land uses that it has considered—which leads me on to mud. I note that the report contains 70 references to “wood” and 46 references to “forest”, but only two references to “wetlands” and seven references to “marsh”—of which five references are to Dr Tim Marshall, who is a planner. I note my interests as a member of the Wetlands APPG, alongside the noble Earl, Lord Leicester, and I am therefore surprised that not more could be said by the committee about the potential of our internationally significant wetlands and marshlands.

Anyone present for yesterday’s climate change debate would have heard me beat the same drum and repeat yet again the concern I raised in debating what are now the Agriculture Act and the Environment Act—that the intertidal habitats around our island nation are ignored at our peril. They are the front line in our defence against the sea and storms, they are the most protein-abundant and biodiverse ecosystems, they have huge sequestration and water purification capacities, and they are accessible and often approximate to our large and needy urban populations. They are where we mostly go on holiday yet they are hugely vulnerable and repeatedly ignored, and the regulations that govern them are not fit for purpose. I will repeat the request that I made last night of the noble Lord, Lord Callanan: will the Minister please acknowledge the importance of intertidal habitats and undertake to consider how they are best regulated and managed for all our benefit?

Finally, on medieval land tenure, August is medieval month at Powderham so it is very much the theme of the month. The noble Lord, Lord Moylan, has set this up well by his reference to private property rights. Here I note my interests as someone whose property interests derive from medieval times—the period of feudal rights. That may sound archaic and somewhat eccentric, but a surprisingly vast proportion of UK land is owned by the descendants of William the Conqueror’s Norman invaders. At a time of debate over land use and access and the duty of private landowners to offer public goods, it is perhaps worth considering that fact afresh.

I note that I am working with the University of Exeter alongside the Duchy of Cornwall on a proposed research project entitled “Past Harvests”, looking at medieval sustainable land management practices to extract lessons for our future land management. The thing that struck me was that feudal barons owed clear and defined duties to their sovereign, arising from their title to the land. Those duties included the duty to protect the kingdom and to provide knights and soldiers, most famously, but also other public duties. The noble Lord, Lord Moylan, references a war footing and, in this day and age, landowners are once more integral to the defence of the realm: this time, against the ravages of climate change. Does the Minister therefore agree that private land ownership could give rise, by its very nature, to a set of public duties to provide managed access to land, healthy, locally sourced food, carbon sequestration and water purification that could provide a fresh paradigm for considering in the context of the Government’s land use framework? I would be interested to hear the Minister’s thoughts.

Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Bill

Earl of Devon Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 21st November 2022 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Devon (CB)]

My Lords, I note my interests as listed in the register, both as a farmer and as an IP and technology litigator at a law firm that represents clients active in this space.

I too welcome the noble Lord, Lord Roborough, to this House and congratulate him on an excellent maiden speech; I am glad to have another Devonian in our midst, particularly one who is so close to the cream and who brings such a wealth of expertise in markets of natural capital.

While welcoming one new Member, I regret the retirement of another. Viscount Ridley would have contributed significantly to our review of this Bill, and his absence will be keenly felt. I hope his rebellious backing of my conservation covenant amendment last year did not contribute to his departure.

As a committed environmentalist, farmer and cross-border IP practitioner, for me, this is a significant and exciting Bill. It promises considerable benefits to our food supply, to animal welfare and to our national well-being; it can contribute to our net-zero ambitions, our climate resilience and our restoration of biodiversity; and it also provides great prospects for our innovative bioscience and agritech industries.

It is the last of these benefits that is probably the most exciting. Generally as a nation, we flatter ourselves in thinking that what we do on our very small island will move the needle much on global climate change, food supply or biodiversity; we simply do not have the land to make a significant difference. But with excellent universities and research centres, harnessing a structured and internationally accepted regulatory framework, we can make technological advances that have a significant impact on a global scale. That is the gold standard for which we must strive.

The Government are therefore to be congratulated on bringing forward this Bill, but they must also be wary that these bright and shiny opportunities do not blind us to the dangers that many fear from the technological developments being considered. For those comfortable with biotechnology and its regulation—and plenty of eminent speakers today fall into that category—these fears about gene editing and the use of precision breeding may seem misplaced, but they may indeed be fed by unreasonable suspicions and a certain amount of hyperbole and misinformation. I note that certain briefings mischievously describe gene editing as a form of “deregulated” or “exempt” genetic modification. However, we need to be mindful of public sentiment and bring consumers with us by openly developing robust safeguards, transparent regulatory processes and proper parliamentary oversight. The Government must temper their tendency to introduce critical policy through secondary legislation that sidesteps oversight and engenders mistrust.

There is a major public relations element to this Bill, and the Government must strive to educate in order to overcome the worrying statistics revealed by Defra’s public consultation. In our post-pandemic, social media-mired world, we cannot ignore the fact that the vast majority of individuals and businesses disagree with regulatory liberalisation for genetically edited organisms. Can the Minister please provide any insights into the public information efforts that will be introduced to support the aims of this Bill?

Public information leads us to the question of traceability and labelling. It is important that consumers are conscious of where their food comes from and how it was grown, and universal traceability of our diet is an important goal, particularly as we seek to shorten supply chains and ensure producers are answerable for the manner in which our food is produced. But I do not think labelling is the answer here, as gene-edited produce that presents no additional risk to health or well-being should not be forced to compete unfairly with non-GE alternatives. If, as suggested, such produce actually improves health and animal welfare, or saves resources, then producers would undoubtedly extol those virtues in their own marketing.

I have already referenced the international export opportunities presented by this Bill, particularly for technology that can be developed. However, can we be certain that it presents no risks to our existing agricultural export business? Both the World Trade Organization and the European Commission are considering the regulation of gene-editing technology. Can the Minister please assure us that, by being an early adopter and taking a lone path, we will not unwittingly exclude ourselves from these international markets? In particular, what mechanisms are in place to ensure we maintain equivalence with future EU or WTO regulations?

I note some uncertainty regarding definitions and the market sectors impacted by this legislation. Briefings I have received focus largely on animals and plants for the food chain, but I trust the Bill will be equally applicable to silviculture and particularly the crucial development of disease-resistant and climate-resistant tree species, which are essential to the fulfilment of our extensive net-zero tree-planting commitments. Equally, I note that the legislation applies only to multicellular organisms. I wonder whether we are missing out by not addressing the opportunities presented by microbial proteins, which are single cell and an important alternative animal feed.

I agree with the concerns raised in the other place over animal welfare, and the fact that gene-editing technology must never be used to create animals able to withstand lower-standard living conditions. That said, it is a complex issue; for example, if we can help to create native breeds that survive in our inevitably hotter climate, that would surely be a good thing, even though some might say it enabled them to endure harsher living conditions.

The Bill asks much of the Food Standards Agency. I hope the FSA is prepared, and will be fit, for this important purpose.

I would be interested to understand the intellectual property implications of this legislation. Considerable intellectual property resides in the technologies developed to achieve gene editing, as seen in the extensive recent CRISPR technology disputes in the United States. Jurisdictions around the world remain uncertain and divided about the patentability of edited genes themselves, particularly where they are not otherwise naturally occurring. Can the Minister confirm whether the Government have considered that issue? It would be significant if gene-edited organisms were themselves protectable by the intellectual property regime, providing potential monopoly power to multinational agritech firms that would prohibit open access to the important public goods that should be created by the Bill.

I look forward to the Minister’s response and to working with noble Lords to deliver, I hope, a better Bill.

Environment Act 2021: Targets

Earl of Devon Excerpts

Tuesday 25th October 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

Absolutely. We had the water framework directive when we were part of the European Union. We have transposed it into UK law. We want to make sure that it is right for the United Kingdom’s environment. However, that directive had very clear markers, which, to be honest, we failed to hit over many decades. Now, with this investment and the huge drive towards different farming techniques, we should see much clearer evidence about how we will hit those targets to get our water courses flowing and functioning properly; that will be available to everyone.

[The Earl of Devon (CB)]

My Lords, we have a biodiversity crisis but also a well-recognised housing crisis in rural areas. How do the Government seek to avoid the introduction of biodiversity net gain and the off-setting of 10% of biodiversity loss exacerbating the housing crisis, particularly in rural areas?

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

The noble Earl is absolutely right. We need to see more houses built. We want them built in the right place. Biodiversity net gain is a welcome addition to ensure that we not only protect habitats from damage but replace them—and some—in future. Small housing schemes in rural areas are, I am absolutely convinced, the right way forward because they have the almost unique element of being popular. We need to find housing particularly for younger families in rural areas, where they are finding it much too expensive. Exception site housing, which has been unbelievably helpful in that direction, needs to be stepped up a gear. I hope that my fellow Ministers in the new Administration will understand that this is a popular way of delivering housing.

Agricultural Fertiliser and Feed: Rising Costs

Earl of Devon Excerpts

Wednesday 29th June 2022 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Devon (CB)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, for securing this important debate. I note my interests as a Devon farmer and a lawyer working for a firm with an agricultural law practice.

The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, highlighted the humanitarian catastrophe unleashed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, from the devastation on the ground to the blockade of the Black Sea, which has held hostage so much of the world’s wheat, sunflowers and other key food commodities on which so many rely. As we focus our attentions on the unprecedented impact of these events on our own food and farming sectors, let us not forget the unimaginable suffering that will be experienced by the Middle East and north Africa over the coming months and years. The Government have my support in urgently seeking to unlock routes to market for Ukraine’s produce.

I turn specifically to the impact on UK fertiliser costs. The numbers are stark, as we have heard, with fertiliser prices increasing fourfold or more. I am aware that the Government have taken preliminary steps to address these costs, but ammonium nitrate has gone from £200 to £800 a tonne, and I understand that the cost of gas suggests it may reach £1,000 a tonne soon.

At the same time, domestic fertiliser production has plummeted as one of only two fertiliser factories in the UK has shut. I was totally unaware of the fragility of our domestic fertiliser production, and I ask the Minister to explain what steps the Government will take to ensure that domestic production recovers and that we establish better resilience and variety of production in the years ahead. It seems highly risky to allow a single company to control all domestic fertiliser production, and it suggests a severe market failure in a strategically crucial agricultural input. Will the Government undertake to monitor this and ensure it can never happen again?

Given that fertiliser cost and supply are likely to remain tight for months, if not years, and that the cost of imported animal feeds will also remain prohibitive, what steps are the Government considering to promote domestic production of alternatives? We have already heard about legumes, such as peas and beans, which are well suited to the UK climate. They are an excellent alternative to soya, they are flowering plants that support biodiversity, they fit well into a combinable rotation and, crucially, they are not dependent on nitrogen fertiliser.

I understand that Northern Ireland has run a protein crops payment pilot in recent years. Will the Government consider expanding this across the UK in response to the fertiliser and feed cost crisis, or perhaps as part of ELMS or the sustainable farming initiative?

Talking of sustainable farming, I went back to Professor Dieter Helm’s work, Green and Prosperous Land: A Blueprint for Rescuing the British Countryside, which I bought in 2019 when we began to consider the Agriculture Bill. His was the seminal work that inspired the agricultural and environmental revolution that we are currently undertaking. In his chapter on food production and self-sufficiency, the professor notes the farming industry’s concerns that farming is about food production and food security first, and then about nature. Dismissing this, he noted:

“Food security is largely an empty slogan of lobbyists. It should not be taken seriously.”


How times have changed. Following the hard Brexit, the pandemic, escalating climatic catastrophe and now the war in Ukraine, the world has turned on its head. Food security, famine and the migration and misery they cause are now top of the agenda.

I have been a keen proponent of the environmental and biodiversity agenda in recent years but have always sounded a word of caution, particularly given the excessive demands being placed on our island’s limited reserves of natural capital. Many of us called for longer to complete the agricultural transition from BPS to ELMS, citing the considerable stresses that would be placed on the fragile farming community. Those requests were rebuffed, with the Government confident that seven years would be sufficient. With fertiliser and feed prices now at unprecedented and wholly unsustainable levels, are the Government giving any further thought to the timing of our agricultural transition?

Noble Lords will recall plenty of debate over the merits of rewilding and the concept of sparing productive land for nature, rather than sharing it. Given the crisis in food production, will the Minister finally confirm that government policy favours the sharing of land and will not support the wanton destruction of productive and essential farmland in pursuit of expensive dreams of an impractical prehistoric wilderness that never truly existed?

Does the Minister agree that environmental benefit will be achieved not by condemning farmers and punishing them but by ensuring their operations remain profitable and productive, while improving environmental and biodiversity outcomes through agri-environmental schemes and agritech solutions? Our academic research institutions are leading the world in these two sectors, and we need to support them better.

I am looking for some silver lining. This crisis may present an opportunity to fast forward the development of environmentally friendly alternatives to existing production methods. Of particular significance is the need to find natural, organic alternatives to the polluting and energy-hungry application of nitrogen fertilisers. For instance, what steps are the Government taking to encourage the development and application of seaweed-based fertilisers? Seaweed is rich in nitrogen, potassium phosphate and magnesium. Given our extensive coastline, surely this is an area ripe for expansion.

Likewise, our green and pleasant land delivers one thing, grass, better than almost anywhere else on earth. Given the cost inflation and the environmental degradation inherent in soya-based animal feeds, will the Minister endeavour to provide better support to the pasture-fed meat and dairy industry? Of particular concern in Devon is the ongoing uncertainty regarding the farming rules for water, which remain opaque and unclear. Their uncertain and punitive enforcement is preventing the application of much-needed organic matter to Devon’s pastures.

Finally, conscious once more of the terrifying hunger that will result from the war in Ukraine, are the Government making any efforts to ensure that UK farming produce is available to assist those hungry and in need around the world?