Single Payment Scheme

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Vale of York (Miss McIntosh) on securing this debate. I rise not only as someone who has a fairly large farming community in their constituency but as a former member of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee and a Front-Bench spokesman on farming. I shall start with some broad issues and then quickly come down to some specifics. First, there is the question about the competence of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. The second question is about the impact on the farming community. It was unfortunate that the hon. Member for Glasgow, South-West (Mr. Davidson) made comments about farmers having their snouts in the trough in the debate on the urgent question. The third question is for all of us who are taxpayers, as we are talking about public money.