HC Deb 21 October 1952 vol 505 cc947-55

7.50 p.m.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture (Mr. G. R. H. Nugent)

I beg to move, That the Draft Ploughing Grants (No. 2) Scheme, 1952, a copy of which was laid before this House on 31st July, be approved. This is the second scheme to provide grants for ploughing up grassland, and it derives its authority from the Agriculture (Ploughing Grants) Act, 1952. There are two main provisions; first of all, to continue the £5 per acre grant from 1st June of this year until 31st May next year. It broadly follows on the ploughing up grant introduced by my right hon. Friend on 5th February last and ending on 31st May this year, which was also for £5 per acre.

There is just this difference between the second scheme and the first one in this respect. The first scheme was a ploughing-up grant for grassland which had been down for four years or longer in grass, whereas this second £5 per acre grant is for grassland which has been down for three years or longer.

The second part of this scheme is a £10 per acre grant for grassland which was sowed down before 4th May, 1939—in other words, before the war—and in respect of which there would be abnormal costs in bringing the land into cultivation.

I believe that the continuation of the first £5 per acre ploughing grant and the introduction of this new £10 per acre ploughing grant for this very old grassland of exceptional difficulty will together be a substantial help in maintaining and increasing the acreage of tillage crops in the country, and in providing the extra food that we so badly need.

7.53 p.m.

Mr. A. J. Champion (Derbyshire, South-East)

There are some questions that I want to ask about this scheme, but first I wish to make one or two observations upon it. Yesterday, we were dealing with another aspect of agriculture, but, as I see them, both the aspects of agriculture under consideration yesterday and today are very closely related.

Certainly, under the Bill considered yesterday, we set out to get much more beef. We want more "red meat." I certainly do not claim any authorship of that phrase, which will be familiar to most hon. Members of this House, but, if possible, we want to get more meat, but not at the expense of the other things that we grow or produce. What is wanted is a net gain from our agriculture, rather than a substitution of one crop for another.

I can imagine that the Parliamentary Secretary has read the "Observer" pamphlet entitled "Rethinking our Future," which makes the point that more than 10 million acres of permanent grassland—nearly a quarter of Britain's agricultural land—still needs rejuvenation, and I am sure that hon. Members will also remember Dr. William Davies's calculation that, if we switch 8 million acres of permanent grass to ley, we could carry 9 million more sheep and 6 million more cattle.

Much of the old permanent grass will scarcely keep a beast alive, and certainly will not fatten one. I believe that is true, and is within the knowledge of Ministers now sitting on the Government Front Bench. We all know land of that sort. The Minister has hopes of an additional 400,000 calves a year, and, if Dr. Davies is right in his estimate of the possibilities, these could be quite easily supported without any drain at all upon our importing resources. Indeed, if we could get this and keep it up, and if we could rejuvenate the pastures which the "Observer" pamphlet asks for, we could, in fact, lessen our importing expenditure.

Part II of this Scheme is particularly welcome, for it certainly does set out to tackle some of the older pastures, and does it by means of a suitable carrot, and £10 per acre is a suitable sized carrot I think it will have its effect, and it is worth doing, but I must say that I am a firm believer in a mixture of both carrot and stick, and I wonder if, when the Minister devised this part of the scheme, he was taking into consideration the judicious use of this carrot and of the stick with which he provided himself in the Agriculture (Special Directions) (Maximum Area of Pasturage) Order.

He came down to the House and asked for that Order, and I believe that he should use his powers in suitable cases. Certainly, we want to see a greater amount of these old pastures broken up and suitable lees introduced into them in order to increase the amount of foodstuffs available in this country, and, undoubtedly, it can be done.

There are a few other questions which should be answered before we allow this order to pass. I should like to know how much of the £3.4 million in the price review for 1952–53 will be used under the No. 1 Scheme which the Joint Parliamentary Secretary mentioned? How many acres will, in fact, rank for grant under that first scheme? I should also like to know how much it is proposed to spend under the No. 2 Scheme. Has the hon. Gentleman any estimate of the number of acres which will fall for payment of the £5 per acre grant, and how many acres will fall for payment of the £10 per acre grant in Part II of the No. 2 Scheme.

I should also like to know from the Joint Parliamentary Secretary if the county agricultural executive committees will certify for the Minister on the reseeding under Part 1 of this No. 2 Scheme, and what sort of points the Minister had in mind when framing the proviso to paragraph 3 (1) of this Scheme. Am I right in thinking that not all land under grass since before 4th May, 1939, will qualify, and, if not, who will decide whether the land is suitable for the £5 an acre grant or the £10 an acre grant? Will the Minister give us some idea what sort of land will be suitable for payments under the second part of the No. 2 Scheme.

My final question to the Minister is: will there be any discretion to pay any amount per acre between the figures of £5 and £10 per acre? Will the payments have to be either £5 or £10 per acre, or will there be, as between those two figures, a certain discretion left to the Minister in cases where the land would not, in the opinion of the Minister, qualify for the payment of the full £10, but where a payment of between £5 and £10 would be justifiable? I think these are some points which ought to be answered at this stage, and I shall be grateful if when he comes to reply the Minister will tell us some of these things.

8.0 p.m.

Mr. Anthony Hurd (Newbury)

Many of us welcome this as an emergency measure which will, we believe, get more land brought into cultivation and into full use for food production. I have particularly in mind the second part of this scheme which allows the Minister to operate grants of £10 an acre for the ploughing up of land which is exceptionally difficult to bring into cultivation. Until now we have not really had any legislation that helped farmers who fall outside either the Hill Farming Act or the marginal land scheme.

Under this scheme, we are offering all farmers, whether they happen to be upland or lowland farmers, this assistance towards the cost of reclaiming grassland of very long standing which is exceptionally difficult to bring into cultivation. I can think of some land which I know very well on the top of the Wiltshire Downs. It is inherently quite good land with deep clay on the top of the chalk downs, but it is studded with stones and a certain number of bushes.

The reclaiming of such land is an expensive job for the farmer to tackle entirely by himself. It may cost him £25 or £30 an acre to remove the stones and bushes in order to plough for the first time and get it ready for cropping. But, with this assistance, I think we shall find several thousands of acres of that type of land brought into cultivation. Therefore, I warmly welcome this Measure on those grounds. It will help farmers to help themselves.

I would say to the hon. Gentleman opposite that this is surely not a matter of issuing any kind of directions to farmers, because a larger proportion of the money involved will be their own money and not Government money. But it will be a great assistance and inducement to them, and will bring into fuller use a lot of land which so far has not been used in our food production drive.

8.4 p.m.

Mr. Baker White (Canterbury)

I only want to ask my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary one question, which is whether old orchard land where trees are scrubbed will qualify for the grant provided the orchards are old grass and one of the scheduled crops is to be grown on them. My reason for asking this is obviously the need for scrubbing old orchards, particularly plum orchards, which is bound to be an expensive business, and will probably cost £40 an acre to do it. If lucky, one might, of course, get £10 an acre for firewood, but if that land is going to qualify for the grant then I am sure it will assist in the clearance of old orchards which could be much better employed in growing fruit.

8.5 p.m.

Mr. Nugent

By leave of the House, I am glad to see that this Order is receiving such a favourable reception on both sides of the House, and I thank the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South-East (Mr. Champion) for giving me notice of the various points he wished to raise. I will deal with them in the order in which he put them to me.

He asked, first, how much of the £3.4 million granted at the last Price Review will come in for payment this year. The answer is that only part of that sum will be paid this year under the No. 2 Scheme because payment under that scheme will not start for another month or two. Therefore, there will only be some four months or so in the present financial year in which to make payments under the scheme.

Taking the picture of the two schemes together, the first as well as the second, on which the hon. Gentleman also asked a question, because of the unexpectedly high acreage ploughed under the first scheme which has resulted in the total cost for that scheme being £5.2 million instead of £2.5 million as estimated, what the farmers will be under-recouped on under the second scheme in this financial year they will have been over-recouped on in the first scheme so that at the end of the financial year they will have received roughly what they expected.

With regard to the acreage ploughed up under the first scheme, the final acreage figures are 610,000 acres for England and Wales, 150,000 acres for Northern Ireland, and 280,000 acres for Scotland. The total acreage of 1,040,000 thus greatly exceeded our most optimistic hopes, which I am sure is a matter of great satisfaction to the whole House.

With regard to the hon. Gentleman's next question, about an estimate of the number of acres which we expect to plough under the £5 an acre scheme, the answer is that it is extremely difficult to give more than a very broad estimate of what might be expected because so many factors come into the picture, but we have made what we think is a safe estimate of 800,000 acres for the United Kingdom. That compares with the one million acres which we got under the first scheme. We think that the backlog, so to speak, of the older pasture was probably largely caught up in the first scheme, and, therefore, that we cannot safely expect more than 800,000 acres for the United Kingdom under the second scheme. The figures for England and Wales represent 450,000 out of the 800,000 acres.

With regard to the £10 an acre scheme, we have estimated for 50,000 acres in the first year of the scheme. That figure, again, must be regarded only as an estimate. It is quite impossible to foretell what sort of response there will be. All I can say at this point is that the farming community seem to be showing a great interest in the £10 an acre scheme, and I was glad to hear the hon. Gentleman opposite welcome the scheme in such warm terms. I am with him and with my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Mr. Hurd) in thinking that it may do much to bring into cultivation land which has for a long time been largely unproductive. How far it will go towards bringing the 12,000,000 odd acres of permanent pasture in the United Kingdom into cultivation remains to be seen, but at any rate it can be regarded as a start.

The next question I was asked by the hon. Gentleman was whether the county committees could act for the Minister under Part I. The answer is that the county committees will act on behalf of the Minister and will use their judgment to decide when it is proper for a farmer to re-seed a particular field instead of putting it down to crops. The particular factors to which they will have regard will be such matters as high rainfall, accessibility, and so on, when deciding whether a field should be put back into a new ley or should carry a cereal crop, or some other kind of crop.

I was also asked whether all land under grass since before 4th May, 1939, will qualify for the £10 an acre grant. The answer is that all land will not automatically qualify. It will only qualify where the preparatory work of clearing and ploughing it is altogether abnormal.

The sort of land which my right hon. Friend has in mind in this connection is land such as my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury has described, provided that the cost of clearing the stones is sufficiently high and that depends on the number of stones; land in the Midlands where there is ridge and furrow land of exceptional dimensions which is extremely difficult to work down to a level field, and also orchards which have been grassed down, as my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr. Baker White) suggested. Some of that land is particularly fertile. Indeed, it was a reclaimed orchard in East Anglia which this year grew three times the average quantity of corn. It is land of that kind which can be reclaimed in this connection and which is of particular value.

The final point about which the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South-East inquired was whether, with regard to the £10 an acre scheme, the county committees would have any discretion as to whether they paid the full amount of £10 per acre. In connection with the £10 per acre they would have no discretion at all. The land has to qualify for the whole £10 an acre or none at all. The £5 an acre scheme would have the same condition attached to it as the first scheme. That is, where the Committee consider the operation does not justify the whole £5 an acre, they may pay such lesser sum as they think appropriate.

I think that that answers all the points put to me. I believe that this second ploughing scheme is something of great value to the farming community and that it will be of great help in obtaining the extra tillage that we want. I hope that the House will be prepared now to give it their approval.

Question put, and agreed to.

Resolved, That the Draft Ploughing Grants (No. 2) Scheme, 1952, a copy of which was laid before this House on 31st July, be approved.

8.11 p.m.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. McNair Snadden)

I beg to move, That the Draft Agriculture (Ploughing Grants) (Scotland) (No. 2) Scheme, 1952, a copy of which was laid before this House on 14th October, be approved. I do not think that it is necessary for me to run over the arguments that have been put forth in regard to this scheme because our scheme is almost identical with the scheme for England and Wales. But there is one point which I should like to put on record in order to remove any confusion that may exist in the minds of our small landholders. We have a special problem in Scotland because of our crofting areas, and our scheme differs from the scheme for England and Wales to the extent that we make a special provision to meet the case of the small landholder who is unable to plough the minimum required of one acre.

Just as under the fertiliser scheme, we make it possible for the small landholders to club together. Where the land is one acre or more they will rank for grant, the application being put in by the committee in charge of a crofting township. We also continue in this scheme our practice in Scotland of paying the grant to the person who actually did the work and bore the expense, in preference to the English practice of paying the grant to the occupier of the land when the operations are completed.

These are the only differences in our scheme as compared with the scheme for England and Wales, but it might be of interest to give the figure of the acreage which qualified under the first scheme, the 1952 scheme, which is now ending. I have to announce that in Scotland we had 25,872 applications and the qualifying acreage was 288,133 acres.

Mr. Champion

How does this compare with the estimate?

Mr. Snadden

It was some 88,000 acres more than we expected, so I think we can say that this £5 an acre ploughing grant has not only assisted the growth of tillage acreage in Scotland but has effected a great gain in coarse grain.

Question put, and agreed to.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Richard Thompson.]