Dairy Farming

I shall be as brief as I can, Dr. McCrea, partly because so many hon. Members want to speak, and also because I must leave slightly before the end of the debate, as I have an important meeting about flooding to attend. I congratulate the hon. Member for Preseli Pembrokeshire (Mr. Crabb). I do not agree entirely with all that he said—I shall explain why—but it is right to discuss dairy farming. I have taken an interest in dairy farming and the dairy industry for a long time, not least because the Severnside processing plant chimney is at the bottom of my garden; I cannot but be influenced by that important industry. I want to make four quick points. First, I make a plea to my hon. Friend the Minister about what is happening in Gloucestershire at the moment, which is the epitome of some of the industry's problems. The county farm estate is actively debating the conflation of its dairy holdings from well over 20 to 11. In a previous life, I chaired the county farm estate's smallholdings group on the county council, and I have always been a great upholder of the belief that dairy farming is an important sector, as it allows people to start in agriculture who could not do so in any other way. It would be a tragedy to use the current problems as an opportunity to increase the size of holdings, as younger people would never be able to get into dairy farming. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will look, as a matter of urgency, at what is happening in Gloucestershire. I have had two debates on the subject, and I have always upheld the importance of the county estate nationally, but this is another side of the debate. I totally oppose selling off what I think of as the county's family silver, but I also worry that we might shut out dairy farming in what, after all, are the country's milk fields. That needs to be considered. I hope that the Government have a view on the matter. They may say that it is up to local government, but we need the Government to take a strategic view. My second point is about something that was mentioned by the hon. Member for Preseli Pembrokeshire—the common agricultural policy and how its reform might affect dairy farming. I have been a complete long-term critic of the CAP. I think that it has done more damage to the dairy industry than to any other sector of industry. Milk quotas should have been removed a long time ago. They are a huge disincentive in this country, and there is no excuse for them. The problem with CAP is that a one-size-fits-all strategy does not work. We should be expanding our dairy industry rather than having to go cap in hand to Europe—forgive the pun—to try to maintain the current situation. The latter is not acceptable. It is about time that we were allowed to pull out of the CAP, if nothing else, because we need to rebuild our dairy industry. My third point is about bovine TB—something on which we will disagree. The debate is so sterile. Yes, I have read the independent science group report, but to me the science is clear. Culling does not work. It is counter-productive. So I turn to what we are doing in my area and the vaccination strategy. The Select Committee on Environment, Food and Rural Affairs debated the matter long and hard. I congratulate the Government, but I wish they would move more quickly. In every other area of animal disease, we are trying to find a vaccination strategy, yet with bovine TB, we go back to the old argument that if we cull one species that carries bovine TB, even though many others carry it, it will be a magic bullet. There is no magic bullet. It is a dreadful disease. I met someone from the farmers' stress network yesterday, and I know what damage it does to people's lives. It is a really awful disease, and we must get hold of it.