Vote 2. Agricultural and Food Grants and Subsidies

HC Deb 14 March 1960 vol 619 cc930-76

Motion made, and Question proposed, That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £7,280,500, be granted to Her Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1960, by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food for grants and subsidies to farmers and others for the encouragement of food production and the improvement of agriculture; for payments and services in implementation of agricultural price guarantees; and for certain other services including a payment to the Exchequer of Northern Ireland.

3.35 p.m.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. J. B. Godber)

This Vote covers the agricultural and food grants and subsidies, both the production grants and the price guarantees. It is always difficult to foresee exactly what will be required for this Vote a year ahead, and experience varies considerably from year to year. In any case, the Estimate has to be prepared before the outcome of the Annual Review can be known, and this year there are a number of items for which we need more money and a number on which there are offsetting savings.

On balance, we need an additional amount of about £7,300,000, but this is on an original Estimate of about £218 million. This is the net difference between excess requirements of about £16,600,000 on those items where the original Estimate provision is not enough, and a saving of about £9,300,000 on other items. The net requirement of about £7 million consists of a net £2 million for the production grants and a net £5 million for the price guarantees.

The production grants are the A subheads of the Vote and we need more money for seven items, in all about £4,100,000, and against this we have savings of about £2 million. The three largest production grant requirements are £1 million for the fertiliser subsidy, just over £1 million for the lime subsidy and £900,000 for the attested herd bonus given to encourage the eradication of tuberculosis from our cattle.

We have this year an exceptionally high use by farmers of both fertilisers and lime. This is, of course, a very good thing for the fertility of our land. It is largely due to exceptionally favourable weather conditions, particularly for liming. It may also be due in part to the stimulus to greater use caused by price reductions for most fertilisers which the manufacturers made last July. Fertiliser consumption is likely to be a record, and lime deliveries are likely to exceed 7 million tons as against an average of 6.2 million tons in the three previous years—a very creditable performance in both cases.

The increased requirement for the attested herd bonus is because the number of herds joining the attested herds scheme has exceeded our expectations. About 85 per cent. of the 2½ million cattle in the final free testing areas under the tuberculosis eradication scheme are now in attested herds, as against a figure of 75 per cent., on which we based our original Estimate. I am sure that everyone in the Committee will agree that this, too, is a very welcome development. Particularly in the final stages of the eradication scheme, we anticipated that a very substantial number of herds would have to be tested compulsorily. We have got this higher percentage in the attested herds and it is something about which we should all be glad.

Those are the main items on Subhead A. I do not propose to comment in detail on the four smaller items of field drainage, calf subsidy, hill cattle subsidy and silo subsidy. My right hon. Friend will be pleased to deal with any points raised by hon. Members when he winds up the debate.

If we turn now to Subhead B for the price guarantees, we have additional requirements of about £12,400,000, but against this we have offset savings of about £7,400,000, giving a net additional requirement of about £5 million. The additional requirements are mainly for cereals, nearly £8 million, and eggs, just over £4 million.

In the case of cereals, we are concerned in each financial year with the final payments on one year's crop and the initial payments on the next year's crop. On this occasion we are concerned, therefore, with the final payments on the 1958 crop and the initial payments on the 1959 crop. The additional provision of nearly £8 million required consists of about £5 million on barley, about £500,000 on oats and about £2½ million on wheat.

On barley, the additional payments arise entirely for the 1959 crop. Expenditure on the 1958 crop was, in fact, rather less than expected, and the 1959 barley acreage, at 2,800,000 acres, has proved to be about 200,000 acres greater than forecast and the level of market prices has been lower than forecast. We have, therefore, had both to pay on a larger acreage and to make a higher rate of advance payment on this crop than forecast. I would point out that the payment here is on an acreage basis as opposed to a tonnage basis for wheat.

On wheat, the increase is due to the end-of-season wheat prices for the 1958 crop being about £1 a ton lower than forecast and to a higher rate of deliveries off farms from the exceptionally good 1959 crop in the earlier months of the crop year—that is, particularly from July to November—than forecast. It allows also for the reduction of 6d. a cwt. in the guaranteed price for wheat made after the 1959 annual review. I would remind the Committee that all my references to changes in the Annual Price Review must be related to last year's Price Review and not to the price review which has just occurred.

For eggs, the additional £4 million is the net result of a number of factors working in both directions. The market price has been running at about 5d. per dozen lower than the estimate on which the flat-rate subsidy was based. Under the profit and loss sharing arrangements which have up to now operated with the Egg Marketing Board, producers bear the loss on the first 2d. a dozen by which the market price falls below the estimate and the Government bear nine-tenths of such loss in excess of the first 2d. That is known as the "2d. band" which applies to the profit and loss sharing arrangements; it has been changed in the Annual Price Review which has just taken place.

The Government's share of the loss on the fall in market prices as compared with the estimate comes to nearly £8 million. About half of this was, however, offset by other factors. These were, first, that the guaranteed price was itself reduced by 1d. a dozen following the 1959 Annual Review, which was not allowed for in the estimate, and, secondly, that the prices of feeding stuffs fell during the year and, therefore, automatically reduced the Exchequer liability in accordance with the arrangement whereby the guaranteed price is adjusted for changes in feed prices.

There are certain other smaller items into which I do not propose to go in detail, but, my right hon. Friend will, of course, be only too ready to deal with points raised relating to them.

The Committee will see that these estimates are affected by many complex factors, the effect of which is always extremely hard to predict. The net result has been to increase the cost of agricultural support this year, so far as as the Ministry's Vote is concerned, by some 3½ per cent. beyond what we had thought it might turn out to be. I think that, with such variables as we have had to contend with, that is not a bad outcome from the estimates which had to be made. The expenditure is a necessary part of our support to agriculture if we are to maintain a sound and efficient industry. It is the firm intention of the Government to continue to do that in future as has been done in the past. I ask the Committee accordingly to approve the Supplementary Estimate of £7,280,500.

3.45 p.m.

Mr. Frederick Willey (Sunderland, North)

In view of the last remarks of the Joint Parliamentary Secretary in his concise and complacent statement, I must remind him that on Thursday I received the following telegram: President N.F.U. has today telegraphed Minister of Agriculture as follows. National Farmers' Union Council emphatically endorsed refusal to agree Government price review determination which shows clear intention to restrict home agricultural production, make way for still more imported foodstuffs and deny the British farmer a proper share of the results of his rising efficiency

The Chairman

I am not clear what that has to do with the Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. Willey

It arises. Sir Gordon, only in view of the Joint Parliamentary Secretary's concluding remarks about the state of the industry. I do not wish to pursue the matter further, but I thought it proper to indicate that there is a difference of view beween the Government and the farmers.

Turning to the Supplementary Estimate, I should like to deal, first, with cereals. Here we are considering a miscalculation by the Government amounting to £8 million, something which merits consideration. The Joint Parliamentary Secretary has given reasons—we appreciate them—for the difficulties about making these calculations beforehand. I am in some difficulty, because the Minister has published further figures. We have now the subsidy figures as set out in the White Paper dealing with this year's Annual Price Review. They apparently show a further increase in the subsidy, the figure being just over £58 million. The Joint Parliamentary Secretary has not given any explanation of that, but it certainly makes it very difficult for us to consider the figures which are before us.

The same consideration applies to other guaranteed price commodities which I do not wish to discuss this afternoon. For instance, we do not know what the true position is today about fat stock, but, looking at the Annual Review White Paper, it seems to me quite out of accord with the position we are discussing under the present Supplementary Estimate. As the Estimate was prepared only a month or so ago, it seems that this, at any rate, calls for some explanation from the Government.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary has said that this additional subsidy is required because of the general fall in market prices. I would merely say that, of course, the Government's policy itself has affected market prices. I do not wish to discuss pigs this afternoon, but, obviously, the Government's pig policy reflects itself in feedingstuff prices.

The position about wheat is that over the last three years there has been a reduction in the guaranteed price—it is not only so for the year that we are considering—afforded to the producers for wheat. It is a reduction of 2s. 2d. per cwt. However, at the same time, we are considering this afternoon an increase in the subsidy, and we face a substantial subsidy of over £20 million. What I cannot understand—this obviously affects the taxpayers, who provide the money—is why these continuing decreases have not reflected themselves in the retail prices of flour and confectionery.

I have mentioned previously that there is a fairly well-known conversion factor. All other things being equal, the price of a 1¾lb. loaf ought to be 1 ½d. less than it was three years ago; but this is not so. As the taxpayers are being required to provide £20 million, I think that we are entitled to ask the Government why this is not so.

So long as we get substantial price support from the taxpayer we must pay attention to retail prices. This confirms the impression that many of us have, on both sides of the Committee, that distribution costs have increased enormously in the last few years. When this is a matter directly affecting the taxpayer and the producer—who has to face successively decreasing prices—there is a burden upon the Government to satisfy the Committee that this Treasury subvention is being used to aid the producer and is not being lost in distributive channels.

I turn now from cereals to eggs, a commodity we almost invariably discuss when we consider Supplementary Estimates. Here we have a substantial subsidy of £36½ million. This in itself demands an explanation from the Government, because we remember that the noble Lord, Viscount Tenby, as he now is, abolished this subsidy When he was Minister of Food. What is the purpose of the subsidy? What change of policy has there been since it was abolished? We have here a very substantial subsidy and an appreciable and substantial increase in it in this Estimate. Here again, as in the case of wheat, we have had three successive price reductions. It would be out of order to discuss the position for the coming year, but we know that there is to be a further reduction.

In 1957, we had a reduction of l¾d. a dozen. The purpose was to reduce output. Instead, we got increased output. In 1958, there was another reduction of l¾d. a dozen. What for? The purpose was to stop expansion of output, but what actually happened? We had a still greater increase of output. In the year we are discussing, we had a reduction of 1d. a dozen. Again, the purpose was, to quote the Government's own words in the White Paper, that the production of eggs should be reduced. What has happened? We have had a further substantial increase in production. This surely demands some explanation. Why has the Parliamentary Secretary not dealt with it? Why have we not had a confession of failure or alteration of purpose by the Government?

We are discussing an additional £4 million by way of subsidy, bringing the total to the very substantial amount of £36½ million. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Norfolk, South (Mr. J. E. B. Hill), when he was articulate, said that this was not a policy, but a calculation. He cannot join in our discussion today. We want to know what the policy is behind it. I understood that the main purpose of the guarantees, and the Treasury support of those guarantees, was to provide the producer with confidence, because we all recognise that, in farming, confidence is the essence of efficiency, but the egg producer has faced four reductions over four years as a deliberate matter of Government policy. There has not been any stability of price, for the White Paper refers to …unduly large and erratic fluctuations in producers' prices … Again, as we did in the case of wheat, we should look at the consumer. Has this benefited him? Not as a matter of policy, though he did enjoy some advantage in the second half of last year.

Mr. Godber

The consumer is benefiting a lot more than was forecast by hon. Members opposite when eggs were derationed.

Mr. Willey

I have the figures here, so we will see how far he has benefited. In March, 1957, the retail prices per dozen were between 2s. 6d. and 3s. In 1958, 1959 and in 1960 they were between 3s. 3d. and 3s. 6d. We know that it is not the purpose of the Egg Marketing Board to allow retail prices to dip. It is trying its hardest to maintain them. Again, we cannot say that the consumer has benefited either from the reduction in the producer prices or from the maintenance of this rate of subsidy

I would have thought that, in view of the result of the Government's policy, somebody would have sufficient intelligence on the Government Front Bench seriously to look at all this. Obviously, something is happening. It is no good the Government going on saying in every Price Review White Paper that they intend to take effective steps to ensure a reduction in production, when the reverse actually occurs. It is for the Government to justify the subsidy in previous years. It has either been unrealistically high and the successive price reductions have not had the effect they calculated, or the pattern of output has changed.

It is well known that there are new types of production in egg production. We have producers depending almost entirely on imported feeding stuffs, and we have types of production practically divorced from the land. Here we have a very short supply service. The Government have a duty to consider this, and to consider what is the main policy of this subsidy and who is benefiting most from it.

It is very disturbing that under this present Vote we cannot discuss savings, but we are aware of the fact that the Government have spent £1 million less on the Small Farmer Scheme than it budgeted. It is incumbent on the Government to look at the expenditure of this money and ensure that it is used for the benefit of the producers for whom it was really intended. As I have said of wheat and flour, we should make absolutely sure that when a subsidy of this size is involved, it is the producers who get the benefit.

The dilemma is that the Government have said for three years, and are saying it again, that they do not intend the producer to get any benefits, because they wish him to reduce production. In the circumstances, I can only assume that the people who benefit are, again, mainly the distributors. There is some confirmation of this from the action taken by the Egg Marketing Board, which has gone into packing. Time after time the Minister and his predecessors have been stigmatised by the Comptroller and Auditor General about the administration of this subsidy. Nothing has been done.

We await a further report from the Comptroller and Auditor General. We have had no explanation either of the purposes or of the effective administration of the subsidy. I was disappointed with the hon. Gentleman's reply, because he failed to deal with these matters, which must disturb everyone who is determined to provide a sound basis for British agricultural production.

I now turn to the question of production grants, in respect of which I find the same disturbing trend. Taking the Price Review as a guide, we find that they are now running at about £95 million a year, those within the present Vote accounting for over £67 million. The Government are now asking for an increase of £4 million by way of the Supplementary Estimate, and I would ask them again how much further these production grants are going.

I do not think that anyone challenges the principle of production grants for agriculture—

Major H. Legge-Bourke (Isle of Ely)

I do.

Viscount Hinchingbrooke (Dorset, South)

So do I.

Mr. Willey

—except the hon. Member for Dorset South (Viscount Hinchingbrooke) and the hon. and gallant Member for Isle of Ely (Major Legge-Bourke). They apparently oppose the grants in principle, which is a tenable view.

Nevertheless, they will probably agree that when these subsidies reach a figure of nearly £100 million a year they necessarily have an impact on the price incentive provided for the commodities in the Price Review. These moneys come out of the Price Review, and we cannot give away £100 million in this way without blunting the price incentive.

The Minister may say that that is his policy. That means that he wants a stagnant agriculture. But if that is his policy, this is a subterfuge. I should have thought that these production grants had reached such a level that we ought to see what return we are getting for them. The right hon. Gentleman has no idea of the return, because no analysis has yet been made. I know that this is very attractive to the Treasury, which is very anxious about Treasury support being given to individual commodities affected by market price levels, but we are concerned with getting the best return for the money we are putting into agriculture, and I hope that this debate will persuade the Government to try to see that we get it.

I now turn to the question of the fertiliser grant. We are providing an extra £2 million this year in respect of fertilisers and lime, and we are considering a total of £40 million to support fertiliser and lime prices. Not only is this a very substantial subsidy; it has been increased considerably over the past few years. In 1951–52, it was running at £8 million, and when we last discussed fertilisers on this Vote, two years ago, it had risen £34 million. Since then it has been increased by another £6 million. The lime subsidy provides between 60 per cent. and 70 per cent. of the price and the fertilisers subsidy about 45 per cent. of the price. Everyone would concede the general argument that the purpose of the subsidy, namely, to encourage the greater use of fertilisers, is a good one.

We are concerned with three points in this connection. First, we want to know whether such a purpose requires the expenditure of £40 million; secondly, whether there are other ways in which the money might be put to better use; and, thirdly, whether the money is serving its purpose. As I said two years ago, I have very grave doubts in this matter. I then said that the British farmer was lagging behind most of the West European farmers in the use of fertilisers, and also in respect of the rate of increase in their use. I have been pursuing my inquiries to bring my figures up to date, and I find that that position still holds good. I will not redeploy the figures, but I will give a simple comparison between this country and West Germany, which subsidises fertilisers as we do, but more modestly. The most recent available O.E.E.C. figures show that West Germany uses nearly twice as much nitrogen and more than twice as much potash as we do, and 40 per cent. more phosphates. These are comparable figures, relating to a two-year period.

In this period, the use of nitrogen in West Germany has increased by six times as much as it has in this country, and the use of potash by more than three times, and whereas the use of phosphates has decreased in this country it has increased by 25 per cent. in West Germany. We can rightly say that the position is not satisfactory, and before we agree to such an increase as this we are entitled to be satisfied.

We now have the Monopolies Commission Report on the supply of chemical fertilisers. We cannot debate the Report, but it shows that the position is unsatisfactory, in that we have tariff-protected and subsidised monopolies. In the case of nitrogen it is true that I.C.I, appears not to have been operating against the public interest, but the question about which we are most interested —the question of a restrictive price agreement—was excluded from the Commission's consideration. Having read the Report, my impression is that nitrogen production in this country has been unenterprising, in spite of the support of the subsidy.

In reference to Fisons, the Report says: We think the company mistaken in believing that it is entitled to use its strength, due largely to the degree of monopoly it enjoys in a protected and subsidised market, in order to earn profits at the high rate of recent years for the express purpose of financing its further overall expansion. We regard the fixing of prices at a level which produces such profits as a 'thing done' by Fisons as a result of its monopoly position which operates and may be expected to operate against the public interest. This is affecting fertilisers, which we are subsidising to a substantial extent.

In passing, I wish to deal with the argument which Fisons adduce in reply. The form says that it is quite true that it is producing fertilisers which are heavily subsidised by the taxpayer and that it makes a profit of 20 per cent. on historic cost. That is necessary because it has to attract capital into the industry to expand. But to expand in what? To expand in the production of nitrogen. So we have the use of money in one monopoly to break the monopoly of another producer.

As I say, it has been in nitrogen. What is it now to be? In contraceptives. Although the firm failed in its take-over bid for B.D.H., it is seeking other fields in which to expand production. As this is largely financed by the British taxpayer, I think that we have to take an interest in these things.

I felt some sympathy for the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield (Sir A. V. Harvey) who, when we were discussing the Price Review the other day, said that rather than increase the subsidy why not consider a reduction in the profits of the manufacturers. That is a point which I have repeatedly argued regarding fertilisers. It is borne out by the Report of the Monopolies Commission, which states, in the case of one monopoly, at any rate, that the profits were too high.

To come back to the Vote we are discussing, it means that before we can agree to the Government's request for another £1 million for fertilisers we should ask why they have not instituted a costing procedure for fertilisers. We have a costing procedure for lime, so why not have one for fertilisers?

The answer is obvious. In the case of fertilisers we are dealing with a very different type of producer, with big monopoly producers, and the Government cannot stand up to them as they can to the smaller lime producers. This point of view is not only borne out by the Report of the Monopolies Commis- sion. It is equally apparent in the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General on the Civil Appropriation Accounts. He questioned the Minister, as I did a couple of years ago, on this matter, and, in reply, it was stated that the Minister informed him that in the absence of price control they had insufficient information about production and distribution costs to judge whether fertiliser prices were fair and reasonable. And of course, like us, they were awaiting the Report of the Monopolies Commission.

If we are providing between 30 per cent. and 45 per cent.—in one case, actually over 50 per cent.—of the price, we are entitled to be absolutely sure that the price is fair and reasonable. If we have a subsidy which, in a few years, has increased from £8 million to £40 million, we are entitled to such an assurance. I hope that hon. Members opposite will join us in harrying the Government until we get satisfaction about this matter. We are to get some legislative action in due course. I hope that it will be sufficient to allow for a costing inquiry.

I apologise for going rather wide on some of the matters we are discussing. The Government, because it happens to have been convenient to the Treasury, have been lackadaisical in their consideration of production grants. They have not satisfied us that they have even sufficient information to know that this is the best form in which to provide aid. It is quite clear, at least regarding the commodities that we are now discussing, that the Government have no idea what purpose is served by these subsidies. We are getting the worst of both worlds. We have a high and an increasing rate of subsidy, producer prices are falling and producers are disturbed, and therefore, whatever the right hon. Gentleman may say, there is a lessening of drive and efficiency within the industry. On the other hand, there is no benefit to the taxpayer, as a consumer, through retail prices.

I know that the Minister and the President of the Board of Trade are considering the question of fertilisers, but here we are concerned not only with the question of monopolies, but also the question of tariff protected subsidised monopolies. We are concerned with the expenditure of a considerable amount of public money. We wish to be sure that the benefit of this expenditure is going to the farmers, because in a real sense it is their money. The fact that these high rates of profit have been obtained is disturbing, and there is a burden on the Government to see that these matters are put right. I hope that we shall have an assurance from the right hon. Gentleman to that effect.

4.16 p.m.

Viscount Hinchingbrooke (Dorset, South)

The hon. Member for Sunder-land, North (Mr. Willey) interlarded quite a good speech with a certain amount of political slating which was unsuited to the intimate atmosphere of a Committee considering Supplementary Estimates and which does not come very well from the Labour Party in its present state of dissolution.

I also think that the hon. Gentleman took far too long to make his speech. These debates on Supplementary Estimates ought to be conducted rapidly, with many hon. Members taking part and with rapid answers by the Minister, after which we should proceed to the next Vote. That being the case, I shall not keep the Committee for more than three or four minutes.

As hon. Members know, I have a financial interest in these debates. Therefore, the Committee may find that I am repeating that sort of argument as each successive Vote passes. On the question of Supplementary Estimates for agriculture, fisheries and food and the grants and subsidies, I am principally concerned with eggs. I have an Amendment on the Order Paper to reduce Subhead B.2 by £1,000. Rather mysteriously, the Amendment has been transferred to the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Shrewsbury (Mr. Langford-Holt) who, I suppose, does not wish to take up a position on this matter, and, less seriously, it has not been selected for discussion. But there is no harm in referring to it.

I am very unhappy about the question of eggs. I am not expert in these matters, nor, I think, are my constituents. But we do not understand why there should be wild scares reported in the newspapers. First, there is a glut of eggs and then there is a shortage. In the view of my constituents, it is the pig problem magnified a thousand times. Then, at the end of the year, they read that £4 million has had to be called into play to satisfy the requirements of the Egg Marketing Board. For that matter, I do not think that they are very happy about the Egg Marketing Board, either. It is a producer-controlled organisation which does not seem to go well with our market economy. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North pointed out that the egg subsidy had been abolished and has now been resuscitated for the producer-controlled Marketing Board to regulate the supply.

Perhaps one cannot go deeply into the policy behind the Supplementary Estimate. The total is very great. Year by year we are called on to vote another few million pounds to satisfy the policy. I do not think that the policy is a very good one. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North talked for quite a time about the policy, but I do not think that it is in order to go so far as he went; and I do not propose to develop the question of policy, because I do not think that it would be in order to do so. It seems to me that we are reaching the stage where the taxpayers are being called on to pay very large sums of money for the subsidisation of agriculture.

I was challenged about my views when I took up a position with respect to Board of Trade assistance to industry. I think, equally, that now we have a lavish and affluent society many people could afford to pay higher prices for their food. If agriculture were protected by tariff supports, we could still have a protective screen thrown round British agriculture, it could still thrive and prosper, but the country would have to pay more for the privilege.

We pay the lowest prices for food of any country in the world in relation to the indices of the cost of living in those respective countries. I think that the time has come to alter the whole principle under which subsidies are given to agriculture, to protect agriculture at the ports, but to stop these new subsidies coming on to the backs of the taxpayers and to allow an affluent economy of highly prosperous people in all walks of life—even in agriculture, where sometimes, £10, £15, £20 and £30 a week is coming into an agricultural cottage, and excellent it is— to pay proper prices, and world prices, for their food.

4.21 p.m.

Mr. John Mackie (Enfield, East)

I have to declare a financial interest in this business, but I will try to take up as short a time as possible. I was interested in the remarks that the hon. Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Hinchingbrooke) made about the provision of tariffs instead of subsidies.

I do not know of any agricultural cottage where £20 to £30 a week is coming in in wages, but perhaps the noble Lord can tell me where these cottages are to be found. These people live individually, not collectively.

I want to refer to the fertiliser subsidy and the increase of £2 million—£1 million on lime and £1 million on fertilisers. I wonder whether it might not be possible to have a large saving not of the percentage on total, but still large, if there were a better method of paying the subsidy. Surely the Minister could find some other way for these individual payments. After all, between 70 per cent. and 80 per cent. comes from two firms and from them for their raw material to the smaller firms. Surely, if the subsidies were paid at the source it would save much administrative work and money as well.

What worries me a little is why—and I have no reason to doubt the Report of the Monopolies Commission—if they charge so much, so many farmers bought this fertiliser from Fisons when I.C.I. was not accused of making the same high profits and several smaller firms as well? I wonder why so many of my fellow farmers gave this money to Fisons, which is now burning a hole in pockets for take-over bids. I feel that there must have been a lot of credit given. Credit seems to be the one thing that farmers go to merchants for rather than elsewhere. I think that that is a bad thing.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary mentioned that the amount of fertiliser and lime being used was a good thing. The subsidy was for the purpose of seeing that they were used and that their use was a credit to the farmers. What is it being used for? It is going on to grass to produce more livestock and it is going on to cereals to produce more pigs and eggs. These are the products that require the most subsidy.

My hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) rightly said the farmer wants these fertilisers to produce more. Yet the whole trend of what the Minister has been saying is to reduce production. To increase the fertiliser subsidy obviously produces more livestock, and with more fertiliser going into the ground and more lime, production is bound to increase. I should have thought that it was a good thing for the country.

The silo subsidy is increased. The administration of this is, I think, wrong. I would ask the Minister to consider whether this could not be incorporated into the Farm Improvement Scheme and thus save a lot of administrative cost. I wonder whether the Minister has ever thought whether it is a good thing to pay Northern Ireland not only a silo subsidy, tout a subsidy for silage which we do not get in this country.

On the question of cereals, if accounting is important, why cannot the Minister save himself a lot of trouble by paying next year's first payment and the balance of the year before to make up his Estimate and then carrying it on to the following year? This would save Mm coming to the House of Commons and asking for a Supplementary Estimate.

I do not understand why there should be £1 million subsidy for potatoes, as mentioned in the White Paper, and only £500,000 mentioned in the Supplementary Estimates. As I said to the Minister last week, no farmer has yet received any subsidy for potatoes, yet potatoes have been sold far below the guaranteed prices, practically the whole season. His answer to that was that the Government were looking at the scheme, which means that it will be 1962 before any farmer gets the benefit of the potato subsidy.

Can the Minister also explain the £200,000 for private-owned potato transport facilities in Northern Ireland? As a seed producer in Scotland, I think that if Northern Ireland producers are to get this assistance, Scotland should also come into the picture.

4.27 p.m.

Sir Anthony Hurd (Newbury)

I have to declare a personal interest in two matters—egg and fertilisers. I happen to be a fairly large egg producer and a director of an egg producers' packing station.

I do not disagree with much that the hon. Gentleman the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) said, except that he is obviously wrong in his analysis of the effects of the egg subsidy. In my judgment—he probably will not agree with me—the greater part of the benefit of the subsidy is going to the consumers. I judge that by reason of the fact that our market prices are so low now that they do not attract the Danes or the Dutch to send here as they can do better for themselves in Belgium and West Germany.

The subsidy is expensive and has given cover for increased home production year after year, so that we now fill almost 100 per cent. of the home market at certain times of the year and over supply the market with shell eggs. Consumption has not quite kept pace, but it will. I should like to put it to the Committee that a major part of the benefit goes to the consumer. I do not grudge it, but I think that we should face that fact. The Minister has already told us, and the hon. Gentleman the Member for Sunderland, North referred to it, that price arrangements between the Egg Marketing Board and the Government are now to be altered so that we can get a greater measure of stability for the producer. That is desirable.

I am a director of Fisons Fertilisers, Limited, and I should like to make one or two points briefly. I should like to give a rather better balanced conclusion than the hon. Member for Sunderland, North was able to give on the Monopolies Commission Report. To quote the last paragraph of its Report, on page 704, the Commission sums up to its satisfaction its conclusions: In the matter of Fisons' pricing policy and the level of profits resulting from it, we do not believe that the company has acted in deliberate disregard of the public interest. We recommend that Fisons should adjust its pricing policy to yield a lower level of profit than has been achieved in recent years, and we believe that the company can be relied on to carry out this recommendation in the light of our Report. It did not need the Report of the Monopolies Commission to make Fisons decide on that course. There have been price reductions while the Report of the Commission was being prepared. I think that my right hon. Friend the Minister will agree that last year the manufacturers of fertilisers, taken together, reduced their prices by £2,600,000.

That was a contribution to saving in costs in agriculture. I hope that with the new resources made available—for instance, the nitrogen factory mentioned by the hon. Member for Sunderland, North, which cost £4 million—we shall see prices reduced still further. That surely is in line with the policy of the Government, to facilitate the reduction of production costs in this country and make our agriculture more competitive. That is the theme underlying Government policy today. The greater use of fertilisers is contributing to that.

I do not grudge this extra subsidy given to farmers and not to the makers of fertilisers. No doubt it has encouraged more of those farmers who are not always as keen businessmen as they might be to use more fertilisers. Thereby, it has helped to get this record figure of 68 per cent. increase of net output in agriculture compared with pre-war. That, again, is a help to the Minister's policy of saving on production costs. If we get higher yields of grain, better use of grass and more fertility into the soil we shall get better output. Assuming that overheads are the same, we get more economical production and a saving of costs.

This fertiliser subsidy has done what was intended. Technical advice has persuaded and induced farmers to use more fertilisers than otherwise they would have done and it is helping forward Government policy in making agriculture more efficient while reducing the high costs of production.

On the proportion of subsidy compared with the price that the farmer pays, I found recently that I was paying £30 a ton for a fertiliser and I was getting back £10 in subsidy. That is a rather high proportion. It is not as high as the hon. Member for Sunderland, North spoke of; it is more nearly an average proportion. I think it rather high and I would be quite content to see that proportion reduced. The fertiliser industry ought to be able to go ahead with a lower subsidy to the farmer and still have the industry developed to full advantage for the country. The farmer could do with a smaller payment so long as the fertiliser firms continue their policy of price reduction.

I do not quarrel with the Supplementary Estimates, but I think that these items for eggs and fertilisers are high. The country as a whole has received benefit from them and I hope we shall agree to these Estimates.

4.34 p.m.

Sir Leslie Plummer (Deptford)

The hon. Member for Newbury (Sir A. Hurd) will not expect me to follow him in his mea culpa for fertiliser firms. He has declared an interest to us and I declare an interest as a customer of the fertiliser companies. I am concerned to see that the companies continue to reduce their prices to the farmers.

What I should like those firms to do occasionally is to look at the price advantage which the large farmer gets, because he can buy in six-ton or twelve-ton loads, or in truck-loads, while the small farmer who has not got lorries to collect has to pay quite an excessive cost for carriage. That extra cost is avoided by the better equipped farm.

What the hon. Member had to say about the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) proved, I think, that he was not listening very carefully. My hon. Friend did not say that the subsidy was going to the farmer and not to the consumer. I think my hon. Friend accepted the fact that the agricultural subsidies are, in fact, subsidies to consumer prices. I do not want to deal with the question of pigs, first, because that would be out of order in this discussion, and, secondly, because —adopting the modesty of the hon. Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Nabarro)—I can now claim that the right hon. Gentleman has adopted the policy I adumbrated to him on the occasion of the debate on the Address, when I urged a certain policy on the Minister.

I want to talk about potatoes. When looking at these figures it is difficult to try to challenge their validity, because they are produced by such expert people in such a form that it is neither possible nor wise to attempt to do so. If we look at the potato subsidy we find that the amount required for the Supplementary Estimate to 30th March is another £166,000. Are those figures based on any certainty of knowledge which the Minister possesses? I ask that because I am puzzled by two conflicting statements.

I am a registered potato producer. In February of this year—at a time covered by the Supplementary Estimate—I received a letter from the Potato Marketing Board which said: On the Board's stock census figures, and assuming there is no great change in human consumption between now and the end of June,"— the following words are in capital letters— THERE IS NO SURPLUS OF POTATOES ON THE PRESENT RIDDLES. After allowing for what the Board has already bought and is diverting to stockfeed, there is, in fact, an estimated shortage. When we turn to the White Paper what do we find the Government are saying? It says: Yields from the 1959 crop are above normal and production is expected to show an increase of about 23 per cent. on 1958–59, with a considerable surplus above requirements for human consumption.

Major Legge-Bourke

I think that the hon. Member is getting confused by something which confused me the first time I read it. If he looks at page 128, subhead B6, he will find that this relates to the price for potatoes guaranteed up to 30th June, 1959. In other words, it is dealing with potatoes from the previous year's crop.

Sir L. Plummer

If that is so, of course it is an explanation and I am very much obliged to the hon. and gallant Member for pointing out what confused me in the discrepancy between the statement made by the Potato Marketing Board and the statement in the White Paper.

But what is still valid is the difference between what the Board said to me last month and what the Minister said to me on Thursday of last week. There is still a great discrepancy there. Does it mean that one branch of the Ministry does not know what another branch is doing? Are there two separate statistical staffs? How does it come about that I am told there is to be a shortage and then I am told there is to be a surplus from the same crop? I ask these questions not to embarrass the Government—that is the last thing I should want to do—but in the interests of agriculture. I want to get the situation cleared up.

My hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North asked what was the Government's policy. Is not the dilemma that the Government are saying to farmers over and over again, "One thing you have to do is to increase your efficiency," while we have no yardstick by which to measure that except increased production? We are to produce more milk from the same cows, more eggs from the same hens, more arable crops from the same acres and more potatoes or whatever we grow. We are to try to cut down costs of production and, at the same time, increase our production.

Here is the dilemma. It will not be met by the Government's policy, which asks for efficiency one day and then the next day decides that efficiency must be penalised by consistent cuts in the guaranteed prices.

4.41 p.m.

Mr. Denys Bullard (King's Lynn)

I should like, first, to deal with the cost of production grants, which is the first item on page 125. I think that a word ought to be said in defence of the general principle of production grants, because I think that my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Isle of Ely (Major Legge-Bourke) will say something against them. I think that a powerful word should be said in their favour, because I know that his advocacy is very powerful.

We ought to remember that these production grants have been of great benefit to the small farmer. In debates in the House we used to hear a great deal about a capital shortage in agriculture. We have not heard nearly as much about it lately, and I believe that that is due to the fact that farmers, and particularly small farmers, have had the benefit of the production grants. Money comes in very quickly after the initial sum has been spent. In a long-term process like agriculture, it is of great advantage if this can be the case.

The fertiliser subsidy, in particular, has been of benefit; all farmers like to receive it, but it is of special advantage to the small producer. The same comment applies to the egg subsidy. We ought to bear in mind that though the cost of these subsidies is undoubtedly high, they are of great benefit. I should not like to see them reduced, although I agree with the hon. Member for Sunder-land, North (Mr. Willey) that it is necessary to see that they are properly applied and that the money gets through the channels to the producer.

We are all a little dismayed at the operation of the egg guarantees. All egg producers are concerned about the great reduction in producers' prices compared with last year. The reduction is about 11 per cent., which is a very big reduction. There is also the big increase in the cost of the egg subsidy to bear in mind.

In criticising the Estimate, as the hon. Member for Sunderland, North did, it is incumbent upon hon. Members to offer us a better scheme than the present scheme so that the egg business may be better regulated. As I understand his conclusion—he is closely engaged in conversation at the moment, but I hope that I shall have his attention—it seems to me that he wanted the egg business to be removed from the schedule of guarantees altogether.

Mr. Willey

No. I recognise the hon. Member's interest in this matter. For three or four years the Government have been trying to reduce egg production. I do not know why. Secondly, there is a wide field of production containing different types of producers. Some are almost industrial producers. I am concerned to see that the true agricultural producer gets the support intended for him.

Mr. Bullard

I accept that, and I am sure that that is the result which the hon. Member wants to see. I have looked at this matter very carefully and thought of all the possibilities of different ways of giving a guarantee to a commodity which, as the hon. Member said, is very short-term in its production life. The problem which faces us arises from the character of egg production.

I support the Government in their policy of a profit-and-loss sharing scheme, as a general principle of administering this industry, because I can see no better alternative. The Government are faced with an extraordinarily difficult problem in guaranteeing egg prices. That applies to some extent, too, to the guarantees of pig prices, which we are not discussing today. Those who grudge the cost of this scheme, it seems to me, must produce a better scheme Which will, at the same time, give a reasonable guarantee to egg producers.

It would be wrong to allow this debate to conclude after a point by point criticism of the Supplementary Estimates— which it is our duty as a Committee to make—without looking at the whole picture of the farm guarantees which, under the Agriculture Act, we are bound to implement.

4.47 p.m.

Mr. Frank Tomney (Hammersmith, North)

With the exception of my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey), I am the only speaker in the debate so far who has not an interest either in the farming industry or in the fertiliser industry. I am interested from the consumer's point of view.

I was very interested in the speech of the noble Lord the Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Hinchingbrooke), who challenged the whole concept of the farming industry as it is today. During the twelve years since these grants and subsidies were instituted, the farming industry has been able to establish itself in a very favourable position in the nation. It has had the benefit of a powerful lobby and highly-paid advocates in bringing this situation about. Not since the departure of Mr. Stanley Evans, formerly the hon. Member for Wednesbury, have we had any hardhitting, vital debates on farm subsidies. Everybody seems to be agreed that the best method by which to give the taxpayers' money away is by both hands to the farmers as fast as we can give it.

Today is no exception. We have before us a whole list of subsidies, which grows year by year. Coupled with that list is a Report of the Monopolies Commission on fertilisers which is alarming. Frankly, I do not understand the mechanics by which some of these prices have been arrived at. In dealing with the egg prices, the Joint Parliamentary Secretary said that there was a support price of 5¼d. per dozen, of which the producer received 2d., and that the Government guaranteed nine-tenths of the remainder. According to my calculation, if there is a glut of eggs on the market, and the producer wants to recover his costs, he simply forces more eggs on to the market to receive a higher guaranteed price. Is that right? That seems to me to be the argument as it affects the consumer. The producer forces more eggs on to the market to get more of the total guaranteed price.

Mr. Godber

The hon. Member is not quite right. It is rather complicated, and I am not surprised that he is not quite right. If he studies my speech in HANSARD he will find that the situation is not quite as he put it.

Mr. Tomney

That is the trouble—it is all complicated.

Here we have a list of subsidies which is very long, and I wonder whether the farmer gives anything out of his own money. According to the noble Lord the Member for Dorset, South, who was right in this context but wrong, as usual, in his final submission, when the Common Market is established by June of this year there will be a surplus of agricultural commodities which they will export to this country willy-nilly, despite the tariff barrier.

The Chairman

Order. The hon. Member is going ahead of the subect. We are dealing only with the Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. Tomney

I thought I should be out of order, but I decided to risk it.

In that case, where are we going? It means that to guarantee ourselves against cheap food from overseas these subsidies must be paid. Over the last dozen years we have seen so much price support—farming subsidies for every commodity, including farm buildings, production prices, improvement grants and machinery grants. Do subsidies never reach a stage when in any one year the Government can say, "We have had enough of that for this year. We do not want any more of it?" Or do they say, "We have had enough of that. We will now try something else"? That seems to be the position.

These different arguments go up in ratio. There is a different ratio for each commodity year by year. One year silo subsidies had the biggest Supplementary Estimate. In another year it is calf subsidies. In another year, as it is this year, it is egg subsidies. So it goes on.

My hon. Friend the Member for Deptford (Sir L. Plummer), who is a practical farmer, said that he does not know how the combination in regard to potatoes has been arrived at because it does not bear any relevance to the last nine months' production of potatoes. The hon. and gallant Member for the Isle of Ely (Major Legge-Bourke) corrected him and said that the figure refers to the previous six months of 1959. How is this calculated? As a mere bystander and lookerover farm gates at fields of wheat, and at cattle, pigs and such animals, I am amazed that the country has got itself into this fix and does not seem to be able to get out of it.

Something must be done. It used to be argued that we needed farm produce because we are an island. The days have gone when that argument could be legitimately advanced. We have now reached a stage in international affairs when a major war would not last very long.

I will now state my only criticism of these Supplementary Estimates. The next time Estimates are circulated I ask the Minister kindly to publish an Explanatory Memorandum with them. I ask him to explain to ordinary back benchers representing such constituencies as mine, where the nearest farm is perhaps ten miles away, how this fantastic set-up has been arrived at and what is the general policy as regards subsidies. If the Minister did that, the Committee would begin to understand exactly what it is doing, what it can do for the industry, and what it can do in justice. No one wants to see the farming industry so low that it is unproductive, but it is obvious that many people have had a nice fat living out of this and are prepared to go on with it if they have the chance.

Mr. Willey

To confuse my hon. Friend a little further, may I ask him if he is aware that farmers' incomes are less now than they were two years ago in spite of the exceptionally good conditions last year?

Mr. Tomney

That is the kind of position we get into. If the experts cannot understand it, what chance has a back bencher? I will take that criticism from my hon. Friend and I hope to discuss it with him later.

If the few points I have raised have added any interest to the debate, I shall be most satisfied with the result of what is my first incursion, but by no means my last, into the details of farming grants and subsidies. From now on, I must take a much greater interest in this subject. Unfortunately, Mr. Stanley Evans has gone. Somebody has to protect the taxpayers.

4.54 p.m.

Major Legge-Bourke (Isle of Ely)

I am sure that we shall all welcome the addition of the hon. Member for Hammersmith, North (Mr. Tomney) to the ranks of the "feather bedders" at very short notice. I have some sympathy with his difficulties, because even those of us who try to study detailed aspects of the subsidisation of various groups find these figures extremely hard to understand fully.

I wish to point out one misunderstanding concerning Item B.6, "Potatoes." The original Estimate was £408,500. The revised Estimate is £575,000. We are dealing with the financial year 1959–60. As the hon. Member for Deptford (Sir L. Plummer) said, if we then go further to Appendix 5D in the White Paper, we see that the total grant for the financial year beginning 1st April, 1959, is to be £1 million.

The hon. Member for Deptford rightly pointed out what the Potato Marketing Board had recently said to him about this year's crop, but I think that I was right—indeed, I think that I saw my right hon. Friend agree—in saying that the £166,500 extra for 1959–60 refers to the guarantee which was payable arising out of the potato crop brought over to the end of 1958 and the beginning of 1959.

Sir L. Plummer

I am not making that point. The point I am making is that the Potato Marketing Board, talking about the present crop, namely, the crop we are now eating, says that there will be a shortage. The Minister, also referring to the crop which we are now eating, says that there will be a surplus. I asked which was the valid figure.

Major Legge-Bourke

I appreciate that that was the other point the hon. Member was making, but I do not think that it is strictly relevant to these Supplementary Estimates.

I am trying to discover why the total shown for the financial year 1959–60 in the Supplementary Estimates is £575,000, whereas in the White Paper the total amount of Exchequer support for the year 1959–60 in respect of potatoes is shown as £1 million. What I strongly suspect is happening is that we do not yet know fully what the total expenditure was for 1959–60 and the Government may be covering themselves against the outside contingency in the Annual Price Review White Paper. Perhaps the Minister will elaborate on that when he replies to the debate.

I do not want to go into any great detail on egg production. I have only one particular point to raise. The Minister will remember that some months ago I took up with him the whole question of new entrants into the poultry industry, and in particular those new entrants who are big farmers already in other types of agriculture. It is important that we should find some way of avoiding a recurrence of what has happened in the Supplementary Estimates with which we are dealing now.

The time has come, if it is not already overdue, for the Minister to do to the agriculture industry what the Chancellor of the Exchequer frequently does to the banks. He should tell them that there is a certain policy he would like their assistance in trying to carry out. The time is now overdue for the Minister to say to the National Farmers' Union, "In allowing the larger of your farming members to come into the poultry industry at this stage, all you are doing is cutting the throats of smaller producers". The Minister should ask the National Farmers' Union to co-operate in all their county branches to find a way out of this.

I have had quite a number of protests from my own constituency about this in the financial year we are talking about, and even before that. My noble Friend the Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Hinchingbrooke) and I probably do not agree on this. If we are to have marketing boards at all, for goodness sake let them be producer-controlled. That may not fully deal with the problem whether there should be a board in every case. If there are to be boards, they should be producer-controlled so that responsibility rests squarely on producers, otherwise they will never have a hope of success.

The difficulties which the Egg Marketing Board has experienced have not been entirely its own fault. I know that during the course of this financial year it has issued several instructions or advice notes to its members saying that, if they increased their breeding stock, the industry would run into trouble. Those pieces of advice have been totally ignored. There has been an increase in a very short time of 250,000 birds in one area in my own constituency. That was after the advice had been issued that breeding stock should not be increased.

If that sort of thing is happening, and if the producers cannot work with their own Board, they have only themselves to blame. The tragedy is that some of the bigger people, who need not have done so, have caused the heaviest burden to fall on those people who are most easily hurt. It is up to the industry itself to help the Board to get out of this situation.

Finally, may I comment on the observations of my hon. Friend and constituent the Member for King's Lynn (Mr. Bullard) in taking me up on an intervention which I made in the speech of the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) about production grants? I would readily agree with my hon. Friend that production grants help the smaller man very considerably, but I must confess that, if we are to have production grants at all, I should have preferred to see them on a far more selective basis, so that if we are to pay them at all, we pay far more to the smaller people, and far less to the people who do not need these grants. That is my criticism of a number of other aspects of present policy regarding farm improvement schemes, horticulture and all the rest.

I was surprised that the hon. Member for Sunderland, North registered any surprise himself when I interrupted him. He has heard me on two occasions, on the subject of horticulture, say that I did not like production grants, as a mater of principle. I adhere to that view, because my belief—and this Estimate bears it out—is that what matters most to the producer is the end-price. If that is achieved, he will be able, out of his prosperity, to plough back.

The hon. Member for Hammersmith, North wanted to know what the consumers are getting out of this. If we say that we want the general prosperity in the country to be shared by the people in the countryside, we must give some support of some kind to agriculture. If that was taken away, we should only have to look across the Irish Sea in order to appreciate what the result would be. The agricultural minimum wage in this country, instead of being £8 per week, would be £5 a week. It would mean acute distress in the rural areas, which I do not think any of us would want to see. Therefore, we have to support agriculture in one way or another. My criticism is of the detailed way in which we are doing it.

If we could get down to the details of these matters in the coming year and see if we could get an all-party agreement on them, the industry would benefit, the Exchequer would benefit and the consumer certainly would not be hurt. Some hon. Members have been asking about the latest figures which we have been given. If hon. Members care to look at the figures given in Appendix II in the White Paper on the Price Review, they will see that they deal with the actual aggregate net farming incomes. It looks very nice, if we take the figure for 1951, when this Government came into power, which is £326 million, and compare it with the figure for the year we are now discussing —1959-60—which is £356½ million. Some account, however, has to be taken of the fall in the value of money, which has meant a very considerable reduction in net income. It is very nearly £100 million less, when we reckon that the £ was worth 20s. in 1951 and it is now worth only 16s. 4d.

When we take that into account, the consumer is not doing too badly. If we were to reduce the level of subsidies now given to the industry in one way or another, the effect would be very damaging to the foreign exchange which this industry enables us to earn. It would certainly not help the agricultural machinery industry to export, and this industry is also earning a lot of money. It must have a firm home market behind it, and if we were to allow agriculture to slip back, we should damage that situation very badly indeed.

I think it is all too easy to pick out the one farmer with a Bentley, but what about all the company directors in London who have Bentleys, or whose companies have Bentleys? I agree with the hon. Member for Hammersmith, North that probably we are both trying to do the same thing—make sure that every penny that is spent is spent in the wisest way; and, if we can, I think we should in the coming year try to get agreement on these matters on an all-party basis.

5.5 p.m.

Mr. John Eden (Bournemouth, West)

Like the hon. Member for Hammersmith, North (Mr. Tomney) I am not a farmer, and also like him, I find myself a little puzzled by the complexity of some of these Supplementary Estimates.

I am sorry that this discussion is limited to Class VIII, Vote 2, because I should have liked to have said a word or two about Vote 3. I have placed an Amendment on the Notice Paper relating to one aspect of that Vote; but it is one of the difficulties of the present basis that one cannot fully examine the Supplementary Estimates before us. I feel that, even though we are picking and choosing and looking at one or two of the subheads, it is nevertheless a pity that we cannot have a more comprehensive investigation and closer scrutiny of all the Supplementary Estimates upon which we are asked to vote. I understand, of course, that this is established practice, and it would therefore be difficult to depart from it.

When making his introductory speech at the opening of this short debate, the Joint Parliamentary Secretary referred quite rightly to the fact that his Department was asking for a further £7 million or just over. In actual fact, the difference between the original Estimates and the revised Estimates, which represents the additional sum required, is something over £16 million, and the order of the difference is rather greater than one might have been led to expect by referring simply to the figure of £7 million. The difference between the £15½ million and the £7 million, referred to on page 126, is due to the expected savings on a number of other subheads.

Would it be in order for either my right hon. Friend or my hon. Friend, whoever will reply to this short discussion, to say anything about these expected savings? What is meant, for example, by expected savings? Is there any sort of degree of certainty about them; and, if some of these savings are not forthcoming, is there to be a fresh approach to the Committee with a further Supplementary Estimate? It is right that we should examine these Estimates as closely as possible.

There is a further point which I had in mind in reading each of these subheads, and the details given concerning them, in this Vote. How much of this expenditure could have been calculated beforehand? How much of it could have been estimated? I understand that this might have been rather difficult, particularly in view of changeable weather conditions, and I agree that one cannot calculate for the weather with sufficient accuracy, even if one listens to the B.B.C. One cannot tell whether it will be a fine day or a rainy day until it actually happens, but could not these figures be more closely estimated in the first case? Does not this difference of £16 million give an indication that insufficient attention is being paid to the experience of previous years? Is there not a possibility of getting the figures more accurately? My right hon. Friend the Minister, in moving the original Estimate, is in danger of giving a false picture in the first place, since we agreed to the figure at the beginning and a little later on, my right hon. Friend comes along with an application for a substantial increase.

I want to refer more specifically, however, to the subject of eggs. Cereals and eggs between them amount to a total additional sum of money of about £12 million. My noble Friend the Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Hinching-brooke) has referred to the Egg Marketing Board, and I am wondering how much of this money goes to the Egg Marketing Board. What happens to the actual sum of £36½ million? Where does that money go? According to the explanation given in page 128 we know that it is paid to the British Egg Marketing Board—but what happens to it after that? Does it go to furnish the Board with finer offices? It has recently moved to a great new establishment. Why should it go into finer offices and in this way draw attention to its activities at the expense of the taxpayer? What exactly happens to the money? Before my hon. Friend asks the Committee to vote this extra money, may we know whether he has made careful inquiry into the activities of the Board and its establishment, and inquired into the necessity for the Board to sustain such a substantial staff, as it no doubt does?

If one is not privileged to be a member of the Opposition, it is very difficult to scrutinise these Estimates with sufficient care and detail, but what scrutiny has my hon. Friend and his right hon. Friend the Minister made of the necessity for this additional expenditure before presenting these Estimates to the Committee? I listened with great respect to my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Sir A. Hurd), and fully understand that he is in a position to speak on the subject with far greater authority than I, but I did not quite follow him when he said that the greater part of the egg subsidy is a subsidy to the consumer.

He spoke as if that were a good thing, but I think that it is a bad thing. Why should the consumer have a subsidy which the taxpayer, who is also the consumer, has to pay? I do not follow his idea of encouraging the taxpayer in one part to pay a substantial sum of money in order to provide a subsidy to the consumer in the other part. Consumer and taxpayer are one and the same. I should like to see the whole system altered so that the consumer paid a more realistic price for the product, and taxes were reduced to enable him to do so.

I hope that my hon. Friend will give further assurances to the Committee that he has been careful to examine the expenditure under these headings, and that it was not possible to estimate more closely in the original Estimates. I hope that he will explain, if he can, further and in closer detail, why this substantial sum of money is required for the British Egg Marketing Board.

5.14 p.m.

Mr. Frederick Peart (Workington)

We have had a very interesting debate. I disagree very much with the noble Lord the hon. Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Hinchingbrooke) who said that these Estimates should go through very rapidly and that we should have only short speeches. That would be too perfunctory. The hon. Member for Bournemouth, West (Mr. Eden) is quite right to ask his own Ministers for reasons for their submitting these Supplementary Estimates.

The time has come when we need more scrutiny of this great industry, and that view has been supported by my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith, North (Mr. Tomney), by the noble Lord, by the hon. Member for Bournemouth, West and by the hon. and gallant Member for Isle of Ely (Major Legge-Bourke). In fact, I wish that instead of discussing these Estimates in this sort of Committee, we had a special Select Committee on agriculture, fisheries and food. We already have a Select Committee on Nationalised Industries. I should like something of that sort for agriculture.

I would be out of order were I to pursue that too far at this moment, but I believe, as many hon. Members have said, that we have not adequate time to scrutinise these Estimates carefully. For that reason, I was rather surprised at the noble Lord's wish to make only a short speech, because it is the duty of every hon. Member—

Mr. John Peyton (Yeovil)

Short speeches are usually much the best.

Mr. Peart

Yes, I think that they are —and that is the best speech the hon. Member has ever made in this Committee.

We are discussing important production grants, and grants that affect the price guarantees, and it is as well that we should remind ourselves what we are discussing. We are discussing the implementation of price guarantees in the context of the recent White Paper. That White Paper, as has been stated, deals with future policy, and the amount involved is £157.8 million. For last year, the figure was £154.7 million. Future policy for farming grants and subsidies means a sum of £94.6 million while, for last year, the figure was £80.9 million.

We all agree that this is a tremendous sum, and at one time we used to be delighted by the former hon. Member for Wednesbury. His ghost has, I think, risen today, and I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith, North will resurrect that former argument, even though I rejected the viewpoint of Stanley Evans when he was a Member of the House of Commons.

It is right that subsidy policy should be scrutinised carefully. That is what we are now doing, and my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith, North was right to intervene in the debate. This is not a matter merely for hon. Members like myself who represent rural constituencies. It affects every constituency, and there is certainly a consumer point of view.

I agree with the hon. Member for King's Lynn (Mr. Bullard) who said that these producer grants serve a useful purpose. On the other hand, it is right— and this is all that my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) advocated—that we should scrutinise their effect. We have argued this in detail during the various stages of the Horticulture Bill, and the hon. and gallant Member for the Isle of Ely put the point of view of the horticultural growers. It may be, as he said, that the incidence of that grant affects merely the large producer, and many hon. Members are worried lest the increased expenditure under the revised Estimates should, in the end, benefit only certain producers belonging to the categories mentioned.

I have always argued that producer grants have been for the good of the industry and of the consumer. They have enabled the community to inject capital into certain sections of the industry, such as fertilisers, which we have been discussing. It is right that we should analyse this, and here I come to the specific points raised by the hon. Member for Newbury (Sir A. Hurd) who, quite rightly, declared his interest in the great firm of Fisons, which has been examined by the Monopolies Commission.

I thought that the hon. Gentleman was rather touchy about the criticisms advanced by my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North. My hon. Friend was merely repeating what was stated by the Commission, and I should like to quote further remarks in pages 208 and 209 of the Commission's Report, which makes a survey of the supply of chemical fertilisers. Paragraph 655 states: Our main criticism is that Fisons has fixed its prices, and hence its profits, at too high a level, having regard to the strength of its position. The Commission continues in the following page to say: We think that Fisons should in future follow a price policy which would result in a lower rate of profit than that at which it has aimed in recent years.

Sir A. Hurd

I do not disagree at all. All I said was that that was, in fact, what the company has been doing, and its profit is now down to 17 per cent. Overall, the fertiliser industry has reduced its prices by £2,600,000 in the past year, so saving farming costs and increasing production. I therefore do not disagree with what the hon. Gentleman says.

Mr. Peart

Yes. but, after all, paragraph 704 says: In the matter of Fisons' pricing policy and the level of profits resulting from it, we do not believe that the company has acted in deliberate disregard of the public interest. We recommend that Fisons should adjust its pricing policy to yield a lower level of profit than has been achieved in recent years, and we believe that the company can be relied on to carry out this recommendation in the light of our report. We say that there was a policy that worked to the disadvantage of the farmer.

Sir A. Hurd

It does not.

Mr. Peart

Of course it did, otherwise that recommendation would not have been made. We can debate that on a later occasion, as we must. I hope, as the hon. Member for Newbury has said, that price policy will be adjusted.

Sir A. Hurd

It is being adjusted.

Mr. Peart

It is being adjusted and it will continue to be adjusted. Our main argument is this. We are to have an increased subsidy for fertilisers. Here we are debating an additional £1 million, and for lime, which was dealt with in connection with the fertiliser subsidy, we have a revised estimate amounting to £1,025,000. These are large sums of money. If we are to have increases in the fertiliser subsidy we want to ensure that the farmer and not the large firms will benefit.

After all, Fisons, I.C.I. and the others which are covered in the Monopolies Commission's Report, are virtually large monopolies. We must ensure that they do not harm the primary producers and that the farmer gets a square deal with this subsidy. In other words, if he receives a subsidy, the price of the commodity should not automatically be raised by those who supply it. That is all that my hon. Friends seek to establish.

I am certain that that is the broad policy of the Government. They too are mentioned in the Monopolies Commission's Report, their views having been requested by the Commission. They were asked for their views on the price to the farmers and they were asked whether there should be a national delivery price. The Board of Trade expressed uncertainty on this matter. I should like to know, in view of the fertiliser position and of what has been said today, whether the Minister still accepts categorically what was said in evidence to the Monopolies Commission. I myself agree with that viewpoint, and I dissent from the views of Professor Allen who submitted a minority Report which can be seen in the Appendix. We agree with the Parliamentary Secretary that we want increased use of fertilisers and we wish also to develop our soil fertility.

There is another point which has not been mentioned. There is a subsidy for nitrogenous fertilisers and one for phos-phatic fertilisers, but there is no subsidy for potash. Yet farmers are using increased amounts of all three. Is this directly due to the subsidy? In one case no subsidy is paid. I should like an answer to that question, because on the surface it would appear to show that the farmer is using more fertiliser on the farm not because of the subsidy but because of the advisory services, and indeed the very good advisory service provided by Fisons and I.C.I. on fertiliser use. That is a good thing, but we want to know how far will this increase in the subsidy affect that trend. Would the trend continue without the subsidies?

Again, there is an increase in respect of silage. I should like to know why there has been this increase in view of the fact that in the Ministry's own Press statement, The 1959 production of silage was affected by the dry season. It is about 2.8 million tons, or 30 per cent. below the figure for 1958. Yet here we are dealing with a specific increase.

There is one item which I support wholeheartedly, and that is Subhead A.7 —" Bonus payments under the Tuberculosis (Attested Herds) Scheme, 1958 (England and Wales)". I think every hon. Member will support this, because we hope that this year we shall have the area eradication plan completed. The Minister has made a statement on this matter recently and we hope that this plan will soon mean the ending of tuberculosis among our herds and a clean herd policy.

But what after that? After the final stage of the plan, where next? Questions were once put to the Minister about this. Does it mean that he envisages a reduction of the sums of money which are broadly covered by this subhead? Will it mean that testing will continue? Will more of our veterinary staffs be engaged on other work? I should like to have specific details.

On cereal production, I would merely say that although my hon. Friends have questioned this point carefully, there is a high rate of Exchequer costs for cereals as a whole and particularly for wheat. I believe that we must encourage this still, even though we must look carefully at the subsidy cost. We want home cereal production. This is a balance of payments matter, and we think it right and proper.

I would repeat what my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North has said on the subject of eggs. Here we are dealing with a very important Estimate—an increase of £4,150,000, from £32,350,000 to £36,500,000. The main point that was mentioned by my hon. Friend was this: here we have a deliberate reduction in the subsidy over the last three years. Yet egg production has increased. The Exchequer contribution has increased. What is our policy to be? It seems a stupid one at the moment. Do we wish large producers or small producers to go out of business? I think the hon. and gallant Member for the Isle of Ely was concerned about the small producers going out.

Major Legge-Bourke

I was concerned with the big new ones coming.

Mr. Peart

He was concerned with the big new one's coming in at the expense of the small producers. Is that the policy of the Government? Are the Government having any special regard to import policy because supplies have increased? I read in the Farmer and Stock-breeder an extremely interesting article by an economist, Mr. Weeks, who put to egg producers these questions, which ought to be considered by the Minister and by egg producers: Do egg producers honestly think that this state of affairs can continue? More eggs coming on to the market and the prospect of more taxpayers' money going in subsidy. Even the producers and people involved in agriculture are concerned with this. We are merely concerned with what is the policy of the Government. Are they seeking to affect the small producer? Are they going to continue, by means of the price policy, to try to restrict production despite the fact that after three years of that policy it has failed? We all know the reasons why egg production has gone up—

The Temporary Chairman (Mr. John Arbuthnot)

Order. I must ask the hon. Member not to discuss the general policy. He may discuss only the Supplementary Estimates.

Mr. Peart

I was trying to reply to points which have already been raised, but certainly I will keep to the Estimates. I feel that we should be told why we have this increase, in view of past policy. That is a reasonable request, and I hope that an answer will be given today.

Many hon. Members have discussed different Estimates in detail. I would merely say in conclusion that today we have considered the Supplementary Estimates and we have allowed ourselves approximately two hours of Parliamentary time. This is not enough. I come back to my original suggestion—I hope I may do so without going out of order —and express the hope that, one day, we shall discuss these matters in a specialist committee.

Today, we have not had ample time for the examination we should devote to these Estimates. We should consult the Minister and discuss these points with him, but, more than that, I should like to see all the other bodies involved in the industry coming before a Parliamentary committee.

This is a very big issue. The Estimates will certainly go through, even though they may go through rather rapidly, as the noble Lord the Member for Dorset, South thought they might; but it is right to question them, and we should be told what really is the policy and purpose of the Government particularly in respect of the various increased items, and how they are related to the broad general background of agriculture.

5.30 p.m.

The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. John Hare)

We have had an extremely useful and interesting debate, although, as the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Peart) has just said, it has not been very long. We have for two hours been discussing these important Estimates, and it is only right and proper that the Committee should take its duties as seriously, as it clearly has this afternoon. It seems to me that I ought to try to answer as many of the main points put during the debate as I can. If I am unable to cover them all and I have to pass over some of the less important matters, I will certainly undertake to write to hon. Members tomorrow.

The subject of eggs has occupied a considerable part of our time. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) had some fairly harsh things to say about the egg subsidy. As my hon. Friend the Member for King's Lynn (Mr. Bullard) pointed out, the hon. Gentleman was rather more destructive than constructive, and he was not entirely accurate in all his conclusions. We have, of course, known and deplored the fact that the egg subsidy has been increasing considerably. We are spending at this moment about £36 million in a year. The portion of the price of an egg represented by the subsidy is about 1d.; and, as the hon. Gentleman said, production has been increasing.

I think I can tell him why there has been this very large increase in production. It is largely due to one factor, namely, the very considerable, almost revolutionary, increase in technical efficiency.

Mr. Willey

I said that.

Mr. Hare

Another factor which the hon. Gentleman did not, I think, mention is that the profit and loss sharing arrangements which were agreed between the National Farmers' Union and ourselves on behalf of the Egg Marketing Board when the Egg Marketing Board was set up have not in practice worked as they were intended to work. They have in fact formed part of the reason for the increase in production which has taken place. Until last year, the arrangements worked extremely satisfactorily from the point of view of the producer. They worked very much to the advantage of the producer in 1957–58, for example. Although we reduced the guaranteed price then by l¾d., producers actually got 2½d. from the profit and loss sharing arrangement. In 1958-59, we reduced the guaranteed price by l¾d., but producers received l.7d. from the arrangements. So producers really had most of the benefit of market prices higher than we had been able to forecast, and these, so to speak, unexpected dividends offset the cuts we made in the guaranteed price to the Board.

That was the picture until last year. Then we cut the guaranteed price by 1d. Producers then actually lost 2¼d. through the profit and loss sharing arrangements and, since they had gained rather more than l.7d. the year before, this meant that they received 5d. per dozen less than they had the previous year. Producers felt directly the effect of the fall in market prices which had taken place as the supplies of eggs increased. So, indeed, has the Exchequer felt the increased cost occasioned by the increased supplies. That is why we have asked for this Supplementary Estimate now.

As I announced last week, we have decided to alter these profit and loss sharing arrangements. We have now agreed on revised arrangements which, I believe, will do a great deal to reduce the year-to-year fluctuations in producers' returns. It may well be that producers will receive about Id. a dozen more next year than they did last year even though we have again cut the guaranteed price. What we all want is greater stability for the egg producer at a rather lower level of production and at prices which allow a profit for efficient producers. I think that the new profit and loss sharing arrangements will go a long way in that direction.

Again, I quarrel a little with the hon. Member for Sunderland, North when he says that the consumer had very little benefit from the egg subsidy.

Mr. Willey

Before the right hon. Gentleman leaves that point about the price of eggs, I should like to have this quite clear. I gather now that, although the Price Review White Paper says that there is a reduction in egg prices, there is not, in fact, to be a reduction—it is an increase—and the right hon. Gentleman is saying, because there is now to be an increase in prices, that there will be a reduction in production.

Mr. Hare

What I said was that we shall have far more stability under the new profit sharing arrangements. I tried to show clearly that, although we cut eggs by only Id. last year, because these profit and loss sharing arrangements worked in the way they did, the producers suddenly had to face a cut of 5d. instead of the 1d. which was intended. Under the new arrangements, I think we shall avoid utterly unnecessary fluctuations.

The hon. Gentleman was not right in saying that the consumer had no benefit from the egg subsidy. My hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Sir A. Hurd) took that point up. The consumer has benefited. We must, I think, look at average retail prices over the whole year. Taking the year 1959–60, the average retail price for all types of eggs is 3s. 6d. per dozen as against 3s. 11¾d. in 1958-59 and 3s. 9d. in 1957–58. It is not, therefore, true to say that the consumer has not benefited from the subsidy.

The next big item in the debate was that of production grants. There was some general discussion about these grants, and we had some discussion about fertilisers in particular. One of the themes of the hon. Gentleman's speech was that, although production grants may be quite good things, we were not certain that we got proper value for money. Well, I believe that production grants are of the very greatest importance. My hon. Friend the Member for King's Lynn pointed out, quite rightly, that they have been of enormous value to the small man. I would say also that, from their very nature, they provide the means by which farmers, big or small, can be enabled to reduce their costs. Such grants, moreover, bear fruit not only in the year that they are received but in subsequent years. I think that they form a very important element in enabling the farming community to reduce its production costs.

Again, I do not think that the hon. Member for Sunderland, North was perhaps as fair as he should have been in what he said about fertilisers. He compared the amount of fertilisers used in this country with the amount used on the Continent. If I remember aright, he started his speech by saying, "I think that on the whole the fertiliser subsidy is a good thing, but I wonder whether we are getting value for money." He said, and it is true, that we are not using as much fertiliser as many Western European countries, but I do not think that he was comparing like with like. I think that he forgets the very different conditions that exist in this country as compared with those in Western European countries. Obviously, a much larger proportion of our land is under permanent grass. Admittedly, I think that we could use far more fertilisers than we are using; but, on the other hand, if one compares large quantities of land under permanent grass with ordinary tillage land such as is almost universal on the Continent, it is clear that there would automatically be a larger proportion of fertiliser used on that tillage land.

There is no doubt that this fertiliser subsidy has proved extremely useful.

Mr. Willey

I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman recognises that these are important matters. How does he square his present argument with the size of the subsidy? If the importance of fertilisers in our agriculture is less than their importance in other countries, why have we far and away the largest subsidy? Will the right hon. Gentleman also deal with the other point that I raised about not only the use but the rate of increase of use?

Mr. Hare

Again, I think that the hon. Member is being a little hasty. I have not yet left the question of fertilisers.

As the Committee knows, we have made a reduction this year in the fertiliser subsidy, but the fact that it has risen from £8 million to the present figure of £29 million is, in many ways, an indication of the success of this subsidy. It shows the very much larger quantity of fertilisers which our farming industry is using as a result of having been encouraged to do so by the subsidy. I do not think that that point was made very clearly by the hon. Member.

There have been one or two comments about the Report of the Monopolies Commission. The hon. Member for Workington gave us his views on this matter. As I have explained, my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade is consulting the industry to see how far it is prepared to give effect to the conclusions in the Report. These consultations are in progress. I do not think that it would be proper for me to comment on the Report until the industry has had a chance to consider its implications and to make its own representations to my right hon. Friend.

Mr. Peart

I well understand if the right hon. Gentleman cannot comment on that matter, but some hon. Members concerned with the matter have rightly put their point of view. Will the right hon Gentleman comment on the Report of the Comptroller and Auditor—

The Temporary Chairman

Order. The Report of the Comptroller and Auditor-General does not come under this Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. Peart

With regard to the administration of the subsidy, may I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether the recommendations will be carried out?

Mr. Hare

I should like to follow up the point raised by the hon. Member. He is, I think, referring to our own domestic arrangements for the administration of the subsidy.

I think that on the whole our arrangements for administering the subsidy are good. But I should be the last in this world to say that no improvement could be made in any arrangements.

I have been looking at these particular arrangements with considerable care and attention. We have made, and are making, certain changes which I think will be helpful in the direction that the hon. Member thinks we should go. We have used the regional organisation as well as our technical staff in order to make many more checks both on farms and, where they agree, at suppliers' premises. We are undertaking many thousands of visits to farms and suppliers and are planning to increase the number of visits next year. Then, secondly, we are extracting for detailed examination all claims for amounts exceeding £150. Finally, we have improved the paper form on which the subsidy is claimed, so as to enable a check to be made on the delivery of fertilisers before subsidy is paid. These arrangements will further strengthen our hand in tackling the problems which the Committee rightly thinks we should tackle. We have a great responsibility in the expenditure of public money.

There is one other improvement which I should like to mention. At present, our powers do not allow us to examine the records of fertiliser suppliers. This is a gap which ought to be filled. As I have already said, I shall in due course be submitting legislative proposals to enable us to examine suppliers' records.

I am glad that these points have been raised, because it is right that the House of Commons should know that we are taking our duties seriously. These are the sort of improvements which I think will assist our administration.

A number of other points were raised which I should like to try to answer. The hon. Member for Deptford (Sir L. Plummer) raised several points. He said that he could not understand the figures, and I think that his confusion was shared by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for the Isle of Ely (Major Legge-Bourke) and the hon. Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Mackie). Confusion was caused because I think that hon. Members have forgotten that we had a Supplementary Estimate, which was not debated, in July this year. If hon. Members will look at subhead B.6 in the Supplementary Estimate, they will see a revised Estimate of £575,000. If they add the revised Estimate of £200,010 in Subhead B.9 and the Supplementary Estimate of £225,000, they will arrive at the figure in the White Paper. I think that that is where confusion arose.

The hon. Member for Enfield, East asked me a number of questions. He said, "Why could not the silo subsidy be paid as part of the farm improvement scheme?" One of the difficulties is that it is a different rate of grant and it was put on the Statute Book before the farm improvement scheme. There would be considerable technical difficulty in doing what the hon. Member suggested, and amending legislation would be needed. The hon. Member also made a point about the fertiliser subsidy. I should like to look into that.

Other points made by the hon. Member related to figures about potatoes, and the hon. Member for Deptford said he could not understand why the Potato Marketing Board had said one thing and I had said the opposite. The explanation is that the Board was discussing the amount of potatoes which would be in supply on the basis of the 2 in. riddle being continued in use, whereas I was dealing with total supplies, which include all potatoes. That might account for the discrepancy.

Sir L. Plummer

That is not the answer. Two categorically contradictory statements have been made. The Potato Marketing Board said that there was a prospect of shortage this year. In paragraph 32 of the White Paper the Minister says that the yields were above normal and that production was expected to show an increase, and he talks about a considerable surplus for human consumption. These are two diametrically opposite views.

Mr. Hare

The hon. Member and I usually quarrel about pigs. This is a new source of discord.

Sir L. Plummer

I won on pigs.

Mr. Hare

The Potato Marketing Board dealt with the total supplies of potatoes for human consumption, on the basis of the 2 in. riddle, whereas I am talking about the total available supply of potatoes.

Sir L. Plummer

For human consumption. The words appear in the right hon. Gentleman's own paper.

Mr. Hare

If we have a 2 in. riddle and say that nothing below 2 in. shall be sold for human consumption, a large number of potatoes are immediately no longer available for human consumption. Is not that a fairly clear explanation?

Sir L. Plummer

No.

Mr. Hare

I will write to the hon. Member, if he cannot understand my explanation.

I am grateful that we had a newcomer to our debates, the hon. Member for Hammersmith, North (Mr. Tomney). I am all for having recruits, because the more people take an intelligent interest in agriculture, the better it is for the industry. The hon. Member was very modest. He admitted that he was a beginner. We like beginners. We hope that he will not adopt too rigid a view, because I am sure that he agrees that he has a lot to learn on the subject. We on this side of the Committee also have a lot to learn.

It is easy to ask what the farmers are doing with the large sums of money made available to them and to ask what happens to the subsidies. My view, and I hope that it is shared by most hon. Members, is that the country has every right to know how these production grants and subsidies are paid, but that it would be doing a major disservice to give the impression that the country is not getting value for money in giving this support to agriculture. Any such impression would be quite wrong. We in this country eat probably cheaper and, as I have said before, from a far wider range of foods than almost any other country.

I am therefore certain that this money is well spent. Unfortunately I did not hear the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth, West (Mr. Eden), but I gather that he asked whether I was looking carefully at the Estimates. I agree with him that it is the duty of the Minister, and of the House of Commons, to scrutinise with care the spending of all this public money. Having said that, I have no hesitation in asking the Committee to approve the Vote.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved, That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £7,280,500, be granted to Her Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1960, by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food for grants and subsidies to farmers and others for the encouragement of food production and the improvement of agriculture; for payments and services in implementation of agricultural price guarantees; and for certain other services including a payment to the Exchequer of Northern Ireland.

CLASS VI