Farming: Financial Sustainability

Rebecca Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 24th June 2026 Westminster Hall

[Rebecca Smith (South West Devon) (Con)]

It is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Turner. Let me start by inviting the new Minister—I welcome him to his place—to visit Dartmoor over the summer to meet farmers, commoners, the Dartmoor hill pony organisations and, importantly, the Dartmoor Land Use Management Group. I invite him to bring Natural England, too, because it is at the centre of quite a lot of what has been said about Dartmoor in the past few weeks.

Previous meetings with Ministers and officials since the Government came into office do not seem to have made a difference and have not delivered a plan for sustainable farming on the moors. In 2023, the previous Government launched the Fursdon review on the future of Dartmoor. Its report includes a recommendation —No. 27, or paragraph 23.2 according to gov.uk—to ensure that ponies remain on the moors, but it also reports, in paragraphs 23.1 and 23.3, that cattle and sheep in significantly deliverable numbers are an intrinsic part of delivering that and the land management needed for Dartmoor; otherwise, farms on Dartmoor are not sustainable.

The Dartmoor Land Use Management Group was set up following the Fursdon review to assess how farming and environmental land management can co-exist. It has yet to report back, which is why it is so disappointing that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and Natural England are pushing ahead with livestock stocking numbers that risk the sustainability of farms right across Dartmoor and, with them, the ponies themselves. A petition to adopt recommendation 27 has more than 200,000 signatures. Ponies, cattle and sheep are intrinsically linked on the moors. In a visit over the summer, the Minister could be assured of a friendly welcome and hear directly from those involved.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen Morgan]

I remind Members that we currently have a good supply of fertiliser and are keen to support domestic production. The Government are live to the other issues that the hon. Gentleman raises; I will take them back to the Department, and am happy to write to him on his concerns.

The Government are also sharing information and guidance to support farmers to diversify sources of nutrients to reduce reliance on artificial fertilisers and strengthen long-term resilience by managing more effectively. DEFRA’s new nutrient management planning tool is already supporting our farmers by matching nutrients to crop and soil needs. That enables farmers to make the most of nutrient sources and to reduce their reliance on artificial fertilisers. More than 500 farms have used the tool since it was launched.

DEFRA has launched a consultation and call for evidence to inform how the Government modernise fertiliser production and the regulations around it, which will further improve future fertiliser supply options. We will continue to work with farmers to ensure that they become more resilient, through our innovation funds and equipment grants or our continued shift from area-based subsidy to environmental land management schemes.

Another issue raised in today’s debate was about fuel. Farmers have told the Government how important manageable fuel prices are to the financial sustainability of the farming sector and food security, and we have listened. While the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore), worries about his selfies for social media, we are focused on taking decisive action to support farmers by slashing the fuel duty rate on red diesel from 10.18p to 6.48p per litre—its lowest rate in 20 years. That means that red diesel now benefits from an 88% tax discount, saving farmers more than £300 million a year.

We have also extended the 5p fuel duty cut until the end of this year, keeping taxes at a 16-year low and saving the average driver £120. My Department will continue to work actively with others to monitor developments in the middle east, including their impact on the supply and price of red diesel. We are committed to ensuring that the market functions fairly, and will continue our discussions with industry leaders, including the NFU and farming stakeholders.

There are real, recent issues that need to be addressed; I have heard from the stakeholders I have already met that additional pressures are affecting farmers. The Government are well aware of the impact of climate change -related extreme weather on the financial sustainability of farms in recent years—this week’s heatwave is a reminder of that. We are committed to working with farmers to deliver long-term solutions to the risks associated with extreme wet or dry weather, and to increase profitability, because farmers being able to run profitable businesses is good for the whole economy and vital for food security. That is why we are investing in farming schemes and grants to make farming more resilient to economic and environmental shocks, and to safeguard our long-term food security.

We have allocated a record £11.8 billion over this Parliament to sustainable farming and food production. Overall, farmers and land managers will benefit from an average of £2.3 billion a year through our farming and countryside programme.

[Rebecca Smith]

On that point specifically, I raised Dartmoor and invited the Minister to visit my constituency. He has about 30 seconds left to speak, but could he respond to that point?

[Stephen Morgan]

I am happy to write formally to the hon. Lady to respond to her questions.

The message I leave with Members is simple: this Government believe that food security is national security. We are standing alongside farmers through global uncertainty, and supporting them by equipping them to manage volatility more effectively. We have already responded to the real pressures around fertilisers and fuel that farmers face and are backing British farming with record investment, improving schemes to make them simpler and fairer and supporting productivity and innovation. We are proud to work with British farmers as we grow the future of farming together.

Oral Answers to Questions

Rebecca Smith Excerpts

Thursday 19th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Emma Hardy]

I thank all flood action groups around the country for doing incredible work for their communities. That sounds like a brilliant example. As I mentioned, we are investing £2.4 billion over the next couple of years. I hope to be able to give more detail in the new year.

[Rebecca Smith (South West Devon) (Con)]

2. What recent assessment he has made of the potential merits of extending the rural England prosperity fund.

[The Minister for Food Security and Rural Affairs (Daniel Zeichner)]

Mr Speaker, I wish you and all your staff a happy Christmas, and thank all those who work in our food system for ensuring that we are fed every day and that, particularly at this time of the year, so many of our constituents can enjoy a traditional, wonderful British celebration.

The autumn Budget on 30 October confirmed the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs budgets for 2024-25 and 2025-26, and funding allocations for individual programmes will be determined in the upcoming months through the Department’s business planning exercise. We will update the House on the rural England prosperity fund in due course.

[Rebecca Smith]

I thank the Minister for that answer. Farmers in my constituency of South West Devon have highlighted the role that the rural England prosperity fund could play in the economic growth of our community. Given the publication of the English devolution White Paper this week, what conversations has the Minister had with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government about how funding, such as the rural England prosperity fund, can ensure that devolution is a success for the countryside?

[Daniel Zeichner]

We are in constant dialogue with our MHCLG colleagues. I was delighted that areas with a significant rural population will on average receive about a 5% increase in their core spending power. That is a real-terms increase. I hope we can continue to work well to address the rural productivity gap of some 18%, which is a real challenge for all of us.

Family Farming in Devon

Rebecca Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd December 2024 Westminster Hall

[Rebecca Smith (South West Devon) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to speak in this debate, which my neighbour, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Torridge and Tavistock (Sir Geoffrey Cox) introduced . Some farms that were once in his constituency are now in mine, so he may well recognise some of the stories that I will tell. He has done me a favour—I am making a speech tomorrow as well, so I will focus on a couple of key issues today. I will take the opportunity to speak directly about Devon while the Minister is in the Chamber, because tomorrow there will be a lot of voices in the farming debate.

My constituency of South West Devon has three types of rural landscape. We have land-based lowlands, coastal lowlands, and uplands, which are less favoured and include protected landscapes up on Dartmoor. Each presents its own challenges and opportunities, and requires special ways of farming, which is one of the values of family farming: a legacy is passed down from generation to generation, so that each one can share the stories, and keep those farms going. What I find most exciting about the constituency is that each of those farms now has farmers who are my generation, in their 40s or 50s, and whose parents are still alive in their 80s, so we have those long-term family farms, which are eager to keep doing their bit to keep Devon looking like Devon. It is worth saying that without our farmers, Devon would stop looking like Devon, because we need that rural landscape to complement the cities we have as well.

All those different farms are all family farms, and have overlapping challenges. It is worth briefly touching on those shared challenges. Our farms are generally smaller than they are in the rest of the south-west, let alone the rest of the country. The average farm in Devon is 16% smaller than south-west farms, which in turn are 34% smaller than farms across the country. That means that there are tighter profit margins. When we shout about agricultural property relief and capital grants programmes, it is because those farms are already tightly run. We are not the wealthy south-east; we are the south-west, and in particular, we are Devon. Farms are also more likely to be owned than tenanted, which is unusual compared with the rest of the country.

Turning to agricultural property relief, I want to briefly mention that for many ageing parents, whose children are often already involved in the farm if they have not taken over already, it has been a given that those farms would be passed down. There is a generation of people nearing middle age who expected to farm into the long term, but who are now rightly worried about what that will look like, both for them and for their children.

I want to talk specifically about the uplands that are now part of my constituency, but which once formed part of the constituency of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Torridge and Tavistock. I have spent a lot of time at Greenwell farm, where a fantastic farmer, Matt Cole, is passionate about upland farming and farming on Dartmoor, and recognises what an opportunity he has. He has some key questions about land that is designated as moorland permanent grassland pasture, which currently falls through the funding gap. While it is better for the environment and for the soil not to disturb it, farmers often only get more funding if they do something to that land. However, Dartmoor, as has been referenced in the Fursdon review, is different. Matt is keen to see if a role can be found for heritage grassland, and whether we could look at a classification for that.

The environmental land management moorland SFI offer is a real challenge on livestock numbers. Under higher-level stewardship, farmers could have 0.3 livestock units per hectare; under SFI 21, that drops to 0.16 per hectare. To decrease livestock numbers unlocks those SFI options, but stocking rates do not represent the land stock on Dartmoor if we lower them, and it does not enable us to do what we need to do to protect that landscape. Where has DEFRA got to on moorland stocking rates? Dartmoor farmers are calling for flexibility on those stocking rates to reflect the findings of the Dartmoor review.

To conclude, I will make just a couple more points. The key issue for upland farms arises from the fact that DEFRA has promised a working group on uplands, specifically to look at this issue in future. What progress has been made on establishing that working group?

Finally, particularly regarding the coastal and lowland parts of my constituency, lots of other organisations feed into what farms are doing with DEFRA. Those organisations, including the Westcountry Rivers Trust and South Devon National Landscape, all receive money from DEFRA through other funding pots, which are all under threat. I believe that the plea of the farmers I have met in recent weeks is about the need for joined-up thinking. When we reduce one pot, for South Devon National Landscape, for example, that has an impact on farmers who might be struggling with their SFI funding.

Farmers are keen to ensure that they can produce, protect the environment, feed the nation, create and sustain good jobs, and generate economic growth, but they cannot do any of that unless they are allowed to get on with the job that they are keen to do.

Oral Answers to Questions

Rebecca Smith Excerpts

Thursday 14th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Steve Reed]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on campaigning for her local water consumers. She is right to point to the wide failings across the system. We have charged Sir Jon Cunliffe with leading a commission that will look at how we can completely reset the sector—regulation, governance and how the sector operates—so that the levels of pollution and failure under the previous Government can never be repeated.

[Rebecca Smith (South West Devon) (Con)]

In 2013, the previous Government introduced a rebate of £50 per household on the water bills of customers in the far south-west. With 3% of the country’s population paying to keep a third of our bathing beaches clean on lower-than-average salaries, will the Secretary of State please reconsider the decision to scrap that rebate for constituents such as mine, which was quietly announced just before the recess?

[Steve Reed]

It is important that support is targeted at the most vulnerable, so we will look at what more can be done through social tariffs to support families who are at risk of being unable to pay future water bills. It is right that we prioritise the poorest.