HC Deb 26 January 1995 vol 253 cc458-9
4. Sir Irvine Patnick

To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what his Department is doing to encourage environmentally sensitive farming.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mrs. Angela Browning)

We are expanding the range of schemes to encourage environmentally sensitive farming, and next year we plan to spend more than £100 million on such schemes in the United Kingdom.

Sir Irvine Patrick

As my hon. Friend is aware, Sheffield, Hallam and Peak park are interlinked. Will she confirm that rambling is to be encouraged but that the Labour party's policy of the right to roam will damage the countryside?

Mrs. Browning

I agree with my hon. Friend. He will be interested to know that, under the new countryside access scheme, which we introduced, 100 applications have been made and are being considered by the Agricultural Development Advisory Service. That will encourage the quiet use of the countryside through pursuits such as rambling and cycling on set-aside land. In the Peak parks and other such areas, we encourage responsibility among those who use and those who have stewardship of the countryside.

Mr. Hardy

Will the Minister ensure that the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food pays proper attention, as I believe the Department of the Environment may be doing, to the recent publication on biodiversity produced by the conservation bodies? For example, does she accept that nearly two thirds of the British skylark population has disappeared in the past 15 years or so and that such problems can be resolved only by the exercise of initiative by the Minister's Department and others?

Mrs. Browning

I can reassure the hon. Gentleman and I hope that he will support the habitat scheme, which is now in its first year and is particularly targeted at water fringe and marshlands. I hope that that will be the start of many other such schemes with a long-term option whereby they can be extended for up to 20 years. Certain species require such continuity to ensure that they and their habitats survive.