Farming leaders welcome Government's 'reset' of relationship with agriculture

Farmers’ leaders have welcomed Andy Burham’s move to reset the Government’s relationship with the agricultural sector, heralding a pledge to cut on-farm reservoir planning delays as a step in the right direction.

Reacting to Andy Burham’s pledge, Yorkshire farmers were, however, keen to emphasise their belief in Labour remained fragile at best following uncertainty over policy and the controversial additional inheritance tax on farmers’ business assets.

Chairman of the British Carrot Growers Association Rodger Hobson, whose family has farmed land at Crockey Hill, near York, since 1847, said: “It’s great to having a Prime Minister who is pro-farming, because it was clear the last one wasn’t.”

While Sir Keir Starmer’s government raised the tax-free threshold to £2.5m in a U-turn just before Christmas, the NFU was quick to highlight that many farm enterprises were on the brink, having again been impacted by extreme weather.

During a visit to a family-run potato farm near Truro, Cornwall, on Saturday that has been affected by the drought, Mr Burnham admitted the Government had a “long way to go to build back trust” with farmers, and that the UK needs to “guarantee our own food production going forward”.

Unveiling a £65m funding package for farmers, amid fears hot, dry weather could drive up food prices on supermarket shelves, Mr Burham said recent weather had represented “probably the hardest summer for British farming in a generation”.

Food producers have been facing a multitude of challenges in recent weeks as large areas of the country experience a series of heatwaves, little rainfall and drought.

Many have been forced to harvest crops early, while others are seeing lower yields and lower quality produce, following the driest July on record.

The Prime Minister added: “I see food and farming as part of national resilience, national infrastructure.

“We need to be able to guarantee our own food production going forward.”

At present it has been estimated the UK produces just 55 per cent of the food it consumes, making it reliant on imports.

Mr Burnham said the £65m funding package was “new money coming from Defra budgets”.

He said the measures announced were “hopefully a sign of intent and an indication to the industry that we want a new conversation”.

Of the £65m, the Sustainable Farming Incentive, which sees farmers receive payments to support nature, will receive an extra £50m for this year’s pot.

Farmers will also get £15m in support for building on-farm reservoirs to provide supplies during future dry summers.

The package will aim to support farmers who need to get water to crops, keep livestock fed where grass has failed and are struggling to continue environmental work without losing money.

As part of the package, farmers will see more flexibility in environmental schemes, such as the Sustainable Farming Incentive.

This means those who are paid to look after wildlife habitat on parts of their land, and are normally barred from grazing or cutting it until later in the year, will now be allowed to do so where grass is scarce without losing payments.

Mr Burnham said: “With the parched nature of the fields, it’s really important that they can use all of the available land to graze cattle and livestock and sheep.”

East Yorkshire dairy farmer and NFU deputy president Paul Tompkins said the signal of intent had come as it had become clear weather patterns were changing.

Mr Tompkins said: “This announcement rightly recognises that it will take a combination of approaches: improved planning to remove unnecessary barriers and make it easier to build farm infrastructure, simplified abstraction arrangements so farmers can access water more easily and financial support to help invest in farm reservoirs and equipment to build long-term food resilience.”

Mr Tompkins said better infrastructure was needed to capture and store water at times of plenty for use in times of shortage.

He welcomed Saturday’s announcement of more funding for farmers, and said it “rightly recognises that it will take a combination of approaches: improved planning to remove unnecessary barriers and make it easier to build farm infrastructure, simplified abstraction arrangements so farmers can access water more easily and financial support to help invest in farm reservoirs and equipment to build long-term food resilience.”

Mr Hobson added: “It’s marvellous that the Government has recognised the need for reservoirs and getting the planning process speeded up.

“The climate has changed so quickly we can’t react to it. We’re going to have to massively reduce the amount of carrots we grow because the water is just now there.”

Mr Hobson said resolving delays over abstraction licences was crucial as getting permits from Environment Agency “is more long-winded than planning”.

He added: “The Government was making a big noise about £15m for farm reservoirs. A decent farm reservoir costs over £1m, so we’re not even going to get one reservoir per county.”

Gavin Lane, president of the Country Land and Business Association, said the Government’s reallocation of money from the farming budget to help farmers combat drought was “a welcome and pragmatic move, but little more than a temporary fix”.

He said: “The announcement that government will make it easier to build on-farm reservoirs is a positive step, but the £15m made available will fund a fraction of the reservoirs we need. This needs to become a sustained programme.”