House of Commons
Thursday 30 January 2003
The House met at half-past Eleven o'clock
PRAYERS
[Mr. Speaker in the Chair]
Oral Answers to Questions
ENVIRONMENT, FOOD AND RURAL AFFAIRS
The Secretary of State was asked—
GM Crops
1. Mr. Simon Thomas (Ceredigion): If she will make a statement on the commercial planting of GM crops. [94156]
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Margaret Beckett): No GM crop currently has all the regulatory approvals needed for commercial growing in the United Kingdom.
Mr. Thomas: I thank the Secretary of State for that answer, but I am looking to the future. May I refer her to the report recently published by the Health and Community Care Committee of the Scottish Parliament, which states that
- "allowing GM crop trials to continue does contravenes the precautionary principle"?
Margaret Beckett: Obviously, what happens in Wales and Scotland is an issue for the devolved Administrations and not just the United Kingdom Government. I am not entirely sure whether I am familiar with the specific report to which the hon. Gentleman refers, but it has always seemed to me, just as it did to my predecessors, that the right way of proceeding is to examine the evidence and conduct proper trials. That is what the Government are endeavouring to do.
Joan Ruddock (Lewisham, Deptford): Further to those points, is my right hon. Friend aware of the position of the Scottish Executive and the Welsh Assembly in saying that the field trial results should be available before the public consultation on which she is embarking is carried out? The steering group of the GM
public debate board has said that it finds it extremely difficult to envisage effective consultation without common timing throughout the UK. Will she take those points into consideration and understand that we, the public, feel very strongly that the results of the trials should be available to inform that public debate?
Margaret Beckett: Of course, I always take seriously the views and concerns of the steering group, but it is not entirely clear to me that the public feel quite so passionately about the precise timing and conduct of the debate. As we are beginning to embark on the inquiry process, what I most want to know is what questions the public wish to have answered. I want to know what information the public want, as opposed—I say this with great respect to all those who are engaged in the dialogue—to what everybody is telling us that they want. I want to hear from the public themselves what they want to know, so that we can do as much as we can to give them the information that they seek in order to allow them to form their own views and judgments.
I cannot remember my hon. Friend's precise words, but I am not sure whether she represents entirely accurately the views of the Scottish and Welsh Administrations, although they have certainly taken more of a view that the issue should be bound up with the crop trials. My worry has always been that, if we were to make the crop trials themselves the main feature of the dialogue and debate, we would be accused of not having a proper debate, but merely one about paving the way for decisions. That is not the case.
Mr. Robert Key (Salisbury): May I encourage the Secretary of State to be far more robust and proactive and to put far more time and resources into the public debate about GM crops and genetic modification in general? Will she ensure that the argument is not allowed to rest solely in the hands of the self-serving scaremongers who apparently represent a lot of views in this country? The vast majority of my constituents are hungry for knowledge, keen to make sensible judgments and, where progress can be made and benefits from GM shown to exist, they are ready to embrace them.
Margaret Beckett: The hon. Gentleman clearly expresses one of the many strands of dialogue and debate on this matter. I note yet another plea for more expenditure from the Conservative Benches, but I fear that the £300,000 or thereabouts that we are prepared to put in seems a large sum. We are certainly very anxious to encourage informed dialogue on the issues.
Andrew George (St. Ives): If the Government really want to reconnect with farmers, as is stated in their farming strategy, which was published last month, why are some elements of the Government so keen to push GM technology on farmers when consumers are at best showing no interest and at worst advancing good arguments as to why farmers should remain GM-free? Whose interests would be served by pushing GM crops on farmers? The Prime Minister seems keen on the issue and Lord Haskins is also keen to lock farmers into
contracts, but if the farmers want to reconnect with consumers, they would be best advised to leave well alone.
Margaret Beckett: I am not aware that anybody is trying to push GM crops on farmers. Certainly, no one in the Government is doing so. I remind the hon. Gentleman that a perfectly proper legal process is under way whereby an application was made to conduct a process of assessing the possibility of commercially growing some of the crops in this country. It was decided by my predecessors that a proper trial should be conducted of the effects of growing such crops on the immediate environment. It is being conducted and that seems an entirely sensible way of behaving.
Mr. Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury): In introducing crop trials into this country, has the Secretary of State taken note of the experience in America, where the Organic Soil Association reports that in one Canadian province the whole organic rape sector was lost owing to the carrying out of such trials? Will she carefully consider the experience in America before introducing trials of any great magnitude in this country?
Margaret Beckett: I am aware of the report that the hon. Gentleman cites. He will be aware that there are a plethora of such reports, which do not all say quite the same thing. The question focuses on crops that are being trialled in this country, which are not necessarily comparable. For example, one of the problems identified in the Canadian studies was that of gene stacking. That can occur only with crops that can cross-pollinate each other, which is not the case with those that are being trialled in this country.
Livestock Movements
2. Phil Sawford (Kettering): If she will make a statement on the 20-day standstill rule for livestock. [94157]
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Margaret Beckett): We announced in a written statement on 23 January that, subject to satisfactory further consultation with the livestock industry, we intend to reduce the standstill for cattle, sheep and goats to six days with effect from 4 March 2003.A supporting document explaining that decision has been placed in the Library and published on the Department's website.
Phil Sawford : I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer. I am sure that many in the agricultural industry will welcome those changes, because the previous arrangement was having a serious impact, especially on smaller farmers. As the restrictions are intended to combat the spread of serious contagious diseases, which could be catastrophic, will my right hon. Friend give an assurance to the House that she will take action against any farmers, landholders, dealers or others who seek to break or circumvent the rules?
Margaret Beckett: My hon. Friend makes an important point. He will know, and other hon.
Members will recall, that the Government were strongly advised by the Royal Society inquiry and the Anderson inquiry to maintain restrictions until an assessment could be carried out. I assure my hon. Friend that one of my reasons for mentioning the consultation with the livestock industry is that the changes are subject to the industry's commitment to a package of measures to improve the level of biosecurity and disease surveillance. In everything we do, we must be sure that we do what we can to minimise the risk of disease entering the country, while, much more importantly, minimising the risk of the spread of disease. We shall certainly keep that well in mind.
Mr. Peter Atkinson (Hexham): I, too, welcome the reduction of the standstill rule to six days, as will Northumbrian farmers. However, does the Secretary of State recognise that some of the other proposals that are out for consultation are causing real concern? I want to highlight in particular the movement restriction that limits the movement of sheep sold through livestock marts to 150 km, or 90 miles. That means that Northumbrian farmers will be unable to move sheep to the abattoirs that are used by all the major supermarket companies, and will be able to sell sheep into that market only by selling directly to the supermarkets, whose prices, as we know, will not be generous.
Margaret Beckett: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for welcoming our proposals. Of course I understand that there will be concern about some issues. The point of the consultation is to enable us to consider them all, and we shall certainly do so.
Lawrie Quinn (Scarborough and Whitby): On the evening of 16 January, I spent an interesting three hours with 18 sheep farmers from the north York moors, who will be very pleased to hear my right hon. Friend's confirmation of the reduction in the standstill rule from 20 days to six days. They asked me to press not only the Secretary of State but her noble Friend Lord Whitty to consider how soon they would be able to switch the six-day rule on to an emergency basis, so that in the event of a future outbreak the regulations could be introduced at that time of difficulty in the industry. Will my right hon. Friend address that issue?
Margaret Beckett: It depends a little on what my hon. Friend was being urged to advocate. If people are anxious that we might need to increase the six-day period in a more difficult situation because of the implications of a disease, I assure him that the Government would review the matter at an appropriate time. However, if some people in the industry advocate a return to the days of no movement restrictions, I find that hard to contemplate. No Government would be keen to risk that, not least because of the huge consequences of the recent outbreak for the industry and a range of other economic interests in rural areas.
Mr. John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings): It would be churlish not to welcome the Government's late conversion on livestock movements—[Interruption.] I say "late" because the industry and Conservative Members told the Government weeks, even months ago to change the 20-day rule because of
the damage that it was inflicting. Hon. Members of all parties highlighted that. Does the Secretary of State understand that the Pauline conversion will be useless if the changes to the operating procedures cripple our essential livestock markets, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) suggested? The threat to those markets is profound and it has been well highlighted in Farmers Weekly, as the Secretary of State knows. Will she guarantee that changes to procedures on keeping animals overnight, washing and disinfecting vehicles and the distances that animals travel will be genuinely practical and cost neutral to the industry? As she is so worried about the import and spread of disease—
Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman gets one question.
Margaret Beckett: I have not forgotten that one of the hon. Gentleman's Front-Bench colleagues—I do not believe that it was him—could not understand the reason for maintaining the 20-day standstill. That was an extraordinarily foolish comment given that the Government had been strongly advised by two independent inquiries, and continued to be advised by the chief veterinary officer and our chief scientific adviser to maintain such restrictions.
Far from being a late conversion, we moved to change the rule as soon as we received clear, further evidence, which we were advised to seek. As I said to the hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson), we will do our best to ensure that the steps that we take are as practical as possible. The hon. Gentleman claimed that the changes would be useless if they cripple markets. I stress to him and to those on whose behalf he claims to speak that nothing crippled the markets as much as the recent outbreak of foot and mouth disease.
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