Steve Reed speech to CLA Conference

Steve Reed MP, Labour’s Shadow Environment Secretary speech at CLA Rural Business Conference, 30 November 2023

"It is a great privilege to speak to you today.

Thank you to the CLA for inviting me.

And thank you too for your crucial work standing up for rural businesses and landowners.

I also want to thank Victoria Vyvyan and Mark Tufnell for the support and guidance they have given the Labour Party over the years.

I am of course very new to this role.

But I am delighted that my three months in post makes me much more experienced than my opposite number.

The new boy Steve Barclay.

I welcome him to his new role.

One of the most significant in government.

And if the voters are willing, I’d be proud to follow him in the Department.

The role of rural life and landowners in our country’s history cannot be overstated.

It was the shepherds and wool mills across the Cotswolds and East Anglia that drove our medieval economy.

With English cloth dressing Europe and much of the world.

It was the ingenuity of our landowners and farmers that fuelled the growth of our towns and cities, powering the industrial revolution, making Britain the world power it is today.

It was our countryside that dug deep for victory during the world wars, feeding our soldiers.

It was the landowners who played a vital role through the centuries as stewards of our environment and custodians of our countryside.

Our entire country is grateful and proud of this history.

It helps define who we are.

Gives us a sense of belonging.

Yet, Westminster in more recent times has ignored the needs and ambitions of our rural communities.

Communities facing an age of insecurity.

A period of rapid change that has left too many behind.

Working families facing falling pay and rising poverty.

The highest personal tax burden since the second world war.

Skyrocketing mortgage rates and rising rents pricing many out of a home.

Inadequate public transport leaving towns and villages cut off.

Farmers abandoned by a government that promised to promote British exports.

But instead locked high quality British produce behind unnecessary trade barriers.

Soaring energy prices have clobbered farmers and producers, forcing up prices for fertilizers and animal feed.

This perfect storm has pushed more than 4 food producers out of business every single day.

Jobs lost, livelihoods destroyed, futures broken.

The beauty of our nature is a source of national pride.

But we see toxic sewage swilling through our rivers, lakes and seas.

With the highest levels of pollution ever recorded in our waterways. 

What a chance the Government had in last week’s Autumn Statement to turn things around.

To give hope back to our rural businesses and communities. 

But they blew it.

They ignored the importance and the potential of our rural communities.

The countryside cannot afford more decline.

It’s time to turn the page and embrace a decade of national renewal with the countryside at its heart.

With Keir Starmer, Labour has a plan to restore pride to our countryside.

Restore pride to our rural communities.

Restore pride to our rural businesses.

Labour will grow our rural economy.

We will get the economy firing on all cylinders - and in all parts of the country.

Set up a new British Infrastructure Council.

Bringing together key investors to steer private investment into rural economies.

Rolling out broadband to drive innovation.

Powering growth with new electricity grids.

We will speed up the planning system that is holding back business expansion.

Replace business rates with a fairer system fit for the 21st century.

Promoting entrepreneurship in our rural economies.

Labour will switch on GB Energy.

A new publicly owned energy company that will drive public and private investment to harness clean home-grown British power: wind, wave, solar and nuclear.

That means cheaper bills for rural businesses and farmers.

We will rewire Britain to get the energy where it’s needed and get the National Grid moving faster.

Under the Conservatives, farmers and landowners wait years to plug their renewable energy into the grid.

No more.

Labour will slash the wait for planning decisions from years to months.

Putting money into the pockets of thousands of farmers and landowners.

Labour will offer a new deal for farmers.

COVID, Ukraine, Israel have shown how insecure our world can be, and how volatile our supply chains are.

Nowhere is this more evident than our food supplies.

Crippling food inflation, empty supermarket shelves, working people queuing outside food banks all tell us one thing.

Food security is national security.

A new deal for farmers to reduce our reliance on insecure imports and deliver high quality, local produce for consumers.

A new deal for farmers to cut the red tape and costs at our borders.

Labour will seek a veterinary agreement with the European Union that will get our great British food exports moving again.

A new deal for farmers that will back British producers.

And we’ll use the government’s own purchasing power so that at least half of all food in our schools, hospitals and prisons is locally produced.

That is more than a billion pounds directed into the pockets of British farmers.

A new deal for farmers that reduces flood risk.

Through a Cobra-style Flood Resilience Taskforce that will meet every winter to protect vulnerable rural communities and farms.

Spades in the ground to dig out new drainage systems, flood defences and natural flood management schemes.

We want responsible access to nature so people from all backgrounds can enjoy the beautiful countryside that is our shared inheritance.

But let me be absolutely clear.

Labour will not introduce a Scottish style Right to Roam Act that is inappropriate for farms and the landscape across England.

Responsible access will not come at the expense of farmers and landowners, the security of their valuable crops and habitats, or public safety.

In the short time I’ve been in this job, people living in rural communities have told me how crime blights their areas. 

We cannot continue to accept rising levels of anti-social behaviour and fly tipping that routinely goes unpunished. 

These might be classed as low-level crimes by some.

But they are devastating to rural communities.

That is why Labour will recruit thirteen thousand more neighbourhood police and PCSOs, paid for by simplifying procurement across our police forces.

That will mean more police on the streets in our towns and villages.

And we will force those who dump rubbish, fly tip or vandalise local areas to join “clean up squads” to make amends for what they’ve done. 

With Labour, those who make the mess will clean up the mess.

In 1997 and 2001, Labour won a majority of rural seats in Parliament. 

But since then, we became too detached from the aspirations and concerns of our rural communities.

No more.

With Keir Starmer’s leadership, Labour will treat our rural communities with respect. 

That means people from urban areas - like me - not telling people who live and work in the countryside how they should live their lives.

That is why Labour will deliver the biggest ever transfer of power from Westminster to the British people in all parts of the country.

We want rural communities to control their own futures.

Choosing the skills, childcare and employment training that suit the needs of their local economy.

Choosing how their local buses should be run.

People who live in the countryside know what’s best for the countryside.

And with Labour, they’ll get the power to make it happen.

Our countryside can no longer afford decline.

It’s time to turn the page and embrace a decade of national renewal.

Labour has a plan to restore pride in our countryside.

A plan to grow our rural economy, switch on Great British Energy, deliver a new deal for farmers, hand rural communities control over their future.

It’s time to give our rural communities their future back."