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Agricultural Policy

It is good to serve again under your stewardship, Mr Caton, for the second time in two weeks on agricultural matters—it is becoming a habit. May I first find the point of agreement with the hon. Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire? It is a great pleasure to follow on from his remarks, because I certainly agree with what he said about tenant farmers, and I do not need to repeat it. It is good that an adjudicator is to be appointed, but the hon. Gentleman will be as aware as I am of the concerns that the adjudicator will end up without sufficient teeth—that the teeth will be pulled—because of the fear of being over-regulatory. That would be a crying shame, because there was cross-party support for the appointment of a regulator—an adjudicator or ombudsman—who could go out and deal with the real issues identified by that office, as well as those raised by anonymous tips from the industry and so on. Many farmers have been calling out for an adjudicator because they know that there is a problem. They are worried about the relationship with the big suppliers and the supply chains. That relationship is not always a direct one with supermarkets; sometimes it is conducted through intermediaries, who themselves are all-powerful, because they control the complete sourcing of a particular product within a region. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that it is good that an adjudicator is to be appointed given that we introduced the code, with cross-party support, while in Government. We just want the code to have real teeth, although we do not want it to be over-burdensome on supermarkets or anybody else. However, if the adjudicator has clear evidence that something is going wrong—independent evidence that no one else has provided to them—they should be able to do something about it. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that that appointment is good news. The hon. Gentleman mentioned new farmers, and Government and Opposition Front-Benchers welcome the new CAP reform proposals to encourage new farmers. There is plenty to disagree with, and plenty to criticise in terms of lack of ambition, but the proposals to encourage new farmers are welcome and can probably be built on in the further stages of negotiation.