Examination of Witnesses (Questions 60 - 79)
THURSDAY 18 DECEMBER 1997
MR JOHN
LLOYD JONES,
MR HUGH
RICHARDS, MR
MALCOLM THOMAS,
MR ROBERT
GRIFFITHS PARRY
and MRS MARY
JAMES
Mr Paterson
60. Can we go back to the supermarkets from the lunacy of
the beef on the bone. You have shown obviously a real fear of
their buying power I have read that four outlets sell 80 per cent
of Britain's food.
(Mr Jones) Yes.
61. Do you think they are too powerful and is there a case
for recommending an investigation?
(Mr Jones) If you believe in a market led economy,
of course, there is very little you can do about that. What we
are saying is the supermarkets themselves have a duty of care
to their customers and whatever they are selling—I am sorry
to keep on repeating the same message—should be properly
labelled so the consumer knows exactly what they are buying.
(Mr Parry) The consumer also has the choice. There
are still the high street butchers where consumers can go and
buy meat but they are voting with their feet, they are going to
the supermarkets.
Mr Livsey
62. I would like to keep on about this supermarket business.
It is true, is it not, now that the supermarkets sell an awful
lot of quick easy manufactured food, it is very difficult to identify
the origin of it. What is your attitude to the Food Standards
Agency which is coming down the line prior to Government legislation?
Would you expect this would assist you in overcoming some of the
problems we have been discussing?
(Mr Parry) This will depend whether we have a proper
label. You are quite correct in saying that the move now is for
convenience food. That is why there has been a decline in the
consumption of beef because this comes in smaller cuts. I think
that the Food Agency will have to look at what is in that package
and it will have to be clearly labelled exactly where it is coming
from.
(Mr Richards) We would welcome the Food Standards
Agency and the sooner the better. We have to be on this level
playing field once again. Everything in that has to be labelled
for the consumer to know when she goes into the supermarket or
wherever she buys her product it is clearly labelled as far as
country of origin and all the things that could be in it and that
is the way forward.
63. You are saying at the moment the supermarkets have driven
a coach and horses right through this issue?
(Mr Richards) I do not know that they have driven
a coach and horses through the system. As I say, the type of information
put out there is quite often questionable.
(Mr Jones) The answer to that is there is no system
in place.
64. Thank you too.
(Mr Richards) There is a system in place but it is
very questionable.
Mr Livsey: Dodgy!
Mr Thomas
65. Acknowledging there is a crisis in the livestock industry,
what do you want the Government to do?
(Mr Parry) To give us first a level playing field
and it is important that there is money in Europe. We know that
the claim on the rebate is going to be costly but I believe that
the Government have to seriously consider two factors: do they
want an agriculture industry in this country and, secondly, do
they want to protect the rural areas.
66. What do you want the Government to do?
(Mr Parry) Actually, first of all, there has to be
a cash injection into the industry.
67. Cash, how much?
(Mr Parry) It is very difficult to say and it would
be improper for me to say that but it has to be a substantial
amount. We have given you evidence of the low income in the industry
and it is very, very important that we do tap into the agri-monetary
compensation that is available to the UK. The beef sector will
get 17 per cent of it, that will give a maximum of £167 million;
the dairy sector will get 48 per cent, a maximum of £304
million; the cereal sector is £471 million and the sugar
beet sector £39 million, that is out of a total of £981
million. Of course that would cost the present Government an £843
million loss of rebate. I believe that if they do want to protect
the most important industry, and I believe that agriculture is
the core industry, especially in Wales, that cash injection must
come straight through to the farmers. Also they have to look at
the medium to long term. There are other schemes in Europe that
the Government has not taken up: the early retirement scheme is
one of them, the installation scheme for young farmers. The problem
at the moment is with the young farmers. There were people in
the Lobby on Tuesday saying that they had sons at home who had
no interest at all now, 15 or 16 year old sons, no interest at
all to come into the industry because they could see no future
in it. Unless this Government does act quickly I am afraid that
will lose the young people from those areas. John was saying before
about the schools, we are going to see a deterioration of the
countryside and I think that the taxpayer is very, very interested
in keeping the rural areas.
68. Does the NFU have similar views?
(Mr Jones) I listed them right in my opening address:
the implementation of the agri-monetary package, redoubling their
efforts to lift the export ban, at worst deferring the add-on
costs until the industry is in a viable enough state to pay them
and also looking as a matter of urgency at a labelling scheme
for supermarkets.
69. What about the regulations with regard to the import
as opposed to the sale of beef over 30 months?
(Mr Jones) Again I think that the wording of the legislation
needs to be looked at and the policing of the system needs to
be looked at.
70. What do you recommend by way of policing?
(Mr Jones) That there is a clear obligation from the
retailer backwards to make sure that what is on sale is what it
says it is.
Mr Edwards
71. How much do you think we have suffered in this country
from not having a long term agricultural strategy both for the
industry and for the Government?
(Mr Parry) That is a very, very difficult question
to answer because we have never had it. There has never been a
long term commitment to agriculture. I remember the days of the
annual price review where we had to vote yearly for payments for
farmers and we seem to be now more or less in the same position
where we never have the same terms as other Member States have
had. We are in the club, the same rules should apply throughout
Europe.
(Mr Jones) Mr Chairman, I know there is a Welsh Office
initiative to have a look at Welsh agriculture in its entirety
from the food strategy to all an all Wales agri-environment scheme.
I think we should welcome that and I think that is one way we
could all come together to see how on earth we can try to solve
these problems both in the short, the medium and the long term.
72. Can I ask, do your separate unions have your own strategies,
your own manifestos of where you want to see the industry going?
(Mr Jones) Our basic one would be to keep as many
farmers as possible in a viable situation on the land.
(Mr Parry) And maximise the number of farms.
(Mr Thomas) In terms of looking ahead, we have the
Santer Agenda 2000 package on which discussion will seriously
commence shortly. Yes, we have analysed that and have particular
views on what might and might not be the best ways to deal with
that package not only here, in Wales, but in the UK and also in
Europe. That is often where the difficulties arise. At the end
of the day there are 15 Member States all of whom start from a
different point and yet the system requires them to arrive at
a common conclusion. Certainly within that framework I believe
that the Santer 2000 package is crucial because now there is a
need to look not just at five years, which may be what happened
with the last reform package, but to look beyond that and put
in place measures which will take us perhaps a decade or 15 years
in agricultural terms ahead.
(Mr Richards) The agricultural policy is driven by
CAP and CAP reform and Agenda 2000 but finding a policy that is
common throughout Europe from the Arctic Circle down to the Southern
Mediterranean and maybe to expand further east is always a difficult
one. I am told that the Minister that is most successful with
this is possibly the person who is able to stay awake for three
days on the trot and then he is able to barter some deal at the
end of it. Discussions go on for day after day after day and you
come out bleary eyed and the man who was awake at the time has
got the better deal for the country and not necessarily the better
deal for agriculture.
(Mrs James) I think the difficulties that agriculture
has is that it requires to take long term management decisions,
the very nature of the enterprise is such that long term management
decisions have to be taken and yet we have the vagaries not only
of the weather, which clearly in our industry have a marked impact,
we have the vagaries of the financial markets, we have the vagaries
of European policy and it is very difficult to draw up strategies.
We know what we want but at the end of the day inevitably whatever
derives from Europe, whatever derives from the WTO talks, inevitably
is a compromise. You go in negotiating what you would like to
see for your industry but what you draw out of any agreement can
vary quite considerably from that which you would seek.
(Mr Parry) The important point here is to stress that,
yes, we need medium to long term policy but we need also something
in the short term for us to be able to be there when it comes
to long term policy.
Mr Paterson
73. Would you like to see agricultural policy decided at
a national level and not a European level?
(Mr Jones) European level.
(Mrs James) I think as far as the Santer proposals
are concerned, clearly they will have a crucial bearing on the
future of our industry. Certainly we recognise that the strength
of the rural vote on the Continent is very much greater than it
is domestically and as a consequence of which probably in a European
context we wield a greater influence on policy than we do perhaps
domestically. Certainly we would welcome an element of subsidiarity
in terms of the CAP reform and we would very much welcome the
fact that there is this element of discretion which they are seeking
to introduce in terms of the distribution of resources. Certainly
we recognise there will not be any real increase in the resources
available to agriculture but what we would like to see is a better
deployment of those resources to maximise the number of viable
family farms we have.
Mr Livsey
74. One point relevant to what you have just said, the Secretary
of State I believe is going to have a review of agriculture but
also we hear the word creeping of restructuring. It is difficult
to quantify exactly what that is but some farmers have interpreted
it as being less people on the land. Do you see that as a danger?
(Mr Richards) Restructuring has taken place since
I have been farming. I look just in my immediate vicinity, how
the number of farmers have decreased over the years. I remember
when I first got involved with the old Milk Marketing Board there
were 70,000 milk producers in England and Wales, we are now down
to 25,000. In France when quotas came in there were 450,000 milk
producers in France, there are now 140,000. It is taking place
all the time. Businesses have always evolved and restructured.
75. Do you not think that the evidence is that our farms
are very much larger than those on the Continent and we have restructured?
(Mr Jones) The real dilemma here is that farmers have
been told that we must be multi-functional, yet we receive by
far the greater percentage from food production both in terms
of what we get from the market place and in terms of agricultural
support: though we are told to be multi-functional it is that
food element which is 90 per cent of our income. What we desperately
need is some mechanism where we are rewarded for those other functions
as well as food production.
Mr Thomas
76. There has been of course considerable media coverage
of certain illegal actions by various individuals. What view do
you take as Unions with regard to those individuals' actions?
(Mr Jones) Once those happened both Mr Parry and myself
immediately condemned them. We had to, quite rightly, because
once you start condoning them where on earth do you start drawing
lines in the sand? Certainly from my point of view, and I am certain
Mr Parry will speak for himself, I am adamant that we were quite
right to take the line we did.
(Mr Parry) I endorse what John has just said.
Mr Jones
77. All the picketing of the ports and things have currently
stopped. What is the mood of the members at the moment in waiting
for the announcement of the Government? What do you think will
be the response?
(Mr Parry) Expectations of what will be in that statement
from the Minister. I think farmers are thinking that they are
going to get good compensation, if that does not come then I am
afraid they will meet again. We will expect a reasonable compensation
as well.
Mr Paterson
78. Do you think you can control them?
(Mr Parry) Can we control the two or three thousand
members that we came across, John and myself, last Wednesday?
It is impossible to control them. They are fighting for their
survival.
(Mr Jones) We have a duty to explain to them exactly
what is happening. What we cannot control is their reaction to
it.
79. What do you think the reaction may be if they do not
like the package, if the package comes?
(Mr Jones) Ask me when the statement has been made
is the only honest answer I can give to that question.
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