Agriculture Bill

Lord Addington Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 21st July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Tyler (LD) [V]]

My Lords, we are all anxious to make progress, so I shall be brief.

These two amendments from my noble friend Lord Greaves, which I strongly support, are deceptively modest but very significant in the context of this Bill. As has been said, the concept of public goods has been a persistent and welcome thread through the early sections of the Bill. Some Members may think that it should have been more rigorously defined on the face of the Bill. I do not accept the suggestion from the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, that we can wait for the Environment Bill. Frankly, by the time we get there, too much of the present Bill will have been decided.

With Amendment 140, my noble friend rightly seeks to achieve a full parliamentary examination of this essential element of the post-CAP package. I lost count of the number of Members in the previous debate who were referring to public goods, and of course Ministers have, throughout all stages of this Bill in both Houses, referred to public goods. Therefore, I hope that the affirmative resolution procedure, which would ensure that we have a proper parliamentary discussion of this important definition, can happen. My previous service on the DPRRC persuades me that this is the proper procedure here.

Turning to Amendment 141, which deals with large-scale tier-3 schemes, my experience of Dartmoor, where I used to chair meetings of the national park committee, and my experience of Bodmin Moor, which adjoined my home in my then constituency, made me especially aware of the sensitivity of moorland restoration schemes. These can have a challenging effect on all those who are interested in them, and on farms in LFAs, which have also been a common theme this afternoon.

Whatever their respective merits, nobody can deny that they inevitably impact on several landowners and land managers, and a variety of other users. Since the UK has responsibility for the stewardship of no less than three quarters of the world’s heather moorlands, this should be very high in our awareness of potentially clashing interests. I was interested in what the noble Baroness said. Like me, she will be well aware of how difficult decisions can be in deciding between different interests in that context.

It may well be true of other projects with overall beneficial environmental objectives, but the likely economic or other impacts on individuals or groups in those circumstances can be very important. I have had experience of uncomfortable impacts—admittedly relatively short-term ones—from major schemes such as coastal marsh creation schemes. My noble friend suggests that we should have the affirmative procedure to look at the details when then Minister comes forward with these. I hope he accepts that this too offers a practical solution.

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, my noble friend’s two amendments are very interesting. Starting with Amendment 140, I thought that I knew what the public good was, having produced amendments which I thought were centred around it, such as public access and how you support that access and make it more readily available to those with disabilities and so on. However, when I read this amendment, I thought, “Ah, someone else put that at a priority level; that makes it a public good.” It is in the Bill, but is it as high a public good as something else? What happens if it starts to compete, which it will, with other activities? For instance, if you want to encourage a certain animal or plant somewhere and a path goes through it, which changes? On that fundamental level, getting some idea about how the assessments are made is important.

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[Lord Clement-Jones (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I support of Amendment 157, of which I am a signatory and which was so well proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Holmes. As we all agreed during the passage of the Telecommunications Infrastructure (Leasehold Property) Bill, the Covid-19 lockdown has shown how dependent we all are on good, fast and resilient broadband—nowadays, few more so than those in our agricultural sector. Indeed, it is clear from the difficulty many Peers have had in contributing virtually to our proceedings how woeful broadband is in some areas, especially rural ones.

The noble Lord, Lord Holmes, illustrated the lack of rural connectivity through the NFU surveys and this is backed up by the Ofcom reports. The average broadband speed in rural hamlets and isolated dwellings in a sparse setting was half that in major conurbations in 2018. During the passage of the Bill, I said that the status of the Government’s intentions regarding the timing of the delivery of a 1 gigabit-capable service or ultrafast broadband was unclear. It is especially unclear as regards rural areas and specifically 5G.

With regard to 5G, we have the Shared Rural Network, which is a collaboration between the four networks that started as a 4G project to cover the notspots. Then, we have the seven trials that have been selected in the Rural Connected Communities competition for funding from what is called the 5G Testbeds and Trials Programme. It now seems that projects have been selected in West Mercia, Orkney, Dorset, Monmouthshire, Wiltshire and Yorkshire.

How do all these fit in with the several existing funding programmes for full fibre, launched under the May Government, including two voucher schemes to subsidise full-fibre connections to rural premises and small and medium-sized businesses? How are the Government avoiding unnecessary duplication in the rollout of full fibre to the home? What about Ofcom’s determination that there will be market competition in some areas—prospective competition and others—and non-competition in yet others? Is that really the most effective way of delivering the Government’s strategy, particularly in rural areas?

In another development, the Secretary of State did not mince his words last Tuesday on the consequences of the Government’s decision on Huawei, from which it is clear that the operators charged with delivering 5G will now, without compensation, have £2 billion less to spend on rolling it out while bearing, as they will have to, the cost of ripping out high-risk vendor 5G equipment by 2027. Many of his Conservative colleagues thought that he was offering too extended a timescale. This is a huge proportion of the investment which was to be committed by the operators towards 5G rollout. Are there really no plans to compensate operators, and will the full costs actually fall on consumers?

In his announcement, the Secretary of State admitted that this will delay rollout by two to three years. Given that 100% coverage at one gigabit will take much longer to achieve, will the Government now prioritise 5G rollout for rural areas, where full-fibre broadband is least likely to be installed on a market basis in the short and medium term?

I applaud the noble Lord, Lord Holmes of Richmond, for bringing forward this amendment, intended to deliver specific priority for rural broadband provision and rural digital literacy. It seems extraordinary in retrospect that broadband connectivity was not included in Annex IV of the rural development regulation as a thematic sub-programme for the purposes of article 7, given that it dates only from 2013. In current circumstances, this is highly relevant—in fact, essential—to the future success of our agricultural sector. It must be part of achieving what are now the UK’s priorities for agriculture.

As the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, argued, there should be a full review of the levels of rural broadband provision and digital literacy, especially before there is any obligation on farmers et al to comply with any regulations by digital means. I very much hope that the Minister will be able to answer my questions about the rollout of rural broadband, but also that he will accept the crucial amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Holmes.

[Lord Addington]

My Lords, this is one of those occasions when you know that somebody in front of you has said it a little better than you. The noble Lord, Lord Cameron, has done most of the heavy lifting on the basic thrust of this group: are we going to make sure that the rural economy is generally supported, along with agriculture? That is how I take it. My noble friend Lord Clement-Jones and the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, talked about broadband. As the last few months have established, I am afraid that it is nigh-on impossible to function in the modern world without broadband at the moment, unless you are going to live in a very tight circle. I hope that we will get answers in the affirmative.

Amendment 155, which I have my name to, asks a technical point: are we going to ensure there is continuity of supply if the UK shared prosperity fund takes a bit of time to get up and going? I hope that we will get the answer to that, and I express my total agreement with the sentiments of those who have already spoken.

[Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, I am happy to support the amendments in this group and will refer particularly to Amendment 156, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington. For me, as somebody from Northern Ireland, this amendment resonates with our whole rural development approach. Through the rural development programme within the European Union, many rural communities benefited from the LEADER programme. It allowed farmers—and farming families—to supplement their income through like-minded industries such as crafts and other types of revenue-making businesses. It also helped the rural community to survive and ensured that those people were retained there, thus creating vibrant farm enterprises. It was a particularly good model. I would like to hear the Minister say how it is to be translated and transposed, through the Bill, into the local economy of England and Wales. What discussions have been held in the ministerial and officials’ group with the devolved regions about how it is to be translated on the ground, so to speak?

It is very important that productivity and employment in rural areas are underpinned so that farming families survive on the land. It is also important that we provide for sustainable farming enterprises, while recognising the difficulties that such households can face during unplanned-for crises, such as the pandemic at the moment or floods. We have witnessed many horrendous floods, which the science would suggest are a consequence of climate change. The amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, recognises the function of farming households in the countryside. It recognises that they are the pivot in the farming enterprise and of the rural economy.

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There is a long history of agri-environmental and other agreements administered on commons over the last 20 or more years. Will the Government adopt best practice from what has been learned over that time and, in particular, make specific legislative provision for commons to underpin what is required? I beg to move.

[Lord Addington]

My Lords, I must apologise for missing the first couple of moments of my noble friend’s speech. That is what comes when you have your back to the Chamber due to social distancing while you have supper, but I apologise.

I add that the land which has the commons is not exclusively in the north or the uplands. I have a little, vaguely second-hand interest, as I usually catch a train from Hungerford in the mornings and get off one there in the evenings. Hungerford has a very picturesque common; it has lots of dog walkers and cattle on it. It goes back a long way and is one of the surviving things from the Inclosure Acts. The Thames Valley has other areas of common land as well. Small agricultural units or smallholdings are usually allowed on them because there is some land you can get to. Sometimes you have tenancies going on them as well, but they change. It is a complicated system down there, from what I have been able to establish with a little research.

These commons are an historic part of our landscape. They allow for different types of activity. We had a long debate about smallholdings and entrants there but the commons allow certain types of entrants into the agriculture system at a lower level, which would not otherwise be allowed. It would be interesting to hear whether the Government have taken on board how these small but interesting and historic parts of our agricultural system are to be accommodated under this new system.

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering]

I am most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, for bringing this amendment forward. I am sorry that I did not have an opportunity to sign it; I hope that he will forgive me for that. They say that when two Scots meet, they form a committee, so I do not know what happens when a Lancastrian and a Yorkshireman meet.

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[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb [V]]

My Lords, I will keep my remarks short. I have signed only two of the amendments in this group, 162 and 171. In fact, they all improve the Government’s reporting and planning provisions. A regular comprehensive food report setting out targets and action plans would help the country move towards a resilient, flourishing and sustainable food system.

[Lord Addington]

I am not sure I can be quite that brief, my Lords, but I will give it a go. I have added my name to the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, about food waste. To deal with that first, identifying and removing waste is the easiest way to improve any supply chain. I hope that the Government give serious consideration to this.

I hope they also start to address the marketing chain. The just-in-time delivery system, which produces something that we are perceived to want at the right point, without any capacity for things going wrong, has been exposed for not taking many bumps to be put off course. The fuel crisis did it, as did a pandemic. As pandemics go, this is not as frightening as some that we have been threatened with before—the bird flu crisis and others. Covid-19 is a very unpleasant disease that kills people; it is not the Black Death. The scientists tell us that worse is out there. How good would any supply chain be when put under even greater pressure? Other noble Lords have talked about war and political decisions. A few natural disasters and a breakdown in the food chain is a good way to start a war or political crisis.

Can we have greater frequency of checking? Three years is about right. Can we also take a good long look at waste in the chain? If we can manage to identify the waste, we will suddenly have spare capacity and our supply will look a little more secure.

[Lord Curry of Kirkharle [V]]

My Lords, this has been a fascinating debate, with some memorable contributions, including that from my noble friend Lord Krebs.

I fully support Amendment 162, as moved by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, and supported by other noble Lords, which says that food security reporting should take place every year. Clause 17 is an important inclusion, and I am delighted that the Government added it. I cannot understand why, once the data capture systems have been identified and established, an analysis cannot be carried out and published each year. It is hugely important to be able to identify trends quickly and to react accordingly. There is a fundamental risk in waiting five or even three years, as proposed in Amendments 160 and 161, in that a major global event or some macroeconomic activity could distort the analysis within a single year. A major weather event can result in crop failure and disproportionately impact on commodity markets.

I agree with almost all the impressive comments made in the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, and I support his Amendment 172 other than on the frequency of the analysis. I believe that an annual report would reduce the risk of distortion by a global event and clearly identify trends. That was highlighted by the contribution from the noble Baroness, Lady Humphreys. Harold Wilson said that a week is a long time in politics, and five years is a long time to wait to calculate the impact of climate change on global food production. As has been stated a number of times this evening, the proportion of home-produced food continues to decline—depending on which metric is used, it is around 60%. With a projected population increase in the UK to 70 million or more within the next decade, unless we actively encourage home-produced food, that proportion will decline even further.

I hesitate to contradict the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, but there are opportunities to increase food production. We already import a significant proportion of our fresh produce from water-scarce areas of the world, particularly Africa, where very often people do not have enough food to alleviate hunger within their own countries and communities. We not only have to find better ways to provide economic support for developing countries but should put in place strategic plans to wean ourselves off our dependence on fragile sources of imported food.

I agree with other Peers who have spoken in these debates that it is very unfortunate that we do not have the report from Henry Dimbleby to inform these debates—I hope we will have an indication of his recommendations later this month and before Report. We had an excellent debate last week on whether food security is a public good. It clearly is a public good, and I would be surprised if Henry Dimbleby does not endorse the importance of that fact. So the process of analysis must inform the response.

I therefore regard a five-year analysis of the data suggested in Clause 17 to be inadequate, and even a three year period, as proposed in Amendment 160 and 161. It is really important to inform both government policy and provide industry with information and data on which to develop strategic plans. We need annual reports. I hope that the Minister will accept this amendment.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Addington Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 16th July 2020 Lords Chamber

With those comments, I return to the opening amendment of this group, Amendment 105. I beg to move.

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for introducing so clearly his amendment and for speaking to other amendments in the group. The issues raised in my amendments refer back to Clause 1. I feel rather mean about doing that, having seen the fairly rapturous smiles on the faces of those on the Government Front Bench when it was agreed that the clause should stand part of the Bill, but I am afraid that that is where the radical stuff is; it is that simple. Clause 1 is where we have the statement that there will be quite a fundamental change to the way that some aspects of the countryside and agriculture are financed. The two amendments in my name refer to Clauses 4 and 5, covering planning and monitoring.

Let us talk about access again because that is what I have talking about, although the environment and agriculture are equally important—for others they are probably more so. If we are to have a plan that seeks to improve access, we need to monitor that and go back to review it. If the Minister can tell us how that is to be done, we will know about it and it will become more real—firmer, if you like. Is a new footpath to be just another line drawn somewhere, with money claimed for doing that, but then it is ploughed up and cannot be used for six months of the year? If a hard surface to stop people trampling over the rest of the field and ensuring a higher level of disabled accessibility is the plan, how will that be reported on?

Amendment 138 may be the more important of the two amendments because it covers reporting back on how things are working. We are going into new territory here. It is almost inevitable that some of the schemes will not work and that some will not be as successful as others. How do we find out how the plans are supposed to be implemented and how do we report back on them? That is very important.

It may be that the Minister has a wonderful answer waiting for me that will mean that I and people outside can totally relax about this, but we should be able to hear about it. With these schemes, with their cultural heritage and so on, you have to know that when you pump money in you will get something back for it— public money for public goods—and in order to know that, we need a better guide through this reporting process.

The farmer—the person who has to change their practices—needs to know as well. They are the implementation system, unless there is going to be a new clause containing a new agency to do it for us. Pigs flying would happen more frequently than that in the current environment, so it is the farmer who is going to have to do the work, or at least the vast majority of it. Knowing how this will be implemented is what we are trying to get at here, or at least what I am trying to get at. Other colleagues have their names to these amendments and they may well have their own takes.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees]

After the noble Lord, Lord Northbrook, I will be calling the noble Baronesses, Lady Scott of Needham Market and Lady McIntosh of Pickering, who were omitted from the original speakers’ list.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Addington Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 14th July 2020 Lords Chamber

Also, will there be any financial assistance for events such as county shows? They are in jeopardy of falling by the wayside and giving up because they have not been given the attention they deserve. I hope my noble friend can comment on both those points, because I know he has lauded county shows in the past in this House. I support him on that. Defra would be a poorer department if it did not have the help from county shows in educating us the way they do.

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, I put my name to these amendments on a very simple principle: if you are asking people to change how they go about their business or the way it happens, you will need some advice or guidance to get you through. If you have not done it before, you will need to be given some guidance, some advice or pathway, on how to get through so that you can do it correctly. Also, if you are giving assistance, you need to be told what you are expected to do for that.

This will be a very complicated mesh—two speeches have been made already and I cannot think of anything I disagree with. If you are trying to do this, you will have to give guidance through very different pathways which will change in every type of landscape you come across. The South Downs, the North Downs where I live, and the fields of East Anglia where I grew up will all need different structures. As the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, brilliantly said in introducing this, you must allow for, if not failure, then less successful schemes to be tried to see how long they take to develop.

We will need this to make sure that the Government’s actions work. It might well be that the Government will not smile on these amendments, but could the Minister embrace the principle here and tell us whether the Government expect to be a place where good information is brought together and passed on? Could he also say what is unacceptable—what will not be supported, financed and encouraged? That would also be beneficial.

The Government are changing stuff. They are basically creating a new rulebook. It would help if everybody could read it before we start.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (The Earl of Kinnoull) (Non-Afl)]

Lord Marlesford, you suggested that you were going to speak on only one group today. Do you want to speak now?

Agriculture Bill

Lord Addington Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 9th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Trenchard (Con)]

My Lords, as I said on Tuesday, additional public access, however beneficial to people whose livelihood does not depend on agriculture, is a distraction from farmers’ primary responsibility to manage their land efficiently to produce food for the nation and to assist our balance of trade by producing high-quality food products for export around the world.

I congratulate my noble friends Lord Caithness and Lord Shrewsbury on their eloquent and persuasive introduction to their amendment. They are absolutely correct that the new scheme must properly compensate farmers for the damage and additional costs they will incur as a result of the obligation they will face to provide more public access. Littering has been getting worse in recent years. So has fly-tipping, which has got much worse through lockdown, as my noble friend Lord Caithness observed. I wholeheartedly support the amendment and look forward to the Minister’s reply.

As my noble friend Lord Shrewsbury said, the answer from my noble friend Lord Goldsmith, which I heard as well, was unsatisfactory and rather ambiguous. It seems that the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, also considers fly-tipping to be at least partly the responsibility of the landowner, which I was rather surprised to hear him state. Could the Minister clarify the Government’s policy on responsibility for fly-tipping and what my noble friend Lord Goldsmith actually intended to say?

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, this is one of those occasions where you have rather more sympathy with what was said than what was written, because the amendment can be taken, and probably would be by many, as an attack on greater access to the countryside. On Tuesday I moved a series of amendments tabled in conjunction with the Ramblers and British Canoeing. I can give noble Lords an absolute assurance that both those bodies would agree with those sentiments.

As someone who lives in the Lambourn valley, close to Swindon and the M4, I know about fly-tipping. Usually a pile of rubbish occurs where there is access to a road and somewhere quiet. It will not be enhanced by a footpath, because people do not carry old fridges up footpaths to dump them—or if they do, I would steer well clear of them. Let us not confuse the issues. The incident the noble Earl, Lord Shrewsbury—who has been here even longer than I have and is a friend—talked about was just trespass. It was not to do with access. The two are not that closely related.

The general points about taking these problems more seriously, with criminal enforcement, are a serious matter. A lot of littering comes either from unplanned, uncontrolled gatherings where you do not have bins, et cetera, or close to urban centres. It is not just the young; grey hair does not stop you dropping litter. I have seen it myself. For any noble Lords who have travelled on the Tube, it is a bit like face masks; the young are only as bad as their seniors. It is engrained.

I totally approve of the attitude of the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, on the last amendment and of the Minister’s response. I am afraid it is rather unanswerable —I cannot ask you about what you have said until you have said it. I appreciate how it was taken down and I hope that flexibility will come in during our discussions on this, because it would make it work better.

This amendment raises issues, but it would be totally against the spirit of the rest of the Bill. Greater access would not cause most of the problems here. On being irresponsible in a Royal Park close to an urban area, I am sorry, but people have access to go there anyway. Extra access will not make it worse. On specialist paths for ramblers and other groups, these groups are more likely to report people—a path that ramblers use regularly will discourage fly-tipping. The general public all have a phone with a camera. Telling people that they have a responsibility to use them may be something the Government can do; they can certainly make it easier to report and get the reports back.

I do not think that we will get more of these problems every time we expand access to the countryside. They are there already in uncontrolled access. Having better control and understanding of the problems—integration, the odd use of cameras, not having better reporting infrastructures—is a better way to go about it.

On the final comment about a farmer resenting having to take time off because someone fell and broke their leg: if somebody falls in the street, would you stop and help them? I know I have done it a couple of times. Was it inconvenient? Yes. But come on—there are limits.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Addington Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansarad) & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansarad): House of Lords
Tuesday 7th July 2020 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Addington]

2: Clause 1, page 2, line 7, after “purposes” insert “to those involved in agriculture, horticulture, forestry or land management”

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, the origins of this amendment are fairly straightforward. As we go through this Bill, we talk about great changes to agriculture. We start off with a list of changes and where things are going to change in relation to government support for agriculture. We do not actually define those whom we are going to support, and I feel that they should be on the face of the Bill. If they are not on the face of the Bill, we should know exactly where that list is.

All the positive changes that might affect the environment and people’s access to it, which I will discuss at considerable length in the next group, are going to be dependent upon farmers taking much of the action and getting through financially in what they need to do. Unless the Government pay them, it is not going to happen. Unless we are getting some sort of new force that is going to go marching into the countryside equipped with whatever it is and on whatever legal authority it is—which I have seen no hint of anywhere —we are dependent on those involved in farming and related industries actually to fulfil this for us. The only way we can reasonably expect them to do it is if they are properly paid, so there is a symbiotic relationship there: they get money for changing their behaviour.

The change of behaviour for farmers is going to be difficult: culturally, financially and in every other way, it is going to be a change in a way of life in many cases. To what extent and where depends on who they are and in what situation, but that is what I am trying to get on the face of the Bill. I do not pretend that this amendment is perfect because I literally went through and thought, “Good, this is in the Bill or that’s in the Bill” and at the end of it, I said, “What about land managers? Let us try to get some idea about this.” They are the delivery system for the other changes set out in the Bill, so let us make sure that they get some support. It does not really go much further than that, other than to say that we have to make sure that they are there and identified. If the identification comes somewhere else, that is great, but if it means running down a list saying, “By the way, if you look across and go legally through and jump across sideways, that’s where the definition is,” that is the classic way to make mistakes. The lay person will not be able to find out what is going on. We have all, in this Chamber, been involved in situations where somebody said, “Legally, it was there,” but we could not find it. It might be slightly more straightforward here than in some of the cases we are talking about, but that is what I am trying to get at.

There is another amendment in my name, Amendment 115, on the accountability system for taking on any action. That probably would have read better in the next group, but if the Government have any undertakings on this, let us find out what is going on. That is really what my initial thinking was about, and I look forward to hearing from those who are going to speak on the rest of the group, but that is my primary motive for moving this amendment. I beg to move.

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering]

My Lords, I will speak to three amendments in my name in this group and thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb and Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, and my noble friend Lord Caithness for supporting Amendment 65. The purpose of this amendment is again to probe the Government. As was said in conclusion by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, we have a limited pot of money being spread very thinly. I hope that we can focus where the money goes on farming, obviously within the remit of agriculture, horticulture and forestry.

In keeping the focus on farming, I will turn to Amendment 103. Just before I do, I will take the opportunity to ask my noble friend the Minister about the types of activities that he feels may be covered. For example, there have been sectors in the past that have received no support but have spent huge amounts of money—I am thinking in particular about antibiotic use, which we have reduced at some considerable expense, although I think this has put Britain in the driving seat with regard to the reduction of antibiotics.

There may be possibilities of supporting, for example, pigs through outbuildings and storage facilities, which will help to tackle climate change and bring a number of benefits while improving the way that we manage—or rather pig producers manage; I do not, obviously—manure and slurry reduction. While it has not been beneficial in the past, I hope that it will help to tackle climate change and increase production. Is that something that my noble friend thinks might be supported?

I want to flag up something that I am sure we will return to in later groups: the potential funding gap between when basic farm payments phase out and when ELMS—which I know we are going to explore in more detail in further amendments—will come in. How is that going to be addressed? I am also looking at the socioeconomic aspects of this, where natural capital seems to have been the focus of great emphasis, although it benefits only those who own the land, for the most part, and it cannot necessarily be shared with tenant farmers, who actually do much of the farming on that land in many circumstances.

I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Ritchie of Downpatrick, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb and Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, for supporting Amendment 103. I am sure that my noble friend will recognise this text because it has come, in great part, from the Government’s own paper Health and Harmony. The public good is very ephemeral and opaque, and I give him the opportunity to put more meat on the bones and reward activities that are related directly to the production of food or farming in its broader aspects and, furthermore, activities from which tenants may benefit. We might focus too much on trees and the planting of crops like special grasses that soak up the water and have many qualities, and I want to make sure that landowners and tenants will benefit.

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[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

Clearly, we know that there are 80,000-plus claimants under the BPS at the moment. Obviously, the range of opportunities, with regard to numbers, will depend on clusters and how many farmers will want to group together—as we have had with farm clusters in other schemes—and those that wish to have individual, predominantly tier 1 consideration. Again, clearly this is why the trials are going on; they will show how that is going to work with the varying tiers and indeed how they all interrelate.

I do not think I would feel comfortable taking it any further than that at this stage, only because this is work in progress. I should think it will go on beyond enactment, but what I will do is make sure that—obviously, there will be continuing work on this and regulations will be coming forward—when we get to further stages of how ELM is coming forward, noble Lords are kept informed.

[Lord Addington]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his usual courteous and informed reply. However, the point that I was trying to raise seems to have got slightly lost: namely, where do we find out who is going to be eligible? If the answer is “We do not know”, I think we might have to come back and dig again to find out exactly where that is placed, but at the moment I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 2 withdrawn.

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Moved by

[Lord Addington]

6: Clause 1, page 2, line 9, at end insert “and people’s access to it;”
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment seeks to ensure that where financial assistance is provided for the protection or improvement of the environment, public access enhancements are, where appropriate, incorporated so that people can experience and benefit from the actions taken.

[Lord Addington]

My Lords, we come to a rather more honed group of amendments. We are talking about access, inspired by

“supporting … access to and enjoyment of the countryside”

in Clause 1(1)(b). It is a pretty fundamental change here that you are getting finance for that purpose, and I believe we should take quite a long and hard look at this. It is changing everything that goes on inside the countryside, but it cannot sit by itself in agriculture. If you are talking about access, you are talking about getting access to activity going out there. We are going through a crisis caused by a disease which does not affect people with decent cardiovascular systems as badly. There is a public health element. There is a sports and recreation policy element here—it affects everything else. There is a tourism element here. If you have good footpaths, you can sell that weekend in a cottage. You can go on and on here, but I will not insult the intelligence of this Chamber by doing so at any great length. The fact is that access matters, both as a principle, as being of practical value to the rural economy and, I hope, to farmers directly now as well. If they are providing this access—the point I was trying to make earlier on—they deserve to get some payment, but we deserve something back for that activity. It is a two-way street. I hope that these amendments will open up a discussion that goes through.

I should also mention that these amendments were created in conjunction with the ramblers and the canoeists. There is a huge amount of activity on waterways which hits all those targets we are talking about: public health, access, enjoyment—it is all connected with the waterways. There are the canoeists—the paddlers—and the wild swimmers can be included here as well. That group’s activity probably becomes more attractive for most of us during the summer months, but it happens. We could have gone to other groups. I have some sympathy with the Minister, because these groups have a reputation for squabbling with each other. Anglers and canoeists are not traditionally the best of friends but they should get on together, and the defence of reasonableness that runs through British law should be applied to all of them. Those on scrambler bikes and those who might occasionally use a byway or a bridle path rather annoy those on horses. I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, and my noble friend Lord Greaves on Amendment 100, as somebody who has, shall we say, a strong equestrian influence in my household—it was rather remiss of me not to bring them in. All these groups slightly compete for access, but they all have to get in there. However, to draw the Minister’s attention to some of the other amendments here, the idea of enhancing access runs through many of these amendments.

If you start talking about footpaths, you get the vision that a footpath is a path that runs across some countryside, often following a historical road. That does not fulfil many of the criteria I have been talking about. If you simply have a muddy path, it can become not easily used by many people incredibly quickly. Some of the amendments here are designed to reward farmers to make sure that these remain useful. There is the buggy and self-propelled wheelchair test—the buggy test is probably the most applicable one here. If there is a muddy path on a winter’s day, especially if it is on a route that people can get to, it will have a habit of getting holes and then puddles in it, which expand. That damages any land around it, either as regards its environmental or agricultural purposes. If you reward farmers for making sure that that has a toughened surface, it will take much more use and will cause less damage to the things around it.

Other people then sometimes contradict this. I remember we did it during the passage of the CROW Bill—my noble friend Lord Greaves, I think, has the scars from that—and we have not yet got anywhere near the number of amendments we had on that; I like to clang the death knell every now and again. There was a great deal of discussion then. People in motorised wheelchairs gained a great deal of traction, which was fair enough—they like access to the countryside—but their issues are not the same as those of a person with a slightly bad knee who needs that surface.

Where is it appropriate to use a gate as opposed to a stile? How do you maintain it? I have heard many a farmer say, “Yes, great, we could put a gate in there. Do you have any idea what they cost and how difficult they are to maintain, and about replacements?” The answer, of course, was that I did not at that time. We must make sure there is a structure here that rewards that sort of help, which will help everybody else here, too: if you need to get to a waterway, for example, you will have a path that is useful and allows access through. These amendments are not so draconian that they would say exactly what the enhancement must be. There will be somebody who lives on the Wiltshire-Berkshire border and somebody, like my noble friend Lord Greaves, who lives in the Pennines, where the hills are steeper and more formidable—he says they are not; he is being kind—but I come from East Anglia and the change was pretty substantial: there, a hill is an event. The point is that different bits of the countryside will need different practices going forward.

Part of the answer here plays into other areas. The Agriculture Bill may be predominantly about agriculture, but it must be aware of what else is going on. I hope the Minister will at the very least be able to give us an idea of how this important aspect of the Bill will be tied into other policy and enhanced. If we do not do this, we are missing a trick. I beg to move.

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD) [V]]

My Lords, like some other noble Lords, I fell victim to the Second Reading cull. Had I been able to speak at Second Reading, I would have focused entirely on the question of public access, so I am very pleased to have the opportunity this evening of supporting my noble friend Lord Addington’s amendments and saying a few words.

We are all agreed that the principle of reward for public good is the right one, and it feels to me as if public access is one of the most important public goods that we can put in the Bill. We know that open-air activity in the countryside—not just walking but all sorts of activity—has a huge contribution to make to individual health and well-being. I think it should sit alongside access to good-quality food as an important outcome of the Bill. I was very heartened to hear the Minister’s response to the last group amendments, when he talked about the importance of projects for well-being and partnership working with other departments.

But it goes much further. There is, of course, an economic development argument, with people coming to visit farm shops, cafés and pubs, but it is even more fundamental than that. One thing that has troubled many of us is the real disconnect between people, the food they eat and the way that it is produced. Noble Lords have tabled a number of amendments later in the Bill to deal with that. Regular access to the countryside is one important way of helping to stimulate this interest in and understanding of the way that our food is produced. It is also a way of exciting young people into thinking, potentially, about careers in agriculture, land management or forestry—individuals who come from towns, not necessarily just country dwellers. The same can be said about biodiversity, landscape, animal welfare—the more access people have to the countryside, the more committed they will be to those things.

For a decade, I chaired a rights of way committee in Suffolk. I know that some landowners are more accommodating than others and that some users do not behave in ways that we might like them to, but this stand-off really does need to end, because going forward, the link between individual taxpayers and farmers will be much clearer than it was in the days of the CAP. If people have a perception that they are somehow not welcome in the countryside, they will ask, “Why should my tax money support you?” I think that it would be in everyone’s interests to begin to think much more carefully about public access.

In the interests of time, I will not go through the amendments, but there are two categories. There are the ones that seek to make sure that nothing in the Bill makes the situation any worse. An example is the important question of cross-compliance: making sure that we do not pay for farmers and landowners who do not even comply with their duties under the Highways Act. Nor should we be using taxpayers’ money to help them to do what they should be doing anyway. So we have one set of amendments that are negative in focus, but then the much more positive ones which talk about enhancement and all the things we do to improve public access—not just public footpaths and rights of way, but access more generally, and particularly how we should think about getting people from towns and cities out into the countryside that we all enjoy. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees]

My Lords, I have received no requests to speak after the Minister, so I call the noble Lord, Lord Addington.

[Lord Addington]

My Lords, the Minister has done his usual thing of being thorough and charming at the same time—and I have now damned him with praise. However, I cannot help but feel that we should take a look at how we expect these trials to go through and see whether we can clarify that at a later stage. With that caveat, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 6 withdrawn.

Direct Payments Ceilings Regulations 2020

Lord Addington Excerpts

Wednesday 1st July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, somebody from these Benches has to admit that not everything about the European Union was great, although we regret leaving it, and the CAP probably comes under the heading of the least-loved bit. Therefore, when anything that changes that comes along, one must bite one’s lip and say, “Well, possibly not too much harm done”. However, the bit that attracted me to speak on this was the second of the two regulations, on the direct payments penalty simplification. Having had a look at the regulations and, I must admit, finding that I got more from the guidance than the text, I noticed the simplification order, which is there because certain small overpayments had a small penalty attached to them. That seems a reasonable way forward.

It is not so much what is being done here as the thought behind it. Are we going to a system that reflects the idea that small indiscretions and bookkeeping errors are less severely punished? If ever something was going to intensify your problems, it is having that extra bit of unexpected financial pressure on you from getting hit for a mistake. A few people will game the system—okay, fair enough; there should be some benefit—but surely there should be an ongoing thought in the department about small mistakes. Things are changing; systems are changing. When we go to the ELM system there will still have to be accounting processes going on. Will the Government take the approach that these small errors should be treated in a more lenient fashion?

This will colour much of the debate that is coming. It may not be directly applicable to these regulations, but as we go forward we are gathering information to hold the Government to account. If I could get a little guidance on that, I would be very grateful to the Minister. Let us not pretend that we are not part of a continuum of discussion; these regulations are simply part of it.

Agriculture Bill

Lord Addington Excerpts

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

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, we are having a very long and complicated discussion on a Bill that is a framework. It is long and complicated because it is a framework. We basically have a series of good intentions here—and good intentions are the road to hell. If we do not get some clarification during the Bill’s passage, noble Lords will have a very busy time voting. I think the Minister knows that and he might want to have a chat with the person who drafted the Bill. Clause 1(1) goes up to paragraph (j); agriculture is first mentioned at paragraph (i).

The Bill talks about how we are to deliver all these wonderful things for the environment. How will we do that? The delivery system is potentially there: it is those who farm and work the land at the moment. They do not know, or are unsure, how they will be supported. British agriculture has needed support from the state, either multinationally or by the nation itself, to make itself productive since about 1870. It was called the great agricultural depression, when the steam engine opened up the prairie and the pampas to production. We have been in decline since then. We cannot compete. It is historically proven. There is a lovely document in the House of Commons Library that shows this.

How will we make sure that the farmer is there to deliver the public good for public money? We must make sure that they know what they are doing. Farmers are currently concentrated on food production. That is what they do, that is what they have been trained to do and that is the culture. To move away from that, they will need the support and encouragement of the state, and a degree of certainty. At the moment, that is not there.

We have another ritual dance when a Minister says, “I’m not going to do that”, but it is not in the legislation. We then come back to the Minister and say, “Yes, but you won’t be there for ever, although you have a wonderful attitude and we know you wouldn’t do it yourself.” It has always been true and it has always been there. We need something in the Bill that defines what we will do here and how the farmer should be supported.

To put it bluntly, we have had many sets of briefing come in. The NFU states the worries and problems of food producers. We should be able to carry on doing this; that is what we do. Then I got one from the Ramblers’ Association that says: if we are supposed to be providing access to the countryside as a public good, why do we not make sure that we pay landowners to make sure that there are public paths to be used, with all the public health advantages et cetera? If the farmer is there and told that they will be supported, that might just work. We might get gates and solid paths around the edge of the fields. If we do not know what is going on, we will not get interaction from the farming community and those who work the land. We have to try to build that trust and give it a firm basis. The fact that a Minister thinks that it is a good idea and will not change it will not help, very often.

Ministers generally last a couple of years in post and civil servants about the same length of time, but planning on this has to be decades long to really get it going. Will the Minister bear in mind, when amendments are moved during the passage of the Bill, that that is the sort of encouragement we will need to make sure that our delivery system, the farming community, is much more compliant?

Direct Payments to Farmers (Crop Diversification Derogation) (England) Regulations 2020

Lord Addington Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, with a list of this length and such quick speeches, it is not surprising that many of the points I wanted to make have been covered. But I reiterate the point made my noble friends Lady Parminter and Lady Northover: the idea of public money for public good should not be lost.

Diversity in farming has been seen as a good thing; it allows you to hedge your bets. The document in front of us suggests that we can do without diversity because of extreme conditions. Anybody who travelled around the countryside when we were still travelling—my normal journey was through the Thames Valley—will have seen fields under water for months. It is therefore understandable to make certain changes to our support system, but, following on from the point of the noble Earl, Lord Devon, I once again ask: where is the science to back up this decision? We should know that, so that future public debate can be enhanced.

We are trying to change the way we support our farmers to try to avoid the countryside either becoming a monoculture or simply not being used. If we are trying to make sure that it is used for the benefit of the whole of society—not only by providing food but by providing a better environment, and indeed leisure facilities for us—we need to know the grounds on which certain decisions and funding will be changed. Will the Minister take this opportunity to at least set out the grounds on which the changes to any existing regulations will take place and what precedent has been set? Will he give us a better idea of what we can expect, given what look to be increasingly volatile environmental and weather systems over the next few years?

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Finlay of Llandaff) (CB)]

The noble Baroness, Lady Falkner of Margravine, has scratched from the list. I therefore call the noble Earl, Lord Shrewsbury.

Fisheries: EU Landing Obligation (European Union Committee Report)

Lord Addington Excerpts

Thursday 23rd January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, I feel something of a fraud being the person to bring this up, as I am probably one of the most junior members of this committee. Where my noble friend Lord Teverson leads on environmental matters, I am afraid I have a habit of following. The previous committee that I served on was the one that looked at the future of the Arctic region, and a huge amount of the work that we did was on fisheries. One of the issues that follow through from that report to this one is that, as has been stated, fish ignore our ways of travelling. Fish could not care less whether we have decided that this is our water or someone else’s.

There is environmental change at the moment, which all but a tiny minority accept as a fact of life, and it means that practices regarding breeding grounds make this matter even more complicated than it was already. We have a long tradition of taking fish more rapidly than the fish can breed. Fishing is probably the only activity where we take something wild, so we are effectively hunting, and expect to go back to it again and again. Taking fish out of your local river since the pre-dawn of history—in many places fishing in rivers is a very important facet, though not so much here—shows that you can overdo it. We have to start regulating now while we have the capacity to catch fish. We must remember that we have the capacity now to make our oceans deserts. We are putting technology designed to destroy submarines on boats to catch fish, and the fish cannot compete. It is about us showing restraint here. If we do not, we are going to run out of fish and all the social consequences that we have just heard about will be there. However, those social consequences are built on a fallacy; we cannot take all the fish that we want. We have to intervene.

The basic point behind this debate is that, if you have a system to stop overfishing, you have to monitor it and enforce it. Unenforced laws become jokes and farces. We all know that; we have all seen it happen. We must put effort into making sure that, when the choke problem arises, those fish are landed and we are monitoring. Effort is required by the Government, and it all depends how they do it. Putting cameras on boats seems an obvious thing to do.

We can now get more aggressive. Even the enthusiastic Europeans on these Benches would agree that not everything about the common fisheries and indeed agricultural policies was a total blessing. However, we must actually get out there and start saying that we have to conserve these fish stocks and the environment that they come from. There can be very few other natural environments where we are prepared to do the same amount of damage that we do in order to take away these species. Unless we start doing something positive about enforcing the laws we have agreed we should pass, and which our neighbours and allies—hopefully still allies—have agreed to, we will get into trouble.

My questions for the Government are as follows. What is the enforcement strategy? What are they doing to make sure they go out there? If fishermen are simply getting cleverer about landing only the right fish, knowing this and passing it on would be a good idea. I rather doubt that that is the case, but hey, let us be optimistic. If we have found a way of going forward that does not damage the environment, great. If not, somebody should be held to account.

There is no point in Members of this House and the other place standing around discussing this and wringing hands if we are not prepared to take some action. I am afraid we are going to have to offend a few people. As my noble friend said, fishing is one of the hardest and most dangerous professions going. If we are going to take fishing communities’ livelihoods away, they should at least know why this is being done. Indeed, if the Government are not prepared to enforce and help them, I suggest they would face a slight complaint when another way forward is being offered to agriculture.

What are we going to do here? That is the question that comes back again and again. We can all agree that there is a problem—virtually everybody has—but unless we are prepared to take some action now, we have left ourselves in a situation in which we can all take a big slice of the blame, because we have all been part of the problem.