Farmers heckled and booed Defra secretary Steve Reed as he gave his speech at the NFU annual conference. But this government is not for budging on that budget decision on inheritance tax – and Reed is now the fall guy as far as farmers are concerned.
It’s not just inheritance tax that farmers feel stung by, either. Reed also had to stand firm on Defra’s refusal to grant an emergency application for the use of a bee-harming neonicotinoid on sugar beet crops. Farmers questioned why there is not a corresponding ban on importing food produced using the pesticides. Reed promised to “never lower our food standards in trade agreements. British farming deserves a level playing field where you can compete and win and that is what you’ll get,” he said.
But farmers are fed up. With finance. With fairness (or lack of it). And with farming ministers. “I am fed up with hearing poultry farmers being told by government, supermarkets and others that they must reduce their stocking densities, increasing their standards, while poultry produced to much lower standards is imported every day,” said NFU president Tom Bradshaw. “That chicken ends up […. i]n our ready meals, in our restaurants, in our hospitals and in our schools, undermining the economics of domestic food production.”
Reed tried to use his speech to reset relationships with the farming sector. There is no quick fix, though. A number of announcements were made, all designed to appease those who make a living from agriculture.
Defra and the Cabinet Office have for example created new requirements for government catering contracts to favour high-quality, high-welfare products that British producers “are well placed to meet”, Reed explained. “This means British farmers and producers can compete for a fairer share of the £5 billion pounds a year the public sector spends on food. That’s money straight into farmers’ bank accounts to boost turnover and boost profits,” he added. Not unless the rules are mandatory, say farmers.
The legislation to implement the Precision Breeding Act for plants in England was also laid in Parliament this week. A new National Biosecurity Centre to transform the Animal and Plant Health Agency animal health facility at Weybridge will also “improve our resilience against animal disease to protect farmers and food producers”.
New regulations for the pig sector in March will “make sure contracts clearly set out expectations and only allow changes if they’ve agreed by all parties”. Similar proposals are being worked up for eggs and fresh produce. The seasonal worker visa route has also been extended for another five years.
Reed said: “The underlying problem in this sector is that farmers do not make enough money for the hard work and commitment that they put in. I will consider my time as secretary of state a failure if I do not improve profitability for farmers up and down this country.”
