§ 2. Mr. Phil Woolas (Oldham, East and Saddleworth)What recent assessment he has made of the benefits of the environmentally sensitive areas scheme for wildlife in rural areas. [113369]
§ The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Elliot Morley)Detailed monitoring has taken place since the scheme was introduced in 1987. The results have been used to adapt and refine the scheme to increase environmental benefits.
§ Mr. WoolasI thank my hon. Friend for that reply. The environmentally sensitive area scheme has been welcomed in my constituency. Baroness Young, the chair of English Nature, has described it as the most important decision on the countryside for 20 years. However, can my hon. Friend help my constituent, Mr. Graham Tibbot of Belle Vue farm in Delph, who faces an apparent contradiction over stock density between the ESA scheme and the proposed hill farm allowance scheme? Will my hon. Friend examine that case?
§ Mr. MorleyI support my hon. Friend's comments on ESAs, which are valuable and provide genuine benefits. The scheme involves some restrictions on stock density, and I appreciate that that can cause anomalies in payments such as hill livestock compensatory allowances. I assure my hon. Friend that we are only too pleased to examine the matter in detail. I shall write to him.
§ Mr. Desmond Swayne (New Forest, West)However beneficial the scheme may be, might it not be thoroughly undermined if hedgerows were grubbed up? Will the Minister put on record the remarks that he made earlier when I tackled him in the water closet, where he said that there is some prospect of seeing off the European directive?
§ Mr. MorleyI need to be careful about giving the hon. Gentleman privileged access.
I want to make a serious point about the recent directives from the Court of Auditors on field boundaries. There is some logic to them, because the European Union pays a subsidy on the cropped area, which may not always extend right up to the field boundary. However, that is a traditional method of farming in this country. That was acknowledged when we agreed the scheme, which was based on Ordnance Survey maps, with the European Commission. There are risks to the environmental benefits of hedgerows and uncropped edges of fields. We are 490 discussing that with the European Commission, and we hope that we can reach a workable and reasonable compromise.