§ Mr. BoswellTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make a statement on the future of the annual review of the Agriculture White Paper.
§ Mr. MacGregorMy right hon. Friends the Secretaries of State for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and I have decided to extend and improve the information which has up to now been published in the White Paper on the annual review of agriculture. The new publication will be designed to give data on the state of the agricultural industry in the United Kingdom. It will contain enhanced information on commodities and on the general financial situation of the industry. The new document will be published annually and copies will be made available in the Library of the House.
It will, however, no longer be published as a White Paper. The origin of that practice is that, before our accession to the European Community, the annual review led to the determination of commodity price guarantees for the coming year, which we published as part of the White Paper. Since our accession, the emphasis has shifted towards the annual negotiation of agricultural prices in the European Community, and the annual review White Paper has effectively become a compendium of agricultural statistics. It is therefore appropriate to discontinue publication in the form of a White Paper.