Lord Chelwoodasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they will publish a table showing the number of hectares of land drained in each of the past five years to provide more farming land, and the annual cost in grants; and whether they will now amend the grants system so that all such drainage schemes would need approval in advance whether grant-aided or not.
§ The Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Lord Belstead)I regret that we do not have the information sought about the hectarage of land drained, but in general the field drainage on which grant is paid is of land already in agricultural use. The amount of grant paid for this purpose in the past five years is given in the table below.
We have no plans to reintroduce prior approval under the grant schemes and no power to require the approval of proposals to carry out field drainage on which no grant is to be claimed.
Field drainage grants paid in the United Kingdom— £million 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 28.2 42.6 44.0 57.2 57.1