Agriculture Bill

Earl of Caithness Excerpts

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

[The Earl of Caithness (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for his introduction of the Bill. First, I pay tribute to three people from whom we shall not hear during our discussions on the Bill: the Countess of Mar, Baroness Byford and the Earl of Selbourne, who have retired. We will miss their expertise, wise counsel and first-hand experience in agriculture. However, I welcome the interest in agriculture from those who do not usually take part in debates on this subject. Sadly, one-third of those who put their names down to speak cannot do so because of the unusual and regrettable way in which this House is now being run. Can my noble friend confirm that there will be no curtailment of debate whatever in the following stages, so that the House can fulfil its function properly?

Like others who have spoken, I have concerns not only over environmental and welfare standards for trade agreements, but also that the Bill should provide for proper environmental standards in the UK with appropriate regulations, long-term funding and certainty, so that farmers are properly rewarded. In the last 50 years, the amount of land available to feed each person on this planet has dropped from two acres to less than half an acre, and it is still falling. The UK is only 75% self-sufficient in indigenous-type foods. Therefore, food security and food strategy must be included in the Bill. I agree with my noble friend Lord Ridley that high-yield farming and improved biodiversity are not mutually exclusive. The Allerton project has scientifically demonstrated that more than successfully for more than 25 years.

Farming is currently an administrative nightmare. I want to focus on one key practical point of the Bill, which is the scale of change and adjustment for farming as it moves from the arrangements inherited from the EU CAP to those founded on markets in food production. It will become more of a marketplace for farmers to sell public goods to the state acting as buyer on behalf of society, as well as probable private sector activity. The outcome will be a much less standardised industry than the one we have created since World War II, as we move away from full-time commodity production. Achieving that will be a major call on all those involved, not only government and farmers. Thus, I hope my noble friend, like me, will endorse the Welsh Government’s observation:

“Advice should be seen as an investment in the capacity of farmers and farms rather than a cost”.


Farming needs a climate positively supportive of sustained, useful advice, with the necessary conversations and time for reflection and delivery of everything from cost control, the adoption of new technology and generational change to repositioning the business, implementing a diversification project, accepting that land should be let out or understanding the value in public good contracts. This will involve both the private and public sectors and we must ensure that it happens.

This is a watershed moment for British agriculture, and this is a hugely important Bill. Although frustrating in many respects, because it is largely an enabling Bill, it puts in place the legislative framework for many years to come. I support it, but I also say to my noble friend Lord Gardiner, who, with his officials, has, as usual, been so helpful with briefing and information, that it would be disappointing and utterly inappropriate if all amendments, particularly the many cross-party ones that will be tabled, were to be rejected.