European Union (Amendment) Bill

My Lords, I was not casting aspersions on the process. I am speaking to the amendment put down by the noble Lord, Lord Taylor. It is perfectly right that I should do so. I want to raise one further matter before I close in order to inform the House and perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Sewel, who is chairman of the sub-committee on agriculture. I hope that he has seized on the recent proposal from the Commission for new pesticide regulation, which is supported by the Parliament and currently in progress in Brussels. The Pesticides Safety Directorate, which regulates the use of pesticides, herbicides and fungicides in this country, has reported that the proposal is extremely damaging for agriculture, not just in this country, but throughout the European Union. The directorate says: "““If the full potential impact of the current Parliament proposals were realised, conventional commercial agriculture in the UK and much of the EC, as it is currently practised, would not be achievable, with major impacts on crop yield and food quality””." This is a serious matter. The proposal could damage UK and European agriculture. It is losing touch with reality to consider this type of proposal at a time when the EU itself recognises that there is a world food shortage and may be reconsidering its biofuel targets. These crazed proposals are coming out of the Commission and Parliament and, if they are approved by qualified majority voting, we will not be able to do anything about it. We will be hamstringing agriculture in this country, our capacity to feed ourselves, and the capacity for Europe to feed itself and other countries. I will return to pesticide regulation later. I hope that the Minister will say something about it tonight, because it demonstrates how impotent we are in the face of proposals from Brussels. I finish with two questions. The first is simple. Does the Minister agree that British agriculture, British taxpayers and British consumers would be better off if we were out of the common agricultural policy? That is a question he can say ““yes”” to very quietly and no one need notice it. Secondly, when are we going to do something about it?