Single Payment Scheme

: This has been a good, serious and constructive debate, and I will endeavour to cover as many of the points and questions raised by right hon. and hon. Members as possible. If I fail to address them all, I promise that I will get my noble Friend Lord Bach to write to hon. Members on any outstanding questions. I apologise that the Minister who speaks on these issues in the Commons, the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset (Jim Knight) is unable to respond to the debate, because he has commitments in the main Chamber on the Natural Environment and Rural Communities Bill. As the Secretary of State made clear in her response to Monday's urgent question, she deeply regrets the circumstances in which we find ourselves and profoundly understands the distress that many farmers feel. I am sure that she would extend—