§ Mr. Peter Millsasked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will give details of the latest estimate he has made of the cost in 1981–82 of expenditure by his Department, the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries for Scotland and the Welsh Office agricultural department under the United Kingdom price guarantees and other agricultural grants and subsidies, together with comparable figures for 1980–81.
§ Mr. Peter WalkerDetails are given in the following table of the latest estimates for the financial year 1981–82 together with the comparable figures for the outturn in the financial year 1980–81.
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Latest estimate of outturn 1981–82 £ million Actual outturn 1980–81 £ million Price Guarantees (a) Sheep(b) — 32.9 Wool 8.5 3.9 Potatoes 9.9 8.7 18.4 45.5 Production Grants and Subsidies Guidance Premiums for Beef and Sheepmeat 7.1 10.2 Milk Non-Marketing Premiums 24.7 30.5 Suckler Cow Premium Scheme 20.5 14.6 Annual Premium on Ewes 28.5 — 80.8 55.3 Support for Capital and Other Improvements Agriculture and Horticulture Development Scheme(c) 85.8 97.3 Farm Accounts 2.5 2.1 Farm Structure 0.6 0.6 Agriculture and Horticulture Grant Scheme(d) 76.0 88.4 Co-operation Grants 2.1 1.4 Others 0.5 0.3 167.5 190.1 Support for Agriculture in Special Areas Hill Livestock Compensatory Allowances (e) 87.6 95.0 Additional benefit to farmers in special areas under AHDS and AHGS 17.7 21.9 Others 1.7 1.4 107.0 118.3 Grand Total (f) 373.7 (f) 409.2 (a) Residual expenditure under the milk guarantee arrangements which terminated on 31 December 1977 is attributed to food subsidies. (b) Price guarantee arrangements for sheep were superseded by the EC sheep variable premium scheme on 20 October 1980. (c) Formerly the farm and horticulture development scheme. (d) Formerly the farm and horticulture capital grant schemes. (e) Takes into account the 1982 rates announced on 19 November 1981, including an increase in the rate of allowance for hill cows. The 1981–82 Estimate is lower than the outturn for 1980–81 because an unusually high proportion of payments was made in 1980–81.
(f) Some of this expenditure attracts contributions from the European agricultural guidance and guarantee fund. These are mainly.received in the following year. In 1981–82 £118.2 million is expected to be received from the fund as compared with £78–8.million in 1980–81.