South-west Agriculture and Fishing Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Michael Tomlinson
Main Page: Michael Tomlinson (Conservative - Mid Dorset and North Poole)Department Debates - View all Michael Tomlinson's debates with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
South-west Agriculture and Fishing
Michael Tomlinson Excerpts(7 years, 6 months ago)
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James Heappey (Wells) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Moon. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Scott Mann), who is a fellow south-west MP, on securing this important debate. This is the second debate in just over a week to which south-west Members have turned up en masse—to stand up first for tourism and now for agriculture.
I cannot claim to have any significant commercial fishing in my patch, but I have a lot of farming and I know how concerning the impact of Brexit is to farmers. There has been a lot of uncertainty in the last few years, with low prices, the poorly administered basic payment scheme and the prospect of a significant change to the agricultural subsidy regime once we have left the EU and therefore the common agricultural policy. I welcome the Chancellor’s announcement that the current agricultural funding under pillar one of the CAP will be maintained until 2020, but despite that commitment the UK Government will spend less on agricultural subsidy because we currently get such a bad deal from the CAP. That must be music to the Treasury’s ears. The end of the decade is not that far away, so the Government need to start articulating the long-term vision for farming in the UK now.
Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)
We have heard many voices from the south-west but none yet from Dorset. Although Dorset is the smallest county in the south-west, it represents nearly 10% of the agricultural workforce. Does my hon. Friend recognise that there are opportunities for the CAP system to be reformed, which farmers have been calling for, specifically in relation to the timing of payments, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Scott Mann) mentioned?
Mrs Madeleine Moon (in the Chair)
Order. For hon. Members’ understanding, James Heappey gains an extra minute.