Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Josh Newbury and Emma Reynolds

Thursday 9th July 2026 Commons Chamber

[Josh Newbury (Cannock Chase) (Lab)]

8. What steps she is taking with Cabinet colleagues to support the agri-tech sector.

[The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Emma Reynolds)]

Innovation and productivity go hand in hand, and the Government are backing British agri-tech with real investment. Innovation is central to our farming road map, and I recently announced that we are boosting the farming innovation programme to £123 million this year. We are also working across Government—for example, with the Department for Business and Trade—to open up new export opportunities and drive growth, productivity and jobs across the sector.

[Josh Newbury]

The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee recently had the privilege of visiting New Zealand. We met an Innovate UK delegation promoting incredible British agri-tech innovations like cups that enable substrate-free hydroponics, vegetables that have 40 times the iron content, and AI analysis of drone, satellite and sensor data. Does the Secretary of State agree that agri-tech will be a key growth area for the UK? Will she work with counterparts in the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology and DBT to accelerate the success of British agri-tech start-ups?

[Emma Reynolds]

My hon. Friend is right to say that the Government absolutely recognise the potential of agri-tech as a high-growth sector. That is why it is included in the Government’s industrial strategy. The UK is already a world leader in agri-tech, but we want to ensure that we maintain that leadership. Under this Government, we will continue to bolster our position and boost global exports, as he suggested. We are supporting British agri-tech innovations, such as automated fruit pickers, which are already being used around the world. We should be proud of our strong research base and our culture of farming innovation.

Farming Road Map and Profitability Review

Debate between Josh Newbury and Emma Reynolds

Wednesday 24th June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Emma Reynolds]

That is very kind of the hon. Gentleman. I thank him for his best wishes, which were a little different in tone from the comments from the Opposition Front Bench. I reassure the hon. Gentleman that we have a separate document that responds to Baroness Batters’ review. Profitability is absolutely at the heart of the road map. There is a lovely diagram on page 18 of the road map—perhaps the words in it were not picked up in his search—showing what we are trying to do, which is to work towards a profitable, productive, sustainable and resilient farming sector. I absolutely agree with him that we need a more profitable sector, and that is the focus of this document.

[Josh Newbury (Cannock Chase) (Lab)]

The road map is a very welcome step forward that will give our farmers certainty for the future. I particularly welcome what the Secretary of State had to say on co-operatives, which could go a long way to redressing the current power imbalance in our food system. I hope we can begin that work at pace. We hear consistently from farmers that they feel that the planning system—made so much worse by the Conservatives—is stacked against them. Broiler chicken farmers, for instance, are expected to lower stocking densities but cannot get permission to expand their sheds to compensate, while farms in water-stressed areas are having to go through years of bureaucracy to build reservoirs. Does the Secretary of State agree that reforming the planning system will be key to freeing up trapped investment and getting us to the sustainable, prosperous future for British farming that this road map sets out?

[Emma Reynolds]

The short answer is yes—I could not agree with my hon. Friend more. That is why I am working closely with the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government on planning reform to ensure that those planning barriers are not holding back investment into the farming sector.

Water White Paper

Debate between Josh Newbury and Emma Reynolds

Wednesday 21st January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Emma Reynolds]

Oh my gosh! Well, I say to the right hon. Lady that I will not take any lectures from the Conservative party. Not only can they not be bothered to turn up for the statement, which shows an absolute disregard for the concerns of the public about the levels of pollution in our waterways—[Interruption.] I will answer her questions. We have done more in 18 months than the Conservatives did in 14 years, so I will not take any lectures from her. I am proud of our water White Paper and that my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Streatham and Croydon North (Steve Reed), commissioned somebody of the stature of Sir Jon Cunliffe and appointed the Independent Water Commission to do the most fundamental review of our water system since privatisation—a privatisation that happened under their Thatcher Government.

The shadow Secretary of State asked how many recommendations we are taking forward. It is the vast majority and more, because we are also looking at agricultural pollution, which we did not ask Sir Jon to look at. The water White Paper talks about tackling that kind of pollution and I will not shy away from that. We are working in partnership with farmers, the National Farmers Union and others because that it is an important source of water pollution.

Again, I will not take lectures from the right hon. Lady about the environmental land management programme when the Conservatives underspent the farming budget. They could not even be bothered to get the money out of the door. She asked about infrastructure upgrades. The White Paper introduces a system that moves away from water companies marking their own homework to a regulator with teeth that gets a grip on the delivery of the £104 billion infrastructure investment. Under the Conservative Government, the pipes and pumps were left in a shocking state of disrepair because there was not the regulation nor the strong regulator that we need. That is what this water White Paper and the upcoming water Bill will deliver.

The right hon. Lady talks about improving water supply. It is absolutely correct—maybe we can agree on something—that we have seen very poor performance from South East Water in recent weeks, and I was in the area last week to meet constituents of the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mike Martin)—[Interruption.] The right hon. Lady asked whether I should have gone earlier. Did she bother to go? [Interruption.] Listen, this is a privatised industry because of decisions made in 1989. I called on the regulator Ofwat to examine the licence conditions and whether they had been breached by South East Water. I do not remember her saying any such thing. I have also hauled in the chair of South East Water to ask for an urgent investigation into what happened last week and the week before, as well as for two weeks before Christmas.

This water White Paper is the most ambitious reform in a generation to our water system. It is severely needed because of the blind eye that the Conservatives turned when they were in government and the record levels of pollution in our waterways.

[Josh Newbury (Cannock Chase) (Lab)]

I welcome the White Paper because customers right across the country have been failed by their water company, and all too often, when turning to Ofwat for support and to hold executives to account, they have been met with bureaucracy and a weak response. Will the Secretary of State confirm that the creation of a new combined, powerful water ombudsman, set out in the White Paper, will finally give customers a route to resolve complaints quickly when companies fail to deliver this most basic of public services?

[Emma Reynolds]

I agree with my hon. Friend. That is why the main focus of our reforms is to create a single, more powerful and integrated regulator. At the moment, as I said in my statement, we have duplication as well as gaps. We have consumers who are not being served well, so we need a regulator that gets a grip on the investment in maintaining our water infrastructure and on bearing down on pollution incidents. We have already made a start on that, but the new regulator will have more teeth and more power to do that. My hon. Friend is right to say that we need that single, more powerful and integrated regulator to ensure we deliver better outcomes for consumers and the environment.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Josh Newbury and Emma Reynolds

Thursday 18th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Emma Reynolds]

Well, Mr Speaker, it was not really worth waiting for. In the first instance, I urge the right hon. Lady to check her emails, as I sent a detailed response to her letter. I also urge her to stop talking the sector down. We are ensuring that we are helping farmers to be more profitable, which is why we have published the Batters review today. We are setting out in the new year our next iteration of the SFI, in close collaboration with the farming sector, and we will also set out our 25-year farming road map.

[Josh Newbury (Cannock Chase) (Lab)]

Merry Christmas to you and your team, Mr Speaker.

Alongside many colleagues on the Government Benches who are passionate about farming, I will continue to argue for a rethink on inheritance tax, but I back this Government and their mission to improve the profitability of our farms. We are speeding up planning, tackling unfair supply chain practices, unlocking finance and boosting exports. Does the Minister agree that the findings of the Batters review mean that we can finally turn a page on dwindling farm incomes and unleash benefits for farmers, the rural economy and our nation’s food security?

Animal Welfare Strategy

Debate between Josh Newbury and Emma Reynolds

Thursday 18th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Emma Reynolds]

I thank the hon. Gentleman, on behalf of the whole House, for what he has just said, and for his service, before he became a Member and since. This is a really important area, and we absolutely appreciate that the Veterinary Surgeons Act needs updating. I can reassure him that we are continuing to pursue opportunities to do that.

[Josh Newbury (Cannock Chase) (Lab)]

All I want for Christmas is a generational boost to animal welfare. That does not have the same ring to it as what the queen of Christmas sang, but given the widespread public support for animal welfare, maybe we could give her a run for her money with that one. Our British farmers lead the way globally on high standards of farmed animal welfare, and they deserve great credit for that. Can the Secretary of State confirm that the animal welfare strategy will continue that trend, and will work with farmers and their representatives, so that they can reap the rewards, and so that domestic production is safeguarded as we move towards higher standards?

[Emma Reynolds]

I can confirm that. As I said earlier, measures are already in place to provide funding to farmers to help them improve animal welfare standards. Those measures include veterinary visits to help them continue to improve their animal welfare standards.