British Farming: Competitiveness

Lord Harlech Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd March 2026 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Harlech]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to increase the competitiveness of British farming against imported produce.

[Lord Harlech (Con)]

My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper and declare my farming and land management interests in Wales.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Baroness Hayman of Ullock) (Lab)]

My Lords, this Government are backing British farmers to create a productive, profitable and sustainable future for farming. We will always consider whether overseas produce has an unfair advantage and any impact that it may have. Where necessary, we will be prepared to use the full range of powers at our disposal to protect our most sensitive sectors. We will set out our wider plans to boost farming profitability and long-term viability later this year.

[Lord Harlech (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for her reply. UK food self-sufficiency has fallen below 65%. Britain increasingly relies on volatile international markets while holding its own farmers to higher standards than most of our trading partners. The Batters review was unequivocal that food security is national security, so, yes or no, will the Government commit to treating agriculture as a sensitive sector in all future trade negotiations and ensure that no future trade deal allows imports produced to lower welfare or environmental standards to undercut British farmers?

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

We have been very clear when working on our trading agreements with other countries that our standards are sacrosanct. We will not allow deals that undermine the standards that we have in this country. We are investing £11.8 billion in the farming budget over this Parliament, so we are absolutely serious about building our farming road map and responding positively to the Farming Profitability Review from the noble Baroness, Lady Batters. It is really important that any products that are produced to different environmental or animal welfare standards can be placed on the UK market only if they comply with the strict requirements that we put in place.