Draft Direct Payments to Farmers (Reductions) (England) Regulations
2022 The Minister for Farming, Fisheries and Food (Victoria
Prentis) I beg to move, That the Committee has considered the draft
Direct Payments to Farmers (Reductions) (England) Regulations 2022.
The Chair With this it will be convenient to consider the draft
Agriculture (Financial Assistance) (Amendment) Regulations 2022 and
the draft Agriculture (Lump Sum Payment) (England) Regulations
2022....Request free trial
Draft Direct Payments
to Farmers (Reductions) (England) Regulations 2022
The Minister for Farming, Fisheries and Food ()
I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the draft Direct Payments to
Farmers (Reductions) (England) Regulations 2022.
The Chair
With this it will be convenient to consider the draft Agriculture
(Financial Assistance) (Amendment) Regulations 2022 and the draft
Agriculture (Lump Sum Payment) (England) Regulations 2022.
As ever, it is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship,
Mr Hollobone. It is also a great pleasure to be part of the
Committee, and a particular honour to welcome my right hon.
Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings, with whom
it is always a pleasure to serve.
A draft of the Direct Payments to Farmers (Reductions) (England)
Regulations was laid before the House on 3 February. Although I
do not directly benefit from agricultural support, I should say
that I come from a farming family who very much benefit from
agricultural support schemes. The matters in the statutory
instruments are closely related. The instruments are being made
under powers in the Agriculture Act 2020. They implement
important aspects of our new agricultural policies, set out in
the “Agricultural Transition Plan 2021 to 2024”, which was
published in November 2020 and updated in June 2021.
The direct payment to farmers regulations apply progressive
reductions to direct payments for the 2022 scheme year. The
Government remain committed to phasing out direct payments—the
basic payment scheme, as we used to call it—in England over the
seven-year agricultural transition period. We are doing so
because area-based payments obviously go, in the main, to larger
landowners. Almost 50% of the total £3.7 billion budget goes to
the largest landowners. Those payments artificially inflate land
rents, stand in the way of new entrants to farming accessing
land, and offer the taxpayer little environmental return.
To help farmers plan, we committed in 2018 to phasing out BPS
direct payments. The specific reductions provided for in the
statutory instrument were announced as far back as November 2020.
As was the case last year, higher reductions will be applied to
payment amounts in higher payment bands—that is, to people who
own more land. Although direct payments are reducing, total
funding to farmers is not reducing. We will make money from the
reductions available for targeted schemes to increase farm
productivity, improve the health and welfare of animals and
deliver environmental gains.
In the coming year, much of the reallocated money will be used to
meet the rising demand from farmers for the countryside
stewardship scheme, which is our key environmental offer at the
moment. My family’s farm also takes part in the scheme. We now
have 52% of farmers enrolled in countryside stewardship, and the
intention is very much that we farmers will transition
automatically to the mid-tier of the new schemes.
Farmers today face significant challenges because of rapidly
increasing input costs. The war in Ukraine has directly affected
the price of food and fertiliser. I am very keen to target
support at those who need it most. We will offer a new suite of
opportunities to farmers, supply chains and researchers to enable
them to collaborate on research and development, so that they can
find practical solutions to the challenges and opportunities that
farming faces.
The draft Agriculture (Financial Assistance) (Amendment)
Regulations update a similar instrument approved on 23 March
2021. They put in place requirements relating to financial data
publication, and to enforcement and monitoring, for four new
financial assistance schemes that we established under the
Agriculture Act 2020. The amending statutory instrument extends
the range of financial assistance schemes covered by the 2021
regulations to ensure that any new financial assistance schemes
launched in 2022, and thereafter, will be subject to the same
checking, monitoring and enforcement requirements that applied to
the original schemes that we launched last year.
As we have set out for several years, as part of our wider
agricultural reforms, we want to support farmers who wish to
leave the industry, as well as those who want to stay. Some
farmers would like to retire or leave farming but have found it
difficult to do so for financial reasons. That is why the lump
sum payment regulations allow a scheme to be introduced in 2022
that provides lump sum payments to farmers in England who want to
leave the sector. Some who wish to retire can find it very
difficult to do so, and the lack of finance is the barrier to
retiring with dignity. We surveyed farmers during the planning
for the Agriculture Act 2020 and found that about 6% wanted to
leave but felt unable to, with financial reasons obviously being
the biggest obstacle. The scheme in the regulations provides
those farmers with a way out. More than 1,000 farmers have so far
requested a forecast statement, showing the lump sum amount that
they could receive if eligible. Obviously, that does not mean
that they will take that sum, but it is an indication that there
is a group of farmers who will find the new scheme useful. The
payments will be in place of any further direct payments to the
recipient during the remainder of the agricultural transition. It
is not new money, and will not have an impact on the funding of
other schemes.
(South Holland and The Deepings)
(Con)
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her remarks. The direct
payment instrument before the Committee is a consequence of the
decision that was taken to incorporate into a new law in 2020
direct payments of the kind that my hon. Friend has described. It
is uncontentious and this is the regulatory application of that
change. She has spoken about farmers leaving the industry
receiving direct payments. I do not imagine that she will be able
to commit to it now, but will she think about direct payments to
people entering the industry? It is very hard now for someone to
become a farmer. The barriers to entry are very high—the price of
land is prohibitive—but we need to get more people, young people
in particular, drawn into agriculture and horticulture. Will my
hon. Friend give that further consideration?
As ever, my right hon. Friend makes a very valid point. I had a
really useful meeting this morning with the National Farmers
Union new entrants, who came to the Department for Environment,
Food and Rural Affairs. They were full of ideas and practical
solutions to the problems faced globally and by their farming
businesses. Yes, DEFRA has very ambitious plans for new entrants;
we are working them up in conjunction with those new entrants. We
are approaching the agricultural transition hand in hand with
farmers. We have 4,000 farmers testing things for us and checking
that the new schemes actually work.
The new entrants policies will be rolled out next year. The exit
lump sum is partially designed to enable the retirement of older
farmers, but it is also envisaged that it will free up land that
we hope may be made available for new entrants. The new entrants
at the Department today had many other ideas, as do other groups,
about how we can support new entrants to the sector
generally.
2.38pm
(Cambridge) (Lab)
It is pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Hollobone. I am
slightly in awe of the weight of experience on both sets of
Benches, given the presence of the right hon. Member for South
Holland and The Deepings, and of my right hon. Friend the Members
for East Ham, and my hon. Friend for Wallasey. I will do my
best.
The Committee will be relieved to hear that the Opposition do not
intend to oppose the SIs, although it is a close call on the lump
sum payment regulations. I will explain why in a moment. The
draft Direct Payments to Farmers (Reductions) (England)
Regulations are familiar ground, because we discussed an almost
identically named SI almost a year ago. The Minister will be
delighted to know that I have her speech from a year ago before
me, so I can quote from it.
Good.
Absolutely. At the time, I predicted that we might be back here a
year later, doing this again.
Yes, and next year, too.
Who knows how many years we will be doing this for? That is
probably for others to judge.
The matter is not particularly complicated, but there are some
points from last year that I want to raise again. First, there is
the question of why this is being done year by year, when the
Government have laid out a clear plan well into the future. I
just wonder whether the Government lack confidence in their
future timetable. I must also ask again where the money is
actually going. Last year, the Minister told us:
“All funding released from the reductions will be reinvested in
new schemes in this Parliament.”—[Official Report, Fifth
Delegated Legislation Committee, 18 March 2021; c. 3.]
I think she echoed that in her opening comments today. When and
how will we be able to see whether that is actually happening? We
are now some way through year one. When can we see figures on how
much has been released and how much has gone into schemes so far?
If there is gap, where might that money reside?
Of course, this year, the reductions are much more
significant—20%, not 5%. That will be really painful for some
people. What form will the promised impact assessments take? I
will also get my customary gripes in early. The Minister referred
to some of the pressures that we are seeing as a consequence of
world events. Input prices are frankly eye-watering, and every
cost is going up—feed, fertiliser, fuel and gas. The hon. Lady
referred to that but did not really tell us whether there are any
plans to offer direct assistance. Could she say a little bit more
about that?
On the level of detail, the reference to direct payments in
paragraph 7.2 of the explanatory memorandum was the source of a
complaint from me last year. The Minister referenced the possible
impacts in her speech today. Paragraph 7.2 states:
“Direct Payments are untargeted, can inflate land rent prices and
can stand in the way of new entrants to the farming
industry.”
All possibly true, but that is conjecture, because they also can
provide stability and keep many people afloat. They may even have
contributed to Cambridge United’s six-nil defeat of Sheffield
Wednesday at the weekend— I do not know. There should not be
conjecture in an explanatory memorandum; there should be clear
statements of fact. I hope that paragraph 7.2 is deleted. In
fact, that conjecture has been copied across to the explanatory
memorandums accompanying a number of SIs.
The terms of the Agriculture (Financial Assistance) (Amendment)
Regulations are slightly more intriguing. It seems to be
tightening up some financial assistance schemes, and widening the
investigatory powers so that they apply to employees or agents of
an applicant or agreement holder. Perhaps the Minister can tell
us what prompted those changes. Perhaps there were oversights in
last year’s SI. She described it then as a “flexible and
proportionate framework”. Well, perhaps it was too flexible. Have
problems been encountered already? We should know.
How many problems have arisen with the four schemes that were
launched in 2021? How many suspected offences are there? I am
also slightly puzzled by paragraph 7.7 of the explanatory
memorandum to the financial assistance SI, which says that the
instrument brings DEFRA’s investigative powers
“closer to those…previously created under Common Agricultural
Policy…rules”.
In that sense, the powers are not new; but the paragraph goes on
to say that the SI gives DEFRA flexibility in a more
proportionate way. So it is like the CAP, but not like it.
Perhaps the Minister can explain that.
The meat of today’s debate relates to the lump sum payment
regulations, the principle of which we discussed at length in
Committee on the Agriculture Act almost two years ago. We will
not revisit the principle today, although I must say that the
amendment I moved in Committee remains relevant. We argued then
that the scheme posed a range of risks, and I am afraid I see
little in the detailed regulations to reassure us about that. I
am grateful to organisations such as Sustain and the Land Workers
Alliance for their briefing on this. They made points very
similar to those we made two year ago, and which I repeat today,
not least the point that encouraging farmers to exit does not
automatically lead to new entrants coming through, much as we all
hope that it will. They also fear, as do I, that the scheme is
wide open to abuse. I am astonished that more safeguards are not
in place. I would not be at all surprised if, in a few years’
time, we found that there had been significant problems with the
scheme.
I need hardly remind the Minister about the difficulties that her
Government have had with fraud. One of her colleagues memorably
resigned from the Dispatch Box in exasperation at the failures.
There was £4.3 billion written off; we do not want that added to.
I am sure that the Minister will want to reassure me, and the
wider public, that I am wrong on this, and I will listen with
interest, but it is hard to see the necessary safeguards. Sustain
warns that a landowner using the exit scheme could rent their
land on a five-year farm business fixed tenancy and regain full
control at the end of that time. Can the Minister confirm that?
The definition of “connected person” in paragraph 7 of the
regulations seems to suggest that the land could be simply gifted
to a brother, sister or family member—indeed, anyone other than a
spouse or civil partner—and get up to £100,000. Is that really
correct? Two brothers farming adjacently—hardly uncommon—could
basically do a swap. What is to stop it?
As I argued two years ago, the linkage to new entrants is
tenuous. We do not yet have details of the new entrant support
scheme. According to paragraph 4, applications have to be in by
30 September, which is just six months away. Does the Minister
expect the scheme to be in place by then? As the right hon.
Member for South Holland and The Deepings asked, what will the
link be? Does the Minister have any clue what the new scheme will
look like? Will it take on any of the recommendations in David
Fursdon’s 2013 “Future Of Farming Review Report”, which I am
grateful to George Dunn of the Tenant Farmers Association for
pointing me to? Getting new people into farming is complicated,
and the report contained many excellent recommendations, which I
hope have come up in some of the Minister’s discussions.
It is not just Sustain raising such concerns. The discussions of
the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee in June last
year are illuminating and bear rewatching. A series of expert
witnesses suggested a range of potential problems, including the
problem of how DEFRA could be sure that the right farmers were
taking advantage of the scheme. That rather prompts the question:
who would be the right people? Does the Minister have a view?
Frankly, it depends on what one sees as the purpose of the
scheme, which remains less than clear.
Presumably the Minister can give us a projection of how many
people the Government expect to take up the scheme. At an early
stage in the discussions, it was suggested that it would be so
popular that it would be limited by the available funds, but I
think many people are now less convinced that take-up will be
that high. Is the scheme cash-limited? If so, what is the limit?
How many are expected to take it up? How many new entrants are
expected to benefit? I suspect that the Minister may not have all
the answers, so perhaps she could write to me.
In the absence of explanations, the Minister will hear us express
again the concerns that we have long raised, including concern
that the real plan is to get rid of inconvenient family farms and
either intensify, to the detriment of the environment, or rewild
and import food produced to lower standards. That is the only
rational conclusion that can be drawn when the Government persist
in failing to set out a proper vision for farming. Perhaps when
we get a response to Henry Dimbleby’s review, we will get a
clearer idea. Will the Minister hint at when that will finally
happen?
There are one or two other minor concerns and loopholes.
Paragraph 7.4 of the explanatory memorandum to the lump sum
payment regulations says that the Government wish to help
“those farmers who wish to leave the sector”,
but that is not what the regulations do. So far as I can see,
there is nothing to stop someone taking the exit payment, using
the money to rent or buy land elsewhere, and then applying either
to the environmental land management scheme or for countryside
stewardship—a rather attractive double-earner. The Minister is
shaking her head, so perhaps she can explain how that will be
avoided.
It is two years since we discussed these issues during the
passage of the Agriculture Bill, and despite a public
consultation exercise, the level of detail we are being given
about how the schemes are supposed to work remains disappointing;
there are many more questions than answers. The Opposition want a
revitalised food and farming sector, in which new entrants are
encouraged and helped, so that there is innovation and new
vigour, and so that the enthusiasm that so many have for our
countryside can help our food production systems to flourish.
However, we have real doubts that the schemes will achieve those
objectives. We will not vote against the regulations today, but I
hope the warnings are noted.
2.48pm
Dame (Wallasey) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship this afternoon, Mr
Hollobone. I cannot say that I am an expert in all things
agricultural or farming, but a few general questions occurred to
me while perusing these statutory instruments, and I look forward
to the Minister’s response.
First, I do not think that DEFRA or this country was ever
stunningly brilliant at administering the common agricultural
policy scheme, so transitioning away from a stable scheme that
everyone was familiar with to something different, albeit for
good reasons, is bound to create the potential for confusion,
worry, and maybe even administrative problems. This is quite a
complex transition from a steady state to something that is
evolving. It would be useful to know whether the Minister has the
confidence to say that her officials and DEFRA can administer the
system over its transition period, which, at seven years, is
quite long.
Secondly, I understand the need for a transition period of this
length, but during such a transition, the objective circumstances
change. My hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge mentioned this
when he discussed the unforeseen circumstances in which we find
ourselves, in which volatile energy prices are impacting directly
on farmers’ costs. At the same time, the cost of fertiliser and
other inputs is rising, and the Government—this was preannounced
and expected—are reducing direct payments significantly and
putting in place a different scheme with different criteria.
Farmers face uncertain and volatile—but probably rising—costs at
a time when the basic income that they are used to is
transitioning. It will be difficult for farmers to deal with that
volatility without some sort of reassurance from the Government,
especially as the Government’s schemes are being tried out and
may change. In fact, the Minister has effectively admitted that
they are being shaped as the Government go along, which again
creates a lot of moving parts, and more uncertainty and
volatility. It also means that there may be a lot of unintended
consequences. Does she have any words of reassurance about that?
When all the cogs start going, we cannot always predict the
output.
As a member of the Treasury Committee, which has just interviewed
about fraud in the coronavirus
schemes, I reinforce the point made by my hon. Friend the Member
for Cambridge about the potential for fraud in some of these
schemes. Obviously, they are about giving farmers income. The
schemes have new criteria, which are being applied in new
circumstances. Will the Minister reassure us about the degree of
detail in them, and particularly in the mechanism for enforcement
and minimising the chances of fraud? If one looks at what has
happened in the coronavirus schemes and what is happening with
anti-fraud enforcement across the piece with this Government, it
is very, very fragmented. The enforcement muscle is weak and
unused, and consequently billions of pounds are being lost to
criminal gangs, opportunistic fraudsters and, quite often,
fraudsters who are far more sophisticated than opportunistic. If
these statutory instruments and the changes to agricultural
schemes are not properly drawn up or enforced, this is another
area where that might happen. Will the Minister reassure me on
those points?
2.53pm
(Thirsk and Malton)
(Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone.
I am not sure who chose me to serve on this Delegated Legislation
Committee, but we do not often have the chance to discuss
something in which we have a genuine interest. I represent a
rural constituency, and it is a great pleasure to do so. The
Minister has been fantastic in her engagement with my farmers,
and she knows some of their concerns about many of the areas that
have been discussed. I really appreciate her engagement.
I shall make a few short points. My very good friend, the
Minister, has talked about the quantum staying the same with
regard to what farmers will receive when moving from one system
to another. Can she confirm that the amount that farmers receive
overall will be the same? There is a worry that we are moving
from a simple, stable system, as has been alluded to, to a much
more complex system that must include lots of checks and
balances, because we are looking at an outcome-based
policy—people are paid for outcomes, rather than acreage. How
much of that money will be absorbed by the administration and
bureaucracy of the process? It is hugely important that farmers
receive the right amount, and the amounts that they have been
used to.
As has been said, the amount that farmers receive directly is
reducing, and other schemes are supposed to compensate for that.
I think that my hon. Friend has acknowledged that some of the
pilot schemes are not particularly well explained, detailed or
clear. A lot of farmers have seen a reduction in revenue—vital
support—particularly hill farmers, and they have not seen a
commensurate increase in revenue arising from other schemes that
they might be in. As my hon. Friend knows, in the past the
countryside stewardship scheme was hugely bureaucratic and often
it felt like people gave more money to be involved in it than
they received in compensation for running the scheme itself. I
know that my farmers would very much like to see a delay in the
proposed reduction and more development work on the pilots before
we move to a system of reduced payments.
We all know that food security and energy security are really
important. I am seeing an increasing amount of my productive
farmland—the best and most versatile land—going under solar farm
applications. That is equivalent to hundreds and hundreds of
acres in what is a very productive part of the country. Our local
authorities in their wisdom have declared climate emergencies,
and they are using that as a way to get round any requirements to
keep the best and most fertile land for farmland. They argue,
“Actually, we have a climate emergency, and therefore that
overrides the need to keep the best and most fertile land for
growing food.” We have energy production imperatives and targets
because of the race to net zero, and at the same time we have not
got food production targets. Our self-sufficiency was 75% in
1985, but it is now 60%. If we had a target for self-sufficiency
to grow to that higher amount, perhaps that would act as a check
and balance against local authorities giving consent for solar
farms.
I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way. There
was a debate in Westminster Hall about this last week, and the
points he is making were amplified. The critical thing is that
these two things are not unrelated. You can shorten the food
chain, reduce the number of air miles and grow more of what we
consume locally. Then one is both serving the objective of aiding
the planet and making us more secure in food in these uncertain
times. He is absolutely right that there is a need for an urgent
review of Government policy, and a change in planning law, if
necessary, to prevent monstrous solar parks from taking up
valuable agricultural land.
I was lucky enough to speak at the end of that debate, although I
was able to be there only for the last few minutes of it. It is
absolutely true. It seems perverse that we are putting solar
farms on productive farmland and not putting solar panels on top
of every commercial building, school, hospital and prison. There
must be some reason why we are doing it that way, but it would
make obvious sense to put panels in those locations rather than
on farmland. It is a debate that we need to have. I have been to
see the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural
Affairs, who is very supportive about the need for more
clarity.
We are moving away from acreage payments, as the rest of Europe
has, for example, to a system that is based on public goods. That
means that we are putting our farmers at a competitive
disadvantage. That is the reality, because they have to do stuff
to get that money. That means investment and the cost of capital.
We must maintain that fair and level playing field through trade
agreements and through the system of payments that we make. I
fear, and I know that the Minister has some sympathy with this
thought, that we are potentially putting our farmers at a
disadvantage. That is something we need to be very careful
about.
2.58pm
I cannot comment on the abilities of Cambridge United—I stick to
supporting Banbury United—but I am absolutely convinced that the
basic payments scheme is fundamentally unjust at the moment. The
top 10% of recipients receive half of the total budget, while the
bottom 20% get 2%. That is not a system that I want to defend. We
are applying the reductions to direct payments fairly, with
higher reductions being applied to those receiving higher
payments. About 80% of farmers will see a reduction of 20% this
year.
I would like to reassure the hon. Member for Wallasey that the
Rural Payments Agency, which traditionally many of us in the
farming industry were possibly less than polite about, has now
got a superb delivery record, and paid 98% of farmers immediately
the payment was due last year. I am genuinely reassured, and I
would be delighted to talk to her offline about that or any other
aspect of future farming policy. I am genuinely reassured that
farmers will be able to deliver these schemes as we roll them
out. They are an integral part of our planning for the new
schemes, and they are at all the meetings. The roll-out of the
scheme is very much about the delivery—testing and checking that
the money can reach the farmer on time. If it does not do that,
it does not work, so we need to make sure that that happens.
I should also like to reassure Members that we have committed to
maintaining the farming budget for the duration of this
Parliament. The money freed up by these reductions will be
repurposed, as I said, into our improved countryside stewardship
scheme—still slightly more complicated, and I say this as a
farmer who filled in the form shortly before Christmas, than I
would hope, and very much more complicated than the application
forms for the new schemes. That is very much part of our
transition to the new schemes. The reductions will also fund the
beginnings of the new environmental land management schemes and
the many grant schemes that are on offer.
All moneys that are saved by those reductions will be invested in
farming and farming businesses. I should like to reassure my hon.
Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton, to whom I often speak on
these matters—he represents some crackingly good farmland, as
well as many pig farmers, who are having a difficult time at the
moment, and many poultry farmers, who have had a very difficult
time with avian influenza this year—that the £3.7 billion budget
will stay the same for the duration of this Parliament. That is
very much an undertaking that the Government have given and to
which his neighbour, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, is
committed.
Direct payments are not strongly correlated with food production
levels. They parted company with headage payments about 15 years
ago, and many of the sectors in which we have the greatest
self-sufficiency are those that we have not traditionally
subsidised very much or at all. We are close to 100%
self-sufficient in poultry, eggs, carrots and swedes, and direct
payments have never been part of the business model of many of
these really successful sectors. Food security is important, and
very much part of departmental planning, as we seek to roll out
these new schemes. Indeed, one of the advantages of the
productivity grants is that sectors that have not been supported
by Government finance in the past will now be able to make real
innovations as a result of the money that we can put in.
Many Members are particularly concerned about the impact of
removing direct payments on small farms, but farm business
profitability is not, in fact, closely dependent on farm size.
Many smaller farmers are no more reliant on direct payments than
larger farmers, and they will initially receive smaller
reductions in their payments. The Government published an
evidence paper that was updated in September 2019 and which set
out the impacts of removing direct payments, including
sector-by-sector analysis, location and type of land tenure.
Detailed and updated impact assessments will be published later
this month, and it is important that we continue to do that as we
roll out this genuinely iterative policy.
The Agriculture (Financial Assistance) (Amendment) Regulations
2022 will ensure that our new financial assistance schemes are
regulated in the right way and are subject to the same
requirements as the schemes launched last year, but they are
tailored to the schemes that we have launched since then, and
that is where the differences arise. The measures have grown as
the schemes have grown. I was interested in the point made by the
hon. Member for Wallasey about fraud. We are absolutely committed
to making sure that these schemes are not subjected to fraud. We
are a small industry—85,000 farmers —and our land is well mapped.
A great deal is known in the Department and in Government
generally about the businesses that we support, but it is
important that we remain vigilant.
I hear what the Minister says, but I do not see anything in the
regulations to prevent some of those things from happening. In
some ways, it will not be fraud; it will just be people using the
system.
If the hon. Gentleman could hold on for just a moment, I will
come to the specific points that he made about the lump sum exit
scheme.
The regulations made good on our commitment to offer farmers a
lump sum exit scheme this year. We believe that the calculation
of the lump sum payment amount is fair. For most farmers, the
lump sum will be approximately equivalent to the amount that they
might otherwise receive in direct payments for the years
2022—this year and next year—to 2027, as they are phased out over
the remaining years of the planned transition.
The difference, which the hon. Member for Cambridge has perhaps
not had fully explained to him before, is that if farmers leave
farming, they will not be eligible to enter into new agreements
for certain land management schemes. The sustainable farming
incentive, agricultural options in countryside stewardship, and
agricultural options in local nature recovery will not be open to
them. The lump sum is very much aimed at those leaving farming,
and will require a bespoke agreement—we are in the process of
creating bespoke quotes for farmers at the moment. It will not be
appropriate or possible for them to take a lump sum and then
enter new schemes or take options within schemes that are based
primarily on owning agricultural land.
The lump sum exit scheme sits alongside extra support to help new
entrants into the industry. As I said earlier, the new entrants
schemes will be detailed and rolled out in 2023.
On the other points made by the hon. Member for Cambridge about
Henry Dimbleby and the Government’s food White Paper, I have
written to him, but the letter has obviously not reached him yet.
I was very much hoping, as I think he knows, to publish the
Government’s food strategy White Paper this week or last, but the
decision has been taken not to do that at the moment because of
the war in Ukraine. I reassure the hon. Gentleman, however, that
the work that would have flowed from that White Paper will
commence immediately, as if it had been published. I very much
hope that global events will enable us to publish it as soon as
we can.
To conclude, it is important that we continue with the
agricultural transition as planned. Applying reductions to direct
payments frees up money that we can use to pay farmers to
encourage environmental protection and enhancement, public access
to the countryside and the safeguarding of livestock and
plants.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That the Committee has considered the draft Direct Payments to
Farmers (Reductions) (England) Regulations 2022.
Draft Agriculture (Financial Assistance) (Amendment) Regulations
2022
Resolved,
That the Committee has considered the draft Agriculture
(Financial Assistance) (Amendment) Regulations 2022.—(.)
Draft Agriculture (Lump Sum Payment) (England) Regulations
2022
Resolved,
That the Committee has considered the draft Agriculture (Lump Sum
Payment) (England) Regulations 2022.—(.)
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