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Rural Communities (Recession)

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. I look at my own constituency as a microcosm. Rising prices eject people from the Lake district and dales parts of my constituency, so they move to Kendal, then that becomes unaffordable, so they move to Milnthorpe and Flookburgh, and then they become unaffordable, so they move even further away. The impact on housing and other parts of the economy is palpable and seriously damaging. Let us have a renewal in agriculture, too. With farm incomes under threat like never before, and with the challenge of climate change facing every one of us, we must ensure that the new deal for the countryside has an unmistakably green tinge. We could extend carbon trading to enable large corporations to offset their carbon emissions by paying our farmers for work further to extend carbon sequestration in the countryside. In the uplands, especially, that could mean that our hill farmers finally get the rewards they deserve for their role as the stewards of our environment and our landscapes. Let us be ambitious about fusing the environmental imperative with the fightback against recession. For example, there should be a far-reaching scheme to ensure that farmers can choose to host anaerobic digesters with Government start-up funding to enable whole communities to recycle organic waste and to create renewable energy.