AGRICULTURE (PLOUGHING GRANTS) (Hansard, 23 May 1966)

Mr. Mills
I personally believe that these ploughing grants have a useful part still to play in the general scheme of things, though, of course, nothing like as it was in years gone by when it was of vital importance to increase production to the limit. It is true that some people question whether there is any need for these grants, for people take the plough around the farm as a matter of normal routine these days. How far will this stop, with this reduction in the ploughing grant? That remains to be seen.
Will not the Minister agree that the fact that these grants have been reduced might cause some suffering to the small farmer, unless of course the money saved was diverted his way in some form or another. This may well be one of the effects of these cuts. I should like to point out to the Minister, too, that it will most likely be the areas such as the South-West and the wetter areas in the West, and indeed in Scotland, with a high proportion of grass that will perhaps feel the cut most. They have practised ley farming by direct reseeding, and surely this ploughing grant cut will not help that to continue, which I believe to be of tremendous value. This again will mean a loss of income to the small farmer who will probably feel it more than the bigger farmers. The reason for this is that the grant, like all other revenue production grants, represents an interim payment towards the price of the 168 end product, and this is extremely important to many small farmers who rely to a great extent on grants of this kind to bolster up their incomes.
I wonder whether the Minister can give any figures about the effect that this will have on the smaller farmers. The Minister gave us the acreage figures and the cost, but I am wondering whether he could break them down a little further and tell us the cost and the acreage in the various regions. I ask this because I believe it is important to compare various regions, to see what effect the reduction of the ploughing grant has in the arable regions as compared with the wetter areas of our country.
There are some further questions that I should like the Minister to answer. Will the form remain the same? I have one here, and I must say that of all the forms that farmers get, this is perhaps the simplest and the easiest to understand. This is a matter on which we should congratulate the Ministry. But will it remain the same? I hope so.
Is the system of payment the same? I believe that speed in payment is important, and I hope there will not be a long delay in the payment of these grants. Will rotavation still be allowed? I hope so. Will other modern forms of preparing the seedbed, such as by chemicals, be allowed? These are important questions and I hope the Minister will answer them.
It will be important to await the practical results of this cut in the ploughing grant. I trust that the dangers of the continuous cereal cycle will not be overlooked by the Minister. I am afraid that the small farmer may find it difficult to recoup another reduction in the total income to his holding.

§ Mr. W. H. K. Baker (Banff)
May I, with great humility, congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Torrington (Mr. Peter Mills) on an excellent "maiden" speech from the Front Bench. He always speaks lucidly, and this evening he not only did that but he put some very pertinent questions to the Minister, which I entirely endorse.
The Minister has not made out a case for the reduction of the subsidy from £5 to £2 10s., particularly as it applies to the remoter areas of North-East Scotland and South-West England. Farmers in these areas have had to put up with a 169 good many imposts from this Government in increased costs and charges. Without doubt, one factor which has helped to making agriculture as viable as it has been the production of homegrown feeding stuffs, by which I mean feeding stuffs actually grown on the farm and not imported either from another area or from abroad.
How can the Minister justify this reduction, in view of all the other increased costs? Secondly, can he tell us haw many of the 600,000 acres ploughed up under Part II of the Scheme since 1952 are in Scotland?

§ Mr. Hector Monro (Dumfries)
This is another sorry decision of the Government. If it was a valuable grant before, it is only half as valuable now, and the farmers of Scotland, particularly those in the remoter areas spoken of by my hon. Friend the Member for Banff (Mr. Baker), will be singularly angry with the Government for their decision.
The Minister ought to realise that in the remoter areas and all the livestock rearing areas of Scotland we are not ploughing for cash crops. We plough to improve the quality of our grassland. We do not do it as frequently as is done for cash crops, and it is all the more important, therefore, to have the leadership which the grant has given to break the ground. This is the saddest aspect of the Government's decision, because the leadership which the grant gave in encouraging farmers to break their ground has undoubtedly improved the quality of grassland throughout many areas of Scotland, but I am certain that there may well be a reduction in ploughing now because of the loss of grant.
The Minister went galloping along on his plough so fast that I was not able to keep up with him on Part II. Perhaps he will make clear whether the £12 grant can still be awarded as well as the scrubland and reclamation grant. In recent years, it has not been so, and I want to know whether there has been a change it policy. I want to know also what the timetable will be in both Scotland and England for the period between application for grant and payment. It now seems necessary to give the 14 days' notice on completion of ploughing.
170 The most important aspect of the whole Scheme is that this is another miserable effort by the Government to reduce the farmer's income, and I hope that we shall take the strongest objection to their attitude.

§ Mr. Alick Buchanan-Smith (North Angus and Mearns)
The debate so far has shown clearly what the impact of this cut in subsidy will be on the livestock areas, particularly in the remoter areas. As my hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries (Mr. Monro) pointed out, in the livestock areas this grant was a great incentive to improve grassland and to increase our production of livestock products, particularly meat, of which this country is in such short supply.
The particularly sorry feature of the cut is that there is no way by which the money is to be put back into farming in these areas. One is taking away a certain amount of money from the arable areas, as well. In the more remote areas—grassland and upland areas—the grant has been of the greatest benefit, but nothing is being put back. This is very disappointing. It is the upland areas which need it. The upland dairy farms have a much rougher time than others, and yet it is from these areas that our supply of store stock, sheep and calves, come forward for fattening lower down.
So it is very disappointing that, if a cut was necessary, there is no simultaneous and corresponding increase in other respects, such as in the grassland renovation grant, which is at a not very adequate level. It is particularly disappointing that the money has not been put back in such a way.
If the grant is to be reduced, as appears to be the case, to £32 million a year—I imagine that that is the figure that the Government have in mind—can the Parliamentary Secretary tell me what the costs of administering the grant will be? If we are coming down to a grant of such a low value, I wonder what the costs of administration will be and whether the money would not be better spent through other schemes to help areas of farmland which are particularly in need of it.
I have been struck by the interest shown in this debate by hon. Members 171 from Scotland. All of us know the feeling that there is in our constituencies about the reduction in the grant. In expressing our views, we are showing the concern that is felt by the farmers in Scotland. Now that the Minister of State, Scottish Office, is in the Chamber, I hope that we shall have the benefit of a reply from him to the debate. This question affects Scottish farmers very much, and I am sure that Scottish farmers who read reports of the debate will be disappointed if we have a reply only from a representative of the Ministry of Agriculture and not from one of our Scottish Ministers.

§ Mr. Michael Jopling (Westmorland)
If it is in order for an English back bencher to speak on this occasion, I shall be very grateful for the opportunity to question the Joint Parliamentary Secretary on a matter touched upon by my hon. Friend the Member for Torrington (Mr. Peter Mills) in his very forceful and questioning speech. He asked whether it was in order for the grant to be paid where grassland had not been ploughed but had been broken down by means of new chemical techniques and resown. These new methods are very much to the fore at the moment.
I am sure that whichever Minister replies to the debate, even if it is the Scottish Minister, will be conversant with these new chemical methods of restoring old grassland. One can spray the grassland and then leave it for six weeks, and this totally kills the sward, and after that one can direct-reseed and restore the grassland to a very excellent state of production in a very short time with the minimum wasted period when there is no production.
Because of the publicity given to these new methods and their technical excellence, they must surely have been considered when the Order was drawn up, but they have been omitted. My hon. Friend the Member for Torrington asked whether it was in order for them to be used. I shall be most surprised if it is in order for them to be used under this Scheme. It seems to me on reading it that only ploughing qualifies for the grant. Whichever Minister replies must tell us why the new techniques have not been included.
172 The farming enterprises of the Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Agriculture appear in all the smart glossy farming magazines very frequently, and I am sure that he is conversant with these methods and has been pressing for their inclusion. They have been left out. Why? Is it because the Government's policy is, in a short time, to scrap the scheme altogether and cut the subsidy from £2 10s. to nothing at the earliest possible moment? Do they think that, because the scheme has only relatively few years to run, it is not worth including new methods of grassland renovation? We must have an answer.

§ Mr. John Peyton (Yeovil)
I want to reiterate and confirm what my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland (Mr. Jopling) has said. If I can have the attention of those on the Treasury Bench, I wish to say to them that, when charges such as he has made are delivered, the Treasury Bench is wont to scoff at them and appear to suggest that there is no foundation for them. We on this side have a very profound and ever-growing suspicion about the motives of the Government towards agriculture in particular and the countryside in general.
Our suspicions have not been laid to rest by the ludicrous propositions we have recently heard from the Chancellor of the Exchequer and which, we understand, are to be fathered by the Minister of Labour. But we expect a more convincing and cogent explanation than we have yet had from the Treasury Bench and the more we see the supercilious smiles coming from that source the greater will be our impatience to hear a sound explanation.
I want to turn attention to the Minister of State, Scottish Office, who, as a very old friend, I am delighted to see on the Government Front Bench. He is a master of English, though not always of the briefest character. We have heard him on many occasions. I am sure, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that you will not permit me to remind the House in detail of his previous escapades, but, nevertheless, I call his attention to something that I would not blame him personally for.
Although the hon. Gentleman has deployed his knowledge of English at length, never have I heard his use language such as is contained in paragraph 173 2(3) of the Scheme relating to Scotland. It would be wrong for these immortal words not to be written into the record: Any reference in this scheme to any other scheme shall be construed as a reference to that scheme as amended by any subsequent scheme, and if any scheme referred to in this scheme is replaced by a subsequent scheme the reference shall be construed as a reference to that subsequent scheme. Modestly, I disclaim any title to the laughter that that ridiculous sentence has excited, Ministers are confident in a great majority and look forward to an almost—to them—unending future of power—[HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] I said "to them"—but there is an almost unending future for them now if they go on this way. I ask Ministers to look with some care at the horrid language which they seek to perpetrate in the name of government.
I am amazed by the restraint which I have exercised tonight. The time will come, I do not doubt, when I shall be tempted to emulate the verbosity of the Minister of State. For the moment I am asking him modestly, and in these very few words, to use his undoubted influence to improve the language which finds its way into these horrid Statutory Instruments.

§ Mr. Paul Hawkins (Norfolk, South-West)
I join with my hon. Friends in condemning this continuous progress of cutting the farmer's income. I do not agree with the Parliamentary Secretary that we can give up leys with safety, particularly in the Eastern Counties. If we do not look out, on our very light lands we shall be continuously growing either cereals or carrots, and I cannot believe that that is a good method of farming.
Nor do I agree with my hon. Friends from Scotland, or from the wetter districts, as they like to describe them, that they are the main victims of this cut in the ploughing-up grant. In East Anglia we have used this grant to great advantage. The light lands cannot go on growing cereal crops year in and year out without a rest, and the rest has enabled us to produce a lot of beef cattle, beef stores on our light sandy lands, although we shall probably not get more than 50 per cent. of the beef cow subsidy because we do not need 2½ acres per cow to keep our cow herds.
174 I protest most vigorously at this reduction, which is another blow to the farmer's income. There would be no grumbles if we had seen where additional income had been put into the pockets of farmers, but in our area cereal prices have been cut to the bone, sugar beet costs have gone up tremendously over the last few years, and prices have remained the same. On the light lands of East Anglia we can make a considerable contribution to the increased production of store cattle for beef production, but this cut in the ploughing-up grant without some additional income in the way of either increased beef prices or a cut in the acreage allowed per beef cow will drive us out of animal husbandry altogether.
I stress that farmers in England and Wales and Scotland, even the wetter parts of England, have found month after month, from the time the Labour Party came into power, that we have had cut after cut and increased cost after increased cost put on the backs of the farmers. We cannot go on bearing this much longer and we must see that this cut in the ploughing-up grant is made up to the farmers in some other way.

§ Mr. J. B. Godber (Grantham)
Surely it is amazing that we should be debating two Schemes, one affecting England and Wales and the other affecting Scotland, without having a speech from a Scottish Minister. We have had a number of speeches from Scottish hon. Members on this side of the House and surely it is customary in these circumstances to have a Scottish Minister to wind up the debate. I wish no discourtesy to the Parliamentary Secretary, to whom we are always happy to listen, but if we are not to have a Scottish Minister, the House will not have the opportunity to hear the Government's attitude to matters affecting Scotland.

§ Mr. Mackie
I think it was the hon. Member for Westmorland (Mr. Jopling) and the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Peyton) who said that we did not pay attention to things—[Interruption.]—if their colleagues opposite would keep quiet when they have made their points, there would be more chance of replying to them, because I missed some of them 175 as a result of the noise from the Opposition benches. The hon. Member for Torrington (Mr. Peter Mills) asked several questions, and I shall do my best to reply to everything.

§ Mr. Charles Morrison (Devizes)
On a point of order. Is it in order, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for an hon. Gentleman to speak twice in one debate without asking the permission of the House?

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Sydney Irving)
The hon. Gentleman has the right of reply.

§ Mr. Mackie
Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I should like to start with the points raised by the hon. Member for Torrington, several of which were also made by other hon. Members, particularly that about the danger of too wide a cycle of cereal growth. I do not think we should be too old-fashioned about this. Many farmers in Scotland—and I dare not mention Scotland too often, or I might get into trouble—have been growing barley for 26 to 30 years and their yields are not going down, nor have they been troubled with any diseases.
We all know that some people are opposed to chemical farming, but as well as spraying there are quicker and better methods of cultivation and a lot of experiments which the Ministry is carrying out on behalf of farmers in England at experimental farms, particularly at Box-worth, in Cambridgeshire, show that not only barley but also wheat can be grown successfully if proper varieties are used and proper care is taken in cultivation and everything else. The hon. Member for Torrington also made the point, which I do not think was very valid, about whether we were trying to squeeze cereal growers by this cut. I can assure him that that is not the case. The 1963 cut of £2—only 10s. less than the present cut—had no effect on ploughing up. In fact more ploughing up has taken place since then and, as the hon. Member knows, there has been a record cereal acreage.
It is also not the case, as he suggested, that smaller farmers would be hurt. If there is any hurt at all, it is in proportion to the size of one's farm. I am sorry that it is difficult to give the hon. Member figures for individual areas off the cuff, but I shall see that he gets them in writing.
176 The hon. Member asked that the form should remain the same and he complimented us, for which I thank him, on the fact that the form that farmers have to fill up is simple. The speed of payment will also be the same. It has been fairly quick. As the hon. Member knows, rotovation is included and remains admissible.
I know that the whole question of chemical treatment of grassland for reseeding—or, for that matter, cropping—is now on the cards. We have not included it yet, but, naturally, we are looking into every method of reseeding. If we feel that it is necessary—and this is the reply also to the hon. Member for Westmorland, who stressed the point—it might come under the grant in due course. I have now been provided with the figures for which the hon. Member for Torrington asked for the various areas, but as they are rather detailed I will send them to the bon. Member so as not to bore the House.
The hon. Member for North Angus and Mearns (Mr. Buchanan-Smith), who, I presume, spoke for Scotland, referred to what he called the impact on the agricultural community. What amuses me is the impact upon hon. Members opposite from Scotland. When the hon. Member, of all people, suggests that Scottish farmers require an incentive for ley farming and ploughing up their leys regularly, he is doing them a gross injustice, because he knows perfectly well that farmers in Scotland regard this as a normal way of going on. They do not need this incentive.

§ Mr. Buchanan-Smith
The present policy of the Government is restricting prices and squeezing the return to farmers. To help them in the way we suggest would be an aid to efficiency valuable for farmers and good for farming in general.

§ Mr. Mackie
We have had these points raised by a number of hon. Members. In discussing the Schemes, they have used your good will, Mr. Deputy Speaker, to enable them to make points concerning the Price Review, [Interruption.] I am complimenting hon. Members opposite on the way they use their time in a debate like this. We have had only two Reviews. The average of those two Reviews has been half as good again as the whole nine Reviews of the two previous 177 Conservative Governments. I know that hon. Members opposite do not like these figures, but they had better accept them.
Over and above that, we have helped the broad run of farmers much more than hon. Members opposite ever did when they were in power. I have a fair list of these things which, some day when we have a proper debate on agriculture, I will read to the House.
The hon. Member for North Angus and Mearns stressed that hill and upland farmers would be hurt. When he thinks of the extra help that we have given to those farmers, including the new cow subsidy, he will not be able to justify what he has said. He simply has not studied what we are doing. He properly made the point that if the amount of grant is reduced but the number of farmers receiving it is probably the same, the costs of administering the scheme are bound to be a little more.
The hon. Member for Banff (Mr. Baker) said that I had made no case. I do not want to repeat what I said earlier. I presume that the hon. Member was present when I made my case. I thought I had made it fairly strongly. The hon. Member asked for the figures for Scotland from the total of 600,000 acres that have been dealt with under Part II. The answer is that 108,000 acres are Scotland's share at £12 an acre.
The hon Member for Dumfries (Mr. Monro) wanted to know whether a farmer who was getting a subsidy for improving his hill land could get the £12 also. As the hon. Member knows, no farmer gets two subsidies for the same job.

§ Mr. Monro
I asked about reclamation.

§ Mr. Mackie
If it is a job of reclamation, the farmer gets the 50 per cent. grant for that, but he cannot get it both ways. I have answered the point about the time between application and ploughing. It will be the same. It will be done fairly quickly. As the hon. Member knows, we have speeded that up.
I am not sure why the hon. Member for Yeovil entered the debate, except that he certainly amused the House. He said that any charge which was put to this side of the House was scoffed at. He can hardly say that I have scoffed at anything which has been said tonight. The hon. 178 Member also dealt with the language of the Schemes. In some ways, I could not agree more. The language of many Orders and Bills is something that probably the hon. Member and I, as ordinary individuals, do not understand. They have, however, to be put in legal language which can be enforced. As it happens, the sentence in question that the hon. Member read cleverly and sarcastically was, I think, drawn up by the previous Government.

§ Mr. Peyton
I used no art whatever in reading that abominable sentence. I defy the hon. Gentleman to rise at the Box and read it in any way which makes the language remotely attractive.

§ Mr. Mackie
Obviously, the hon. Member was not listening to me. I was almost agreeing with him. I was explaining that Statutory Instruments have to be drawn up in a legal manner so that they can be enforced.
The hon. Member also raised the question of the Selective Employment Tax, which is completely out of order in this debate and I do not propose to deal with it. The hon. Member for Norfolk, South-West (Mr. Hawkins) was also worried about continuous cereal growing. I do not think that he need worry, because he knows perfectly well that there is a great deal of it in Norfolk. He said that farmers would not get a fair share of the beef subsidy because the acreage standard that we are going to put down—although this has not been finalised—of two and a half acres per cow was high for an arable area. We are putting the subsidy this way because we want the emphasis placed on the poorer land.
He also said that we had done nothing for the beef farmers. We have given them £6 10s. per cow and 10s. per cwt. for beef. What more would he like? Through the Prices and Incomes Board we are trying to keep prices down, which means keeping the costs of farmers steady and this is what we are doing.

§ Mr. Hawkins
This extra 10s. is not an extra at all. The beef prices is well above it. No extra money is being paid out by the Government.

§ Mr. Mackie
It would be at present, but it is an extra 10s. and a guarantee. I am not sure that the hon. Member is 179 right because, if I remember rightly, we were paying out a subsidy last week. I should not say that it was not being paid.
I think that I have answered all the points raised by hon. Members.

§ Mr. Michael Noble (Argyll)
I would like to make two points to the hon. Gentleman, and one to the House. In arguing against the point put by one of my hon. Friends, it was said that the cut is the same, whether the farm is large or small. This demonstrates the quite remarkable ignorance of the hon. Gentleman of the situation of many small farmers, such as are represented by my hon. Friends. I rather wish that the Parliamentary Secretary's brother had been here. He would have demolished that argument, lock, stock and barrel. Although the cut may be the same, per acre, the percentage return of the small farmer can be very serious. Clearly, if one has 1,000 acres of arable, and a big farm, a percentage difference between £5 and £2 10s. is minute considered against one's annual trade.
It is wrong of the hon. Gentleman, when he is asking the House to listen to him twice in the course of one evening, and when he had figures in his hand, for which had been requested by one of my hon. Friends, to say that he would not give them in case they would bore the House. It is admirably clear from the debate that many of my hon. Friends are extremely interested. It is also true, having looked at the silent benches opposite, that no one on that side is interested at all. Of course, the Liberal Party is totally unrepresented. That being so, the Parliamentary Secretary was a little less than fair to the House.
The point I particularly wanted to make is to say that in the past we have had a perfectly reasonable custom, that where the House has agreed to take both English and Scottish Schemes at the same time they would be discussed together, so that hon. Gentlemen on both sides of the House, if they were interested, could raise points relating to their respective countries.
It has, in the past, been almost invariable that if an English Minister opened, 180 a Scottish Minister replied; if a Scottish Minister opened, an English Minister replied. Tonight, we have had the sorry spectacle of a Scottish Minister—one of a team which the Prime Minister described during the election as the best team that had ever been at St. Andrew's House—sitting totally unable to speak, knowing nothing about the subject and contributing nothing to the problems which my hon. Friends have been raising about their own country.
It is a great pity, and inevitably it means that in future we shall have to consider carefully whether to have one or two debates on these sorts of Schemes.

§ Mr. John Mackie
With the permission of the House, I will reply to one point—[HON. MEMBERS: "The Scottish Minister."] Two of the three points were put to me, and I wish to answer the percentage one. Whatever way one looks at it, I said the percentage was the same——

§ Mr. Noble
That is exactly what I did not say.

§ Mr. Mackie
I said the percentage of the reduction was bound to be the same. If 100 acres are ploughed on one farm and 10 on another, the reduction in the percentage is the same.

§ Mr. John Mackie
No, I will not give way again. [HON. MEMBERS: "Give way."] No, I will not.

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
Order. The right hon. Gentleman must resume his seat if the hon. Gentleman will not give way.

§ Mr. Peyton
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. A point of order was raised with you just now, when the hon. Gentleman sought to address the House for the second time, as to whether he had a right to do so. You said that he had a right of reply. The point that I wish to put to you now is whether that right of reply continues indefinitely throughout the night.

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
The hon. Gentleman has only one right of reply, but he prefaced his remarks by asking the leave of the House on this last occasion.

§ Mr. Noble
Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. With one or two exceptions, I was the nearest to the hon. Gentleman who rose to speak, and I heard no such words.

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
Order. I was under the impression that the hon. Gentleman asked the leave of the House to speak again. If he did not, perhaps he will do so now.

§ Mr. Peyton
Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Whether or not the hon. Gentleman sought the leave of the House, it was quite clear that he did not get it. That is the point that I wish to put to you and, in doing so, to reinforce the admirable remarks that have just been made by my right hon. Friend saying that we really expect a reply, if we must endure one, from a Scottish Minister.

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
Order. Mr. Mackie

§ Mr. Mackie
If the right hon. Gentleman did not hear me ask for permission, may I now make it quite clear to him, if he is a little deaf, that I did ask for permission. Most of my hon. Friends heard me, but I presume that he did not. I hope that I am now speaking sufficiently loud for him to hear me.
I wish to reply to the charge that I was ungracious to the hon. Member for Torrington in not giving him the figures. As nine hon. Members had spoken and only one hon. Member asked for those figures, I thought that it would be more courteous to write to the hon. Gentleman and give him the long list, rather than bore the other hon. Members who had not asked for them.