§ Mr. GrocottTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, pursuant to her answer of 9 December,Official Report, column 369, if she will set out each reason why she cannot estimate the precise cost to United Kingdom consumers of the CAP; and what is the best approximate figure available to her for the cost (a) to the Exchequer and (b) to an average family in terms of food prices.
§ Mr. JackEstimates of the cost of the CAP to United Kingdom consumers, and of the savings that could be secured if current policies were ended, are possible only be making many assumptions. Important judgments are necessary about the current levels of world prices—no simple matter given the wide variations in quotations and substantial fluctuations from year to year—and the changes in these prices if present policies were abandoned. The latter depend on how producers and consumers throughout the world might respond to the new circumstances and on the impact on such factors as exchange rates.
Estimates made by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development—OECD—using a particular set of assumptions, imply that the transfers from European Community consumers in 1992 resulting from agricultural policies in European Community as a whole were equivalent to £11 per week for a family of four. This is one estimate of the extent to which the CAP raises the cost of food and agricultural products compared to existing world prices. The estimate takes no account of the effect that removal of farm support would have on world prices, and other variables, and thus gives no indication of the extent to which European consumers might be better off if current policies were removed. OECD does not publish a separate estimate for the United Kingdom.
The Exchequer cost of CAP expenditure in the United Kingdom in the current financial year is estimated at £2,727 million. In addition, the United Kingdom also contributes to the cost of the CAP in other member states. However, the United Kingdom contributes to the EC budget as a whole, and this is reduced by the Fontainebleau abatement which cannot be attributed to particular sectors of the EC budget.