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6.36 pm
Mr. James Paice (South-East Cambridgeshire): I must start my brief contribution by informing the House of my interests in this matter. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Mr. Boswell), I grow corn, albeit on a much smaller scale. I have just one field of corn on my property, but the fact remains that I grow it--this year, it is Riband--and, therefore, I have an interest to declare.
I am also privileged to represent the British Society of Plant Breeders, which has its headquarters in my constituency, a number of plant breeding companies--similar to those represented by my hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr. Lansley)--and, of course, many farmers.
This debate has been marked out by the exceptional maiden speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr. Collins). As is traditional, he described his constituency in glowing terms and all of us who know it will accept them. At times when one listens to maiden speeches, it takes a little broad mindedness to accept the glowing terms ascribed to some areas, but that is certainly not true of his constituency. He also paid rightful tribute to our great friend Michael Jopling, who is now a colleague in the other place.
Coincidentally, I first met Michael Jopling in 1975, when he held the post that I now occupy--the No. 2 Opposition spokesman on agriculture. That was at the time of the then Labour Government's destruction of the farm tenancy system by the introduction of inherited tenancies, which led to the drying up of supply, as we believed that it would.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale on an exceptionally good and clear speech about his constituency and his views on this issue. I was particularly interested in his comments about the controller's salary. I noticed the look of consternation that passed down the row of officials as soon as civil servants' salaries were raised. That bodes well for my hon. Friend's future contributions in the House. I also share his recognition and experience of the way in which, despite our differences, the House can come together at times of individual trial and grief. I, too, lost my father a few months ago, and I entirely share my hon. Friend's feelings.
Most of the issues that have arisen are probably best dealt with in amendments, and I shall certainly press the Minister on them in Committee, so for now I want only to refer to one or two contributions. My hon. Friend--and neighbour--the Member for South Cambridgeshire represents part of the area that I formerly represented, including much of the National Institute of Agricultural Botany, where so much work is done with plant varieties and purity testing and where the approved lists originate.
My hon. Friend the Member for Daventry demonstrated, as one would expect from a former Minister responsible for such matters, his immense knowledge of the subject. I look forward to his
contributions in Committee. He reminded us of many of the old varieties and I cannot forbear reminiscing for a moment: years ago, I was a qualified crop inspector, inspecting thousands of acres of cereals and legumes, as standing crops, for varietal purity. Sadly, other things got in the way and my qualifications have long since lapsed, but I recall many enjoyable and not so enjoyable days traipsing through standing crops with my yardstick--it was a yardstick in those days--testing for purity.
My hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes), who also has a huge constituency, expressed a view that I hold dear: that ultimately the interests of farmers and of plant breeders must be the same. They are interdependent, and that is why the Opposition welcome the Bill, which originated in our time in government. It represents the convention for the protection of new varieties of plants--the UPOV convention--and the European Union regulation and has had a long and sometimes painful birth. I am aware, from my constituency involvement, of how long it took for the discussions between farmers and breeders to come up with an agreement on farm-saved seed. They now recognise their interdependence.
Mr. Rooker:
I shall reply to the debate succinctly, on the basis that questions of detail can be dealt with in Committee. I am grateful for the constructive way in which hon. Members have approached what is a complex and technical Bill. There is an enormous amount of knowledge around from outside interests, and perhaps that has helped us to have a balanced and supportive debate. It is also clear that some hon. Members have taken the trouble to read the compliance cost assessment and check what is in the Library; I am grateful for that, and for the back-up that has been available to me as a new Minister in preparing for the debate.
The hon. Member for Lewes (Mr. Baker) asked various questions, many of which I hope that he will not feel obliged to repeat in Committee; nevertheless, I will do my best to give him detailed answers in Committee, rather than now. I want to disabuse him straight away of any impression that the Bill allows or provides for retrospective payments; it does not and there are no grounds for supposing that it does.
We have an enormously complex protective arrangement to ensure that the food that gets on the table in our homes is safe. I freely admit--I have said it both inside and outside the House since taking office--as someone who was not involved with the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food in the past, that I was astonished to see the hundreds of people working in MAFF on food safety and regulation, in a detailed, supportive and professional way, whose work has been completely overshadowed by the few big crises that we all know about and need not go into now.
No new foods can be created in this country without being constantly checked and tested. No new products or ingredients are allowed into the country without checks and testing. Nothing should happen by accident, and if
accidents happen we have a procedure for dealing with them--and we even intend to tighten the procedures that we have inherited.
Mr. Baker:
If food safety has been such a roaring success in recent years, why are the Government introducing a food standards agency?
Mr. Rooker:
We are introducing legislation to transfer the very people whom I have just described, plus others in the Department of Health, to allow them to work in a more concentrated fashion. They will be seen to be completely independent of the Government, so when problems arise it will not have to be a Minister who is the arbiter. If hon. Members are not interested in having a food standards agency, I shall be glad to debate it with them when we introduce the relevant Bill. We want to improve the regulatory system and boost consumer confidence.
The hon. Member for Lewes gave the impression that food ingredients and seeds are uncontrolled and appear on the plate in consumers' homes without any checks. That is simply not the case, as I shall make clear when we introduce the other legislation. I welcome his amendments, however, as we are proceeding not in a rush but at the convenience of the House.
The House will rule on whether we proceed to further stages. As is right with such a Bill, announced only last week, starred amendments have been selected. I freely admit that the Government originally contemplated introducing the Bill in the other place, but the timetable following the general election for the preparation of legislation was such that there was a convenient slot that we thought it right to take advantage of today.
My hon. Friend the Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell) raised many issues, some of which were well outside the scope of the Bill, but I understand why he raised them. He asked about the strength of our regulatory system. I told him that we have in place the necessary regulatory systems, through the Advisory Committee on Releases to the Environment, to ensure that genetically modified plants are not released into the environment. As the hon. Member for Daventry rightly said, that is a matter for the Department of the Environment.
On food safety, my hon. Friend the Member for Linlithgow recognised that no new foods could be made available to the public without clearance from the Advisory Committee on Novel Foods and Processes. A few weeks ago, I sat in on a meeting of that Committee. I freely admit that I am an ordinary production engineer and the science is way over my head, but the committee is incredibly high powered, with people with doctorates, vice-chancellors and professors around the table. There are two non-scientific members, one of whom is specifically concerned with ethics; I believe that that is almost unique among the Government's advisory committees.
People are concerned about novel foods and processes. We did not invent the committee; its members were already in place when we came to office. It is not a secret science committee: it has a consumer input and an ethical input, and that is extremely important. We want to reinforce that contribution in other bodies involved with the Ministry.
Mr. Dalyell:
Is there any disadvantage in having two committees running in parallel, one responsible to MAFF and the other to the Department of the Environment?
Mr. Rooker:
I know of no difficulty, but there is clearly incredible cross-fertilisation between Whitehall Departments. Sometimes it is right that matters are dealt with by more than one Ministry so that a different set of minds is brought to them. The point will be raised in more detail later in the year, or certainly next year, when we produce a draft Bill on the food standards agency following the White Paper.
I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr. Collins). I have no problem in saying that the Lake district is the most beautiful part of my country. I really enjoyed my ministerial away-day in his constituency yesterday. It was my second away-day out of London, both of which have been in the north of England. I was educated, informed and made extremely welcome by all the people whom I met in the environmentally sensitive farm that I visited, in the farm shops and while launching the booklet. I freely admitted that the farm shop innovation was not thought up by this Government but was something that we carried through happily from the previous Government. I pay tribute to the previous documents that MAFF has published on farm diversification.
The hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale made a remarkable maiden speech. He rightly reminded us of Michael Jopling, to whom hon. Members who were in the House before the general election are grateful. It took 34 months for us to debate the Jopling report after it was published. I always said that that was a disgrace. A questionnaire found that 85 to 90 per cent. of hon. Members agreed with all its recommendations and could not understand why we had had to wait for 34 months to civilise our arrangements. That involved not cutting but reorganising our hours. We pay tribute to Michael Jopling for that.
The hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale asked about the power of the controller and the assistant controller. I make no bones about it. I am not prepared--I do not think that any Minister would be--to discuss the individual salaries of professional, career civil servants. This is not a quango. They are career civil servants appointed by Ministers. One of their duties is dealing with plant varieties. I asked about the other duties that they perform this morning. They deal with plant variety rights, national listing--which was raised by many hon. Members but has nothing to do with the Bill--and seed certification. The plant variety office, in respect of all the factors that I mentioned, is operated by about three dozen people; the plant variety rights system costs about £1 million a year. All of that is recovered from the fees that plant breeders pay; there is no cost to the taxpayer. When officials represent Britain abroad, plant breeders do not pay; that is a taxpayer-funded job because it is a matter of public interest. He would not expect me to go beyond that.
The hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale asked about the powers of Ministers to instruct farmers to hand over information under clause 9. Farmers will have to give exactly the same information as they do under the EC system, including their name and address, the amount of seeds saved, the name and address of the processor and, if appropriate, when they previously saved seed of the
variety concerned. That is not onerous. Processors will have to give breeders the same information as they have given under the EC system, including name and address, the name and address of the person for whom they processed the farm-saved seed, and the amount and variety they processed. That is not onerous. If anyone can put a case that it is, I shall consider it.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Mr. Kidney) asked about the speed of the Bill's passage. I hope that I have covered that point. I compliment him for taking the trouble to find out that notes on clauses were in the Vote Office and that the compliance cost assessment was in the Library. That is a very helpful document and the only one in which figures are given. I commend it to hon. Members. They may find it useful reading while we are having the Division that the Liberals may call.
The hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr. Lansley) exemplified the knowledge of hon. Members who represent both breeders and farmers. It is helpful to have Members who represent both sides. They understand the balance that has been struck. They realise that breeders cannot operate without farmers and vice versa; they are interdependent.
The second maiden speech was that of the hon. Member for South-East Cornwall (Mr. Breed), to whom I pay tribute. I note his compliments to Robert Hicks. I was first elected in February 1974, and remember that the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler) was here during the interregnum in 1974 and then out of the House for all the years that Robert Hicks looked after the constituency so ably. Everyone will be grateful for his tribute to Robert Hicks. I wish his constituency well with the Eden institute. I hope that the lottery money for it does not take as long as that for some projects in my constituency. That is a constant problem for hon. Members.
The hon. Member for Daventry (Mr. Boswell), a fellow midlands Member, supported the Bill. He was right to pay tribute, as do I, to the work of the officers, officials and scientists who put the Bill together over the years. If the issue had been different on 1 May he would probably have been standing at the Dispatch Box now. He understood the need for speed. We are not rushing against anyone's wishes. We will do our best.
I accept that a Bill that goes through all its stages in one day, if that is the wish of the House, deserves very detailed consideration in the other place. The Government will be more than susceptible to amendments tabled and comments made in the other place. If the other place amends the Bill, we should be happy to provide the necessary time, as would be our duty, to ensure that the House can properly debate the issue. I give that assurance. Given what I have said for about 20 years as a Back Bencher, I would do nothing else.
I am grateful for the support of the hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes) for the Bill and for his comments on the speech of the hon. Member for Lewes (Mr. Baker), which I found helpful even though he had to do a 180 deg turn to the Chair to present them. He pointed out that co-operation of farmers and breeders is crucial. He asked about genetically modified organism technology. I cannot go into detail now, but there will be an opportunity to do so in Committee or on Third Reading. I will certainly give him an answer. Whenever we discuss such issues, hon. Members will raise GMO technology. I am as concerned as anyone: I am an
ordinary consumer. Where genetic modification is involved, there must be complete openness. Public confidence must be built, and that can come only from openness of information on labelling and on technology transfer and exchanges. It is vital that we do that. We do not want to put people off. GMO technology will happen anyway, so Britain cannot opt out. We and our farmers would suffer economically. Our technology and economic interests would suffer if we sought to opt out of technology.
The hon. Member for Daventry asked about smaller varieties. That is a question for the national list. Without going over the matter in greater detail, having had a quick opportunity to take advice, my views are generally those that he expressed in writing to people when he was a Minister. Clearly, we will press for changes in the Community. It would be churlish to quote him back his own letter, but I hope that he will be satisfied that that is the view that I am currently content to take. I hope that the House will give the Bill a Second Reading.
Question put, That the Bill be now read a Second time:--
The House divided: Ayes 289, Noes 35.
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